Millions of workers throughout the world struggle to survive but it is not all doom and gloom in capitalism - some people are doing exceptional well. 'The population of dollar billionaires across the globe has increased by a net 155 to 2,325 in the past 12 months, according to the latest census....' (Times, 18 September) The Singapore-based Wealth-X, a consultancy that tracks the number of the extremely rich has come up with the following figures for billionaires. US 571, China 190, UK 130, Germany 123 and Russia 114. RD
The Glasgow & Edinburgh Branches Blog. Towards a better understanding of the world, in order to change it.
Given that capitalism has gone through some kind of economic unpleasantness recently, how is it the number of capitalist billionaires is increasing? It sound counter intuitive. Surely a crisis would have undermined some capitalists. If the capitalist class does well even in a recession does the concept 'capitalism in crisis' even mean anything anymore? Of course, things are difficult for the workers, but then they always are, more or less.
ReplyDeleteCertainly a section of the capitalist class suffered from the recession but another section quickly recovered to take advantage of the misfortunes of those less lucky capitalists. A bankruptcy creates a bargain acquisition for another corporation.
ReplyDeleteI should also add that the disappearance of one business increases the market share for the survivors.
ReplyDeleteI would rather have the cpaitalist's kind of suffering than the worker's.often the same guy who .disappears one business downsizes realises on the assets,goes on and profits, from the misfortune of others.
ReplyDeleteHere is an interesting piece from May 1979 Standard ,
ReplyDeletehttp://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/1970s/1979/no-897-may-1979