[lbo-talk] The Dysfunctionality of Slavery and Neoliberalism

michael perelman michael.perelman3 at gmail.com
Mon May 18 17:14:04 PDT 2015


We are all patriotic. Let's start with the Star Spangled Banner.

You all are familiar with some of it, but perhaps some of you may not know this particular stanza: Don't worry, I won't sing it:

"No refuge could save the hireling and slave from the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave." Keep in mind that the militias referred to in the Second Amendment seem to have been the groups that hunt down escaped slaves.

The elevation of slave owners' property rights easily morphed into the expansive property rights of those who hired wage labor. This power allowed capitalists to call upon the state rather than militias of slave captors to keep workers' rights and wages in check.

This arrangement supposedly served the public interest because low wages mean high profits, which, in turn meant increased investment, which translates into shared prosperity, presumably even including otherwise downtrodden labor -- a bourgeois version of the unity of opposites.

https://michaelperelman.wordpress.com/2015/05/18/the-dysfunctionality-of-slavery-and-neoliberalism/

-- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929

530 898 5321 fax 530 898 5901 http://michaelperelman.wordpress.com



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