The article is good info to have if you follow such things but that's only partly my reason for posting. I came across this article on HN, and was happy to see the top comment starting with: I've...
The article is good info to have if you follow such things but that's only partly my reason for posting.
I came across this article on HN, and was happy to see the top comment starting with:
Of course it is. Why? Because both parties operate at the behest of the capital-owning class.
I've posted a couple of times here at Tildes about how important I think it is for capital and government to get main billing in the national conversation.
There are a lot of big things in the world to fix. Climate change being probably the biggest. Conversations about those things are important and valuable. We don't have time to wait.
But the reason it's so hard to fix all the big problems, particularly in the US, is that capital owns the government. Large corporations and the wealthy heavily influence or completely control most our the systems. That's what we have to fix first. If it's even possible at this late stage.
Step one is for the majority of people to take it for granted that it's true. Remember Occupy Wall Street? At the time I imagined that the conversation surrounding it would change cultural awareness in a big way. I think it probably did, but even now, all these years later, it's still not at the forefront of enough conversations, articles and talks. There are still lots of people who believe the fantasy about America we've been selling to our kids for decades. Politicians as kindly uncles, eager to help us all realize the American dream. A core of altruism in government, marred only by the occasional bad apple.
Which is remarkable considering that history teaches us extreme wealth consolidation has been subverting human wellbeing since the dawn of sedentary civilization. The only difference now is that there's more power to consolidate then ever before.
Evidence alone doesn't seem to be enough to displace a popular myth. Especially when the aforemention capital owns all the media outlets and has a strong interest in steering the conversation elsewhere.
We have to be repetitive, and a little loud, to move the needle.
Anyway I was excited to see it at the top of at least one conversation!
I suspect that "both parties operate at the behest of the capital-owning class" might itself be a common myth. It's something many people say out of frustration, but how would they know one way or...
I suspect that "both parties operate at the behest of the capital-owning class" might itself be a common myth. It's something many people say out of frustration, but how would they know one way or the other?
It's no mystery, the system is there on display for anyone who wants to look. We have generations of reporting to draw from, books and articles from people who've worked within the system....
It's no mystery, the system is there on display for anyone who wants to look. We have generations of reporting to draw from, books and articles from people who've worked within the system. Regulatory capture certainly isn't a myth. Likewise the revolving door between industry and goverment. We have financial interest funded lobbying organizations and think tanks. We have all the scandals and gates. And so on.
But really even if we didn't, when you have wealthy industries and government regulation alongside each other, there's only ever been one way for it to end up, given time, at least so far in human history.
I'm curious what your reasons are for thinking it's a myth?
Yes, from reading the news I believe that regulatory capture happens. Experts moving between government and industry happens. Lobbying happens. But that's not directly relevant to what goes on in...
Yes, from reading the news I believe that regulatory capture happens. Experts moving between government and industry happens. Lobbying happens. But that's not directly relevant to what goes on in political parties. Political parties and regulatory agencies are different.
You're pointing everything bad that happens (and there's a lot of it) and claiming it as evidence. That's not really how to build a case.
(Also, "operate at the behest of" is kind of vague; it's not really saying anything specific about what political parties do.)
I believe that most people (including me) aren't experts in how political parties operate, and saying that "it's obvious" doesn't turn us into experts. We should avoid "instant expert" syndrome.
You avoided giving any reasons why the outsized influence of capital on government is a myth. It's interesting that you imply we can't know because we're not experts. This topic doesn't seem...
You avoided giving any reasons why the outsized influence of capital on government is a myth.
It's interesting that you imply we can't know because we're not experts. This topic doesn't seem opaque to me at all. Rather there's so much undisputed evidence that it's difficult to choose which angle to approach it from.
The concept of money in politics being an escalating problem isn't new or novel. It seems to me that the burden of proof would be on someone claiming it was a myth.
"There is an outsized influence of capital on government" is different from from a claim about parties, which is itself different from the more general claim that "money in politics is an...
"There is an outsized influence of capital on government" is different from from a claim about parties, which is itself different from the more general claim that "money in politics is an escalating problem."
I don't know which of those claims is really true, it would take a lot of work to establish, and I'm not going to do the work. I think we probably shouldn't continue this discussion; you assume a lot of things that I don't take for granted.
I will put forth a simple example: The Affordable Care Act. A simple bill, most of which cribbed from Republican policy, only sponsored by Democrats, had to remove the provisions in it which gave...
I will put forth a simple example: The Affordable Care Act.
A simple bill, most of which cribbed from Republican policy, only sponsored by Democrats, had to remove the provisions in it which gave options to opt-out of the private insurance industry (aka capital). So many concessions were made to weaken the bill to try to get support from Republicans that didn't vote for it anyway. Perhaps, they could have just crammed through the strongest-possible anti-capital bill they could. But they didn't, and they won't...because they serve capital.
Even if 98% of Democrats would have supported keeping those provisions, if every single time an issue comes to a vote, if it won't pass without stripping the public provisions as a concession to capital, it's a distinction without a difference.
Joe Manchain is the Democratic party. Even if not specifically Joe, every single time Democrats have been in power, there's a scapegoat in the party for why they can't oppose capital.
Another simple example: The vitrol against socialism and communism that lead to the Red Scare (and the subsequent instilling of many dictators) was almost entirely due to the demands of capital, who saw it as worldending for them (rightly so IMO).
The risk wasn't in the dictatorships or oppressive governments that had taken hold so far. It was the risk of a democratic society adopting the same measures in an equitable fashion and disposing of the need of the ownership class.
It's kind of reductive to reduce any opposition to extending the welfare state to "capital." It just starts to look like "stuff I like" = not capital and "stuff I don't like" = capital. But when a...
It's kind of reductive to reduce any opposition to extending the welfare state to "capital." It just starts to look like "stuff I like" = not capital and "stuff I don't like" = capital. But when a climate bill involves bajillions of dollars in subsidizes to green energy companies and construction companies, but this is opposed by the fossil fuel industry then which side of this argument is the side of "capital" exactly?
Or if a Pharma bill fails because of a vote from a legislator whose district had a hundred thousand jobs in that industry, is that person serving "capital" or are they serving the actual people who vote for them?
The fact is it's a large democratic system with a lot of voting blocs and a lot of veto points. Rich people can put a lot of pressure on people using those veto points. But so can every political pressure group. They just need the resources to do it.
It's definitely true that it's more nuanced than capital vs not-capital, but that doesn't mean that the ownership class doesn't have outsized influence, compared to the rest of the population,...
It's definitely true that it's more nuanced than capital vs not-capital, but that doesn't mean that the ownership class doesn't have outsized influence, compared to the rest of the population, which is essentially what "both parties operate at the behest of the capital-owning class" means.
I believe it's "operate at the behest of" which is the point of contention here. There are multiple sources of pressure on the political system of which money is the most powerful. But that...
I believe it's "operate at the behest of" which is the point of contention here. There are multiple sources of pressure on the political system of which money is the most powerful. But that doesn't mean the system is only responsive to the "capital-owning class." Not least of which because there isn't a single "capital-owning class." The green energy startup and the fossil fuel baron, for example, have dramatically different objectives. As does the dude who only cares about the size of his 401k because he's counting down the days until he retires.
Basically, it's a level of simplification that stops at giving you a satisfying explanation for things but doesn't actually tell you anything about the "so what do you want to do about it?" question. That, to me, is the purpose of explanations so I don't find it very useful for anything other than giving you the ability to have a take without really saying anything.
That's a reasonable summary of the difficulties that the Obama administration has passing the bill, except that it has "because it doesn't serve capital" tacked on. A more conventional explanation...
That's a reasonable summary of the difficulties that the Obama administration has passing the bill, except that it has "because it doesn't serve capital" tacked on. A more conventional explanation is that the reason that the Republicans opposed it is that they were determined to oppose everything that the Democrats did, for reasons of partisan politics.
Opposition from the insurance industry did play a role because in a close vote, any senator can bargain for concessions, and the Democrats had barely enough votes. That doesn't mean that the insurance industry was in control, though.
Showing that sometimes businesses have influence doesn't justify overblown claims that businesses are in control of everything. It shows that they participate in politics, as do many other players. None of those players can be sure that they will get what they want, because political negotiations are somewhat unpredictable.
Similarly, bringing up the red scare and then saying it was due to "the demands of capital" asserts a relationship without proving anything. Anti-communism was a widespread consensus in the US at the time due to the experience of seeing so many countries fall to communist dictatorships, including eastern Europe, China, and Cuba. Not to mention the threat of nuclear war, which was then fairly new. This seems like sufficient explanation of why accusing someone of being a communist was so potent?
Yes, many business groups were anti-communist but they were part of a broader society that was anti-communist. Why point to one group in a larger movement?
Really I just think that, if you are "highly online", the degree to which Americans are disasstified with their technological overlords is probably significant overstated than the actual national...
Really I just think that, if you are "highly online", the degree to which Americans are disasstified with their technological overlords is probably significant overstated than the actual national average.
The surveys the Verge does is always an enlightening read
Amazon has a 87% favorability rate. Apple, 79%. Google, 90%. Microsoft: 86%. It only gets bad when you get to Facebook, with a 66% favorability rate. Twitter, if it counts as "big tech" (it's not), is the lowest at 58%.
Still, considering the favorability rating for Congress itself is a blistering 18%, it is only poor when graded on a curve.
70% of Americans believe Amazon has a positive benefit on society. Who woulda thunk.
74% of Americans trust Amazon with their personal information; 69% trust Google.
A more recent poll from Pew
Overall, 44% of Americans think major technology companies should be regulated more than they are now, down from 56% in April 2021. Conversely, the share of Americans who say they want less government regulation of major technology companies has roughly doubled, from about one-in-ten (9%) in previous years to one-in-five today.
I'm not going to saw that lobbyist aren't a factor, but to be honest, I think the amount of big tech scrutiny in Congress is likely proportionally HIGHER than the population's as a whole (especially Twitter - D.C and Congress are just absolutely disporpotionally filled with Twitter addicts, when it's like the 6-7th most used social media site), rather than the other way around.
If we had a popular vote on tech regulations, and magically there was proportionate turnout, given the statistics it's hard to argue the vote would pass.
You're absolutely right that average consumers are less concerned about the big five than people in the tech world. But also, can't ignore that the rest of the western world is regulating and...
You're absolutely right that average consumers are less concerned about the big five than people in the tech world.
But also, can't ignore that the rest of the western world is regulating and fining them with great vigor (EU, UK, CAN, etc..). Whereas in the US things have been unusually easy for market leaders (of all sorts, not just tech) in recent years.
I think anti-trust regulation is important even if public awareness of the issues is lacking.
During the last few years big tech has been pushing hard against this kind of legislation. Not just with lobbying, but with consumer advertising and B2B messaging as well.
That means that we're at least 3 steps out from regulation in the US, then. I think the idea that we'd have tech regulations if not for lobbyist is misguided, mainly. First, you need to actively...
That means that we're at least 3 steps out from regulation in the US, then. I think the idea that we'd have tech regulations if not for lobbyist is misguided, mainly.
First, you need to actively convince the populace that it's something we need to do. Once that broad consensus is there, then you can pressure on representatives to write a bill about it. Finally you can deal with whipping votes and lobbyist.
We're not even at the first step, or anywhere close to it. That's the focus if you want that kind of policy - worry about lobbyist bending the will of the people when it's actually the will of the people first.
I agree that public opinion is important. However, to pick an example: The antitrust move against the OG big tech, Microsoft, when they forced them to change their bundling practices with IE, did...
I agree that public opinion is important.
However, to pick an example: The antitrust move against the OG big tech, Microsoft, when they forced them to change their bundling practices with IE, did not really have any public awareness behind it. Ditto for a lot of other antitrust regulation over the years.
I mean, when the general populous is not aware of the problematic nature of the tech companies, it's easy to generate that support via marketing and cheap toys. If the largest proportion of...
I mean, when the general populous is not aware of the problematic nature of the tech companies, it's easy to generate that support via marketing and cheap toys.
If the largest proportion of opposition to the tech giants are the people most involved in tech, then that is the population you should be listening to. And if that is the case...congress is actually doing their job pretty well, which is refreshing to think about.
The article is good info to have if you follow such things but that's only partly my reason for posting.
I came across this article on HN, and was happy to see the top comment starting with:
I've posted a couple of times here at Tildes about how important I think it is for capital and government to get main billing in the national conversation.
There are a lot of big things in the world to fix. Climate change being probably the biggest. Conversations about those things are important and valuable. We don't have time to wait.
But the reason it's so hard to fix all the big problems, particularly in the US, is that capital owns the government. Large corporations and the wealthy heavily influence or completely control most our the systems. That's what we have to fix first. If it's even possible at this late stage.
Step one is for the majority of people to take it for granted that it's true. Remember Occupy Wall Street? At the time I imagined that the conversation surrounding it would change cultural awareness in a big way. I think it probably did, but even now, all these years later, it's still not at the forefront of enough conversations, articles and talks. There are still lots of people who believe the fantasy about America we've been selling to our kids for decades. Politicians as kindly uncles, eager to help us all realize the American dream. A core of altruism in government, marred only by the occasional bad apple.
Which is remarkable considering that history teaches us extreme wealth consolidation has been subverting human wellbeing since the dawn of sedentary civilization. The only difference now is that there's more power to consolidate then ever before.
Evidence alone doesn't seem to be enough to displace a popular myth. Especially when the aforemention capital owns all the media outlets and has a strong interest in steering the conversation elsewhere.
We have to be repetitive, and a little loud, to move the needle.
Anyway I was excited to see it at the top of at least one conversation!
I suspect that "both parties operate at the behest of the capital-owning class" might itself be a common myth. It's something many people say out of frustration, but how would they know one way or the other?
It's no mystery, the system is there on display for anyone who wants to look. We have generations of reporting to draw from, books and articles from people who've worked within the system. Regulatory capture certainly isn't a myth. Likewise the revolving door between industry and goverment. We have financial interest funded lobbying organizations and think tanks. We have all the scandals and gates. And so on.
But really even if we didn't, when you have wealthy industries and government regulation alongside each other, there's only ever been one way for it to end up, given time, at least so far in human history.
I'm curious what your reasons are for thinking it's a myth?
Yes, from reading the news I believe that regulatory capture happens. Experts moving between government and industry happens. Lobbying happens. But that's not directly relevant to what goes on in political parties. Political parties and regulatory agencies are different.
You're pointing everything bad that happens (and there's a lot of it) and claiming it as evidence. That's not really how to build a case.
(Also, "operate at the behest of" is kind of vague; it's not really saying anything specific about what political parties do.)
I believe that most people (including me) aren't experts in how political parties operate, and saying that "it's obvious" doesn't turn us into experts. We should avoid "instant expert" syndrome.
You avoided giving any reasons why the outsized influence of capital on government is a myth.
It's interesting that you imply we can't know because we're not experts. This topic doesn't seem opaque to me at all. Rather there's so much undisputed evidence that it's difficult to choose which angle to approach it from.
The concept of money in politics being an escalating problem isn't new or novel. It seems to me that the burden of proof would be on someone claiming it was a myth.
"There is an outsized influence of capital on government" is different from from a claim about parties, which is itself different from the more general claim that "money in politics is an escalating problem."
I don't know which of those claims is really true, it would take a lot of work to establish, and I'm not going to do the work. I think we probably shouldn't continue this discussion; you assume a lot of things that I don't take for granted.
Good choice, but just to clarify, it was never about parties, the original comment I quoted said "both parties" as a way of saying "the whole thing".
I will put forth a simple example: The Affordable Care Act.
A simple bill, most of which cribbed from Republican policy, only sponsored by Democrats, had to remove the provisions in it which gave options to opt-out of the private insurance industry (aka capital). So many concessions were made to weaken the bill to try to get support from Republicans that didn't vote for it anyway. Perhaps, they could have just crammed through the strongest-possible anti-capital bill they could. But they didn't, and they won't...because they serve capital.
Even if 98% of Democrats would have supported keeping those provisions, if every single time an issue comes to a vote, if it won't pass without stripping the public provisions as a concession to capital, it's a distinction without a difference.
Joe Manchain is the Democratic party. Even if not specifically Joe, every single time Democrats have been in power, there's a scapegoat in the party for why they can't oppose capital.
Another simple example: The vitrol against socialism and communism that lead to the Red Scare (and the subsequent instilling of many dictators) was almost entirely due to the demands of capital, who saw it as worldending for them (rightly so IMO).
The risk wasn't in the dictatorships or oppressive governments that had taken hold so far. It was the risk of a democratic society adopting the same measures in an equitable fashion and disposing of the need of the ownership class.
It's kind of reductive to reduce any opposition to extending the welfare state to "capital." It just starts to look like "stuff I like" = not capital and "stuff I don't like" = capital. But when a climate bill involves bajillions of dollars in subsidizes to green energy companies and construction companies, but this is opposed by the fossil fuel industry then which side of this argument is the side of "capital" exactly?
Or if a Pharma bill fails because of a vote from a legislator whose district had a hundred thousand jobs in that industry, is that person serving "capital" or are they serving the actual people who vote for them?
The fact is it's a large democratic system with a lot of voting blocs and a lot of veto points. Rich people can put a lot of pressure on people using those veto points. But so can every political pressure group. They just need the resources to do it.
It's definitely true that it's more nuanced than capital vs not-capital, but that doesn't mean that the ownership class doesn't have outsized influence, compared to the rest of the population, which is essentially what "both parties operate at the behest of the capital-owning class" means.
I believe it's "operate at the behest of" which is the point of contention here. There are multiple sources of pressure on the political system of which money is the most powerful. But that doesn't mean the system is only responsive to the "capital-owning class." Not least of which because there isn't a single "capital-owning class." The green energy startup and the fossil fuel baron, for example, have dramatically different objectives. As does the dude who only cares about the size of his 401k because he's counting down the days until he retires.
Basically, it's a level of simplification that stops at giving you a satisfying explanation for things but doesn't actually tell you anything about the "so what do you want to do about it?" question. That, to me, is the purpose of explanations so I don't find it very useful for anything other than giving you the ability to have a take without really saying anything.
That's a reasonable summary of the difficulties that the Obama administration has passing the bill, except that it has "because it doesn't serve capital" tacked on. A more conventional explanation is that the reason that the Republicans opposed it is that they were determined to oppose everything that the Democrats did, for reasons of partisan politics.
Opposition from the insurance industry did play a role because in a close vote, any senator can bargain for concessions, and the Democrats had barely enough votes. That doesn't mean that the insurance industry was in control, though.
Showing that sometimes businesses have influence doesn't justify overblown claims that businesses are in control of everything. It shows that they participate in politics, as do many other players. None of those players can be sure that they will get what they want, because political negotiations are somewhat unpredictable.
Similarly, bringing up the red scare and then saying it was due to "the demands of capital" asserts a relationship without proving anything. Anti-communism was a widespread consensus in the US at the time due to the experience of seeing so many countries fall to communist dictatorships, including eastern Europe, China, and Cuba. Not to mention the threat of nuclear war, which was then fairly new. This seems like sufficient explanation of why accusing someone of being a communist was so potent?
Yes, many business groups were anti-communist but they were part of a broader society that was anti-communist. Why point to one group in a larger movement?
Oh, it's easier to prove than you might suspect. Check this video for the short version.
Really I just think that, if you are "highly online", the degree to which Americans are disasstified with their technological overlords is probably significant overstated than the actual national average.
The surveys the Verge does is always an enlightening read
Amazon has a 87% favorability rate. Apple, 79%. Google, 90%. Microsoft: 86%. It only gets bad when you get to Facebook, with a 66% favorability rate. Twitter, if it counts as "big tech" (it's not), is the lowest at 58%.
Still, considering the favorability rating for Congress itself is a blistering 18%, it is only poor when graded on a curve.
70% of Americans believe Amazon has a positive benefit on society. Who woulda thunk.
74% of Americans trust Amazon with their personal information; 69% trust Google.
A more recent poll from Pew
https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2022/05/13/support-for-more-regulation-of-tech-companies-has-declined-in-u-s-especially-among-republicans/
I'm not going to saw that lobbyist aren't a factor, but to be honest, I think the amount of big tech scrutiny in Congress is likely proportionally HIGHER than the population's as a whole (especially Twitter - D.C and Congress are just absolutely disporpotionally filled with Twitter addicts, when it's like the 6-7th most used social media site), rather than the other way around.
If we had a popular vote on tech regulations, and magically there was proportionate turnout, given the statistics it's hard to argue the vote would pass.
You're absolutely right that average consumers are less concerned about the big five than people in the tech world.
But also, can't ignore that the rest of the western world is regulating and fining them with great vigor (EU, UK, CAN, etc..). Whereas in the US things have been unusually easy for market leaders (of all sorts, not just tech) in recent years.
I think anti-trust regulation is important even if public awareness of the issues is lacking.
During the last few years big tech has been pushing hard against this kind of legislation. Not just with lobbying, but with consumer advertising and B2B messaging as well.
That means that we're at least 3 steps out from regulation in the US, then. I think the idea that we'd have tech regulations if not for lobbyist is misguided, mainly.
First, you need to actively convince the populace that it's something we need to do. Once that broad consensus is there, then you can pressure on representatives to write a bill about it. Finally you can deal with whipping votes and lobbyist.
We're not even at the first step, or anywhere close to it. That's the focus if you want that kind of policy - worry about lobbyist bending the will of the people when it's actually the will of the people first.
I agree that public opinion is important.
However, to pick an example: The antitrust move against the OG big tech, Microsoft, when they forced them to change their bundling practices with IE, did not really have any public awareness behind it. Ditto for a lot of other antitrust regulation over the years.
I mean, when the general populous is not aware of the problematic nature of the tech companies, it's easy to generate that support via marketing and cheap toys.
If the largest proportion of opposition to the tech giants are the people most involved in tech, then that is the population you should be listening to. And if that is the case...congress is actually doing their job pretty well, which is refreshing to think about.