Capitalism: did we get the first tremblors of a quake?

Was Wednesday the first tremblors of a capitalism quake?.

When I first saw the headlines, I thought, “Ah, a disgruntled employee or customer lashing out at the top man.” I didn’t read the articles because I had other things to do

But when the news kept roiling, I then thought, “Okay, this is more serious. Let’s dive into those articles in my feed.” That’s when I received a shock: the idea that people would be cheering a CEO’s death was shocking and a little unnerving because I was wondering if we are closer to some kind of revolution.

A little over ten years ago, I thought we would encounter some kind of revolution of capitalism, but I thought that would be further in the future, like 2040 or 2050, not today in 2025. And, I figured that automation and artificial intelligence would be the determining factor because with those two technologies, people would be laid off in the name of efficiency (code for: in the name of shareholder value).

We’re not there yet but we are careening towards that future with the accelerated automation and AI embedding.

But now, that timeline may be accelerated through the potential inflation from tariffs and mass deportations, if the economists’ analyses are correct (and I don’t see why their analyses would be incorrect). In one of the analyses, the combination of tariffs and mass deportations, with deportations having a greater impact, would lead to a state of affairs where most Americans (or the average Americans, I don’t remember which) would not be able to afford the basics.

Yikes! That alone should cause worry about how people will react.

Talk of French Revolution? A disturbing sign for capitalism

And now, I see more and more references to the French Revolution:

• A friend mentioned the French Revolution but I forgot what it was in relation to. Just the fact she mentioned it had me concerned.
• A group that I very infrequently watch mentioned obliquely the French Revolution (“consider guillotine as an artform”). They aren’t actually going to do a revolution but I do believe they are preparing for possible resistance. Not pleasant to see that.
• The reaction to the United Healthcare CEO’s assassination was a disturbing jubilee with people declaring they had no empathy for him. Interspersed in the glee were a few nods to the French and their revolution.

Wednesday’s backstory to the internet reaction

The CEO was assassinated at 6 am in New York, right outside the hotel. He was in New York to do a presentation to the investors. As CEO of United Healthcare, he was part of the healthcare insurance industry which already had a bad image, along with the pharmaceutical industry and maybe even the medical industry.

But apparently, United Healthcare was especially bad because it had high premiums and the highest rate of denials. One in three claims (roughly 33%) were denied whereas the average was 16%. On top of that, the CEO was supposedly the one who instigated the installation of an AI that produced rejections of claim up to 90%. And, on top of that, he got paid $10 million for rejecting people in order to juice up the profits for the shareholders.

Consequently, upon announcement of his assassination on social media, the sentiment celebrating his death poured out along with stories about countless healthcare denials and deaths.

From that initial shock at that response from the public, the news media have been doing articles with analyses on whether that response was appropriate. As you can imagine, there were pros and cons to the debate on the response.

Cons to killing a CEO

Here are some arguments I heard or read as to why it is not a good idea to go around killing CEOs just because you are unhappy with the boss or service.

• It is morally wrong to kill people, even if they are bad.
• The problem of cruelty or inequality or whatever doesn’t get solved by killing people.
• And even if you do kill all of the CEOs, they will just be replaced. (Here’s the first inkling of the power in the shareholders’ hands.)

Pros (I hate to use such a word) to such action

Here’s the other side of the coin, which can be compelling.

• Legal system hasn’t worked, especially in the case of the healthcare insurance industry because such decisions already have the legal support. The capitalism already has embedded in the legal system the allowance for cruelty in business, especially the kinds in the insurance industry.
• The CEO had already killed thousands of customers through his/his industry’s method of denials. And he added in the AI system. The legal system has not charged him with those so-called murders.
• If the Americans can go out and kill Osama bin Laden, then killing “murderous” CEOs is “justified”.

My take?

I don’t know. I don’t like violence and generally they don’t solve problems; they tend to worsen problems. But I will admit that if the inequality and inequity continue with no legal way of rectifying the situation, I can see violence or a revolution becoming very attractive. Attractive to me? I don’t think so, but I can’t say never.

With the thought that inflation will be worse next year, that is going to make people even crazier. Add on top of that the strutting billionaires – Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy – who talk blithely about cutting social security, Medicare, Medicaid, Veterans aid, and a whole swath of the government designed to help the unfortunate, the mood of the public could boil over. And oh, let’s not forget artificial intelligence sweeping through the corporate halls, potentially ravaging employment.

The combination of oblivious and cruel billionaires cutting services, the sweep of the artificial intelligence through the workforce and the devastating impacts of climate change (if it still continues as it has in the 2020’s) is scary to think about. That combination is a dangerous combination. Any one alone would be horrifying but all three at once?

I don’t know if our society can hold.

Tipping point may actually be closer than 2040 / 2050. The next administration is just accelerating the injustice.

(Oh, did I mention that the next administration will be staffed with a lot of billionaires – if not mostly? Can we say corruption?)

Already, there is some impact

With the news of the assassination, there already has been some impact on CEO behaviors as they realize they potentially have a target on their back.

• CEOs have already placed calls to get some security unit to protect them. They recognize that the emotions are volatile right now.
• Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield was going to institute a time limit on using anesthesia during surgery but backed away after the assassination. Yep, smart move. You don’t want people waking up in the middle of surgery, encountering acute pain, in the service of cost cutting.

Unfortunately, these impacts might encourage further attempts.

This is scary for me, although I do understand why one would want to resort to violence.

Where does capitalism go from here?

Those 10+ years ago musing on the state of capitalism and how it is likely to progress with the advancement of artificial intelligence and automation made me think we were likely to progress through some really dark times before we find a way to inject equity in capitalism or progress to an entirely new type of society. We won’t be able to envision that new society because we have to go through a couple of iterations around the world to hit upon something that will be an improvement on today’s democracy+capitalism. Democracy is not the problem; our current capitalism is the problem.

How will capitalism progress? I don’t really know but here were some elements of thought that came to mind 10 years ago:

• Split of society into the ultra-wealthy and the abject poor with no middle class, much like India was before US technology companies started to deploy them as outsourced labor. The wealthy lives without much regard or feeling for the teeming mass of the impoverished workers (if there are any work) and families. There could be some form of caste system.
• With the split of the wealthy living separate lives from the poor and never the twain meet, battles will be between the wealthy. The poor will have no input or play. They are just not part of the drama. We already saw incipient beginnings with the battle between Jeff Bezos and MBS (Mohammed bin Salem). I was surprised and thought it was starting kind of early at the time. With these battles of the wealthy, the pool of the wealthy begins to shrink since the market is declining. There is no way to increase wealth if the market is declining with no increase in employment. The only way to increase wealth is through these battles that knock off some other wealthy person. Hmmm, kind of hunger games but in the inverse. Instead of the poor fighting, it’s the wealthy.
• WIth the split of the wealthy from the poor, corruption could rise to extreme levels as I personally think that quite a lot of the wealthy are socio/psychopaths.
• It could be that the wealthy live such separate lives that they become like the gods. The poor won’t have the money for the technology or anything like that; all of the money will be in the hands of the wealthy, and they will be unapproachable. They might appear to be some kind of gods (but not the benevolent ones that we think of today). In that case, the wealthy lead one set of lives – wealthy beyond imagine – and the poor develop their own set of societies that might eventually lead to some kind of different wealth. The question is how to retain the talented, smart and hardworking people within the “poor” society instead of being siphoned off by the lure of wealth from the wealthy? In order to progress the “poor” society, you need the talents, smarts and the tireless energy of regular people. You need the Einsteins, the Martin Luther, the Thomas Jeffersons, etc.
• Could have a variation of the feudalism except I would imagine it to be worse than that in the Middle Ages because no money would be forthcoming. Jobs would be taken over by AI.
• In the midst of this, climate change could play a role. Will the wealthy be able to escape or limit the impact of the climate change? The average person might not be able to afford the solutions to climate change. Does that mean the population of the average person decline through the devastation of climate change (burned by fires, drowning by flooding, crushed by tornado winds, imperiled by hurricanes)? If that is the case, we could end up with mainly the wealthy living on earth.
• In the face of climate change, the wealthy could try to escape to Mars. Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk and Richard Branson all have space flights in the works. A few years ago, there was talk about populating Mars, so maybe that is the outs for the wealthy. The wealthy is going to have to bring along some of the poor average people because they are the ones who will have the muscle and brain for survival in adverse environments. I don’t see the wealthy having that.
• A totally new society is born after the chaos of the poor revolting against the wealthy. By that time, society will have moved far away from the capitalism theory to something else that we cannot dream of today. It may be a combination of some aspects of capitalism plus socialism plus something else. I often wondered how society arranged themselves back before capitalism developed. You know, those cavemen traversing the land in search of food and cover without any money or trade. That was a form of arranging society without money.

Is it appropriate to talk about revolution?

The internet has talked mostly about the French Revolution, probably because that was a battle with the upper class which could be synonymous with having a battle with the wealthy CEOs. And that revolution was bloody with its images of the guillotine.

But there was also the American Revolution where we threw off the shackles of the British king. Why was that revolution okay but not the insurrection of January 6, 2021 or maybe any future revolution?

One thought that I had was back in 1770s, the colonists did not have voting rights whereas the people of today do have voting rights that the January 6th insurrectionists tried to abrogate through violence. That may be the main difference: one was fighting for rights to live their own lives without the dictatorships of kings and the other was the fighting for their way despite losing a valid election vote. They voted and they lost.

But in the future, it may be okay to do some kind of insurrection or revolution. Maybe if the population lost their rights to vote. Or maybe if the government instigates violence first without any due process. I tried to figure out who fired the first shot in the American Revolution, but I’m having a hard time determining that. It almost sounds like the British began the war, but it was implied during my research, not stated emphatically.

The killing of Osama bin Laden has been held up as an example of deploying rightful violence. In this case, bin Laden initiated the horrible terroristic attack on September 11, 2001 and practically declared war on America, so it is proper to assassinate him many years later.

The Civil War began with the South firing first at Fort Sumter: the Confederacy fired upon the Union (North). And the South lost. Nobody really argues about whether the South should or should not have started the war. The only thing argued about whether they should have tried seceding and whether they were right about slavery. This war might not be a good example to use to decide if revolution is the proper solution to one’s grievance.

World War 2 was basically initiated by the Germans for very poor reasons. And they lost too.

There is not a lot of good examples where one would be justified initiating a revolution. It seems to be that civil disobedience may be the best route – American Revolution does say otherwise.

I just don’t know.

CEOs are not the only ones driving capitalism

One thing that is NEVER mentioned in all of this discussion about capitalism: the role shareholders play in the inequity. They hold all of the power, even over the CEOs.

It has been said that the 1% holds roughly 53% of the stock and the 10% holds about 93% of the stocks. Let’s do the math: the bottom 90% holds only 7% of the stock or wealth.

To do something about capitalism, we have to do something about the wealthy. I am not talking about violence; I’m talking somehow curtailing their power. It might be to do what was done back in the 30s and 40s which shrunk the wage range. Or maybe there is some other answer. Some have spoken outlawing excessive wealth, but the question becomes: at what point does wealth become excessive? I’m sure that’s an easy one to answer.

Focusing on CEOs alone will not be enough to change how capitalism works. The solution has to also include curtailment of uber wealthy.

Also, I wish some economist would do some sort of analysis or paper to counter the Milton Friedman dogma that the only prerogative of businesses is the bottom line, not the health and welfare of society.

If we want to escape revolution, maybe even a bloody one, we need to change capitalism or change our society value system from money to something else or change from a focus on shareholders to the exclusion of everything else or at least curtail their power. Something has to change in the direction of good for the general welfare of society, not just for the billionaires and millionaires.