this post was submitted on 02 Oct 2023
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I agree that the rich in America are siphoning from the poor. But I think that the biggest way they steal from the poor is through debt, not living expenses.
Think about it. Americans are taught that they must go to university right after high school. Kids are forced to make a huge financial decision without any understanding of the consequences, and there's a lot of social pressure on them to conform by taking out a student loan.
Next Americans are taught that they should always use credit cards, and that they need to build a good credit score (so they can get approved for more debt later.) They are again pressured by advertising and social norms to take on debt, in addition to the gimmicky rewards like airline miles and cash back, which intices you to spend more than you normally would.
Finally people have even started using debt products like margin trading, which allows you to lose more money on the stock market than you even have, and apps like Afterpay allow you to buy expensive items you can't afford. It's just a never ending cycle of debt.
If people were taught about the debt trap from an early age they could protect themselves and actually save their money, not become a wage slave like so many Americans have.
Please just read any communist literature about class oppression instead of making up wild theories about why the working class is so poor. You're trying to reinvent the wheel without any idea about how a normal wheel functions in the first place.
Sorry professor, I didn't realize I interrupted your communism 101 lecture. Unfortunately I live in the real world where not everyone is out to get you and not everything is hopeless.
I'm not trying to be passive aggressive, I am trying to be earnest:
Youre wasting your abilities by not educating yourself on marxist analysis. You come close to a bunch of points that are made by marxists but don't have the base of knowledge to develop them properly and do further analysis on them. Modern Marxists actually do write on the debt economy and you have the very start of their analysis but you veer off.
This is not an attempt to call you stupid, this is pointing out that you're trying to do something and having the right tool for the job would make your life easier.
It is probably possible for me to write this in terms of philosophical theory but I would not consider that a good use of my time. I'm more concerned with addressing the practical ways someone can improve their life regardless of the current state of the economy or how the current state came to be.
Some people are doomed from the start. But there are so many more people that could be thriving right now if they would just stop and think before taking out a loan and at least gain some basic financial education.
On the subject of Marxism, if people stopped getting into debt a lot less money would be flowing to the top. Banks would have fewer profits and their power would shrink. Therefore abstaining from debt could even be considered a kind of activism. The best kind of activism really, because it actually makes you wealthier.
See, this is an example of getting so close and missing analysis that you could have just read.
If I put this in Marxist analytical terms then no one would understand it and no one would learn anything.
Most people don't understand calculus either, doesn't mean it isnt necessary for certain applications.
And marxist analysis is generally more useful to the average person.