American "Uber-Capitalism" Is Soul Crushing
We don't have to live like this.
People have strong feelings about Bernie Sanders. I’m often taken aback by those who say they hate him, much the way I find Hillary hatred befuddling. I guess I’m rare in that I like both of them, though my view of capitalism has for some time been much more aligned with Bernie than Hillary.
In his new book, “It’s Ok To Be Angry About Capitalism” Bernie lays out the utter immorality and indecency of American capitalism today, which he calls “uber capitalism.” I often call it “late stage” capitalism. We are both referring to a form of capitalism that is untethered to basic decency.
Sanders hones in on an important point that he has made before: It’s impossible to be truly free without economic security. As I noted in a piece for CNN:
Sanders has said over the years that he sees Scandinavia’s generous social safety nets as a model of the kind of system he supports. In his book, he emphasizes an inspiration closer to home: President Franklin Delano Roosevelt — in particular, FDR’s insight that “true individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence.”
Any person who is living paycheck to paycheck, working to the point of exhaustion just to survive and stay on top of their debt surely recognizes this statement is true. How “free” is a person really if all they do is work?
How “free” is someone who lives with a debilitating health condition because they can’t afford the medication or health care that could cure them? How “free” is a person who starts adulthood weighted down with a mind-bending amount of debt incurred just to get the education they need to get a job?
This is the America that most people live in. If you don’t, you are lucky. It’s a place where far too many find themselves one medical crisis away from a lifetime of chronic debt and even bankruptcy. This should not be perceived as a “normal” eventuality of human society. It certainly isn’t freedom.
Wages for Americans remain stagnant, but salaries for the people at the top just keep going up. As I note in my column, “Between 1978 and 2018, CEO pay skyrocketed by more than 900%, while worker pay grew by just under 12%, according to a report by the Economic Policy Institute.”
And CEO wealth just keeps growing, even when they are laying off workers and even when their companies aren’t doing well. TIME magazine reported that CEO pay was “up roughly 21% from 2021, even though the S&P 500 index was down 20%.” Must be nice. From TIME:
At the top of the list [of overpaid CEO’s]: Warner Bros. Discovery’s David Zaslav [parent company of CNN, where I am a contributor] who received $246 million in 2022 even though the company’s stock fell 60% in the same year and roughly 40% of shares voted against his pay package. The second most overpaid CEO was Estée Lauder’s Fabrizio Freda, who earned $66 million in 2022 while the company’s stock fell 33%. Penn National Gaming’s Jay Snowden, who was paid $65.9 million, comes in at no. 3 on the list; his company’s stock fell 42.7%.
I’ve offered only a few data points about what we are dealing with when it comes to a rapacious economic system that is enriching a few people while making life miserable for almost everyone else. It’s a system that has overtaken every aspect of our lives — to the point that people view themselves as brands (Gen Z is calling it “identity capital”) and we think nothing of it.
I can’t pinpoint the exact moment that I realized American capitalism was completely toxic. It happened slowly, then all at once—the breaking point occurred in a dentist’s office in 2019 when I was nonchalantly presented a bill for $5000 for a root canal.
There is no insurance on the open market that covers this. While I receive a salary from CNN, I do not have health insurance, because I’m a contractor. When you don’t have insurance through an employer, then the best dental insurance you can find, at least where I live, will cover a few cleanings at best, because in America teeth apparently aren’t part of the human body.
I have supported a single payer health care system along the lines of what France offers (which was ranked the best health care system in the world) for at least the last decade, because I had already reached the conclusion that access to health care is a fundamental human right and the U.S. health care industry is truly deranged.
Speaking of the health care industry, my friend Jen broke her leg and ankle and here is the bill she posted last week:
How on earth could fixing a broken leg and ankle cost $172,000? But just as importantly, why is a person with health insurance still being asked to pay $1600? We live in a country where most Americans would have to put an amount this high on a credit card, and the interest would grow $1600 dollars into God only knows what. According to a 2022 report, 100 million adults have health-care debt — and 12% of them owe $10,000 or more.
Like I said: deranged.
Which brings us back to my $5000 root canal, which also would put your average American on an endless hamster wheel of debt because they would have to charge it. I am fortunate in that I could take the money out of savings, but it was a big financial hit.
What makes a bill like this so offensive is that there is no reasonable explanation for why it costs this much. When I told an American friend who spends 6 months a year in Italy (as a non-citizen) the cost, he said, “I had a root canal in Italy and it was $500.” I hear these stories all the time from friends who live in other countries. My friend added that it was the best root canal he had ever had, which is shocking to people who have been brainwashed into believing that European health care is inferior to the U.S.
People who defend the American system often claim it’s so expensive because it is vastly superior to that of other countries. This is absolutely false. The U.S. as a nation spends more on health care than any other developed country but has worse health outcomes.
Defending the U.S. health care system is like defending billionaires. Many non-billionaires freak out when Bernie says billionaires shouldn’t exist. Yet, most billionaires wouldn’t spend two seconds worrying about the lives of the average person who rushes to defend them against aggressive taxation because it would be “unfair.” Most billionaires are spending their money to ensure that the system is unfair, just to their advantage. They happily skirt taxes while benefiting from living in the United States and having access to all that it has to offer.
The U.S. health care industry is the same. Their entire game is to ensure that the system is unfair to the average person in a way that benefits them, their executives and their shareholders. They have no problem charging Americans more for drugs than people in other countries. They do not care about you.
But the health care industry and executive pay are just the tip of the iceberg. The system is truly rotten from top to bottom and has warped our understanding of what life is supposed to be about. For those who haven’t forgotten, they are often bereft of the time they need to spend with their families and community, or just to do nothing at all. It’s a system that fetishizes productivity, prizes accomplishment above all else and fuels consumerism as a way to fill the existential hole that the system created in the first place.
What should we do?
What Bernie lays out in his book is not a road map for Democratic socialism, but for a reform of capitalism that looks a lot like New Deal liberalism. I do not know where I will ultimately end up in terms of what I think the solution is, but I am clear that I am against the current system. I am not opposed to Democratic socialism as I understand it, but I need to understand it better. I’m in the process of reading everything I can about capitalism and socialism to become more informed.
Stay tuned.
I was fortunate enough to have sufficient funds to retire from the corporate world early in 2019. But as someone with a pre-existing health condition, I was concerned that Trump was trying to kill Obamacare, because it was the ONLY show in town for people like me. My Republican friends would say “No - Donald said he would provide for that” and I challenged them to find that policy for me. Crickets. I mention this because the level of discourse on this important subject is very poor. Healthcare is currently very poor in the UK too, not because it is socialized, but in my view because it has been grossly underfunded by the conservative government.
This is so to the point and 100% accurate. I've spent thousands on dental bills. It all went on credit cards. And yes, no insurance to help with dental. But too many will write you off as a misguided socialist rather than a realist speaking what is known by those without resources. Excellent article. Look forward to more on this topic!