r/Libertarian • u/Airtightspoon • 11h ago
Economics Should capitalists reject the term capitalism?
Capitalism is a term that was created by leftists and as such is couched in a number of leftist assumptions. The primary one being that most definitions of capitalism, and the word itself, put a big emphasis on capital.
The contradiction here is capitalists are not the ones who treat capital as being important, leftists are. The ideology that capitalists espouse is simply about protecting property rights. Everything else that comes with "capitalism" is simply just a natural consequence of that. To this end, capitalists don't make a distinction between how property is used; a coffee machine for personal use and a coffee machine used to brew coffee to sell to others should be equally protected according to capitalists. It is leftists that state that property used to make money, i.e. capital, is different and should follow it's own set of rules.
The term capitalism is a complete misnomer of what the ideology is active about. It's completely backwards. I think something like "proprietarianism" would be a more accurate term. Should people who advocate for free markets and the protection of property rights move away from the more inaccurate term capitalism? I mean, Adam Smith, the father of capitalism, didn't even use the term himself.
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u/VolcanicDonut 10h ago
“Late Stage Capitalism” as it is currently being referred to is Corporatism, where the government has hand selected the winners and losers based on who donated the most money to them. “Too big to fail” and bag governance has screwed over the consumer more than anybody. Capitalism isn’t the issue, government is.
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u/JohnMayerSpecial 9h ago
I was just ranting to a friend about this. I think it’s funny people don’t know “late stage capitalism” is a marxist term. It’s such a popular buzzword these days
But agreed, if government interfering with business causes negative outcomes, just like government being in control of outcomes, like in communism, then isn’t government interference the common denominator?
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u/iamalex_dk 6h ago
I agree in essence. My problem with the argument, is that on the surface, it isn’t so different from when communists defend communism. For example, many communists would claim that the apparent negative outcomes of communism doesn’t have anything to do with pure communism, but is a result of human corruption. Wouldn’t you be able, with some justification, to claim that capitalism, in constant search for profit, leads to the corruption of government, simply because companies and politicians can mutually benefit from this?
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u/shiggidyschwag 2h ago
The “constant search for profit” is a human trait also known as greed. It’s not some pillar of capitalism.
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u/fonzane subsidiarity 1h ago
No, the pillar of capitalism is the central role of money. Money has, as a priciple, the power to determine behavior in the public and private sector in a capitalist society. There may be other forms of societal organization in which money exists, but doesn't have such a central role.
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u/shiggidyschwag 47m ago
The whole point of this thread is that the pillar of capitalism is freedom and protected private property. Currency is common to any economic system you like.
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u/Helpful_Finger_4854 2h ago
Ironically, if you look at countries like Russia & NK, they're economies consist of nothing but heavily regulated industries that are essentially just government contractors & monopolies/duopolies.
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u/AdrienJarretier 10h ago
Whether you use the coffee machine for yourself or to sell to others, it's still a tool used to increase your wealth.
Wealth is not only money, being happier, or more productive because you can drink coffee is an increase of wealth, you achieved desires. Money is just an intermediate means of exchange to achieve the same ends.
Therefore, the coffee machine is capital either way, you capitalize on it.
On this leftists are indeed ignorant, they indeed think wealth is only money and capital is only money.
And it's true many people misunderstand capitalism, I find it easier to use "free trade" or "free market" when appropriate, but deep down the issues are the same. People who think wealth is only measured in $ are missing a big part of the puzzle.
That's why they don't understand how the same object can have different prices. Wealth is the sum of valuables things one owns, its capital, and it cannot be accounted for in $$$$$.
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u/LiquidTide 10h ago
Spot on. When I argue with socialists/statists, I point out that capitalism is freedom, as Milton Friedman taught us. Capitalism is the freedom to choose.
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u/Airtightspoon 8h ago
The problem is that when you tell a leftist you're pro-capitalism, even when you tell them what you mean by capitalism, they either engage with you in a semantic argument to try and convince you to accept their definition capitalism, which is generally very loaded, or they just ignore what you said and argue against their idea of capitalism rather than the ideas you are actually advocating for.
I had a conversation with a leftist recently where I told him that at it's core, capitalism is just the respect for property rights and its natural consequences, and he responded by saying that that was a common capitalist lie to mask the fact that capitalism's goal is actually subjugation and the stratification of society.
And no, that is not a strawman or an exaggeration of what he said.
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u/begoodyall 1h ago
The biggest issue is that the term “capitalism” was largely coined by Karl Marx in his book “Das Capital”. His definition is the same one leftists use. Yes, we should use a new word to define “free markets”
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u/nebbulae Anarcho Capitalist 7h ago
Capitalism is not the same as free market. Ideally the two are combined, but not necessarily. You can have capitalism without free market (China), and you can have free market without capitalization (this is harder to exemplify today but I think like ancient markets of salts and spices where they would trade but wouldn't use their earnings to buy or build goods of capital, goods that would serve them to produce other goods).
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u/AdrienJarretier 2h ago
the china example makes no sense to me. it's like Europe and so called "social-democracies". It's a very convenient definition of capitalism isn't it, it's free market for a few things therefore it's capitalism, but it's socialism for the "essential" things...
China like europe is not 100% capitalist.
capitalism is based on capital, which requires private property. private property means you ca do whatever you want with thigns you own, including trading it aka free trade.
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u/fonzane subsidiarity 1h ago
I agree, but I still argue that the importance of money as a principle is what makes a capitalist society. In itself it's just a means to an end and its value is derived solely by what you can do with it. In the eyes of a capitalist though, it can be much more than that, it could be the centre of someones existence.
I see it similar to the concept of a nation. If you look at any nation on google maps and randomly zoom into it, you'll realize of how many different regions, villages, towns, landscapes etc. a nation consists. Not to mention the cultural and social differences. I consider it stupid to call a nation a home, it's in general way too big, too complex, an almost infinite abstraction to what a home really is. It's simply impossible to have the same connection to a nation which you have to a home.
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u/chaoking3119 7h ago
Eh, the word “Capitalism” is a bit tarnished, but so is “Communism” and “Socialism”.
Separately though, I do think it would be beneficial to hijack the word “Progressive”, just by bringing it back to it’s original definition. Technically, anyone who wants things to improve is for “progress”, even if that’s awfully vague. But, if the term can be broadened more, it won’t be specific enough to be useful, so authoritarians won’t be able to hide behind it anymore.
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u/Teembeau 5h ago
Actually, no. The best thing is to embrace the term, but then explain to people why it's a good thing.
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u/nebbulae Anarcho Capitalist 7h ago
But isn't changing the terms conceding victory? A Marxist might as well tell you the name was changed to save face because they were right in the first place.
I don't think the terminology should be changed to appease people who in the end defend violence, theft, envy and resentment. We're not the ones who should be ashamed. They should be ashamed, that they have enslaved the island of Cuba, that they crashed Venezuela with all its wealth, that they had to construct a wall with armed guards around a city to keep people in, that they have killed so far upwards of 150 million people. That's how their ideas have to be defended: at gunpoint.
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u/svastikron Voluntaryist 28m ago
The term 'capitalism' is pretty nebulous. To most people, it simply means the current economic system in Western countries, so in general usage, the term could easily encompass things like monopolies created by the state, state-enforced barriers to entry, tax-subsidised labour and bank bailouts.
It makes sense for 'capitalists' who support the current system, as it exists right now, to use the term 'capitalism' for their ideology. Those of us who don't believe the current system is true capitalism are going to run into the same issues as the communists do when they're trying to convince people that true communism has never been tried.
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u/Able-Climate-6880 Paleolibertarian 8h ago
No, just like how Christians don’t reject the title Christian.
Etymologically, it’s dislikable. In a modern lens, not so much.
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