if we’re to escape capitalism, we’re going to need to get much better, collectively, at differentiating between businesses that operate to provide goods and/or services and not lose money and those that operate to make a profit by providing goods and/or services.
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@ifixcoinops @djsundog There’s currently a fourth crop of companies where future potential profits makes the bulk of their market valuation which is somehow even more vile than the third kind you pointed out.
@djsundog That _kinda_ was the case in a bunch of countries until Reaganomics/Thatcherism/Neoliberalism flipped the table in the 1970s-1990s: (modulo some rose-tinted histrionics, and with a lot of shortcuts taken to tell the story in 3 paragraphs)
What was needed to run a modern society was mostly run by the state, or close to it (regulation), or partially to keep the rest of the crowd honest (e.g. in housing), at a loss if need be.
The "free market" still had plenty of room with the companies that provided the nice-to-haves etc. That also meant that the casino gamblers at Wall St and elsewhere couldn't endanger the necessities, only the extras (and with a social safety net, even the workers there were mostly inconvenienced)
And then the rumor came up that private businesses are "more efficient" (and that "efficiency" is a value in itself, and not merely a tool), and that persists to this day.
@djsundog Honestly I'd be happier with either of those than with the third category, businesses that have to not only make more profit every year than they did the year before but also increase the rate at which those profits increase otherwise the business is a failure