The Really-Existing Mixed Economy and the Cold War Either/Or Binary

 Why Urbanism Failed? Spoiler: Capitalism Killed It. Charles Mudede, The Stranger April 24, 2024

Good stuff on Keynes but why I still resist the capitalism vs socialism binary: it reflexively registers with everyone (Americans, at any rate) as an either/or proposition: private property or no private property. And so as a critique of capitalism it's stuck in a Cold War either/or muddle and ends up bolstering capitalist dogma. 

People like private property rights and generally want more private property; they almost universally do not want less private property (even the people with way too much of it, I gather). Talk supporting the abolition of private property turns people off. 

Yes, we need less unfettered free market capitalist governance and more democratic socialist governance but this refers to the reality that the economy and governance are in fact inseparable,  we live in a mixed economy, and we live in that mixed economy with a corrosive political fiction that elevates the economy over everything else in society. 

In short, we need a sustainable Green New Deal hybrid of democratic socialism and capitalism. Either/or conceptions of capitalism vs socialism are a zombie Cold War fantasy and get in the way of a really-existing progressive hybrid world where urbanism can be revived and thrive. 

But fat chance of any great compromise in the progress of liberal enlightenment coming together anytime soon, perhaps, but my gut still says much closer to reality (or even desirable) than the total eradication of capitalism and/or private property. There, I said it; stodgy Neo-Keynesian liberalism, perhaps, but more practical and less abstract than, frankly, dated binary capitalism vs socialism formulations.  

Anyway, beyond my pet peeve about the lingering intellectual muddle of the Cold War, and fear that I'm likely not radical revolutionary enough for Mr. Mudede or The Stranger, I'm most definitely on their side in this struggle, and agree with everything in this story: 

Seattle Revives the Bullshit Economics of Low Wages

Should we survive corporate rule's effort to cook the planet so as to preserve their exorbitant profit-seeking rates of return, in the ensuing changes, adapting reforms, any corporation, publicly traded or large scale business (or government office, for that matter), paying less than a living wage will appear to us as an astonishing aberration, obviously exploitation of labor, and even criminal expropriation. And failure of a rich business to pay its fair share in taxes for the public infrastructure that supports social prosperity will appear obviously predatory; and their claims that they cannot afford living wages or cleaning up the environment an intolerable gaslighting absurdity.  

And only then will it become apparent to everyone that business success does not require such kleptocratic, hoarding, and monopolizing extremes as we indulge and glorify today. In fact, free markets may create Billionaires but they are always lowballing labor and squeezing small businesses, evading taxes, and evading responsibility for their contributions to global warming and destruction of the environment.

I believe raising wages, rent controls, and price controls, strategically applied, are expansionary. And tax cuts for the rich, tax evasion, and obstructing technological innovations in sustainable energy production are in the long-run deflationary and, worst of all, pushing the world towards more catastrophe.