The Simple Reason Nothing Is Fixable: Addiction Capitalism
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To say that nothing is fixable is anathema to the dominant zeitgeist, which holds that 1) there is a technological fix to every problem and 2) anything less than enthusiastic optimism about the future, stressing hope and opportunity, is defeatist.
Among all the possible choices for zeitgeist default settings, these two are pretty good options, for they have a solid foundation in history--the amazing advances in technology--and psychology: a positive mental attitude is far more likely to generate positive results than entitlement, resentment, indignation or resignation.
But neither technology nor positive thinking are enough by themselves: there has to be a system that enables adaptation, a.k.a. problem-solving, and the sharing / propagation of solutions, and a set of commonly shared incentives and values that maintain the system's integrity (what we can also call its coherence) and utility.
In the broad sweep of history, Modernism and Capitalism arose in complementary harmony: Modernism elevated the individual and Capitalism elevated self-interest--the economic perfection of individualism.
Just as Capitalism famously melts all traditional social and economic structures into air--family, community and society are all subject to the demands of capital to increase efficiency to increase profits--Modernism expanded into the vacuum left as traditional constraints on individuals' freedom of movement and expression were swept away. Anything goes, and the purpose of life is to get rich and express your individuality: have it your way.
The mythology--there is no other description that isn't some form of sugarcoating--of Modernism and Capitalism is, like all mythologies, compelling and powerful: the pursuit of individual self-expression and self-interest magically create a vibrant, self-organizing society and economy that naturally benefit everyone.
In classical economics, this self-organizing magic is called "the invisible hand" of the market: as we each scramble to optimize our own self-interest, everything gets better for everyone: new innovations emerge, costs and prices fall, and whatever is scarce is replaced by some new product or service which is abundant due to its immense profitability.
This self-serving fantasy conveniently overlooks that Capitalism arose within an institutionalized, coherent system of law, finance and commerce that had developed over several centuries within Great Britain, which bequeathed these institutional structures and the values they embedded to its breakaway colonies in America.
These structures were like the water the capitalist fish swam in: they were taken for granted, as natural as self-interest itself. But these structures arose in specific times and places; they are not inevitable "laws of Nature."
But even these structures are not enough; as I explained in The Glue Binding Democracy and a Free Economy Has Melted: societies require shared values that manifest as civic virtue and social contracts, shared interests that place limits on greed / self-interest being the sole pursuit of life.
The single-minded pursuit of self-interest does not automatically generate a stable social order; rather, self-interest leads to attempts to bypass rules, rig the system to private advantage, bribe officials and fashion monopolies and cartels that are exempt from the competitive pressures that guide "the invisible hand" to become more efficient and productive.
If the single-minded pursuit of self-interest automatically optimizes the organization of society and the economy to ever-improving efficiencies that serve the common good, then how do we explain America's healthcare system, which costs more per capita than any other developed nation while delivering extremely uneven results in terms of the overall health of the populace, even as it generates billions of dollars in private profit?
If the profit motive by itself supposedly organizes society to the benefit of all participants, why does US healthcare display so many characteristics of a racket rigged to benefit the few at the expense of the many?
If we ask "how can we radically reduce the costs of healthcare while radically improving the overall health of the American public?", we quickly find reform is essentially impossible due to the single-minded pursuit of self-interest: every entity gorging at the feeding trough refuses to budge, for why should they? It's cheaper to bribe officials and politicians with hundreds of thousands to continue the flow of billions.
Rather than seek efficiencies, the system is choked by special interests each seeking to defend their slice of the $4.7 trillion pie (on its way to $7 trillion in a few years) by any means available.
Let's propose three thought experiments to help clarify the fundamental nature of our healthcare system.
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