Here I share the raw insight into how carrots make capitalism work and look bad all at the same time.
In a nutshell, the whole edifice of the capitalist system rests on carrots, with all the embarrassing implications this brings with it.
The kernel of insight in this observation – which I have to admit also works as an insult, playful as it is – is that we shouldn’t need to be profit-driven in order to produce marvellous things and contribute to society. That at bottom, we don’t need a big carrot dangled before us to make us do our best and produce good, either for ourselves or society at large. Not in our enlightened age. Yet the unduly high pay of many public sector jobs is often justified with reference to the private sector, arguing that it is the only way to attract talent into the public sphere else it would defect to the private. Company CEOs and bankers on the other hand, feel no such compulsion to justify their worth (in contrast to conservative politicians and civil servants in the public sector), as the world is there to be exploited, and capitalism has instilled in them from birth that it’s OK to be greedy while you are ripping the heart out of society. This was embarrassingly highlighted by Prime Minister Boris Johnson when he claimed greed gave us the Covid vaccine. Or to give it a tone softer than the PM’s admission of greed, the sole and truthful justification for the Capitalist system is profit and personal gain, moderated by a supposed enlightened self-interest that drives industry and the economy, and by which the world goes round… of sorts.
Such a motive however nicely put is not simply mistaken; it is, I argue, also embarrassing.
If the unsustainability not to mention insanity of continued profiteering, also termed “growth”, under capitalism fails to awaken us to the necessity of replacing it, hopefully the image of the capitalist as no more than a donkey pulling a cart as he tries to reach the carrot will; helping open our eyes to exactly who it is we are dealing with. Plainly put, assess, beautiful and strong without doubt, yet pulling us along the road of calamity in the pursuit of what they claim is good for all, which also happens to fit nicely with what they want for themselves. A nice big juicy carrot.
We speak (at a first level) of a handful of banks, multinational corporations and private individuals – Gates, Soros, Musk, Bezos, Buffett, Branson, Murdoch, little Zuckerberg, etc., and also (at the second level) quite a few mules who languish in relative poverty at the multi-million dollar level, those not quite up to the illustrious carrot-reach of the uber-billionaire asses.
So at last, a modern day use for a quote from poor, troubled Nietzsche [1]: Adventavit asinus, pulcher et fortissimus and full of carrots.
All of the above multinational and individual holders of wealth can, perhaps, take note of MacKenzie Scott, to whom Jeff Bezos was once husband. Scott at least recognises that the fortune accumulated by her and Bezos when married effectively represents exploitation and profiting from the inequalities of society. To address this injustice with regard to her share of the accumulated fortune with Bezos (which initially totalled $57 billion at divorce), Scott along with others is “attempting to give away a fortune that was enabled by systems in need of change. In this effort, we are governed by a humbling belief that it would be better if disproportionate wealth were not concentrated in a small number of hands, and that the solutions are best designed and implemented by others.”[2]
We should wait and see what comes of this. But it looks at least to be on the right track for now, and may possibly also be an argument for having women on top.
1. “Here comes a donkey, beautiful and strong”, Fredrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil
2. The Guardian, Philanthropist MacKenzie Scott gives away $2.7bn to hundreds of charities
Updated 22 August 2021
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