Survival__ Structuring Prosperity for Yourself and the Nation - Charles George Smith [74]
In this analysis, the Plutocracy is well-served by a politics of experience which neatly dices the political ideological spectrum into various non-threatening and mutually distracting slices of rancor and illusion.
Democracy, Empire, Socialism and the Fantasy of Self-Regulating Markets
Since the middle class is the foundation of the State (by paying the taxes and providing political support for the status quo), then questions of democracy, markets and empire directly affect the squeezing of the middle class.
While this discussion may seem far afield from practical responses to the intersecting crises we face, it is actually of paramount importance. For if the American State/Empire over-reaches globally, and the Plutocracy over-reaches domestically, then the middle class must either respond in its own defense or collapse beneath rising taxes.
The State and ruling Elites will defend the status quo very robustly and perseveringly, overriding or simply ignoring middle class attempts to limit its power.
We should pause here to remind ourselves that the politics of experience, the "obvious" incentives and assumptions which we do not even notice such is their "naturalness," masks the actual mechanics of this destruction of the middle class.
Thus the State will argue that regulation protects everyone (even if it doesn't, and is riddled with profitable loopholes that served Elites' interests behind a sham transparency), the "underprivileged" "need" various services and benefits (even if the supposedly "necessary" benefits like bilingual classes fail in their stated objective) and an ever-increasing public payroll is needed to "serve the public."
The question of who pays for all this is left uneasily unsaid; the Elites will pay a much smaller percentage of their income than the middle class, and as a result their share of the national income continues to rise as the middle class founders.
The Elites will quietly voice their needs in the hushed halls of power, confident that the media (recall that they own or control the mainstream media) will provide a simulacrum of transparency, a facsimile to satisfy an easily distracted public.
Thus it is not at all clear that democracy and Empire, that is, geopolitical hegemony, are compatible. Nor is it clear that centralized State planning (socialism) and democracy are compatible, either (please see The Road to Serfdom by F. A. Hayek).
Why? Socialism always contains the potential for "the tyranny of the many" which concerned many of the United States' Founding Fathers. If 51% of the citizenry are receiving benefits or "free" services from the government, they can essentially dominate the minority productive class via the ballot box.
Put another way: the percentage of people who will gladly accept free money or services is virtually 100%, while the percentage of those willing to risk their time and capital for productive enterprise is considerably less than 100%. Thus the less-productive benefactors of government largesse can extract ever-higher taxes from the remaining productive members of the society, until the productive members either collapse into penury as in the late Roman Empire, or they opt out of the burdens imposed on them by the tyranny of the State's more numerous benefactors.
In his book Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy, economist Joseph Schumpeter argued that capitalism collapses from within as democratic majorities vote for the creation of a welfare state. This so burdens entrepreneurship that the capitalist infrastructure which supports the State and its dependents collapse.
Ironically, perhaps, the structure of Empire remains the same regardless of the ruling ideology: Neoliberal Capitalist or Socialist (democratic or autocratic) or totalitarian: a small ruling Elite benefits enormously from the Empire, and bestows sufficient benefits on the home nation's citizenry to buy their passive complicity.
In all