Of Flying Cars and the Declining Rate of Profit

Barry Ritholtz points via his 10 Friday AM Reads to the case “Of Flying Cars and the Declining Rate of Profit” by David Graeber in The Baffler.

Graeber wonders:

Where, in short, are the flying cars? Where are the force fields, tractor beams, teleportation pods, antigravity sleds, tricorders, immortality drugs, colonies on Mars, and all the other technological wonders any child growing up in the mid-to-late twentieth century assumed would exist by now? Even those inventions that seemed ready to emerge—like cloning or cryogenics—ended up betraying their lofty promises. What happened to them?

In contrast to The Unhappy Marriage of Capitalism and Conservatism, Graeber argues that the social conservative nature of Capitalism is holding back break=through innovations such as listed above. Instead, the Capitalists are providing incremental improvements as an illusion that Capitalism is a progressive force.

Defenders of capitalism make three broad historical claims: first, that it has fostered rapid scientific and technological growth; second, that however much it may throw enormous wealth to a small minority, it does so in such a way as to increase overall prosperity; third, that in doing so, it creates a more secure and democratic world for everyone. It is clear that capitalism is not doing any of these things any longer. In fact, many of its defenders are retreating from claiming that it is a good system and instead falling back on the claim that it is the only possible system—or, at least, the only possible system for a complex, technologically sophisticated society such as our own.

In other words, Capitalism is running out of ideas that keep the current social order while maintaining the impetus of historical changes that Capitalism has unleashed. The concentration of wealth means that the spread of ideas among the elite is restricted by the small numbers involved and their defensive attitude towards wealth retention. They do not want to rock the boat, yet they must fight off anyone who tries to climb aboard.