• Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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    8 hours ago

    There’s absolutely empirical proof of steady monopolization and concentration of production in fewer and fewer hands, it happens in all countries as industry develops. Growing larger and more complex is a necessary aspect of lowering supply chain costs, and thus chasing profits. As for your specific questions:

    Why are there capitalist countries that don’t see a rise in inequality?

    These don’t exist. There are countries where large influxes of concessions from Capitalists have lowered inequality temporarily, but there is still rising inequality over time.

    Where is housing in your analysis, which makes up more than 50% of all wealth (up from 15-20% 100 years ago).

    I don’t even agree with your numbers, if you could source them that would be great, but even if we take them at face value as true, rent and land are key aspects of Marxist analysis. Land is finite, as population grows and supply is constrained, monopoly prices can be extracted. It’s usury, landlordism is parasitic. The land factories are on also plays a part in the cost of finished goods, rent is tied to commodity pricing.

    Georgists seem to think they are the only ones to have noticed the problems with private land ownership, but the truth is that Marxists have a more comprehensive understanding of it. See China, Cuba, and other countries run by Marxists to see what Land Reform under Marxists looks like. I think you’ll probably like the PRC’s model.

    Why is the capital to income ratio not rising when housing is taken out of the equation?

    Citation needed, and you need to narrow the scope. You need to take Imperialism into account as well, workers in the Global North are paid “bribes” won by international plundering.

    Why is every productivity gain in society accompanied by equally rising housing rents?

    It’s not always equal, but often is. Worker wages are largely depressed to the cost to reproduce them, and rents rise accordingly. Productivity isn’t coupled with wages in Capitalist countries as a rule, the landlords and Capitalists swallow all of the gains up.

    Overall, you seem to think you have a grand insight into land. You’re certainly above the average liberal, who sees no real problem with it, but Marxists have a more multi-sided understanding of land, and have regularly enacted successful land reform. Georgists also have no real way to implement their policies without adopting a revolutionary stance, where they are far outnumbered by the Marxists and Anarchists.

    Georgism is more correct than standard liberalism, but is too focused on one aspect of the failures of Capitalism, too one-sided, too insufficient even if it were enacted, and has no path to actually be enacted. Marxism has none of those faults.