CAPITALIST TENTACLES & FRONTS

MoA—The U.S. is providing the world with another example of its great exceptionalism. In a few days it will have the greatest number of Covid-19 cases and the greatest number of casualties of the disease. It will also have spent the greatest amount of money on the crisis with the smallest part of it going to the people who need it. It is not a nice picture and it makes me sad. The more than two trillion dollar the lobbyists told Congress to put into their 800+ pages relief bill will mostly go to very rich people. It is  corporate socialism – a bailout for investors and managers.

ROB URIE—To understand why Wall Street should be left to rot this go around, look back to January 1980, when the current bull market can be estimated to have begun. The S&P 500 has to fall by another 2/3rds, from 2,400 to 910, to get to the normal valuation level (CAPE P/E = 8.5) at which this epoch of finance capitalism began. Understand, the S&P 500 at 910 wouldn’t represent a crisis, just a more reasonable valuation level. The financial crisis, to the extent there is one, is due to systemic leverage, the same problem that Wall Street faced in 2008. The pandemic is but the catalyst for current financial troubles, not the cause.

BY MONTHLY REVIEW ONLINE—SOCIAL DEMOCRACY: Look up the term in a dictionary and you’ll find a definition something along the lines of “an ideology that advocates or supports political, social and economic interventions to promote social justice within the framework of a representative democracy and capitalist economy.” Most “social democrats” (such as members of the Lib Dems today) would agree with that. Social democracy often presents itself as a “centrist” movement, opposing what it labels the “extremes” of left as well as right.

CAITLIN JOHNSTONE—I mean, we’re in the first moments of an unfolding pandemic which, from what I can tell just looking at the numbers, is about to change the world in some pretty significant ways. Governmental faceplant after governmental faceplant after missed opportunity after missed opportunity all around the world appears to have set us on a trajectory toward overburdened healthcare systems, severe economic downturns, and, of course, mass deaths.

MoA—The stop of air travel due to the Coronavirus pandemic will cause many airlines to go bankrupt. Many more Boeing and Airbus orders will get canceled. Global air travel and orders for new airplanes will take several years to crawl back to the pre-pandemic level. Five workers at Boeing’s widebody production line in Everett have come down with the Coronavirus disease and the production may have to be stopped.