originally appeared in Truthout.org

Thomas Friedman's latest column touting online education "is another exercise in (1) finding a potential positive dimension of capital's latest profit-driven move, (2) hyping it and (3) ignoring its contradictions, especially those that are negative."

  The transitions from feudalism and other pre-capitalist economic systems to modern capitalism have always and everywhere been celebrated for bringing a new epoch of human history. Freedom, democracy, and equality were the hallmarks of those celebrations. The French Revolution of 1789 raised the slogan of liberte, egalite, fraternite. The US has long celebrated its capitalism for producing a vast “middle class” that permanently overcame previous societies’ tendencies toward extreme inequalities of wealth and income.

  orignally appeared in Truthout.org  

Extremely unequal distributions of wealth and income continue to enable the richest and largest individuals and enterprises to manipulate the economy and control the political parties. The result is an economic structure disinterested in a democratically focused way out of crisis and decline.

originally appeared on Al Jazeera's Inside Story

As unemployment in the US decreases and large companies expand their profit margins, has the capitalist system once and for all proven its ability to endure and adapt?

The jobless rate in the US has dropped to its lowest level in four years. And the economy, which in 2008 appeared to be on the brink of collapse, is said to be recovering.  

 

Updates on Marvins' "shared unemployment," $4 trillion profits hoarded by US corporations, and root issues of the "fiscal cliff." Discussion of solutions for unemployment. Responses to listeners: on pluses and minuses of China's economic growth and on the contradictions of "social investing."

 

  On Economic Update with Professor Richard Wolff, Wolff and guests will discuss the current state of the economy, both locally and globally in relation to the economic crisis.