Wealth inequality is present in all capitalist regimes. Sometimes it is mollified by state policies under control of social-democrat policies, for a certain time. But never for ever. Sweden, Norway, Finland and others are examples of melting prospects. Capitalism will exact the due price for their audacity. An so it is today. The inequality needed in capitalism is also its nemesis. If we forget all its propaganda and focus in human endeavour, inequality will ever be viewed as an enemy of human empathy. And as such very difficult to be swallowed by humans. The pressure against private property is inexaustible, and it is impossible to augure how long capitalism will endure this inescapable attriction.
In some capitalist countries, like Brazil, the State helps the forgotten with ways to survive, very much like the Roma Emperors distributed bread among the proletarii, but capitalism still resists in strength, as deep reforms are not envisioned. Deep reforms entail changes in the status of private property, especially in the countryside in places like Brazil. In more industrialized countries, the fight against private property is more complex. The proletarii of advanced capitalism need the same as in Old Rome. The Emperor had to give bread for them to eat and thus avoiding rebellion. The phantom of class struggle can barely be hidden.
The high tech employed today in the total length of economic and logistic streams cannot avoid the human factor, and issues of work retribution are always present. A single work strike in this long chain can paralyse the whole system, as recent strikes in USA ports shows with luminous clarity.
The idea that IA will make human work avoidable is a fallacy, IA is just one of the unending stream of novelties promising profound changes. In the end, to solve problems, human intervention is necessary. Where are the robots promised in the 1990s?.
Behind this question a bigger question lies. What is the role of human labour in the world of new technologies? People ask GPT how to make butter and end up with a pigstie in their kitchen.
There is a concerted effort to convince everybody that bits and bytes will make their life more comfortable. For a price, of course. Is it worth? Very doubtful.
In the end, we are left with a population divided into two halves. The first can benefit from informatics, and the other cannot. Information tech is ever more specialised and alien to the common worker. Machines can be used by pressing buttons, and that is the world of the worker. Other people create the software that guides machinery, and they are not button-pressers. They get much higher paychecks.
Of course you might ask: why not send the children to software engineering? You cannot, because your paycheck barely covers monthly expenses, let alone college tuition. The class barrier reaffirm itself every year, and may well end up in slavery.
At this point, it is legitimate to ask: what is your threshold to run from obedience to rebellion?
Rebellion is one of the greatest human virtues. Without it we would never have escaped the middle ages. Think again.
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