Introduction

As this is being written, there are states in the United States of America that are actually lowering their minimum wage, even as the cost of living continues to escalate. Forbes magazine is praising this as sound economic policy, using the time-worn dogma that raising wages causes jobs to be eliminated, prices to rise, and businesses to fail. To quote the article from December 2015 which refers to the action of Kentucky governor Bevin who had just signed an executive order cutting the minimum wage from $10.10/hour to $7.25 an hour:

"Bevin hinted that he would prefer the state have no minimum wage at all: ‘Wage rates ideally would be established by the demands of the labor market instead of being set by the government,’ he said…”

Tim Worstall, author of the article, went on to say: “I agree entirely with that statement, indeed would go further. For wages are entirely set by the market: those who don’t produce enough to be worth $10.10 or $7.15, end up getting nothing as they have no job at all."

This comes at a time when over 52% of U.S. workers are paid under $30,000/year, which is equivalent to around $15/hour in an economic environment where the majority of employees are unable or barely able to meet basic living expenses.

Taking a longer view, since 1970 the cost of living in the U.S. has gone up approximately 500% overall. CEO compensation has gone up approximately 1,000%, while employee pay has risen less than 12%. It is not unusual for the CEO of a company to make as much or more in one day - or in some cases in one hour - than a typical employee of the same company makes in a year.

Americans and many other peoples around the world have been taught for nearly a hundred years that Democracy is the same as Capitalism, which is the same as Freedom, and that this represents the best possible human society. These same people have been taught that any form of Socialism, or indeed anything other than the purest possible Capitalism, is Communism, which is synonymous with Dictatorship and everything bad.

Unfortunately, few students, teachers, or citizens have taken the time to learn what these concepts actually mean and represent. The above beliefs are cited, believed, fought for, encoded into law and unquestioningly enforced and accepted as true without any serious awareness of what they are... and in utter ignorance.

Democracy, simply put, is government of, by, and for the People. There are many different forms and expressions of democracy, most of which are representative – meaning that the People by one process or another elect representatives who will enact laws, make decisions affecting the nation, set policies, govern and conduct international interactions on behalf of those who elected them. There are two-party systems (usually some version of liberal and conservative), multi-party systems; in some countries one votes for the individual and in some one votes for a party which then assigns their leaders to government roles in proportion to the percentage of the vote that they received. A very few are direct democracies in which decision-making is done directly by the People themselves.

Capitalism is not a system of government but rather an economic system in which private parties determine and drive the economy.

Where some form of democratic political system co-exists in the same community or country with a Capitalist economic system, there exist two separate power structures that are more often than not at cross-purposes. As will become clear in this writing, the Capitalist economic system is a strongly stratified pyramidal power structure in the best case scenario. In extreme cases it is more sharply and extremely stratified than even the Pyramidal model would suggest, driven by the microscopically tiny segment of the population that occupies the very top of the pyramid. Ultimately, the Capitalistic power structure subsumes and supercedes the originally democratic governmental mechanism and the people in it. Capitalist economic paradigms inevitably give rise to a strongly non-democratic power structure that very closely parallels the Feudal systems of medieval Europe.

Communism is a socio-economic system that strives to centrally coordinate the economy to optimize and balance production, consumption and employment in a way that creates a democratic economy free of class stratification. Sadly, most implementations of Communism since the early 20th century have suffered from a paucity of political democracy, even though the intention of the paradigm is to achieve a free, democratic, and un-stratified Community. The results in most affected Communities have been a different kind of stratification into two classes: Members of the Communist Party, and the rest of the population. This originally was largely the result of the demagogue and political manipulator Stalin in the U.S.S.R., and replicated throughout much of the “Communist” world.

Yet it would be a dangerous and tragic mistake to try to divide these systems into “good” and “bad.” Each presents its own strengths and weaknesses; each had some inspiring achievements and some frightening failures.

At this moment in history we do not see true or even much of a semblance of democracy in the United States nor in many countries following the same socio-economic paradigms as the United States. Government is driven far more by lobbyists employed by mammoth multinational mega-corporations under direction of the ultra-wealthy elite who comprise less than a hundredth of a percent of the population, than it is by the will or good of the people. This skews the priorities of government strongly towards the interests of these wealthy individuals and corporations at the expense of the desires and well-being of the People.

We also do not at this point in history see many examples of real Communism. The People's Republic of China claims to be Communist but in fact practices monopolistic state Capitalism while subjecting many or most of its citizens to unsafe and oppressive working conditions that do not in any way resemble the Communist paradigm, but rather hark back to pre-Revolutionary Feudalism. The same is true of Vietnam. Mao Tse-Tung and any veterans of the Long March would be outraged. Ho Chi Minh would probably vomit in disgust. The post-Stalin Soviet Union, as well, bore less and less resemblance to actual Communism as a caste society formed with Party members enjoying aristocratic privilege while the rest of the population were disenfranchised. The Soviets did, however, do a very good job of providing excellent healthcare, public transportation and education as well as supporting and nourishing the arts, sciences and engineering and those who practiced them. Sadly the Soviet mode of operation was heavy-handed and suppressive of open and free public discourse. Cuba has the distinction of having what is widely acknowledged as one of the best healthcare systems in the world, even given the shortness of resources due to a generations-old blockade by the United States that began during the Cold War. There is no such thing as paying rent or mortgage in Cuba since a place to live is a guaranteed right. Yet this state of affairs is under siege as aggressive Capitalistic pressures are fostering the emergence of illegal parasitic real estate markets.

There are some notable and highly successful examples of Democratic Socialism which work in practice much better than either Soviet-style attempts at Communism or U.S. style Capitalism. Countries like Norway, Denmark, Sweden, and Finland among others achieve a much higher level of individual and community empowerment, synergy, quality of life, dignity and overall well-being than is possible under either Capitalism or the most common implementations of Communism. Many of the necessities of life are guaranteed, resources are managed in a large degree by governments answerable to the people who are free and empowered to vote in free elections, express themselves freely, and advocate for their needs. As discussed later, many of these countries may not even need Transitions, or may naturally transition through social evolutionary processes. Yet in these countries, the use of currency still introduces a degree of non-access, of inefficiency, and of unnecessary entropy, albeit orders of magnitude less than is commonplace under Capitalism and Soviet-style Communism.

We do, in contrast, have an abundance of living examples of true Capitalism. The above quote from Forbes is sadly typical of prevailing attitudes among the economic ruling elite. Under the Capitalist paradigm it actually has validity within that framework, from the point of view of those at the “win” end of the win-lose equation. In practice, we see historically that where there are no labor unions and no minimum wage, there has been wholesale exploitation of employees at the complete expense of anything recognizable as a free or thriving Democratic society.

Economists, activists, lawmakers, judges and others incessantly keep tweaking and adjusting Capitalism to try to make it work better, to curb excesses and abuses as they arise. This fits the classical generic definition of insanity: repeating the same actions over and over while expecting a different result. In fact, the psychological reinforcers at the individual and societal levels, and the fundamental principles of operation of Capitalism translate in practice into a system where it is indeed good and practical economic practice to keep wages as low as possible and prices as high as possible. Under Capitalism it is taken as a given that in order for businesses to thrive and the economy to be "healthy", the majority of people must be kept at sub or barely living wage and be permanently disenfranchised. This obviously is incompatible with government of, by, and for The People, with the rights to Life, Liberty, and Pursuit of Happiness guaranteed to all. It is incompatible with a healthy, free, thriving democratic society of engaged, empowered individuals making their best contributions to the Community while enjoying fulfilling lives.

If there were a sport in which death and maiming of over half the players and much of the audience was a necessary and inevitable result of the game being played well, then that sport would be banned in any civilized country. Yet many countries that consider themselves civilized and enlightened, not only tolerate but enforce an economic system that essentially does the same thing in a much less obvious and flamboyant manner.

In practice, Capitalism is a fundamentally flawed, non-viable pyramid scheme not in any way different from illegal pyramid schemes. It is an economic system that inevitably and inexorably devolves into a particularly insidious, oppressive and destructive re-creation of Feudalism. Capitalism is by its very nature inimical to, and at odds with with, a free, Democratic and thriving human society. It negates and overrides the principles of the U.S. Constitution or that of any country possessing similar core principles in its defining documents. To keep trying to make it work is like repeatedly re-inflating a lead balloon and expecting it to float - a dangerous, destructive, wasteful and impractical waste of time, effort, lives, and the only home we humans have to date.

Proponents of Capitalism compare it favorably to Communism because they view the centralized control of production and distribution of goods and services under Communism as dictatorial and prone to abuse by those in controlling positions. Indeed in the Soviet Union we observed this phenomenon. Such proponents hold up Capitalism as a contrasting example of a free society. This comparison is misinformed at best and deliberately misleading at worst. In reality, the results are more similar than different. Under Capitalist paradigms, control of more and more resources, production, distribution, and access inexorably and inevitably concentrates into fewer and fewer hands. Control of nearly all resources from living space to food to medical care is in the hands of corporate boards of directors and the ultra-wealthy at their helm. This is exactly the same socio-economic dynamic as is criticized in many supposedly Communist paradigms. The results are exactly the same but even more dire in many ways under Capitalism. It truly makes no difference whether centralized control is in the hands of a government committee or a corporate board of directors. The abuses are the same and the harm to the people is no less. In fact, the reinforcers are stronger for abuse in the Capitalist paradigm. A committee in the Soviet Union was originally tasked with ensuring sufficient, efficient and equitable distribution of goods and services for the people, but they were disconnected from input from or dialog with the people. Their failure was due to the typical corruption that occurs in any hierarchical social structure as well as the non-democratic political system in operation. Under Capitalist paradigms, there is strong reinforcement for behavior that maximizes profits, market share and stock value, which as we will see nearly always inevitably comes at the expense of the people as surely as the life of a parasite diminishes the life and vitality of its host or victim. There is absolutely nothing democratic about Capitalist paradigms.

If you find yourself thrust into a game where the rule is every person for themselves and the goal of production is to accumulate maximum wealth by maximizing profits and stock prices, you will make very different choices than you will make if you find yourself in a game where the rule is to work together for the greatest good of each and all and the goal of production is to make sure that there is enough of things for everybody at the highest achievable level of quality. The behaviors that are reinforced are what will predominate.

It is time to implement new paradigms crafted wisely in the light of experience of what has been tried in human communities, what has worked and not worked and why/how. It is time for a socio-economic paradigm designed to strongly lean towards and reinforce the mutual co-empowerment and thriving of every human being in a context of a win-win and the best possible human experience for each and all, rather than the win-lose-lose-lose model of Capitalism.

This is NOT a call to arms to displace those in power and punish them for their abuses and misdeeds or to take revenge upon them. Nor is this a call to abandon the rule of law. Humanity is not yet mature enough to be able to function well without some laws carefully designed to support a safe and thriving Community. It is a call to end all or most hierarchical power systems so that none will lord it over or have rights over another. It IS a call to mobilization to end the dysfunctional Capitalist paradigm, by nonviolent force if necessary, to bring it to as graceful an end as possible quickly, then to replace it with a socio-economic paradigm that will have as its guiding principles the empowerment and actualization of every person and the community. This will necessarily involve the establishment of psychological reinforcers that strengthen and incentivize working together cooperatively (while recognizing, respecting and empowering each individual and their contribution) for mutual benefit among individuals and groups as well as between the individual and the community, while keeping in mind the importance of preserving and sustaining our planetary home.

This must be done as soon as possible and with no compromise BUT with compassion and non-violently. Force of arms must be the last resort except surrender (which is not an option), and only in self-defense and the absolute minimum necessary. Since we seek to create a compassionate and empowering society, we MUST overthrow the oppressive power structure and once that is done, we must treat the former CEO's and other power brokers with the same firm no-nonsense compassion that we would treat a person with any mental or physical illness or disability.

As you read these pages, please keep your mind open and set aside any preconceptions you may have about political and economic systems. This is not about Communism versus Capitalism. It is about the deeper fulfillment and more complete implementation of government of, by, and for the People. It is about achieving a thriving, free and vibrant human community/society.

Forcibly and non-violently transitioning from one socio-economic paradigm to another, overthrowing the dominant power structure and creating a completely different non-power structure for one or more entire countries, is a daunting and almost overwhelmingly challenging task that may appear impossible. Yet it would be tragically fatal to fail to attempt it due to such perception.

From the perspective of a typical inhabitant of the European Middle Ages, Democracy, Communism and Capitalism would have appeared to be impractical, impossible, and against the natural and Divine order. To inhabitants of 17th century Europe, the very idea of out-manned, out-gunned, out-funded colonists taking on the power of Britain, one of the pre-eminent European superpowers of its day, would have seemed a hopeless fool's errand doomed to failure. To dwellers of early 20th century Russia, the idea of a bunch of uneducated peasants taking on the hereditary power of the Czar would have appeared utterly preposterous and likewise doomed. To observers of late-1940's China, no one would have been likely to bet on the chances of a collection of half-starved, untrained, barefoot, illiterate, severely under-armed peasants prevailing against the U.S. - supported anti-Communist forces who had far superior fire-power, expertise and training. Similarly when India undertook her struggle to become independent of her British occupiers and do so by completely non-violent tactics and when the ANC embarked upon overthrowing the generations-long rule of Apartheid - from many points of view their chosen goals and missions appeared nearly or completely hopeless and contrary to common sense. There was a time when the very concept of a heavier-than-air flying machine was considered a complete waste of time by most serious scientists and yet now we enjoy a plethora of different kinds of flying machines and have even made it to the Moon.

The point of this reminiscence is to remind us that the fact that a new idea or paradigm has not been tried or done yet on this big of a scale, or that it appears daunting and near-impossible, is not a defensible reason not to embark upon it. The more so because the alternatives: failure to attempt such an overthrow and restructuring on one hand, or else a violent overthrow on the other hand, are far too bleak and desolate to permit to occur.

To allow things to continue as they are is an almost certain guarantee that the current consolidation of money, power, and resources into the hands of a very few ultra-wealthy power and money addicts will result, at the rate this process is accelerating, in a situation, in our lifetimes, in which a growing majority of us will be increasingly hungry, homeless and relegated to favelas like those in Brazil. At that point we will be in a much weaker position than now to embark upon this transition.

Similarly, to embark on the transition by violent means would almost certainly give the old guard the advantage and make it easy for them to discredit our Transition. The likely result would be blood bath that is avoidable if we choose a non-violent mode of forcing the transition, to be discussed later in these writings.

We must show ourselves and the world a whole new approach to the art of staging a forcible change of paradigm. It is important that we change the paradigm for this process as well. Too many well-founded revolutions have devolved into blood-baths with atrocities committed by the side of the just as well as the unjust. The moment that path is taken, the stage is set and the pump is primed for rage and hatred to out-create reason and compassion, which will most certainly compromise the intention of such a transition beyond recognition. Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. It is essential and imperative that we not create power structures that can take on a life of their own, be abused and become a tyrannical end unto themselves.