







if there's one conclusion that the study of both labor history and imperialism converge on, it is that the richest people in the world are happy to burn money on control, power, impunity. and the "everything is about profit" version of anti-capitalism does not survive serious contact with either
Leonard Pierce
Adding to this thread: it’s a common mistake (I’ve made it myself, many times) to think of the motivations of the capitalist elites as essentially mercantilist: that is, that they are largely still motivated *entirely* by profit and loss, selling product, etc. This has not been true for a while.
Mar 20, 2026 at 12:46 AM
Anti-work
An obsession with work is a colonial, patriarchal, and capitalist construct. As such, the anti-work movement is an important part of decolonization, feminism, and anti-capitalism. Work is a tool of oppression By anti-work, I don’t mean that no one ever works. That’s preposterous of course. There are things that need to get done, and people need to do them. But this obsession with hard work as a virtue, as a good and righteous thing to do, the glorification of toil and sweat and labor… that’s a tool the wealthy who don’t work for a living use to oppress those who do.

Political Aspects of Full Employment
Why do capitalists hate full employment? Because it weakens their power over workers.

1% for the People
Capitalism is the undisputed powerplant of global prosperity. Since Adam Smith first described the “invisible hand” that allows economies to be efficiently self-organizing and self-renewing, every attempt to supplant it with a competing system has failed spectacularly.
Global Inequality — Harvard University Press
Winner of the Bruno Kreisky Prize, Karl Renner InstitutA Financial Times Best Economics Book of the Year An Economist Best Book of the Year A Livemint Best Book of the YearOne of the world’s leading economists of inequality, Branko Milanovic presents a bold new account of the dynamics that drive inequality on a global scale. Drawing on vast data sets and cutting-edge research, he explains the benign and malign forces that make inequality rise and fall within and among nations. He also reveals who has been helped the most by globalization, who has been held back, and what policies might tilt the balance toward economic justice.“The data [Milanovic] provides offer a clearer picture of great economic puzzles, and his bold theorizing chips away at tired economic orthodoxies.”—The Economist“Milanovic has written an outstanding book…Informative, wide-ranging, scholarly, imaginative and commendably brief. As you would expect from one of the world’s leading experts on this topic, Milanovic has added significantly to important recent works by Thomas Piketty, Anthony Atkinson and François Bourguignon…Ever-rising inequality looks a highly unlikely combination with any genuine democracy. It is to the credit of Milanovic’s book that it brings out these dangers so clearly, along with the important global successes of the past few decades.—Martin Wolf, Financial Times

US Labor & Imperialism Pt. 1: the War Against Communism w/ Jeff Schuhrke
Hope in Common
We seem to have reached an impasse. Capitalism as we know it appears to be coming apart. But as financial institutions stagger and crumble, there is no obvious alternative. Organized resistance appears scattered and incoherent; the global justice movement a shadow of its former self. There is good reason to believe that, in a generation […]

Capitalism and Its Critics: A History
A Financial Times Most Anticipated Book of 2025A sweeping, dramatic history of capitalism as seen through the eyes of its fiercest critics. At a time when artificial intelligence, climate change, and inequality are raising fundamental questions about the economic system, Capitalism and Its Critics provides a kaleidoscopic history of global capitalism, from the East India Company and Industrial Revolution to the di...
Anarchy and modern convenience
A major part of anarchy and socialism is the concept of anti-work. An obsession with work is a colonial, patriarchal, and capitalist construct. As such, the anti-work movement—a focus on working less overall and sharing labor more equally—is an important part of decolonization, feminism, and anti-capitalism. A common criticism of this is that reducing the amount everyone works to something like 20 hours a week instead of 40+ means we would have to give up a lot of conveniences.

Mercantilisme et capitalisme de la finitude : aux origines de l’Empire Trump | Le Grand Continent
Les seigneurs de la Silicon Valley s'installent dans l'État américain : un nouveau pouvoir disrupte le libéralisme et la démocratie. Vivons-nous un moment inédit ? Il y a quatre cents ans, une start-up de la City – la Compagnie des Indes – se lançait déjà dans une entreprise de conquête mondiale similaire. Pour expliquer Trump et Musk, Arnaud Orain renoue avec les fils de cette histoire, en forgeant un concept : le capitalisme de la finitude.

Will capitalism end capitalism? | Steve Loftus | The Critic Magazine
Imagine waking up one morning to discover your job still exists, but your services are no longer required. The work is being done, just not by you, not by anybody. Somewhere, a machine is doing it…

Exocapitalism: economies with absolutely no limits
There is a touch of destiny with this one. We have real…

I'll go on a little rant about this paper in @QJEHarvard if only for its treatment of the literature. As it's clearly not the first paper to analyze Black economic progress after slavery, we'll focus on the value-added over previous research. An important reference here is Sacerdote (ReStat 2005) "Slavery and the Intergenerational Transmission of Human Capital". by @AndreasShrugged(Andreas Backhaus) | Twitter Thread Reader
I'll go on a little rant about this paper in @QJEHarvard if only for its treatment of the literature. As it's clearly not the first paper to analyze Black economic progress after slavery, we'll focus on the value-added over previous research. An important reference here is Sacerdote (ReStat 2005) "Slavery and the Intergenerational Transmission of Human Capital".

The American Black Bourgeoisie, a story
*The American Black Bourgeoisie is affirmed on this date in 1619. They are America’s Black upper class based on financial income. The Black Bourgeoisie comprises engineers, lawyers, accountants, doctors, politicians, business executives, venture capitalists, CEOs, celebrities, entertainers, entrepreneurs, and heirs with annual incomes of $200,000 or more. This social class sometimes referred to as the […]

The world’s first trillionaire is a killer
Elon Musk’s empire of wealth is built on suffering.

The world’s first trillionaire is a killer
Elon Musk’s empire of wealth is built on suffering.

Cognitive Capitalism - Public Seminar
There are broadly three ways of thinking historically about capitalism. One draws on Marx’s value theory and pretty much treats...Read More
