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What makes capitalism distinctive isn’t that it has markets, but that it is organised around perpetual growth; indeed, it is the first intrinsically expansionist economic system in history. It pulls ever-rising quantities of nature and human labour into circuits of commodity production. And because the goal of capital is to extract and accumulate surplus, it has to get these things for as cheap as possible. In other words, capital works according to a simple, straightforward formula: take more – from nature and from labour – than you give back.
Less Is More
Jason Hickel
In order to restore the rate of profit and keep capitalism afloat, governments had to shift away from social objectives (use-values) to focus instead on improving the conditions for capital accumulation (exchange-value). The interests of capital came to be internalised by the state, to the point where today the distinction between growth and capital accumulation has almost completely collapsed. Now the goal is to tear down barriers to profit – to make humans and nature cheaper – for the sake of growth.
Less Is More
Jason Hickel
Starting in too small a market can be just as risky as starting in a market dominated by REITs. Too small and you have no options—especially if the local economy centers around only one or two major employers. A market with only a few thousand people is extremely risky. If that population is stagnant or even shrinking, your risk of losing money is high, no matter how you set it up.
The Investors Guide to Growing Wealth in Self Storage
AJ Osborne
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