I would argue that this is not really true under capitalism. The logic of capitalism is one of capital accumulation, which requires growth. Under other systems you still have markets and money and profits but there are other goals than the accumulation of capital and therefore achieving “homeostasis” is a successful strategy-a business run with consistent inputs and outputs which includes a sustainable profit.
Comment on Why do companies always need to grow?
hansolo@lemmy.today 3 weeks ago
In the strictest definition, they don’t.
Capitalism is minimally fulfilled when a business sells something for a profit and reinvests the profit (now capital) in the business. Hence the term. It doesn’t have to grow the business, make new products, or do anything beyond maintenance of its processes, be that fixing or updating machinery or training employees. A single person selling tomatoes in a market in Madagascar that fixes of their tomato table with profits is perfectly capitalist.
Expecting constant growth is not a requirement of anything.
dylanmorgan@slrpnk.net 3 weeks ago
hansolo@lemmy.today 3 weeks ago
You don’t need to argue anything, because there is no universal definition of capitalism. Were not trying to define it.
But the term itself requires capital to be involved, and for a business to exist, that capital needs to be reinvested in the business. That doesn’t require growth. The absolute minimal state simply requires pricing a good sold at a net profit. That’s all. Growth isn’t a requirement.
aesthelete@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
While this is true it’s certainly the case that publicly traded companies have strong incentives to grow.
Private companies mostly have the ownership, or the desire to go public to blame.
hansolo@lemmy.today 3 weeks ago
And publicly traded companies are the also the minority of the total number of companies in the US. So this is a niche issue with outsized effects, meaning a policy solution is out there that
einkorn@feddit.org 3 weeks ago
A farmer selling their produce is not necessarily a capitalist. A farmer toiling on their own field sells the fruit of their own labor, so to speak. One step up are what Marx calls “Little Masters”: They own and work their means of production, but sometimes have employees such as farmhands or apprentices (Think companies where the owner still works in the workshop). Actual capitalists are detached from the production process: They no longer work, but simply own the so-called means of production and exploit others by buying their labor force for less than their produced result is worth.
hungryphrog@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 weeks ago
If we are going by the original definition of the word, it is. The farmer here is growing produce to sell it in exchange for money; they are not sharing it with their community, bartering with it, growing it to eat themselves, or giving it to their liege lord.
einkorn@feddit.org 3 weeks ago
I’m not sure why people always insist if money is involved that it’s capitalism. Money is an abstract form of trade. No one is suggesting that trade will cease to exists in a world without capitalism.
hungryphrog@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 weeks ago
It’s not about money, it’s about private ownership of capital. en.wiktionary.org/wiki/capitalism
porksnort@slrpnk.net 3 weeks ago
People frequently conflate capitalism with enterprise, not seeing the distinctions.
porcoesphino@mander.xyz 3 weeks ago
An economic model that includes capitalism explains a lot of the world including having some close process analogs in nature.
A capitalist sounds like a label you’re trying to apply in an attempt to label someone as being maximally for profits. A lot of companies admittedly work that way and it’s important to include that concept.
By my reading you’re taking the use of the first term and then saying they are using the second term. I think this is called equivocation.
einkorn@feddit.org 3 weeks ago
All companies work that way, or they risk to fail. The maximization of profit stems from the need to stay competitive. If your competitor can produce the same amount of goods for a lower price, you won’t be able to sell yours for a cost-covering price and therefore go bankrupt. Instead, you then have to find a way to be more efficient by investing in your business. To be able to invest, you have to have created profit. Once you have done that, your competitor has to do the same and the cycle starts anew. That’s the idea of modern capitalism.
I am not sure what you mean by that. I tried to show that just because someone sells something, they are not necessarily a capitalist.
porcoesphino@mander.xyz 3 weeks ago
The question says capitalism (not so loaded term) your answer said capitalist (more loaded term and you’ve taken time to use the loaded part of the term).
That said, I accidentally replied to a question in lemmy.ml so the person asking the question is probably more aligned with your way of thinking and explaining than I am. Sorry about that
hansolo@lemmy.today 3 weeks ago
If you want to nitpick, I never said farmer. Also, farmers have inputs, so your comparison is wholly removed from reality.
einkorn@feddit.org 3 weeks ago
What does a farmer having inputs have to do with my argument being removed from reality?
hansolo@lemmy.today 3 weeks ago
Look, everything is connected, and there is no terminal point of anything from which anarcho-socialist magic can magically arise and flow down to make some post-consumption utopia. It’s a circle with no beginning and no end. You can’t force economic change to change human behavior, and Marx’s ideas have famously failed hard. Over and over. Spectacularly.
You’re taking about a 30 generation cultural change that you won’t ever see.