Juneteenth should remind us what ungoverned capitalism does.

Markets are not a natural phenomenon and only exist when they're formed and governed by people. Ungoverned markets are the opposite of free.

I just wanted to write a post today to all the lovely folks who like to scream about soviet russia and Venezuela anytime I talk about an economic system that prioritizes the well-being of the majority of people who make up that system.

Juneteenth is the day we celebrate the emancipation of legally enslaved people in the United States.

People who criticize my recommendations for worker cooperatives and corporate structures where the labor force makes strategic and distributive decisions democratically like to say how terrible communism is and how unregulated capitalism magically creates fairness and equity.

Many seem unwilling to acknowledge that the enslavement of millions of people in the United States was legal and intentional under ungoverned capitalism.

In fact, when the 13th Amendment was ratified, an exception was included.

https://www.naacpldf.org/13th-amendment-emancipation/

That amendment leaves an exception that criminals can be enslaved. Unsurprisingly, former slaves started being arrested for various trumped-up crimes and then sold to their former plantations by the justice system, often for a nice profit. Even today, African Americans are overrepresented in prisons.

There’s an excellent documentary on the subject that would make educational Juneteenth viewing.

So, leaving aside that the total abolition of slavery wasn’t codified into law and that there’s an exception for “criminals,” we need to reckon with the fact that while slavery existed before capitalism, capitalism happily embraced it as a desirable and legal means of procuring labor.

It’s time we had a more nuanced conversation beyond “everything, but laissez-faire capitalism is authoritarian gulags!” there are many alternatives, such as worker-owned cooperatives.

We need to recognize that the purpose of capital markets is to serve the society in which they operate. Any measure of the “economy” that doesn’t prioritize the well-being of all the people is a bullshit measure.

I don’t want to hear about “productivity” numbers unless they include the number of people in those systems who are living in poverty, have food insecurity, and lack healthcare.

Today, take some time to reckon with the legacy of our country’s shameful past. Ask yourself how those systems continue to harm people and what you can do to improve this country today.

I leave you with an economics professor’s quite humorous and succinct take on socialism.