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this post was submitted on 16 Jul 2024
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chapotraphouse
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Depends, are you a believer in means/ends unification a la Anarchism, or are you more of a Marxist? Socialism will not be brought about by personally abstaining from retirement accounts and whatnot, and the State does not provide enough of a welfare net to avoid this issue. Workers must invest to survive, as they must consume products of Capitalism.
have been trying to write a reply but both of yours ITT make the point much better than I can
Thanks, comrade!
The forced participation in the investment market is a way to make people believe like they own capital while only giving back a pittance from the stolen value
Yes, I agree.
I'm not saying that having a 401k makes you a bad communist, I'm saying that it's against our beliefs
In the absence of a real alternative, I don't think offering investing advice goes against leftist beliefs. After the Revolution, we can do away with investing altogether. But that Revolution is not yet here, and neither is the welfare of Retirement that brings.
If you are willing to leech from other workers, go for it
All Workers must leech from each other to survive in Capitalism, so long as it exists, unless their wages are high enough that they may ensure their future subsistence through savings alone.
I agree that we must move against it, but participation is a necessary sin.
That's what I've tried to say the whole time, some participation is impossible to avoid, but it's still against the principles
My point is more that what @sub_ubi@lemmy.ml was offering initially, ie Personal Finance advice, is the necessary sin. Capitalism has made it necessary that Workers in the Imperial Core engage with it ruthlessly to ensure their own existence, there is no path outside of this unless you earn so much individually that you can avoid it.
We agree in concept, but I believe you place more of an emphasis on Moralism. If you're arguing for Means/Ends unity, ie we must live and construct our goals in the same manner presently as we build them to ensure the ends match the means, then that's a separate argument.
Marx engaged in stock market speculation for his own personal enrichment. Marx isn't some moral guideline everyone must follow, of course, but it does call into question the position that leftists must avoid basic personal finance strategies.
All the financial guidance they offered lead to marginal gains from the back of the working class, I'd rather fight the people outside of the bucket instead of all my fellow crabs
All the basic personal finance strategies they offer force the working class to infighting while the ruling class skim the cream from the top
There's a difference between doing what you must and capitulating to the ruling class
What is it, to sin? Materially, I mean. Investing in the stock market enriches oneself on the backs of labor, but we must see these movements as aggregates. From the whole of Value contributed, a Proletarian that eventually makes enough to retire has taken back what has been taken from them. Investing for a Proletarian is a means of taking from the system of Capital the value taken from their labor.
Individual acts do not exist. Everything is in motion, guided by the past, shaping the future. A proletarian investing in the context of Capitalism is ultimately still contributing far more to Capitalists than they have taken back for themselves. A Bourgeois investor who does no labor and instead seeks accumulation is not the same as a Proletarian who, bit by bit, claws back the Value they have created and had stolen from them.
Again, aggregates and totals. A proletarian will not reach the level of their oppressors without extreme effort, and though this sum investment comes from the workers, they themselves are a worker and are clawing back what was taken. You are asking them to not claw anything back, but be beaten and stomped for the sake of solidarity. This mere self-flaggelation is not an act of leftism, but Moralism.
Moralism is a dead end, materially. We must all do what we can, but we must acknowledge the Material reality of why Capitalism itself is unjust, yet Marx avoided moral arguments for it.
I'll leave this with a great quote about Marx: “The moment anyone started to talk to Marx about morality, he would roar with laughter.”
You either haven't read my posts or are intentionally misreading them
There's things we must do to survive, and there's things we can do ignoring the survival and well-being of others
If the only way to win is to become the oppressors, we lose by default
On the contrary, I have dutifuly tried to engage as forthright and honestly with you as possible. I respect you as a fellow leftist, I just disagree with your attatchment to Moralism. Sadly, you haven't taken the time to respond to the points I have made, at least not directly.
Then tie Proletarian's meager investments, which pale in comparison to the oceans of wealth taken from the Proletariat, to ignoring the survival and well-being of others. A proletarian taking a meager bucket back from the wealth stolen from them does not change their position with respect to their fellow Proletarians, nor does it impact the dialectical contradiction between the Proletariat and Bourgeoisie.
Not a single person here is claiming that the path to Socialism is via Proletarians individually investing, neither does investing so that you may eventually retire mean you are no longer a wage slave.
Never forget that Communism is the Doctrine of the Conditions of the Liberation of the Proletariat. The Proletariat will use the tools at its disposal to its advantage, regardless of individuals with "principles" rejecting them. Communism is not a guideline on how to be a proper Worker within Capitalism, but a path to move beyond Capitalism. Harm reduction is good, but focusing on vague, arbitrary levels of acceptability based on nothing other than vibes is missing the forest for the trees.
I think you should step away from the keyboard for a bit, I think you've gotten pretty heated in this thread and seem to be replying to everyone. I think it would be beneficial for you to take a break and come back later, though don't confuse this for me telling you what to do. I don't know what you've got going on right now.
What you don't seem to be understanding is that no matter how much you nobly refuse to invest in stocks, none of those stocks you're refusing to invest in are going to go to the workers.
And what you don't seem to be understanding is that none of the money you invest or gain from those investments is going towards the revolution, it's just stolen from other working class people
Capital gains are antithetical to Marxism and I'll fight anyone on this
True, but I'm not the one who stole it from them and no amount of investing will make it so that I am. It was already stolen, and nothing I have the power to do will return it to its rightful owners. However, any value I can extract from it is a little more in the hands of the working class that it was stolen from and a little less in the hands of the ruling class who stole it. That is the least harmful thing I have the power to do with regard to the value tied up in the stock market.
I completely disagree. Doing what you must to survive is not against any of the socialist principles that I follow. In a similar way, as a vegan, I don't think it is against the principles of veganism to kill and eat a wild animal (or a fellow human) if you are in a situation where that is literally the only way to survive. Every person, and every thing on this planet, has the fundamental right to fight for their own existence even at the detriment of others, and to me that principle outweighs all else. It is in the absence of necessity that other principles, such as those that say murder is wrong and that it is wrong to benefit from the work of others, come into play.
Doing what you must to survive is not against any leftist principle, but trying to maximize your personal profits from someone else's work is, that's my whole fucking thesis
But maximizing your personal profits is doing what you must to survive, and even then it might not be enough. No matter how efficiently you optimize your investments, at least on my income or equivalent, or (as horrific as it is to imagine) less income than me, one bad ambulance ride can put you into crippling debt from which you will never recover. Under capitalism, you're never secure unless you're literally a capitalist. A worker like me cannot amass enough of a safety net to be 99% safe such that further optimization of income ceases to be justifiable as necessity and becomes unnecessary seeking of profit.
I'm not going to stop you if you want to profit from the work of others, I'm too busy stealing from my employer
But it doesn't change the theory, maximizing your personal profits without working for it is antithetical to socialism
I don't necessarily disagree and have retirement accounts myself.
But how do we draw the line between this and buying property to rent to others? Is being a landlord acceptable as a communist if we realize we are forced to participate in the system and need the extra income?
Directly and purposefully shifting from Proletarian to Bourgeoisie is probably not a good move for a Communist. Materially, one could become a Landlord and intentionally take no profit, which would benefit the Proletariat, but would merely be charity work within a dying system. Instead, joining a Renter's Union or owning your own home outright is better, the former helping all of your local proletarians and building up power.
When it comes to investing, it's important to think of aggregates. A Proletarian clawing back some of the wealth stolen from all of the Proletariat does not mean said Proletarian has taken back more Value than they have had taken from them in the first place.
Finally, we must consider what it means to behave Morally in Capitalism. Yes, we all can and should boycott the worst of the system, but unfortunately, we are forced to engage with it. The only path out is to organize, no amount of self-flaggelation and rejection of wealth will change this process. Moralism is a dead-end, Materially.
It's a complicated subject philosophically, so you must consider what your goals are, and why. Communism isn't about being the most morally upstanding victim of Capitalism, but a path to eliminate and replace the system altogether.