Michael R. Strain, Columnist

‘Late Capitalism’? Not Even Close

Market economies weren’t worn out when Marx wrote about them and they aren’t now.

January 10, 2020 at 12:00 PM UTC

Michael R. Strain is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist. He is director of economic policy studies and Arthur F. Burns Scholar in Political Economy at the American Enterprise Institute. He is the author of “The American Dream Is Not Dead: (But Populism Could Kill It).”

Wrong, then and now.
Photographer: Uwe Meinhold/DDP/AFP via Getty Images

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Even the most ardent defenders of capitalism must acknowledge the indignities it occasionally imposes. The toilet seat designed to be uncomfortable with the goal of getting employees back to work quickly seems to capture some of the essence of the criticism that capitalism has jumped the shark. The image of a tiny, environmentally friendly paper straw inside a large plastic cup is similarly absurd, as are the straps you can fashion around your thighs with clips that attach to your shirt to help keep it tucked in.

I found these examples by searching Twitter for “late capitalism,” an ominous phrase associated with Marxist theorists (though not Karl Marx himself) that has been borrowed widely to express exasperation with the economic system that governs the developed world today.