- Socialist Revolution - https://socialistrevolution.org -

Worried About the Future?


   Support Socialist Appeal – Subscribe [1] or make a Donation [1]!


According to a recent CNN/Research Corp. national poll, only half of all U.S. homeowners are confident they can make their mortgage payments and less than forty percent are confident they can maintain their standard of living in the next year. Moreover, just one in four parents of children less than eighteen feel they can afford their child’s college education, and a scant one in five Americans who have yet to retire are very confident they’ll be able to save enough money to do so comfortably.

This is hardly surprising, as economic uncertainty has reached all levels of society, even those with “white collar” jobs that had previously offered a higher level of security. More and more people, from factory workers to office workers, are realizing that capitalism views them as expendable. Even if not directly affected by the current crisis, they are no doubt indirectly involved and chances are, have family or friends who are struggling to make ends meet.

While some short-sighted academics tried to claim that “history is over,” people are drawing their own conclusions.

Although many still have illusions in the Democratic Party, increasing numbers realize something is wrong and that the Democrats are incapable of fixing the problem. Most of these people have probably never read a Marxist critique of Capitalism, but have nonetheless grown to harbor increasingly “radical” views. As Lenin once said, “life teaches.” Most workers on the factory floor understand they know how to run the factory better than the boss. Most people working in an office understand this as well. Often, it simply takes a personal experience to crystallize what turns out to be common sense.

Capitalism, despite the massive amount of wealth it has created, can’t even fulfill basic societal needs. Right now there are millions of homes with no one living in them and millions of people with no homes. There are people starving while tons of food rots in storage. There are millions of workers wanting to make thousands of products and millions of people wanting to use these products, but because a small group of people can’t make a large enough profit off of them, these demands go unmet. Until the economy is rationally organized under workers’ control, the chaos of the market will continue to wreak havoc on people’s lives.  As their consciousness develops, we must argue loud and clear for socialism!