Among other blurbs on behalf of capitalism and its virtues, one of the more frequently heard is that the system creates opportunity open to all. Especially in the United States, the claim goes that anyone can succeed, anyone can prosper, that capitalism in the US is a land of opportunityBall it takes is hard work and dedication.
Well. here’s a case in Philadelphia, a more or less down-at-the-heels city on the East Coast. The main east-west thoroughfare is Market Street; along its far western blocks, where there is a huge community of African-Americans, Market Street has been for many years the site of a long string of small retail businesses–the mom-and-pop stores we all love so much and which some take as evidence that anyone can start his own business and succeed. And truly, these little businesses were doing all right for a long time. But the elevated tracks of Philadelphia’s electric transit system runs along (over, actually) that stretch of Market Street, and the time finally came for the transit authority to renovate. This meant blocking large chunks of traffic lanes under the elevated, and finally closing down almost the whole stretch completely–no parking, no sidewalks, nothing. And the small businesses? Customers could no longer get to them. As for driving to shop there, forget it–no parking possible. So these small business owners might as well eat their stock, for they certainly have no hope of selling it. Like the shooting of the innocent Brazilian man in London the other week, the situation was looked upon by the powers that be as “regrettable” but “necessary” and “temporary.” The construction project has been going on for more than a year, more than a year since anyone needing to patronize these small businesses could even get to them.
The likely end to the story is all too predictable. By the time the construction project is finished, these modest excursions into do-it-yourself capitalism will have vanished, most likely to be replaced by chain stores and franchises. Maybe some of the owners can become franchisees and pretend to be business owners even if they’re not. The point is that capitalism does not care for Small. Small fish are for feeding the big fish, and if small fish escape that, the system has other ways of clearing them out. Their fate in this case reveals once again the fraud that capitalism is, with its bogus claims of limitless opportunity and its pathetically false blather about economic self-fulfillment. If it doesn’t work for small-time capitalists or would-be capitalists, how can it be expected to work for wage-earners? The fact of the matter is that it won’t–it can’t– it’s not structured that way. It works, and has to work, for the welfare of capital, and no scrawny would-be’s are allowed.
Related posts:
