Maybe it isn’t the people at the top of the wave that actually drive the process?
As with politics, are those who aspire and succeed really the cause, or the effect of the social dynamic?
The fallacy of capitalism is that markets need money to circulate, but as goal oriented creatures, we see it as the signal to extract from the noise of society and the economy. Requiring ever more to be added and ever more inventive ways to store what has been extracted. Which tends to speed up the process, like a warm ocean will add to the power of a hurricane.
We assume it to be a commodity, but it is mostly a contract, with one side an asset and the other a debt. Which means that in order to store the asset, similar amounts of debt are required. Which means debt is not a bug, but a feature of the system.
For one thing, it creates a centripetal effect, as positive feedback draws the asset to the center of the community, while negative feedback pushes the debt to the edges. Given finance is the value distribution mechanism for the entire community, this is like the heart telling the hands and feet they don’t need so much blood and should work harder for what they do get. The Ancients used debt jubilees to reset this dynamic, but after a few centuries of colonialism and industrialization, the modern economy hasn’t reached the end of its tether. Yet.
Another consequence is that government has been manipulated into being debtor of last resort. While many people complain of government overspending, no one seems to recognize that the capital markets couldn’t function, without the government siphoning up trillions in surplus capital. The secret sauce of capitalism is that public debt backs private wealth.
Eventually, though it will become apparent that blowing up other countries is a poor investment.
The fact is that Capitalism will follow Communism into the dustbin of history, no matter how low they drop interest rates.
Even the billionaires will not likely fair all that well. When the ecosystem collapses, the top predators are more vulnerable than the tiny little creatures in the bushes.
