Parasitism: the economics of imperialism
Amerika’s economy is like a giant mall. The majority of “workers,” instead of actually producing things, have jobs distributing things. This includes tasks like moving things around, repackaging them, designing advertising campaigns, standing behind cash registers, etc. Inevitably, you have the people whose jobs are to merely account for all these financial and labor transactions, an army of private security guards [and police] and a few people who clean up the mess at the end of the day. This is essentially what Amerika’s service-based economy looks like.
Though Amerikans are engaged in almost exclusively nonproductive busywork, they earn massively inflated wages. While most workers of the world labor for 50 or 60 hours a week under oppressive conditions for about 3 dollars a day, the median yearly income for a full-time Amerikan “worker” over 25 years was $39,336 in 2005. (1) An adult “working” Amerikan pulls in 30 times the world’s median wage. Plus, Amerikans often “work” less, enjoy paid vacations, shorter hours and better “working” conditions. The result is that most Amerikans have a substantial amount of time and money to use as they please.
With the extra money from their inflated wages, Amerikans consume in the most frivolous ways. More importantly, in doing so, they return to the giant shopping mall that is their economy. From amerika’s daily shopping spree, a profit for the system is insured and the need for all the security guards, sales people and cooks is fulfilled.
But you can’t have an economy based only on selling things. Commodities don’t just magically appear. People need to make them. In the same vein, you can’t have system where everyone is gaining because you need a source for the profit. Behind every overpaid, unproductive Amerikan “worker” there is a mass of productive workers who earn subsistence and sub-subsistence wages. It is from the exploited labor of the Third World that Amerika is able to float this parasitic system. Exploitation of the Third World is what makes possible the inflated wages of the amerikan labor aristocracy.
Amerikan imperialism takes the products created by the exploited labor of the Third World and passes it off to Amerika’s aristocratic “workers.” From here, amerikan “workers” are overpaid to basically tinker around with the products before they are sold. In turn, Amerikan “workers” use their inflated wages to buy these products thus making possible the final realization of profit for the overall system. In this manner, Amerika uses global exploitation to keep its domestic mall economy afloat and enable its existence as an entire nation of parasites.
Notes.
1. http://pubdb3.census.gov/macro/032006/perinc/new03_001.htm
Anti-Imperialism.org 