General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThe flooded landscape of 21st century capitalism
Some questions from the article:
2) HOW DID capitalist development in Houston make the effects of the storm even worse? Also, there are more than 1,000 people dead in in South Asia--why are the floods like those in Bangladesh, India and Nepal also more deadly?
3) DID GOVERNMENT administrators in Houston know this disaster could happen, but didn't do anything about it because of the cost or pressure from real estate interests?
THE IMPORTANT thing to remember is that this disaster didn't start last week--it happened over decades. That's the real problem.
Last December, there was an article about Houston published by ProPublica and the Texas Tribune called "Boomtown, Floodtown." They document, going back to the 1930s, how flooding has taken place in Houston as a byproduct of development.
To read more:
https://socialistworker.org/2017/09/06/the-flooded-landscape-of-capitalism
Capitalism is all about maximizing profit. If capitalists can avoid the costs of doing business and push those costs on to taxpayers, they will do so. And we will all pay for the externalizing of liabilities in increased spending on disaster relief and remediation.
leftstreet
(36,119 posts)guillaumeb
(42,641 posts)Any unregulated system will allow fro this type of thing. Houston is built on a flood plain and experiences constant large folds. Texas is, in my view, one of the closest things to a Libertarian state that exists in the US.
disalitervisum
(470 posts)in her book, "The Shock Doctrine. Both artificially induced and natural disasters are used to implement unregulated free-market policies. This is what destroyed progressive society in Latin America starting in the 70's with Chile and continuing to this day in the United States.
guillaumeb
(42,641 posts)Klein has a real talent for explaining how things really work.
pansypoo53219
(21,010 posts)guillaumeb
(42,641 posts)All else is superfluous.
socialist_n_TN
(11,481 posts)But then I would.
guillaumeb
(42,641 posts)I find it interesting how workers can defend capitalists. As if there could be any commonality of interest or desires.
socialist_n_TN
(11,481 posts)Convincing workers that they have anything in common with the owners as far as economic interests go.
guillaumeb
(42,641 posts)inevitable workings of capitalism. But they also have the mainstream, corporate owned media on their side in this.
jalan48
(13,915 posts)We need to make a serious change to the current paradigm.
guillaumeb
(42,641 posts)And, as some commenters have observed, this seems to be the cancerous stage of capitalism.