Learning About Capitalism at Gunther's Garage

by Joe Bageant from Counterpunch. Joe has a very unique style for capturing the gritty realities of working people and does so with love, compassion, humor, and insight. In this article he draws inspiration from talking to a working grunt in his hometown in Virginia and goes on to provide some rather profound insights on the economy and prospects for change. There are so many gems in this article to highlight that it is hard to select just one, but this is my choice:

Defenders of capitalism claim that there can be no real economy, no real material value created by the real people on Main Street, without the financing of Wall Street’s virtual economy. Allegedly, they are so intertwined as to be the same thing, which they are, and that no other way of doings things is possible, which is patently untrue. The storyline goes that without virtual economy financing from Wall Street, without the ever-expanding debt that drives the quest for limitless growth, the world would end.