Portal:Capitalism

The Capitalism Portal

Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and its use for the purpose of obtaining profit. This socioeconomic system has developed historically in several stages and is defined by a number of constituent elements: private property, profit motive, capital accumulation, competitive markets, commodification, wage labor, and an emphasis on innovation and economic growth. Capitalist economies tend to experience business cycles of economic expansion followed by recessions.

Economists, historians, political economists, and sociologists have adopted different perspectives in their analyses of capitalism and have recognized various forms of it in practice. These include laissez-faire capitalism, free-market capitalism, state capitalism, and welfare capitalism. Different forms of capitalism feature varying degrees of free markets, public ownership, barriers to free competition, and state-sanctioned social policies. The degree of competition in markets, the role of intervention and regulation, and the scope of state ownership vary across different models of capitalism. The extent to which markets are free and the rules defining private property are matters of politics and policy. Most of the existing economies in the world today are mixed economies that combine elements of free markets with state intervention and, in some cases, economic planning.

Capitalism in its modern form emerged from agrarianism in England, as well as from mercantilist practices in European countries between the 16th and 18th centuries. The Industrial Revolution of the 18th century established capitalism as a dominant mode of production characterized by factory work and a complex division of labor. Through globalization, capitalism spread across the world in the 19th and 20th centuries, especially before World War I and again after the end of the Cold War. During the 19th century, capitalism was largely unregulated by the state but became more regulated in the post–World War II period through Keynesianism, followed by a return of more unregulated capitalism termed neoliberalism starting in the 1980s. (Full article...)

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Towards the late 1970s, Hong Kong became established as a major entrepôt between the world and China. The city has developed into a major global trade hub and financial centre, and is regarded as a world city and one of the eight Alpha+ cities. It ranked fifth on the 2014 Global Cities Index after New York City, London, Tokyo and Paris. The city has one of the highest per capita incomes in the world, and the most severe income inequality among the advanced economies. It has a high Human Development Index and is ranked highly in the Global Competitiveness Report. Hong Kong is the third most important financial centre after New York and London. The service economy, characterised by low taxation and free trade, has been regarded as one of the world's most laissez-faire economic policies, and the currency, the Hong Kong dollar, is the 13th most traded currency in the world. (Full article...)

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Karl Hess (born Carl Hess III; May 25, 1923 – April 22, 1994) was an American speechwriter and author. He was also a political philosopher, editor, welder, motorcycle racer, tax resister, and libertarian activist. His career included stints on the Republican right and the New Left before embracing a mix of left-libertarianism and laissez-faire anarcho-capitalism, a term which is attested earliest in his 1969 essay "The Death of Politics". Later in life, he summed up his role in the economy by remarking "I am by occupation a free marketer (crafts and ideas, woodworking, welding, and writing)." (Full article...)

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“

The most melancholy feature in all the disputes between labour and capital is that it is scarcely ever capital that succeeds in breaking down the price of labour, but, alas, it is labour which stabs labour. Look around you and see labour working for 10, 20 and even 30 per cent, less in some mills, and at Johnstown and Harrisburg for less than one-half what we pay for skilled labour in this district; and then in your hearts blame not capital, but consider employers who regret those reductions in wages, who stand out against them and run for years at higher prices, as the best friends of labour, even although at last they must frankly confess that if they are to give their men steady employment and save their capital and works, they are forced to ask them to work at the rates obtained by their competitors. The first employer who reduces labour is labour's enemy; but the last employer to reduce labour may be labour's staunchest friend. The fatal enemy of labour is labour, not capital.

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— Andrew Carnegie (1835 – 1919)
The Empire of Business , 1902

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General images

The following are images from various capitalism-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1The subscription room at Lloyd's of London in the early 19th century (from Capitalism)
Image 2The Rothschild family revolutionised international finance. The Frankfurt terminus of the Taunus Railway was financed by the Rothschilds and opened in 1840 as one of Germany's first railways. (from History of capitalism)
Image 3Cosimo de' Medici (pictured in a 16th-century portrait by Pontormo) built an international financial empire and was one of the first Medici bankers. (from Capitalism)
Image 4A caricature inspired by the myth of Sisyphus to denounce child labor in capitalism, c. 1913 (from Capitalism)
Image 5The Industrial Workers of the World poster "Pyramid of Capitalist System" (1911) (from Capitalism)
Image 6The gold standard formed the financial basis of the international economy from 1870 to 1914. (from Capitalism)
Image 7The New York Stock Exchange (from History of capitalism)
Image 8Augsburg, the centre of early capitalism (from Capitalism)
Image 9The Anglo-Dutch Wars were fought between the English and the Dutch for control over the seas and trade routes. (from History of capitalism)
Image 10Robert Clive with the Nawabs of Bengal after the Battle of Plassey which began the British rule in Bengal (from Capitalism)
Image 11Sir Josiah Child, an influential proponent of mercantilism. Painting attributed to John Riley. (from History of capitalism)
Image 12Map of a medieval manor. Notice the large commons area and the division of land into small strips. The mustard-colored areas are part of the demesne, the hatched areas part of the glebe.
William R. Shepherd, Historical Atlas, 01923 (from History of capitalism)
Image 13A painting of a French seaport from 1638 at the height of mercantilism (from Capitalism)
Image 1419th-century Great Britain become the first global economic superpower, because of superior manufacturing technology and improved global communications such as steamships and railroads. (from History of capitalism)
Image 15The Watt steam engine, fuelled primarily by coal, propelled the Industrial Revolution in Britain. (from Capitalism)
Image 16The gold standard formed the financial basis of the international economy from 1870 to 1914. (from History of capitalism)
Image 17The New York stock exchange traders' floor (1963) (from History of capitalism)
Image 18The city of Genoa, one of the birthplaces of capitalism (from History of capitalism)
Image 19Gustave Doré's 19th-century engraving depicted the dirty, overcrowded slums where the industrial workers of London lived. (from History of capitalism)
Image 20Portrait of traders at the Børsen, Copenhagen (Peder Severin Krøyer, 1895) (from History of capitalism)
Image 21The New York stock exchange traders' floor (1963) (from Capitalism)
Image 22British East India Company 1801 (from History of capitalism)
Image 23The Spinning mule, built by the inventor Samuel Crompton (from History of capitalism)
Image 24Decaying hedges mark the lines of the straight field boundaries created by an inclosure act. (from History of capitalism)
Image 25An industrial worker among heavy steel machine parts (Kinex Bearings, Bytča, Slovakia, c. 1995–2000) (from Capitalism)

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Did you know

... that rational egoism is the idea that it is always in accordance with reason to pursue one's own interest, used by Ayn Rand as the rationale behind objectivism?
... that in the 16th century people convicted of sedition had their ears nailed to the pillory in Norwich Market, and when their pillory time was completed their ears were cut off?
... that the economy of Tolkien's Middle-earth has been described as a mix of feudalism and capitalism, with one scholar even suggesting it had communist elements?