You can't have cutthroat competition when there's no one stopping you from actually cutting each other's throats. In order to build up trust we also have to think about each other's needs and it creates an entirely different dynamic.

What we're already doing is communism. The first step we have to make is to realize that we're already closer to it than we think.

Debt is the most effective way to take a relation of violent subordination and make the victims feel that it's their fault.

Aristotle [would] probably conclude most Americans, for all intents and purposes, are slaves.

If your father is an air-conditioner repairman from Nebraska, its conceivable that you might become a CEO, but you can't imagine being the drama critic for the New York Times. So if you come from a background like that and you want to actually have a career which involves doing something noble in the world, what can you do? You can join the army. That's about it. Or you can work for the church. That explains a lot of the focus of right-wing populism. The right wing figured that out, that people want enough to survive and to do good.

Look at labor policy. What's the point of making everybody work too much? It's not very useful. It is destroying the planet, actually. But it's great at keeping people off the streets.

As it turns out, we don't "all" have to pay our debts. Only some of us do.