Why poverty reduction under capitalism is a myth
Abandoned row houses in Baltimore, Maryland. Photo by Cranky Messiah/Flickr. From its beginnings, the capitalist economic system produced both critics and celebrants, those who felt victimized a...
Richard D. Wolff
The world economy is changing—the people know, but their leaders don’t
Container vessels at the Yangshan Port, Shanghai, January 2, 2022. Photo courtesy Visual China Group. The year 2020 marked parity between the total GDP of the Group of Seven (the…
Market fundamentalism is an obstacle to social progress
The Bull of Wall Street in the Financial District of Manhattan, New York City. Photo by David Hogan/Flickr. A changing world order, a shrinking US empire, migrations and related demographic…
The economic realities we face at the end of 2022
Photo by Sascha Grosser/Wikimedia Commons Economies around the world were shocked and damaged over the course of 2022. Global capitalism had been brewing conflicts among the major powers (the United…
BRICS: the powerful global alliance
The current set of BRICS leaders, from left to right: Xi Jinping, Vladimir Putin, Jair Bolsonaro, Narendra Modi and Cyril Ramaphosa. Photo courtesy Palácio do Planalto/Flickr. Professor Richard Wolff informs…
A critique of obscene wealth
The obscenely rich have driven economies and societies further from anything remotely resembling a “level playing field,” writes Richard Wolff. Photo by aisletwentytwo/Flickr. Wherever and whenever obscenely rich people existed,…
Global capitalism: The challenge of China
According to University of Massachusetts professor Richard Wolff, China’s rise is unmistakable and one of the most important developments in recent economic history. Photo from iStock. In this month’s lecture…
How capitalism’s dogged defenders and propagandists defend it from criticism
Photo by Jorge Salvador/Unsplash The more victims and critics of capitalism coalesce and thereby strengthen one another, the more that economic system is questioned and challenged. That in turn provokes…
Can progressives save Biden from disastrous economic policies?
Joe Biden at Royal Missionary Baptist Church in Charleston, South Carolina, April 20, 2020. Photo from Flickr. Since the 1970s, US real wages have largely stagnated. After a century of…
Why the Neoliberal Agenda Is a Failure at Fighting Coronavirus
A mural celebrating essential workers during the COVID-19 pandemic. Photo by Nathaniel St. Clair. The utter failure of private capitalism to prepare for the coronavirus should have surprised no one.…
COVID-19 and the Failures of Capitalism
The desperate policies of panic-driven governments involve throwing huge amounts of money at the economies collapsed in response to the coronavirus threat. Monetary authorities create money and lend it at…
This 4th of July: A letter from Richard D. Wolff
On this 4th of July, when Americans think about the nation’s independence, it is partly under dark clouds. The Trump/GOP regime, desperately trying to “make America great again,” has chosen…
Capitalism Becomes Questionable
The depth and length of the global crisis are now clear to millions. In the sixth year since it started in late 2007, no end is in sight. Unemployment rates…