Comment by jmyeet

> But there is very little value without tools.

Did those tools magically come into existence? Or were they made? Who made them? More workers. Where did the materials come from? More workers.

The point here is that everything we as a society do is so fundamentally interconnected that thousands of people contributed to pulling gold out of a mine, for example, both directly and through the tools that were created to make it possible then why are we concentrating the proceeds of this enterprise onto the capital owner who got a lease from the government (with the threat of violence backing it) just because they wrote a check to fund the operation?

> ... there's a third party in the situation

Yes, more products of labor.

> I can't buy "the worker deserves it all"

I don't believe you intended it this way but it reads as a false dichotomy.

I don't expect radical change in our economic system. I would be happy to see more cooperatives for housing and manufacturing (like Mondragon). This requires some class consciousness and collective action.

So much of our modern society deifies hyper-individualism. You ever wonder why that is? It's sold as "freedom" but it's really to manipulate you because there's a massive power imbalance between your employer and you. If you withhold work, most likely that employer will be fine. If that employer withholds work, you might end up homeless. The only way to counter that power imbalance is with collective action.

Modern political discourse is dominated by manufactured culture war issues. This isn't new. Post-Civil War there was fear in the South of emancipated slaves and poor white people uniting [1].

To be absolutely clear, I'm not accusing you of racism or similar. My point is to show how this is manufactured to divide workers. Even the idea of the "middle class" is intentionally divisive. Why do the interests of a white-collar (middle class) worker differ from a blue-collar (lower class) worker? Why are we making that distinction?

[1]: https://bittersoutherner.com/from-the-southern-perspective/m...