Quote of the day: Neoliberalism in a nutshell

From Dr. Gus Bagakis, a retired philosophy instructor at San Francisco State University, writing for Truthout:

The Reagan administration mobilized and promoted a heartless formulation of capitalism: neoliberalism. This was a model based on replacing the state with the market as a way to coordinate the economy. It stood for a world in which human relationships are forced to conform to an ideal of economic competition. The individual is transformed from a citizen into an independent economic actor. Under the regimes of President Reagan in the US and Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in the UK, neoliberalism led to massive tax cuts for the rich, the destruction of trade unions, a growing inequality of wealth, deregulation, privatization, unemployment and the decline of public services — with the exception of prisons and the military-industrial complex.

The main principles of neoliberalism are:

• The rule of the free market around the world from restrictions imposed by government (also known as globalization).
• The cutback of money spent for social services (also known as austerity).
• The reduction of government regulations for everything that could hamper profits.
• The privatization of government ventures leaving wealth in a few private hands.
• The focus on individual responsibility over that of the public good.
• Tax reductions for corporations and the wealthy.

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