Four Autopsies: Late Capitalism a Survival Guide

Thanks to our Patreon members for helping to make this episode possible and we're now available on all the major podcasting platforms. You can find more information at the links below. Good evening ladies and gentlemen and welcome to late capitalism a survival guide four autopsies. So I want to pause having covered governments in two parts all these details all the structures and look at some very concrete examples of how these uh structures impact our lives both personally at the state level at the government level at the financial level at every level so that when we move forward for the rest of the series we have some you know just concrete examples we can get our hands on.

Now, you may not want more examples, which I can understand, and so maybe just skip this episode. But I did want to look at four examples of how this works, how it impacts our lives, and how we might respond to it. Maybe, maybe not. That's definitely an open question.

But for me at least, it's either interesting or I might be obsessed. You make the call. Hopefully, you're interested as well. So, the first example I came up with or encountered on my holiday break was I received a gift card.

Now, this is a very low level, very personal. That's where I wanted to start. And that gift card was $50. A $50 Visa gift card.

So, it looks kind of like a Visa card, but it has just a $50 limit on there. And then I can use that anywhere Visa cards are accepted. Hey, what a great idea. Thank you for the gift, brother-in-law Tim.

Now, when you flip that gift card over, it says, "Hey, Presto, when you activate this card, a $4.95 fee is charged." And I was like, "Well, hello." says $50 on the front and very small print on the back. It says $4.95 fee, which means of course it's functionally a $45 card. And you just think, well, no, no, just pause there for a moment. It's going to get worse, of course, but just pause there for a moment and and think about this.

So, this is a 10% fee. If you if you had just given me a $50 bill, there would be no fees involved. 10% fee just to use the card. So, Visa is 100% ...