In the final video from our Capital in a Day series, commemorating the 150th anniversary of Karl Marx’s Das Kapital, Ben Curry looks at the question of accumulation and inequality within capitalism.
In the final video from our Capital in a Day series, commemorating the 150th anniversary of Karl Marx’s Das Kapital, Ben Curry looks at the question of accumulation and inequality within capitalism.
In order to explain these ideas, Ben examines the dynamics of capitalism – of competition and the drive for profit – which lead to (in the words of Marx) “profits accumulating at one pole; and misery accumulating at the other”.
In turn, Ben discusses how capitalism comes into being through the most violent means, “with blood dripping from every pore”, in order to establish the laws of private property and create the working class – those who own nothing but their own labour power.
