"In the wake of the 1929 economic collapse, the Ro

"In the wake of the 1929 economic collapse, the Roosevelt administration was able to pass a broad program of government oversight and regulation of business practices. There followed forty years of unprecedented growth and the rise of an American middle class, the first time in history that any economic system had supported a majority of its citizens in comfort and security. But in 1980 began the Reagan backlash, deregulation, and the return of unbridled economic competition. Capitalism became predatory, the middle class began to shrink, business cycles deepened, and a growing rift now separates a wealthy elite from the struggling majority. There have been three major stock market crashes in the thirty years since deregulation, each followed by painful unemployment and economic stagnation. Without regulation, competition becomes destructive. The idea that stability and a broad prosperity can emerge from pure competition is thoroughly discredited in practice, but it is a useful myth for the 1 percent who profit mightily when there are no rules and no regulators. If they told the truth about their motives, the rapacious corporate giants could never sell deregulation to an enlightened democracy. So they promote the dogma of a “free market,” not because they believe in this or any ideology but because it supports the freedom of the largest and the strongest to pillage everyone else." -JM, DS