Why do capitalists support Trump when his policies will likely destroy the economy?
Why do capitalists support Trump when his policies will likely destroy the economy?
I'm a bit confused why capitalists support Trump when he plans on doing stuff that I think would destroy the economy. Thinking of mass deportations and high, broad tarrifs.
I'm not sure if:
- They just don't care because they have enough wealth to weather anything.
- They don't think Trump will actually do these things.
- They're dumb and think it won't hurt the economy.
- They plan on trading wealth for more direct power. I.e. becoming oligarchs.
- They have other ideologies (racism, Ayn Rand-ism, accelerationism, Dark Enlightenment, etc) that they prioritize higher than obtaining as much wealth as possible.
Or maybe some combination of the above, or something else entirely.
Edit: by "capitalists," I mean the "elite" like Musk and his other billionaire donors. But I guess it's a good question for smaller donors as well.
- The poor and middle class are stupid. Inflation got out of hand all over the world and profits went up faster than they did under Trump because companies were screwing us.
- Businesses will be overall happy with the new regime because they can ignore more regs (better margins), fire workers more easily, merge and buyout competitors easier, and take advantage of more slave (i.e. prison) labor.
Anything bad that happens will either be framed as Bidens fault or the price of getting our finances in order.
Why did many powerful and rich people support Brexit? Crises shake up existing ownership structures, e.g. people sell houses and companies for lower than usual to cover rising costs. If your investments are spread out globally, you'll be able to invest at these cheap low points, giving you a massive boost once the economy comes back.
Just look at home ownership since the mortgage crisis - so much wealth was transferred up, and it happens again and again.
It's a two stage solution to today's existing corruption and problems.
- Break everything to expose the rot
- Break it again to make sure it stays broken
“Chaos is a ladder”
A lot of them are motivated by power more than anything else. They want to feel superior and get off on the misery of others. They'd rather have a bigger slice of a smaller cake, even if the smaller slice of the bigger cake would be objectively larger.
More or less, a mix depending on which part of his base you're referring to. For his wealthy campaign backers, most likely point 4.
Because it's a matter of power to them first and foremost, the capital class will tolerate the economy crashing as long as it hurts you more than it hurts them. If anything, the economy crashing (so long as we don't see total collapse) merely presents an opportunity to buy up the remaining pieces to add into their portfolios.
We already have a precedent of "too big to fail", so Congress will just bail out the largest players anyways to all-but ensure this is the way things end up going.
They'll grift their own winnings
All of the above.
Another one is that they think they can manipulate or bribe him into exempting their interests or targeting their competitors.
There's also the true believers who fell deep into the cult and accept whatever Trump says as their current truth so economics isn't really a consideration for them now.
I do think most of them don't really believe him yet and won't until he actually starts implementing the tariffs and rounding up immigrants. Then we get to watch them freak out while the economy crashes yet again.
Good money is on stupid.
The 6 bankruptcies behind the “successful businessman” is in fine print.
Most don't, its just the idiots or people that already have enough money and don't make much more.