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Its a very interesting topic and both of our points are correct in some sense. From what I've learned, protestantism enhanced American capitalism, rather than all global capitalism, by instilling an ethic of hard work and individual savings. That is why class mobility was actually more likely for white male workers at the turn of the 19th century than it is today. Also, with a protestant work ethic that instilled hard work and created all sorts of mythologies about laziness, particularly attributed to africans in america, capitalists had a labour pool that was ready to produce goods for them at unprecedented rates while having to pay out next to nothing. It was an ethic of working hard and producing in the present in order to be rewarded in the afterlife. Also, with that hard work was also a culture of thriftiness among the working class where spending and consuming for the sake of consuming was considered irresponsible and sinful. So, for capitalists this mode of thinking was to their benefit because they could get more output from workers. The culture of thrift, however, led to two major economic crises by the 1880s and 1920s where capitalists were overproducing while workers were reluctant to consume. That wasn't the only reason for the crisis but in the 1920s, for the first time in US history, the government involved itself in issues regarding consumption in order to raise demands for ever increasing levels of production. In 1921, before he became president, Herbert Hoover established and served as the head of the Commerce Department. From that point on consumption came to mean something completely different in America and in the world.
******************************************** "If you think you're too small to make a difference, try sleeping in a closed room with a mosquito."
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