1
00:00:06,931 --> 00:00:08,862
Narrator: Dover.

2
00:00:08,965 --> 00:00:10,931
The most dangerous man
in Europe

3
00:00:11,034 --> 00:00:13,758
is about to arrive
on Britain's shores.

4
00:00:16,620 --> 00:00:18,482
His preachings
are so incendiary,

5
00:00:18,586 --> 00:00:21,068
he's been forced out
of his native country.

6
00:00:27,206 --> 00:00:29,586
Only liberal Britain
will tolerate his presence

7
00:00:29,689 --> 00:00:31,241
on her soil.

8
00:00:32,896 --> 00:00:36,206
He heads to London,
to live in exile.

9
00:00:36,310 --> 00:00:38,551
The year is 1849.

10
00:00:42,482 --> 00:00:44,931
And the man is Karl Marx.

11
00:00:45,034 --> 00:00:47,689
Incredibly, this most dangerous
of thinkers might offer the key

12
00:00:47,793 --> 00:00:50,344
to understanding the mess
we're in today.

13
00:00:54,620 --> 00:00:57,275
Most people know Marx
as the father of communism.

14
00:00:58,379 --> 00:01:00,241
You might be surprised to hear

15
00:01:00,344 --> 00:01:04,551
that most of what he wrote
was about capitalism.

16
00:01:04,655 --> 00:01:07,034
And today, his ideas about that
are being taken seriously

17
00:01:07,137 --> 00:01:09,310
right at the heart
of global business.

18
00:01:09,413 --> 00:01:11,448
[indistinct clamouring]

19
00:01:11,551 --> 00:01:14,103
- His analysis
was pretty on the button

20
00:01:14,206 --> 00:01:15,724
and explains a lot,
I think,

21
00:01:15,827 --> 00:01:18,068
about some of the things
that we see going on

22
00:01:18,172 --> 00:01:19,827
around in our economy today.

23
00:01:20,965 --> 00:01:22,655
Narrator: For Marx,
the best argument

24
00:01:22,758 --> 00:01:25,344
against capitalism was that
it was inherently unfair.

25
00:01:26,448 --> 00:01:27,448
His ideas on inequality

26
00:01:27,551 --> 00:01:29,724
have more resonance than ever,
today.

27
00:01:31,448 --> 00:01:33,344
- What Marx did do

28
00:01:33,448 --> 00:01:36,379
is to install
this sense of urgency -

29
00:01:36,482 --> 00:01:39,206
things cannot go on forever

30
00:01:39,310 --> 00:01:41,344
the way they are.

31
00:01:41,448 --> 00:01:43,379
Narrator: In this series,
we'll explore the lives

32
00:01:43,482 --> 00:01:45,000
and revolutionary thinking

33
00:01:45,103 --> 00:01:46,793
of three extraordinary men,

34
00:01:48,724 --> 00:01:50,620
John Maynard Keynes,

35
00:01:50,724 --> 00:01:52,241
Friedrich Hayek

36
00:01:52,344 --> 00:01:53,827
and Karl Marx.

37
00:01:55,241 --> 00:01:57,517
Their worlds were changing
as never before.

38
00:01:57,620 --> 00:01:59,551
They saw
that the fate of nations

39
00:01:59,655 --> 00:02:01,724
would hang
on the power of money.

40
00:02:01,827 --> 00:02:03,448
And they had
radically different ideas

41
00:02:03,551 --> 00:02:05,206
about how to control it.

42
00:02:07,413 --> 00:02:11,344
Today, the stakes
could hardly be higher.

43
00:02:11,448 --> 00:02:14,034
Of all the great thinkers
who analysed capitalism,

44
00:02:14,137 --> 00:02:16,758
Marx had the most radical advice
of all.

45
00:02:16,862 --> 00:02:18,206
Get rid of it.

46
00:02:31,413 --> 00:02:33,344
Narrator: In 1989,

47
00:02:33,448 --> 00:02:36,206
Karl Marx's reputation
lay in ruins.

48
00:02:38,655 --> 00:02:39,586
For most of us,

49
00:02:39,689 --> 00:02:40,896
the fall of the Berlin Wall

50
00:02:41,000 --> 00:02:43,206
meant the end of Marx.

51
00:02:43,310 --> 00:02:45,034
Millions rejected the horrors

52
00:02:45,137 --> 00:02:48,517
of a violent and repressive
police state.

53
00:02:49,758 --> 00:02:51,172
And because
the communist countries

54
00:02:51,275 --> 00:02:53,344
claimed Marx
as their inspiration,

55
00:02:53,448 --> 00:02:56,137
his ideas were cast aside,
as well.

56
00:02:58,310 --> 00:03:01,586
Marx became associated
with communism.

57
00:03:01,689 --> 00:03:03,551
Indelibly associated
with communism.

58
00:03:03,655 --> 00:03:06,137
And indelibly associated
with communist regimes,

59
00:03:06,241 --> 00:03:09,620
because these regimes
did their work

60
00:03:09,724 --> 00:03:11,310
in the name of Marx.

61
00:03:11,413 --> 00:03:14,310
So the association
was very, very powerful.

62
00:03:14,413 --> 00:03:15,379
In fact,

63
00:03:15,482 --> 00:03:17,448
it was they
who were claiming Marx

64
00:03:17,551 --> 00:03:19,862
rather than Marx,
as it were, claiming them.

65
00:03:22,413 --> 00:03:23,586
Narrator:
But in the last few years,

66
00:03:23,689 --> 00:03:24,793
something strange has happened.

67
00:03:24,896 --> 00:03:26,827
It's like
the global financial crisis

68
00:03:26,931 --> 00:03:30,310
has brought Karl Marx
back from the dead.

69
00:03:30,413 --> 00:03:32,551
Now, we still don't care
what he said about communism,

70
00:03:32,655 --> 00:03:36,517
but people are going back to see
what he said about capitalism.

71
00:03:36,620 --> 00:03:38,482
All its deep-seated flaws,

72
00:03:38,586 --> 00:03:40,241
with a nagging doubt.

73
00:03:40,344 --> 00:03:42,448
Is it all, now, coming true?

74
00:03:48,275 --> 00:03:49,413
When times were good,

75
00:03:49,517 --> 00:03:51,655
Marx was nowhere.

76
00:03:51,758 --> 00:03:54,586
But now the Western economies
are in crisis,

77
00:03:54,689 --> 00:03:56,379
he's attracting new interest,

78
00:03:56,482 --> 00:03:59,034
right at the heart
of the economic establishment.

79
00:04:00,344 --> 00:04:03,344
From a former IMF
chief economist...

80
00:04:03,448 --> 00:04:06,482
- Marx is right
on a number of dimensions.

81
00:04:07,620 --> 00:04:09,413
He certainly is right

82
00:04:10,448 --> 00:04:12,000
that income inequality

83
00:04:12,103 --> 00:04:15,000
can be a source
of tremendous tension.

84
00:04:15,103 --> 00:04:18,655
Narrator: ..to the man who saw
the 2008 crisis coming...

85
00:04:18,758 --> 00:04:21,172
- He understood
that there are situations

86
00:04:21,275 --> 00:04:24,862
in which capitalism
and globalisation

87
00:04:24,965 --> 00:04:28,344
can lead to economic crisis.

88
00:04:29,620 --> 00:04:31,034
Narrator: ..and an economist
at one

89
00:04:31,137 --> 00:04:32,724
of the world's leading banks.

90
00:04:32,827 --> 00:04:34,241
- It's quite hard
to convince people

91
00:04:34,344 --> 00:04:35,689
who live in Chelsea
or Chelmsford

92
00:04:35,793 --> 00:04:38,000
that this is
of great relevance to them,

93
00:04:38,103 --> 00:04:40,379
but, actually,
it's worth a bash.

94
00:04:43,448 --> 00:04:45,137
Narrator: Marx's key insight

95
00:04:45,241 --> 00:04:48,103
was that capitalism
was inherently unstable.

96
00:04:48,206 --> 00:04:51,275
He said we'd lurch
from crisis to crisis,

97
00:04:51,379 --> 00:04:53,827
and that society would become
increasingly unequal.

98
00:04:58,413 --> 00:05:02,931
Marx divided the world
into bosses and workers.

99
00:05:03,034 --> 00:05:05,482
For him, they would always
be at odds,

100
00:05:05,586 --> 00:05:08,758
and that battle
was a recipe for crises.

101
00:05:11,172 --> 00:05:15,517
To make profit, bosses squeeze
what they pay workers.

102
00:05:15,620 --> 00:05:16,758
The crisis comes

103
00:05:16,862 --> 00:05:18,862
when workers
then don't have enough money

104
00:05:18,965 --> 00:05:22,206
to buy what bosses
are trying to sell them.

105
00:05:22,310 --> 00:05:23,793
For decades after World War II,

106
00:05:23,896 --> 00:05:26,448
all of that
looked completely wrong.

107
00:05:26,551 --> 00:05:28,551
We'd had years of stable growth,

108
00:05:28,655 --> 00:05:32,172
and workers were taking
a larger share of the pie.

109
00:05:32,275 --> 00:05:33,965
But not anymore.

110
00:05:36,137 --> 00:05:38,896
- Marx would explain this crisis
in terms of the fact

111
00:05:39,000 --> 00:05:40,620
that ordinary people

112
00:05:40,724 --> 00:05:42,206
haven't got enough money
to spend.

113
00:05:42,310 --> 00:05:44,103
Why have they got enough money
to spend?

114
00:05:44,206 --> 00:05:46,068
Because there's been
a big redistribution,

115
00:05:46,172 --> 00:05:48,275
over the last few decades,

116
00:05:48,379 --> 00:05:50,344
away from ordinary people

117
00:05:50,448 --> 00:05:52,758
towards capital, towards wealth.

118
00:05:56,413 --> 00:05:59,620
Narrator: And for Marx,
there's no turning back.

119
00:06:00,931 --> 00:06:04,275
Capitalism would produce
bigger and bigger crises

120
00:06:04,379 --> 00:06:05,965
and then, it would collapse.

121
00:06:10,379 --> 00:06:12,344
- Marx had
a very simple formulation

122
00:06:12,448 --> 00:06:13,827
about crises,

123
00:06:13,931 --> 00:06:16,551
which is
that they are manifestations

124
00:06:16,655 --> 00:06:18,689
of the fundamental flaws,

125
00:06:18,793 --> 00:06:20,517
or contradictions,
as he called them,

126
00:06:20,620 --> 00:06:22,103
of capitalism.

127
00:06:22,206 --> 00:06:26,344
How would Marx have suggested
solving the crisis

128
00:06:26,448 --> 00:06:30,241
is, of course,
by abolishing capitalism.

129
00:06:30,344 --> 00:06:32,448
Narrator:
To understand the Marxist view

130
00:06:32,551 --> 00:06:33,724
of the mess we're in,

131
00:06:33,827 --> 00:06:35,827
we first have to see
the world today

132
00:06:35,931 --> 00:06:37,931
as Marx might have seen it.

133
00:06:43,310 --> 00:06:46,310
Capitalism's
most implacable critic was born

134
00:06:46,413 --> 00:06:49,137
in the picture-postcard town
of Trier,

135
00:06:49,241 --> 00:06:51,689
in what is now
Southwest Germany.

136
00:06:51,793 --> 00:06:54,517
- Marx comes across
as a young man,

137
00:06:54,620 --> 00:06:58,034
as this, sort of, energetic,

138
00:06:58,137 --> 00:07:00,724
fiery, hairy figure.

139
00:07:00,827 --> 00:07:03,827
He was known as 'The Wild Boar'
or 'The Maw',

140
00:07:03,931 --> 00:07:07,068
which sort of points to
his sort of Levantine complex.

141
00:07:07,172 --> 00:07:10,000
He was full of ideas,
he was full of debate.

142
00:07:10,103 --> 00:07:12,034
He liked big drinking sessions

143
00:07:12,137 --> 00:07:13,827
and then
deep philosophical debate

144
00:07:13,931 --> 00:07:18,034
about the nature of Christ
and German Romanticism

145
00:07:18,137 --> 00:07:19,758
and politics.

146
00:07:19,862 --> 00:07:21,965
Narrator: As he studied,
Marx came to believe

147
00:07:22,068 --> 00:07:23,586
the world was sharply divided

148
00:07:23,689 --> 00:07:26,310
into those who own
the means of production,

149
00:07:26,413 --> 00:07:27,344
the capitalists,

150
00:07:27,448 --> 00:07:30,689
and those who owned nothing,
the workers.

151
00:07:30,793 --> 00:07:32,413
The conflict
between these two groups,

152
00:07:32,517 --> 00:07:36,793
for Marx,
shapes how society works.

153
00:07:36,896 --> 00:07:38,724
- The foundations
of Marx's thinking

154
00:07:38,827 --> 00:07:40,413
was materialism.

155
00:07:40,517 --> 00:07:42,655
That when you cut away religion,

156
00:07:42,758 --> 00:07:44,931
ideology, politics,
at its root

157
00:07:45,034 --> 00:07:47,931
were the material relations
between man.

158
00:07:48,034 --> 00:07:49,793
The need for food,

159
00:07:49,896 --> 00:07:52,206
the need to have a roof
over your head,

160
00:07:52,310 --> 00:07:56,586
this is what ultimately drives
so much of human interaction.

161
00:07:56,689 --> 00:07:59,310
- What was unique in Marx,

162
00:07:59,413 --> 00:08:04,344
he didn't see economy
just as a special sphere.

163
00:08:04,448 --> 00:08:08,344
He saw economy
as the structuring principle

164
00:08:08,448 --> 00:08:11,379
of the entire social totality.

165
00:08:11,482 --> 00:08:14,689
And, so that what happens
in economy,

166
00:08:14,793 --> 00:08:17,896
the way it structures
our ideologies and so on,

167
00:08:18,000 --> 00:08:21,448
this, again,
is another lesson today.

168
00:08:21,551 --> 00:08:24,448
Maybe even more pertinent

169
00:08:24,551 --> 00:08:27,310
than in the time of,
times of Marx.

170
00:08:30,275 --> 00:08:33,172
Narrator: We might see
a complex modern economy,

171
00:08:33,275 --> 00:08:34,896
which all of us have a stake in,

172
00:08:35,000 --> 00:08:36,482
but Marxists would say

173
00:08:36,586 --> 00:08:38,931
the same old rules still apply.

174
00:08:39,034 --> 00:08:41,620
For them, the divided society
Marx saw

175
00:08:41,724 --> 00:08:44,413
is still, broadly, here today.

176
00:08:44,517 --> 00:08:47,689
They see workers
still slaving away.

177
00:08:48,724 --> 00:08:50,000
And capitalists,

178
00:08:50,103 --> 00:08:51,172
or bourgeoisie,

179
00:08:51,275 --> 00:08:52,758
still exploiting them,

180
00:08:52,862 --> 00:08:55,413
always striving
to make more profit.

181
00:08:56,448 --> 00:08:57,586
In Marx's world,

182
00:08:57,689 --> 00:09:00,034
any capitalist that doesn't seek
maximum profit

183
00:09:00,137 --> 00:09:02,275
is soon replaced
by one who does.

184
00:09:05,620 --> 00:09:09,241
So, the system follows
a completely predictable course,

185
00:09:09,344 --> 00:09:12,413
he would say,
to its own destruction.

186
00:09:12,517 --> 00:09:15,241
It's not an idea
that many people accept.

187
00:09:17,034 --> 00:09:18,448
- He was completely wrong.

188
00:09:18,551 --> 00:09:20,137
Including the idea

189
00:09:20,241 --> 00:09:22,862
that capitalism
was merely a phase,

190
00:09:22,965 --> 00:09:24,379
and contained within it

191
00:09:24,482 --> 00:09:26,275
the seeds
of its own destruction.

192
00:09:26,379 --> 00:09:27,758
That's not the case.

193
00:09:27,862 --> 00:09:29,724
Well, everything
is bound to collapse

194
00:09:29,827 --> 00:09:30,862
if you wait long enough.

195
00:09:30,965 --> 00:09:33,241
I mean, the Earth's going to,
you know,

196
00:09:33,344 --> 00:09:35,758
be sucked into the sun, someday.
[chuckles]

197
00:09:35,862 --> 00:09:37,586
And, of course,
what we're really talking about

198
00:09:37,689 --> 00:09:38,965
when we talk about capitalism,

199
00:09:39,068 --> 00:09:41,931
is individual liberty
and property rights.

200
00:09:43,068 --> 00:09:44,379
Could those come to an end?

201
00:09:44,482 --> 00:09:47,000
Well, they have in places.
It's possible,

202
00:09:47,103 --> 00:09:48,689
but I'm not seeing
any signs of it.

203
00:09:50,206 --> 00:09:51,586
Narrator: You'd be forgiven
for thinking

204
00:09:51,689 --> 00:09:53,758
the total collapse
of capitalism

205
00:09:53,862 --> 00:09:56,000
sounds a little implausible.

206
00:09:57,586 --> 00:09:58,586
How could seeking profit

207
00:09:58,689 --> 00:10:00,241
be so disastrous,

208
00:10:00,344 --> 00:10:02,310
when it's done
such amazing things?

209
00:10:05,551 --> 00:10:08,448
Just look at how we eat,
under capitalism.

210
00:10:10,793 --> 00:10:15,137
We get fresh fruit flown in
from all over the world.

211
00:10:15,241 --> 00:10:18,344
We can choose from 700 types
of breakfast cereal.

212
00:10:19,379 --> 00:10:20,517
We have enough of it,

213
00:10:20,620 --> 00:10:22,413
and it's all safe to eat.

214
00:10:24,275 --> 00:10:25,758
This incredible plenty,

215
00:10:25,862 --> 00:10:27,896
and the technology
it depends on,

216
00:10:28,000 --> 00:10:29,586
didn't come from the state.

217
00:10:29,689 --> 00:10:30,793
It's what happens

218
00:10:30,896 --> 00:10:33,482
when you let capitalists
compete for profit.

219
00:10:35,137 --> 00:10:37,068
They didn't do it
for our benefit,

220
00:10:37,172 --> 00:10:39,482
they did it
because it made them rich.

221
00:10:41,448 --> 00:10:43,275
So, at first glance,
Marx's idea

222
00:10:43,379 --> 00:10:45,896
that capitalism's search
for profit

223
00:10:46,000 --> 00:10:48,931
would be its downfall,
sounds absurd.

224
00:10:49,034 --> 00:10:51,724
- Profit may often sound venal,
it may often sound wrong,

225
00:10:51,827 --> 00:10:54,000
but it is
what pushes progress ahead.

226
00:10:54,103 --> 00:10:56,862
Profit is actually what
drives the world forward.

227
00:10:56,965 --> 00:10:59,448
And that's what Marx
could never quite handle.

228
00:10:59,551 --> 00:11:01,448
The profit motive is essential.

229
00:11:01,551 --> 00:11:03,379
I mean, after all,
what is the profit motive

230
00:11:03,482 --> 00:11:06,965
if it's just a way of achieving

231
00:11:07,068 --> 00:11:08,275
a better society,

232
00:11:08,379 --> 00:11:11,896
by people wanting to better
their own individual lot?

233
00:11:12,000 --> 00:11:13,379
In terms of economics,

234
00:11:13,482 --> 00:11:15,551
Marxism is not
very much used today,

235
00:11:15,655 --> 00:11:18,482
and that's because he was wrong
on several of the fundamentals.

236
00:11:18,586 --> 00:11:21,310
And if you erect a building
on cracked foundations,

237
00:11:21,413 --> 00:11:23,551
the building, itself,
is cracked.

238
00:11:27,068 --> 00:11:28,965
Narrator: When you think of how,
fundamentally,

239
00:11:29,068 --> 00:11:32,379
the profit motive has shaped
and enriched our world,

240
00:11:32,482 --> 00:11:35,103
it's no wonder
Marx fell out of favour.

241
00:11:35,206 --> 00:11:38,241
But we shouldn't dismiss Dr Marx
quite yet.

242
00:11:38,344 --> 00:11:39,931
It's true, he talked quite a lot

243
00:11:40,034 --> 00:11:42,137
about class exploitation,

244
00:11:42,241 --> 00:11:44,241
misery, chaos.

245
00:11:44,344 --> 00:11:46,517
But he didn't think capitalism
was all bad.

246
00:11:46,620 --> 00:11:47,965
Far from it.

247
00:11:52,068 --> 00:11:54,275
This cocktail bar
in London's Soho

248
00:11:54,379 --> 00:11:56,448
hides a revolutionary past.

249
00:11:58,827 --> 00:12:00,896
It used to be The Red Lion Pub,

250
00:12:01,000 --> 00:12:04,517
site of a clandestine meeting
of communists in 1847

251
00:12:04,620 --> 00:12:06,689
that would echo down the ages.

252
00:12:11,896 --> 00:12:13,758
It was at that meeting
that they commissioned

253
00:12:13,862 --> 00:12:16,620
Karl Marx and his sidekick,
Friedrich Engels,

254
00:12:16,724 --> 00:12:18,689
to write one
of the most incendiary pamphlets

255
00:12:18,793 --> 00:12:19,965
of all time,

256
00:12:20,068 --> 00:12:22,758
'The Communist Manifesto'.

257
00:12:22,862 --> 00:12:24,862
It goes through
a number of drafts.

258
00:12:24,965 --> 00:12:28,137
Engels is the key drafter
on the texts,

259
00:12:28,241 --> 00:12:31,068
but then Marx takes it away,

260
00:12:31,172 --> 00:12:32,517
and in a sort of, you know,

261
00:12:32,620 --> 00:12:34,379
massive essay crisis style,

262
00:12:34,482 --> 00:12:37,137
just sits down
and writes the thing.

263
00:12:37,241 --> 00:12:38,689
And that's the beauty of it.

264
00:12:38,793 --> 00:12:41,586
Because it might have been
organised by a committee,

265
00:12:41,689 --> 00:12:43,379
but it's written by one man.

266
00:12:43,482 --> 00:12:45,965
And that energy, that brio,
that passion

267
00:12:46,068 --> 00:12:48,034
which is in the manifesto,
comes from the fact

268
00:12:48,137 --> 00:12:50,655
it has a single author
in the final stages,

269
00:12:50,758 --> 00:12:51,862
which is Marx.

270
00:12:56,793 --> 00:12:58,655
Narrator: You may know it
for its revolutionary calls

271
00:12:58,758 --> 00:13:00,724
for a new age.

272
00:13:00,827 --> 00:13:03,172
What might surprise you
is that it also contains

273
00:13:03,275 --> 00:13:07,103
very perceptive and admiring
writing about capitalism.

274
00:13:09,172 --> 00:13:11,448
I think what's surprising
of a lot of Marx's writing

275
00:13:11,551 --> 00:13:13,896
is that you find,
in amongst the communism,

276
00:13:14,000 --> 00:13:16,620
a lot of good analysis
of capitalism.

277
00:13:16,724 --> 00:13:19,275
And, actually,
you also find within it

278
00:13:19,379 --> 00:13:21,724
quite a lot of praise
for capitalism.

279
00:13:21,827 --> 00:13:24,413
Marx's attitude
towards capitalism

280
00:13:24,517 --> 00:13:27,482
is basically ambiguous.

281
00:13:27,586 --> 00:13:30,137
At the same time,
he was honest here, Marx.

282
00:13:30,241 --> 00:13:31,482
Ultra-fascinated.

283
00:13:31,586 --> 00:13:32,862
He was fully aware that this

284
00:13:32,965 --> 00:13:36,310
is the most productive,
dynamic system

285
00:13:36,413 --> 00:13:38,241
in the history of humanity,
and so on.

286
00:13:38,344 --> 00:13:42,000
He praises it
for its huge force,

287
00:13:42,103 --> 00:13:44,931
for, as far as he can see it,
for progress.

288
00:13:45,034 --> 00:13:48,172
For tossing aside the traditions
and the customs of the old world

289
00:13:48,275 --> 00:13:50,413
and making way for a new one.

290
00:13:50,517 --> 00:13:52,758
And I think
it's quite interesting

291
00:13:52,862 --> 00:13:54,448
the more intelligent
modern Marxists

292
00:13:54,551 --> 00:13:56,000
feel much the same way.

293
00:13:58,172 --> 00:14:00,172
Narrator: The truth is,
Marx did understand

294
00:14:00,275 --> 00:14:01,724
that the drive for profit

295
00:14:01,827 --> 00:14:04,068
would achieve incredible things.

296
00:14:07,068 --> 00:14:08,275
It's been the first to show

297
00:14:08,379 --> 00:14:10,793
what man's activity
can bring about.

298
00:14:10,896 --> 00:14:13,172
It has accomplished wonders
far surpassing

299
00:14:13,275 --> 00:14:14,517
Egyptian pyramids,

300
00:14:14,620 --> 00:14:15,620
Roman aqueducts

301
00:14:15,724 --> 00:14:17,655
and Gothic cathedrals.

302
00:14:24,103 --> 00:14:26,137
- He did really get
the kind of global aspect.

303
00:14:26,241 --> 00:14:27,827
He got the idea that

304
00:14:27,931 --> 00:14:29,655
people were suddenly being able
to get things

305
00:14:29,758 --> 00:14:30,862
from all the way
around the world,

306
00:14:30,965 --> 00:14:34,241
in a completely new way,
and the impact of that.

307
00:14:34,344 --> 00:14:36,034
Narrator: The need
of a constantly expanding market

308
00:14:36,137 --> 00:14:37,034
for its products

309
00:14:37,137 --> 00:14:38,413
chases the bourgeoisie

310
00:14:38,517 --> 00:14:40,896
over the entire surface
of the globe.

311
00:14:41,000 --> 00:14:42,275
It must nestle everywhere,

312
00:14:42,379 --> 00:14:43,482
settle everywhere,

313
00:14:43,586 --> 00:14:46,034
establish connections
everywhere.

314
00:14:47,827 --> 00:14:51,517
It creates a world
after its own image.

315
00:14:51,620 --> 00:14:54,103
But you know,
there's got to be a downside

316
00:14:54,206 --> 00:14:55,620
for the bourgeoisie.

317
00:14:55,724 --> 00:14:58,310
Modern bourgeois society
is like the sorcerer,

318
00:14:58,413 --> 00:15:01,793
who is no longer able to control
the powers of the netherworld,

319
00:15:01,896 --> 00:15:04,724
whom he has called up
by his spells.

320
00:15:04,827 --> 00:15:07,931
What the bourgeoisie
therefore produces, above all,

321
00:15:08,034 --> 00:15:09,827
is its own gravediggers.

322
00:15:11,965 --> 00:15:13,137
Its fall,

323
00:15:13,241 --> 00:15:14,758
and the victory
of the proletariat,

324
00:15:14,862 --> 00:15:17,275
are equally inevitable.

325
00:15:17,379 --> 00:15:19,758
How can Marx think
capitalism is so brilliant,

326
00:15:19,862 --> 00:15:22,068
and, also, so doomed?

327
00:15:22,172 --> 00:15:24,862
Well, the answer lies
in how it treats the workers.

328
00:15:34,034 --> 00:15:36,827
To understand
Marx's analysis of crises,

329
00:15:36,931 --> 00:15:38,275
we have to first understand

330
00:15:38,379 --> 00:15:40,655
the capitalism that he knew.

331
00:15:40,758 --> 00:15:42,344
19th century capitalists

332
00:15:42,448 --> 00:15:46,000
might have built wonders
surpassing Egyptian pyramids,

333
00:15:46,103 --> 00:15:48,448
but they also
forced their workers

334
00:15:48,551 --> 00:15:51,000
to endure
terrible conditions and pay.

335
00:15:52,275 --> 00:15:55,344
- It is difficult
to overstate the horror

336
00:15:55,448 --> 00:15:58,241
of industrialisation in Europe.

337
00:15:58,344 --> 00:16:00,310
In 1829,

338
00:16:00,413 --> 00:16:02,103
Liverpool, for example,

339
00:16:02,206 --> 00:16:05,172
the life expectancy at birth
was about 28 years.

340
00:16:05,275 --> 00:16:08,758
And that was the lowest age
since the Black Death.

341
00:16:08,862 --> 00:16:11,689
So, the impact
of the Industrial Revolution

342
00:16:11,793 --> 00:16:13,724
on life chances,
on life expectancy,

343
00:16:13,827 --> 00:16:16,448
in the great cities of Europe,

344
00:16:16,551 --> 00:16:20,931
in Hamburg, in Berlin,

345
00:16:21,034 --> 00:16:23,724
in Manchester, in Liverpool,
in Birmingham, in London,

346
00:16:23,827 --> 00:16:26,275
was absolutely terrifying.

347
00:16:26,379 --> 00:16:30,551
This was a revolutionary epoch
of change,

348
00:16:30,655 --> 00:16:32,758
which, for the working classes,

349
00:16:32,862 --> 00:16:36,275
which, for the proletariat,
in the 1820s and 1830s,

350
00:16:36,379 --> 00:16:39,344
had devastating consequences
for their standards of living.

351
00:16:39,448 --> 00:16:43,241
Marx is certainly revered
amongst historians

352
00:16:43,344 --> 00:16:47,206
as the pre-eminent analyst
of mid-19th-century capitalism.

353
00:16:48,379 --> 00:16:51,517
No-one before Marx,
or possibly since,

354
00:16:51,620 --> 00:16:53,655
had really,
has really been able

355
00:16:53,758 --> 00:16:56,034
to get into that system

356
00:16:56,137 --> 00:17:00,551
of mid-19th-century
Western-European capitalism,

357
00:17:00,655 --> 00:17:02,034
based on a, kind of,

358
00:17:02,137 --> 00:17:06,379
urban manufacturing set
of relationships.

359
00:17:06,482 --> 00:17:11,000
Whether that's relevant today
is a very interesting question.

360
00:17:11,103 --> 00:17:12,862
Narrator: The horrors
of Victorian working conditions

361
00:17:12,965 --> 00:17:15,517
clearly shaped Marx's economics.

362
00:17:18,034 --> 00:17:20,206
In his time,
minimum pay for proles

363
00:17:20,310 --> 00:17:22,896
meant maximum profits
for bosses.

364
00:17:23,000 --> 00:17:25,689
And any bosses
who did choose to pay more

365
00:17:25,793 --> 00:17:27,172
usually went bust.

366
00:17:31,620 --> 00:17:34,206
Subsistence wages
will always be paid

367
00:17:34,310 --> 00:17:36,379
in the Marxian system.

368
00:17:36,482 --> 00:17:38,724
So, now, subsistence wages,
of course,

369
00:17:38,827 --> 00:17:41,965
is a little bit
of a flexible object, right?

370
00:17:42,068 --> 00:17:44,000
What we think of
as the subsistence wage now

371
00:17:44,103 --> 00:17:46,448
might not be the same
as Marx thought it was

372
00:17:46,551 --> 00:17:47,689
in the mid-19th century.

373
00:17:47,793 --> 00:17:50,862
But still,
there's no obvious way

374
00:17:50,965 --> 00:17:53,586
that wages will arrive
above a subsistence level.

375
00:17:53,689 --> 00:17:55,551
He thought there'd always be
downward pressure on wages,

376
00:17:55,655 --> 00:17:58,034
and that wages would come down
to the minimum

377
00:17:58,137 --> 00:17:59,689
that enabled bare survival.

378
00:17:59,793 --> 00:18:01,068
They couldn't go lower
than that,

379
00:18:01,172 --> 00:18:02,448
otherwise the workers would die.

380
00:18:02,551 --> 00:18:03,758
But he thought
they'd be depressed

381
00:18:03,862 --> 00:18:04,793
down to that minimum.

382
00:18:04,896 --> 00:18:06,758
The reality, of course,
has been the opposite.

383
00:18:06,862 --> 00:18:09,034
It has been
a continual advancement

384
00:18:09,137 --> 00:18:12,310
in wages - year in, year out,
decade in, decade out.

385
00:18:16,172 --> 00:18:17,482
Narrator: Marx was wrong.

386
00:18:17,586 --> 00:18:19,517
He thought
it would all get so bad,

387
00:18:19,620 --> 00:18:21,931
the workers
would overthrow the system.

388
00:18:24,413 --> 00:18:25,724
Yet, even as he was writing,

389
00:18:25,827 --> 00:18:27,517
reformers were beginning
to get rid

390
00:18:27,620 --> 00:18:29,620
of the worst
employment practises.

391
00:18:31,344 --> 00:18:34,310
Capitalism got kinder,
not nastier.

392
00:18:34,413 --> 00:18:36,793
But the idea
that the competing interests

393
00:18:36,896 --> 00:18:39,689
of bosses and workers
would cause crises,

394
00:18:39,793 --> 00:18:41,896
well, that does seem relevant
today.

395
00:18:45,103 --> 00:18:46,724
Marx wrote
that the ultimate cause

396
00:18:46,827 --> 00:18:48,206
of all real crises

397
00:18:48,310 --> 00:18:50,137
always remained the poverty

398
00:18:50,241 --> 00:18:52,620
and restricted consumption
of the masses.

399
00:18:52,724 --> 00:18:55,379
Put simply,
if workers aren't paid enough,

400
00:18:55,482 --> 00:18:57,482
they don't have enough money
to spend in shops,

401
00:18:57,586 --> 00:18:59,758
and the economy
doesn't stay afloat.

402
00:19:01,206 --> 00:19:02,172
Some believe this idea

403
00:19:02,275 --> 00:19:04,724
is very useful
in understanding the crisis

404
00:19:04,827 --> 00:19:06,068
we're living through today.

405
00:19:19,448 --> 00:19:22,068
Let's take a look
at the last 40 years of history

406
00:19:22,172 --> 00:19:25,000
through the prism
of Marx's theories,

407
00:19:25,103 --> 00:19:27,310
to show how they might explain
the mess we're in.

408
00:19:29,137 --> 00:19:32,206
An imaginary 'Marxist
Broadcasting Corporation'

409
00:19:32,310 --> 00:19:35,172
would see it all
as a good old 1970s-style

410
00:19:35,275 --> 00:19:36,586
class struggle.

411
00:19:39,551 --> 00:19:40,896
The fight is over wages.

412
00:19:41,000 --> 00:19:44,172
Capitalists want to pay less,
the workers want to get more.

413
00:19:44,275 --> 00:19:46,000
Man: [over megaphone]
All those in favour,

414
00:19:46,103 --> 00:19:47,310
please show!

415
00:19:49,551 --> 00:19:51,620
Narrator: In the '70s,
powerful trade unions

416
00:19:51,724 --> 00:19:53,896
battled to keep wages high.

417
00:19:54,931 --> 00:19:56,344
But then, we come to the '80s.

418
00:19:56,448 --> 00:19:58,793
Fightback time
for the capitalists.

419
00:20:00,586 --> 00:20:02,862
There she is, look,
can't you see her now? Look.

420
00:20:02,965 --> 00:20:04,068
Narrator: Marx would have seen

421
00:20:04,172 --> 00:20:05,758
Margaret Thatcher
and Ronald Reagan

422
00:20:05,862 --> 00:20:07,482
as acting purely
in the interests

423
00:20:07,586 --> 00:20:09,310
of the capitalist bosses.

424
00:20:11,310 --> 00:20:13,448
It was their governments
that helped business,

425
00:20:13,551 --> 00:20:14,724
by getting rid of the obstacles

426
00:20:14,827 --> 00:20:18,172
that made it hard to cut wages.

427
00:20:18,275 --> 00:20:20,896
- The vilest intimidation
we have seen

428
00:20:21,000 --> 00:20:22,482
should never have happened.

429
00:20:22,586 --> 00:20:24,724
It is the work of extremists.

430
00:20:24,827 --> 00:20:26,413
It is the enemy within.

431
00:20:26,517 --> 00:20:29,551
..and if they do not report
for work within 48 hours,

432
00:20:29,655 --> 00:20:33,310
they have forfeited their jobs
and will be terminated.

433
00:20:35,551 --> 00:20:38,034
Narrator: So, for the 'Marxist
Broadcasting Corporation',

434
00:20:38,137 --> 00:20:40,068
the capitalists won
in the 1980s,

435
00:20:40,172 --> 00:20:42,724
and they kept on winning.

436
00:20:42,827 --> 00:20:45,448
The guaranteed high wages
and job security

437
00:20:45,551 --> 00:20:49,034
that workers had enjoyed
until the '70s had gone.

438
00:20:49,137 --> 00:20:52,551
And downward pressure on wages
started to lay the seeds

439
00:20:52,655 --> 00:20:54,448
of the crisis we see today.

440
00:20:56,931 --> 00:20:58,931
It's an appealingly
simple story,

441
00:20:59,034 --> 00:21:02,172
but how much truth is there
in it?

442
00:21:02,275 --> 00:21:03,862
Well, we know the Marxist view
of history

443
00:21:03,965 --> 00:21:05,000
is right about one thing,

444
00:21:05,103 --> 00:21:06,620
at least in Britain and America.

445
00:21:06,724 --> 00:21:08,413
Earnings at the very top
have soared

446
00:21:08,517 --> 00:21:09,655
in the last few years,

447
00:21:09,758 --> 00:21:12,000
and everyone else
has been squeezed.

448
00:21:13,206 --> 00:21:14,896
In Britain,
real earnings have been flat

449
00:21:15,000 --> 00:21:16,827
or falling
for the best part of ten years,

450
00:21:16,931 --> 00:21:18,724
since before the crisis.

451
00:21:18,827 --> 00:21:20,275
In America,

452
00:21:20,379 --> 00:21:22,448
that's been happening
since the 1970s.

453
00:21:26,620 --> 00:21:29,413
- In the United States,

454
00:21:29,517 --> 00:21:31,482
a full-time male worker,

455
00:21:31,586 --> 00:21:33,758
median income has stagnated

456
00:21:33,862 --> 00:21:35,137
for a third of a century.

457
00:21:36,034 --> 00:21:36,965
No increase.

458
00:21:37,068 --> 00:21:38,758
Household income today

459
00:21:38,862 --> 00:21:41,344
is the same as it was

460
00:21:41,448 --> 00:21:42,758
15 years ago.

461
00:21:42,862 --> 00:21:45,862
All the increase to the income
has gone to the top.

462
00:21:45,965 --> 00:21:48,206
The share of income

463
00:21:48,310 --> 00:21:49,896
in the United States,

464
00:21:50,000 --> 00:21:53,965
that was going to the top 1%
of the households,

465
00:21:54,068 --> 00:21:55,482
20 years ago,

466
00:21:55,586 --> 00:21:59,448
was around 12%.

467
00:21:59,551 --> 00:22:04,620
Today, that share
is closer to 23%.

468
00:22:10,137 --> 00:22:12,172
Narrator: Things haven't gone
that far in the UK,

469
00:22:12,275 --> 00:22:15,586
but inequality's certainly
creeping up the agenda.

470
00:22:17,931 --> 00:22:19,965
But rather than see it
as a deliberate strategy

471
00:22:20,068 --> 00:22:22,206
on the part
of greedy capitalists,

472
00:22:22,310 --> 00:22:24,965
we have to recognise
there are bigger forces at work.

473
00:22:31,413 --> 00:22:33,965
A lot of it's down
to new technology.

474
00:22:39,413 --> 00:22:41,137
Work previously done by hand

475
00:22:41,241 --> 00:22:42,862
is now done by machines.

476
00:22:45,689 --> 00:22:47,137
With fewer workers needed,

477
00:22:47,241 --> 00:22:48,793
there are more competing
for every job,

478
00:22:48,896 --> 00:22:51,068
meaning bosses
can pay them less.

479
00:22:53,896 --> 00:22:56,275
But perhaps
the most significant factor

480
00:22:56,379 --> 00:22:57,793
is globalisation.

481
00:22:59,931 --> 00:23:02,517
With falling barriers to trade
around the world,

482
00:23:02,620 --> 00:23:04,206
global business
has gained access

483
00:23:04,310 --> 00:23:08,172
to a giant new pool
of cheaper labour.

484
00:23:08,275 --> 00:23:11,241
- You have brought
into the market, now,

485
00:23:11,344 --> 00:23:13,862
millions and millions
of new workers.

486
00:23:13,965 --> 00:23:18,620
In China, in India,
in other parts of Asia,

487
00:23:18,724 --> 00:23:21,793
in parts of South America,
Brazil, for instance.

488
00:23:21,896 --> 00:23:25,793
So, that process has transformed

489
00:23:25,896 --> 00:23:29,310
the capital labour ratio
on a global scale.

490
00:23:30,724 --> 00:23:32,896
- Clearly,
competition from countries

491
00:23:33,000 --> 00:23:34,310
around the world

492
00:23:34,413 --> 00:23:37,793
has put pressure
on certain jobs,

493
00:23:37,896 --> 00:23:40,482
typically jobs that can be done
at a distance.

494
00:23:40,586 --> 00:23:43,482
So for example, an analyst,

495
00:23:43,586 --> 00:23:45,379
can, as well, be sitting

496
00:23:45,482 --> 00:23:49,000
in the Philippines
or in Mumbai,

497
00:23:49,103 --> 00:23:50,793
to do the job that is done

498
00:23:50,896 --> 00:23:53,482
at a much higher price
in New York.

499
00:23:57,517 --> 00:24:00,034
Narrator: Many workers
in the rich countries

500
00:24:00,137 --> 00:24:03,448
are now competing
with an industrial reserve army,

501
00:24:03,551 --> 00:24:05,241
running into the billions.

502
00:24:05,344 --> 00:24:07,655
- I think,
in emerging market economies,

503
00:24:07,758 --> 00:24:09,724
there'd be an overwhelming vote

504
00:24:09,827 --> 00:24:11,413
in favour of what has happened

505
00:24:11,517 --> 00:24:12,689
because almost everyone

506
00:24:12,793 --> 00:24:16,034
is better off than they were,
and would've been.

507
00:24:16,137 --> 00:24:18,344
But that's less evident
in the industrialised world,

508
00:24:18,448 --> 00:24:21,793
and many lower-paid people
have become even lower paid,

509
00:24:21,896 --> 00:24:24,000
relative to those
who've prospered.

510
00:24:24,103 --> 00:24:25,172
And that is a concern.

511
00:24:29,517 --> 00:24:31,068
Narrator: It's an analysis
that rings true,

512
00:24:31,172 --> 00:24:33,965
even for the leader
of the world's biggest economy.

513
00:24:34,068 --> 00:24:36,931
[applause]

514
00:24:37,034 --> 00:24:38,517
- Long before the recession,

515
00:24:38,620 --> 00:24:41,000
jobs and manufacturing
began leaving our shores.

516
00:24:42,241 --> 00:24:44,689
Technology made businesses
more efficient,

517
00:24:44,793 --> 00:24:46,620
but also made some jobs
obsolete.

518
00:24:48,448 --> 00:24:50,103
Folks at the top
saw their incomes rise

519
00:24:50,206 --> 00:24:51,379
like never before.

520
00:24:52,517 --> 00:24:53,724
But most hard-working Americans

521
00:24:53,827 --> 00:24:55,931
struggled with costs
that were growing,

522
00:24:56,034 --> 00:24:57,137
pay cheques that weren't,

523
00:24:58,482 --> 00:25:00,758
and personal debt
that kept piling up.

524
00:25:00,862 --> 00:25:01,724
Narrator: So, for Marx,

525
00:25:01,827 --> 00:25:03,517
low wages
would be the root cause

526
00:25:03,620 --> 00:25:05,517
of the crisis
we're living through today.

527
00:25:06,758 --> 00:25:08,758
- Even leaving aside

528
00:25:08,862 --> 00:25:12,068
the morality question
of whether it's fair

529
00:25:12,172 --> 00:25:16,206
to have a highly unequal
distribution

530
00:25:16,310 --> 00:25:18,379
of income and wealth,

531
00:25:18,482 --> 00:25:23,034
even purely in terms
of economic efficiency,

532
00:25:23,137 --> 00:25:27,103
having that redistribution
of income from labour capital,

533
00:25:27,206 --> 00:25:28,931
from wages to profit,

534
00:25:29,034 --> 00:25:31,206
there's a negative
economic effect.

535
00:25:31,310 --> 00:25:34,000
Because it tends to reduce
aggregate demand,

536
00:25:34,103 --> 00:25:37,620
because it reduces the income
of those who tend to spend more.

537
00:25:39,482 --> 00:25:40,862
Narrator: Of course,
in the late 20th century,

538
00:25:40,965 --> 00:25:44,241
that problem could be solved -
temporarily, of course.

539
00:25:44,344 --> 00:25:46,586
Step forward, the credit card.

540
00:25:49,000 --> 00:25:50,655
You had more inequality,

541
00:25:50,758 --> 00:25:53,103
you had more concern
amongst the public,

542
00:25:53,206 --> 00:25:56,310
and I think that put pressure
to do something.

543
00:25:56,413 --> 00:25:58,517
Democracies work well
with pressure,

544
00:25:58,620 --> 00:26:01,206
put pressure for the politicians
to do something

545
00:26:01,310 --> 00:26:03,379
for the people
being left behind.

546
00:26:03,482 --> 00:26:04,724
The right thing to do,
in my view,

547
00:26:04,827 --> 00:26:06,620
would've been focus much more
on education,

548
00:26:06,724 --> 00:26:08,862
on skill building.

549
00:26:08,965 --> 00:26:12,655
What happened was
a more shorter-term solution,

550
00:26:12,758 --> 00:26:15,689
which was, give them credit.

551
00:26:15,793 --> 00:26:18,517
Narrator: With consumer credit,
people can carry on spending,

552
00:26:18,620 --> 00:26:20,448
even if
they haven't got the money.

553
00:26:22,862 --> 00:26:24,724
The economy stays afloat,

554
00:26:24,827 --> 00:26:29,034
and the capitalists
still make their profit.

555
00:26:29,137 --> 00:26:33,103
As we know, it went well beyond
credit cards.

556
00:26:33,206 --> 00:26:35,172
What ultimately
brought the crisis to a head

557
00:26:35,275 --> 00:26:37,827
was the billions borrowed
on mortgages.

558
00:26:37,931 --> 00:26:39,931
People thought
the value of their house

559
00:26:40,034 --> 00:26:41,344
would keep going up forever.

560
00:26:42,517 --> 00:26:45,068
- Housing credit is beautiful.

561
00:26:45,172 --> 00:26:47,275
Because if your house price
is increasing,

562
00:26:47,379 --> 00:26:48,758
and you're borrowing

563
00:26:48,862 --> 00:26:51,655
against the increasing value
of your house,

564
00:26:51,758 --> 00:26:54,103
you don't feel you're borrowing
your way into debt.

565
00:26:55,206 --> 00:26:57,965
Narrator: But, of course,
you are.

566
00:26:58,068 --> 00:27:00,448
In America,
it happened on a massive scale.

567
00:27:01,965 --> 00:27:02,965
There, as we know,

568
00:27:03,068 --> 00:27:06,551
the capitalists
were getting richer and richer.

569
00:27:08,931 --> 00:27:11,310
They couldn't spend
all of their extra money.

570
00:27:11,413 --> 00:27:12,689
Driven, as ever,

571
00:27:12,793 --> 00:27:15,275
by the desire
to make more profit,

572
00:27:15,379 --> 00:27:19,000
they lent it out,
in riskier and riskier ways.

573
00:27:20,034 --> 00:27:22,103
The name given to this lending

574
00:27:22,206 --> 00:27:23,862
might well be familiar -

575
00:27:27,000 --> 00:27:28,275
subprime.

576
00:27:32,379 --> 00:27:35,896
- What we did is,
as the incomes of most Americans

577
00:27:36,000 --> 00:27:37,172
were stagnating

578
00:27:37,275 --> 00:27:39,827
or even declining, we said,

579
00:27:39,931 --> 00:27:41,344
"Don't let it bother you.

580
00:27:42,655 --> 00:27:45,275
"Keep spending
as if your income was going up."

581
00:27:45,379 --> 00:27:47,551
And they did that very well.

582
00:27:47,655 --> 00:27:49,000
I mean, who would oppose it?

583
00:27:49,103 --> 00:27:51,034
The banks were making money,

584
00:27:51,137 --> 00:27:53,827
the households
were getting their house,

585
00:27:53,931 --> 00:27:55,862
the politicians
will have happy constituents.

586
00:27:55,965 --> 00:27:58,689
I mean, there is nobody
who's going to be unhappy

587
00:27:58,793 --> 00:28:01,275
in this process
until it collapses.

588
00:28:01,379 --> 00:28:04,448
Subprime is the endgame,
if you like, of...

589
00:28:06,862 --> 00:28:11,068
..the debt solution
to the lack of a market.

590
00:28:13,655 --> 00:28:19,000
And it's the culmination
of trying to evade crises

591
00:28:19,103 --> 00:28:21,586
which arise out of lack
of effective demand

592
00:28:21,689 --> 00:28:23,758
in the market.

593
00:28:23,862 --> 00:28:25,655
And then what you do
is you end up

594
00:28:25,758 --> 00:28:28,310
creating a credit crisis,
instead.

595
00:28:28,413 --> 00:28:31,379
So subprime is the end
of that process.

596
00:28:34,793 --> 00:28:36,482
Narrator: And we all know
how it ended.

597
00:28:37,724 --> 00:28:39,931
In retrospect,
it seems obvious,

598
00:28:40,034 --> 00:28:41,931
lending to people
who couldn't afford it

599
00:28:42,034 --> 00:28:44,827
wasn't a lasting solution
to anything.

600
00:28:44,931 --> 00:28:47,620
It led to a housing bubble,
which burst,

601
00:28:47,724 --> 00:28:50,275
threatening some of the world's
biggest banks.

602
00:28:51,482 --> 00:28:52,862
And thanks
to our integrated world,

603
00:28:52,965 --> 00:28:55,965
what started
in the United States spread

604
00:28:56,068 --> 00:28:58,172
and infected the entire system,

605
00:28:58,275 --> 00:28:59,724
causing a global recession.

606
00:29:07,482 --> 00:29:09,689
Capital, when it's faced
with a problem,

607
00:29:09,793 --> 00:29:12,931
usually seeks to move it around.

608
00:29:13,034 --> 00:29:16,068
It moves it from one sector
to another,

609
00:29:16,172 --> 00:29:18,551
or from one geographical region
from another.

610
00:29:19,896 --> 00:29:22,655
Any part of the world
that's in economic difficulties

611
00:29:22,758 --> 00:29:24,482
will seek to unload
those difficulties

612
00:29:24,586 --> 00:29:26,103
on another part of the world.

613
00:29:27,724 --> 00:29:30,137
What will also happen is that,

614
00:29:30,241 --> 00:29:32,206
if there's a problem
in the banking system,

615
00:29:32,310 --> 00:29:35,137
they will seek to move it
into the state system,

616
00:29:35,241 --> 00:29:36,965
and if it's a problem
in the state system,

617
00:29:37,068 --> 00:29:38,068
they'll try and move it

618
00:29:38,172 --> 00:29:40,620
onto the taxation
and austerity of the people

619
00:29:40,724 --> 00:29:42,586
to extract the wealth

620
00:29:42,689 --> 00:29:44,482
from a population.

621
00:29:46,448 --> 00:29:48,793
Narrator:
It's an extraordinary tale.

622
00:29:48,896 --> 00:29:51,896
And a lot of people would say
it's completely wrong.

623
00:29:52,000 --> 00:29:53,517
Marxism doesn't actually work,

624
00:29:53,620 --> 00:29:54,620
but it keeps coming back,

625
00:29:54,724 --> 00:29:56,586
'cause it makes
for a good story.

626
00:29:56,689 --> 00:29:58,724
I don't think low wages
played any role at all

627
00:29:58,827 --> 00:30:00,137
in causing the crisis.

628
00:30:00,241 --> 00:30:01,172
The crisis was caused

629
00:30:01,275 --> 00:30:03,862
by governments and central banks
flooding the market

630
00:30:03,965 --> 00:30:05,620
with cheap credit
and cheap money,

631
00:30:05,724 --> 00:30:07,965
because politicians
don't like the downturn

632
00:30:08,068 --> 00:30:10,000
in an economy
that throws people out of work.

633
00:30:10,103 --> 00:30:13,068
I think it may have,
to some degree,

634
00:30:13,172 --> 00:30:15,034
increased the level
of indebtedness

635
00:30:15,137 --> 00:30:17,379
that people went into
the crisis with,

636
00:30:17,482 --> 00:30:21,482
which I think intensifies
how deep the crisis became.

637
00:30:21,586 --> 00:30:23,000
But it wasn't
the underlying cause,

638
00:30:23,103 --> 00:30:25,758
it was a contextual factor,
which made it a bit worse.

639
00:30:25,862 --> 00:30:27,689
Narrator:
But the idea that low wages

640
00:30:27,793 --> 00:30:30,586
may have contributed
to the crisis is gaining ground,

641
00:30:30,689 --> 00:30:32,965
in some surprising places.

642
00:30:34,896 --> 00:30:37,482
- It was on this trading floor.

643
00:30:37,586 --> 00:30:40,620
It was probably the weekend
before Lehman's went bust

644
00:30:40,724 --> 00:30:44,413
and it's, normally,
a little bit noisy.

645
00:30:44,517 --> 00:30:46,655
But at the time,
you could hear a pin drop.

646
00:30:46,758 --> 00:30:48,413
It was that deathly quiet.

647
00:30:48,517 --> 00:30:50,551
And I could almost feel,
you know,

648
00:30:50,655 --> 00:30:53,517
that the global system
was frozen.

649
00:30:54,448 --> 00:30:56,103
And it was quite
a scary thought.

650
00:30:56,206 --> 00:30:58,448
It took me back
to a lot of the things

651
00:30:58,551 --> 00:31:00,034
that I used to read about
and study

652
00:31:00,137 --> 00:31:01,793
when I was much younger,

653
00:31:01,896 --> 00:31:05,034
the days when
I actually read Marx for fun.

654
00:31:05,137 --> 00:31:08,586
It was a comment
that I posted up on a newswire,

655
00:31:08,689 --> 00:31:12,482
and it was one of the most
commented-upon pieces

656
00:31:12,586 --> 00:31:13,896
for quite a few weeks.

657
00:31:14,000 --> 00:31:15,758
But there are a lot of people

658
00:31:15,862 --> 00:31:18,275
who were quite opposed
to the idea

659
00:31:18,379 --> 00:31:21,827
that anything
that was socialistic or Marxist

660
00:31:21,931 --> 00:31:23,172
you know, could be a tool

661
00:31:23,275 --> 00:31:25,862
considered serious
in the mainstream.

662
00:31:25,965 --> 00:31:27,379
A lot of this hate mail,
I have to say,

663
00:31:27,482 --> 00:31:28,689
came from the United States

664
00:31:28,793 --> 00:31:32,344
and I was accused of being,
you know, an Obama clone.

665
00:31:32,448 --> 00:31:34,413
So there was a lot
of negative reaction

666
00:31:34,517 --> 00:31:36,241
from, I think,
people that probably,

667
00:31:36,344 --> 00:31:38,310
predictably, you know,

668
00:31:38,413 --> 00:31:40,896
had already tied
their own ideological colours

669
00:31:41,000 --> 00:31:42,344
to the mast.

670
00:31:42,448 --> 00:31:44,862
Narrator: But the people
who do find value in Marx

671
00:31:44,965 --> 00:31:47,413
aren't necessarily
going to follow him all the way.

672
00:31:47,517 --> 00:31:50,482
- I don't think
anybody seriously believes

673
00:31:50,586 --> 00:31:52,275
that, you know,
this is all about,

674
00:31:52,379 --> 00:31:53,689
the, you know,

675
00:31:53,793 --> 00:31:55,517
dawn of the dictatorship
of the proletariat,

676
00:31:55,620 --> 00:31:56,689
or anything like this.

677
00:31:56,793 --> 00:31:59,551
I think Marx helps
in framing the problem,

678
00:31:59,655 --> 00:32:02,793
but I think the solutions
have to be different,

679
00:32:02,896 --> 00:32:04,689
given the different environment
we are in.

680
00:32:06,827 --> 00:32:08,551
Narrator:
Except, Marx would insist

681
00:32:08,655 --> 00:32:11,344
the trap is inescapable.

682
00:32:11,448 --> 00:32:14,000
Capitalists must seek profit
above all else,

683
00:32:14,103 --> 00:32:16,000
or they'll go out of business.

684
00:32:16,103 --> 00:32:17,379
So why would they ever choose

685
00:32:17,482 --> 00:32:19,586
to give workers
a bigger share of the pie?

686
00:32:20,931 --> 00:32:23,551
- What Marx would say is that

687
00:32:23,655 --> 00:32:26,724
we have to look for ways
out of this crisis

688
00:32:26,827 --> 00:32:29,482
which look beyond
the restoration

689
00:32:29,586 --> 00:32:31,000
of capitalist-class power.

690
00:32:32,000 --> 00:32:33,068
And I think this is a time

691
00:32:33,172 --> 00:32:34,517
when we actually need
to start thinking

692
00:32:34,620 --> 00:32:36,689
about the revolutionary solution
again.

693
00:32:40,517 --> 00:32:43,448
Narrator: But who exactly
is revolting against whom?

694
00:32:43,551 --> 00:32:46,758
Marx divided the world neatly
into workers and capitalists,

695
00:32:46,862 --> 00:32:50,482
but today, his stark distinction
is incredibly blurred.

696
00:32:50,586 --> 00:32:53,586
Bosses work for themselves,
and workers own shares.

697
00:32:55,103 --> 00:32:57,103
In our modern world,

698
00:32:57,206 --> 00:32:59,275
enough of us do have a stake
in the system,

699
00:32:59,379 --> 00:33:01,586
whether mobile phones
or pension plans,

700
00:33:01,689 --> 00:33:04,551
to stave off talk
of armed revolt.

701
00:33:04,655 --> 00:33:10,137
I think capitalism survives
because, at its core, it works.

702
00:33:10,241 --> 00:33:13,793
It pushes progress.
It pushes people forward,

703
00:33:13,896 --> 00:33:16,620
it appeals to a basic thing
in people's lives,

704
00:33:16,724 --> 00:33:18,241
which is to try and get ahead,

705
00:33:18,344 --> 00:33:20,241
to try and improve things
for their children.

706
00:33:20,344 --> 00:33:23,827
The fact that more people
win from it than lose from it

707
00:33:23,931 --> 00:33:26,172
is the thing
which keeps on pushing it ahead.

708
00:33:26,275 --> 00:33:27,482
Narrator:
But what about the people

709
00:33:27,586 --> 00:33:29,000
capitalism's failing?

710
00:33:29,103 --> 00:33:31,551
What does Marx have to say
to them?

711
00:33:31,655 --> 00:33:34,655
Incredibly, for all
his criticism of capitalism,

712
00:33:34,758 --> 00:33:37,034
he offers us next to no idea

713
00:33:37,137 --> 00:33:39,793
of what a fairer alternative
might look like.

714
00:33:46,206 --> 00:33:48,172
As Marx entered his final years,

715
00:33:48,275 --> 00:33:50,862
he seemed quite content
with the way things were.

716
00:33:52,482 --> 00:33:54,758
He'd been poor
for a lot of his life,

717
00:33:54,862 --> 00:33:59,034
but by 1856, he had enough money
to move to London's suburbs.

718
00:34:02,827 --> 00:34:04,551
The young firebrand

719
00:34:04,655 --> 00:34:07,379
now looked like
part of the establishment.

720
00:34:07,482 --> 00:34:11,137
- He would spend his day
walking around Hampstead Heath.

721
00:34:11,241 --> 00:34:14,344
He would spend his day
in correspondence.

722
00:34:14,448 --> 00:34:17,448
He would spend his day,
you know, reading 'The Times'.

723
00:34:17,551 --> 00:34:19,620
He would worry
about personal finances,

724
00:34:19,724 --> 00:34:21,551
he would worry
about his daughters

725
00:34:21,655 --> 00:34:23,586
and the expense
of their piano lessons.

726
00:34:23,689 --> 00:34:27,448
I mean, he lived
a remarkably bourgeois life,

727
00:34:27,551 --> 00:34:29,689
in many ways.

728
00:34:29,793 --> 00:34:32,448
Narrator: Marx didn't want
to rush revolution.

729
00:34:32,551 --> 00:34:33,620
To understand why,

730
00:34:33,724 --> 00:34:37,137
we need to understand
his analysis of world history.

731
00:34:41,448 --> 00:34:44,172
He saw the great sweep
of humanity's endeavours,

732
00:34:44,275 --> 00:34:46,241
from the caveman

733
00:34:46,344 --> 00:34:49,862
to the slave societies
of Greece and Rome,

734
00:34:49,965 --> 00:34:52,689
to the feudalism
of kings and castles.

735
00:34:54,310 --> 00:34:56,103
All of which was replaced,
in turn,

736
00:34:56,206 --> 00:34:57,931
by our own capitalist system

737
00:34:58,034 --> 00:35:00,172
of bosses and workers.

738
00:35:00,275 --> 00:35:01,413
- Heave, ho!
[whip crack]

739
00:35:01,517 --> 00:35:03,517
Narrator: Incredibly unfair,

740
00:35:03,620 --> 00:35:06,034
but also, incredibly productive.

741
00:35:09,275 --> 00:35:11,482
Marx said only when we'd got
everything we could

742
00:35:11,586 --> 00:35:12,862
out of capitalism,

743
00:35:12,965 --> 00:35:15,068
could we afford
to have a revolution.

744
00:35:20,000 --> 00:35:21,206
In his words,

745
00:35:21,310 --> 00:35:25,000
"The knell of capitalist
private property sounds.

746
00:35:25,103 --> 00:35:29,034
"The expropriators
are expropriated."

747
00:35:29,137 --> 00:35:31,103
All to be replaced by...

748
00:35:32,586 --> 00:35:34,758
..more or less, nothing.

749
00:35:34,862 --> 00:35:35,862
Irritatingly,

750
00:35:35,965 --> 00:35:39,034
there's next to no alternative
laid out.

751
00:35:39,137 --> 00:35:40,931
- Marx, basically,

752
00:35:41,034 --> 00:35:43,965
was not the one
who simply gave us a blueprint,

753
00:35:44,068 --> 00:35:47,310
you know, five stages
after capitalism, communism,

754
00:35:47,413 --> 00:35:49,103
here you have
the basic guidelines,

755
00:35:49,206 --> 00:35:51,379
what to do and so on. No, no!

756
00:35:51,482 --> 00:35:54,689
It's up to us.
He just opened up the field.

757
00:35:55,862 --> 00:35:57,724
- Is there an alternative
to capitalism?

758
00:35:57,827 --> 00:35:59,758
I've no idea.

759
00:35:59,862 --> 00:36:01,655
Well, I suppose there could be
all kinds of alternatives,

760
00:36:01,758 --> 00:36:03,172
dead-silence, starvation...

761
00:36:05,103 --> 00:36:07,103
..or the end of the world
or anything.

762
00:36:07,206 --> 00:36:09,482
But I simply have no idea
if there is an alternative.

763
00:36:09,586 --> 00:36:10,689
It doesn't occur to me.

764
00:36:10,793 --> 00:36:12,206
It doesn't seem, to me,
to be of importance.

765
00:36:12,310 --> 00:36:14,931
It's like saying, is there
an alternative to weather?

766
00:36:15,034 --> 00:36:17,655
I think he would have written
a lot more,

767
00:36:17,758 --> 00:36:19,551
had he lived ten years more,

768
00:36:19,655 --> 00:36:24,482
on what a socialist republic
would look like.

769
00:36:24,586 --> 00:36:26,068
And, who knows?

770
00:36:26,172 --> 00:36:29,379
But that might have saved
the world a lot of bother.

771
00:36:29,482 --> 00:36:32,482
[Soviet Russia anthem plays]

772
00:36:35,068 --> 00:36:37,793
Narrator: Without his blueprint,
we all know what happened next.

773
00:36:41,034 --> 00:36:42,275
There weren't any revolutions

774
00:36:42,379 --> 00:36:44,068
in the rich,
developed countries,

775
00:36:44,172 --> 00:36:45,724
as Marx predicted.

776
00:36:45,827 --> 00:36:49,793
Instead, it happened in one
of the world's poorest nations.

777
00:36:52,172 --> 00:36:55,275
Soviet Russia
may have left Marx far behind,

778
00:36:55,379 --> 00:36:58,275
but it was an attempt
to try something else.

779
00:36:58,379 --> 00:37:01,034
And many have drawn lessons
from its failure.

780
00:37:02,862 --> 00:37:03,862
- The truth is, at the moment,

781
00:37:03,965 --> 00:37:05,551
there are different forms
of capitalism.

782
00:37:05,655 --> 00:37:07,862
Some have
slightly more social democracy,

783
00:37:07,965 --> 00:37:10,310
some are closer
to laissez-faire,

784
00:37:10,413 --> 00:37:12,275
and there's a continuum
between them.

785
00:37:12,379 --> 00:37:15,034
But on the big argument,
about whether you really want

786
00:37:15,137 --> 00:37:17,724
to have a communist system
or a capitalist one,

787
00:37:17,827 --> 00:37:20,517
that is pretty much won
everywhere, I think.

788
00:37:20,620 --> 00:37:23,241
There are more humane versions
of capitalism,

789
00:37:23,344 --> 00:37:27,034
or more barbaric forms
of capitalism.

790
00:37:27,137 --> 00:37:29,310
But I don't think
there's a systemic alternative

791
00:37:29,413 --> 00:37:30,482
to capitalism.

792
00:37:30,586 --> 00:37:32,896
Will there ever be?
Yes, I would think so.

793
00:37:33,000 --> 00:37:35,206
I mean, you know,
nothing is forever.

794
00:37:35,310 --> 00:37:36,551
Absolutely nothing.

795
00:37:36,655 --> 00:37:39,827
And capitalism is not forever.

796
00:37:43,241 --> 00:37:45,724
Narrator: But anyone looking
for a fairer alternative

797
00:37:45,827 --> 00:37:47,655
knows they can't ever repeat

798
00:37:47,758 --> 00:37:50,586
what happened east
of the Berlin Wall.

799
00:37:50,689 --> 00:37:53,310
Dictatorship,
political oppression,

800
00:37:53,413 --> 00:37:55,758
and millions of ruined lives.

801
00:38:03,241 --> 00:38:06,172
From 1945 till 1989,

802
00:38:06,275 --> 00:38:09,137
this was the main remand centre
for political prisoners

803
00:38:09,241 --> 00:38:10,896
in communist East Germany.

804
00:38:12,655 --> 00:38:15,000
Today, it's been turned
into a memorial.

805
00:38:26,931 --> 00:38:28,689
It's possible
that places like this

806
00:38:28,793 --> 00:38:32,482
explain why even capitalism's
toughest critics today

807
00:38:32,586 --> 00:38:35,896
seldom talk seriously
about replacing it.

808
00:38:41,206 --> 00:38:43,034
- You can see,
with all of this protest

809
00:38:43,137 --> 00:38:46,000
in Europe, Greece
and so on...

810
00:38:46,103 --> 00:38:47,931
I was in Spain, in Greece,

811
00:38:48,034 --> 00:38:49,931
asking, always,
the same question.

812
00:38:50,034 --> 00:38:52,827
OK, what do you want?

813
00:38:52,931 --> 00:38:55,965
Apart from
some purely moralistic answers,

814
00:38:56,068 --> 00:38:59,413
I didn't get any good,
concrete proposals.

815
00:38:59,517 --> 00:39:03,275
You know, answers like,
"Oh, money should serve people,

816
00:39:03,379 --> 00:39:05,586
"not people serving money."

817
00:39:05,689 --> 00:39:07,275
My god, Hitler and everyone

818
00:39:07,379 --> 00:39:08,931
would have agreed with this,
I'm sure.

819
00:39:09,034 --> 00:39:10,620
You would've thought,

820
00:39:10,724 --> 00:39:13,310
that with this implosion
of the banking system

821
00:39:13,413 --> 00:39:16,206
at the heart of the capitalism
in the United States,

822
00:39:16,310 --> 00:39:18,379
versus the United Kingdom
and so on,

823
00:39:18,482 --> 00:39:22,517
there would be a huge rush

824
00:39:22,620 --> 00:39:25,793
to Marxism
and extreme socialism.

825
00:39:25,896 --> 00:39:27,137
That hasn't really happened.

826
00:39:28,586 --> 00:39:32,620
It is quite surprising,
and I'm very pleased.

827
00:39:37,103 --> 00:39:39,689
Narrator: But if memories
of this place do fade,

828
00:39:39,793 --> 00:39:43,344
could there ever be
an alternative to capitalism?

829
00:39:43,448 --> 00:39:47,206
Or should what happened here
be a lesson for all time?

830
00:39:47,310 --> 00:39:49,172
- I think, if you remove
the free market,

831
00:39:49,275 --> 00:39:51,241
you're removing
people's ability, freely,

832
00:39:51,344 --> 00:39:52,793
to trade with each other.

833
00:39:52,896 --> 00:39:55,206
To acquire the things they want,

834
00:39:55,310 --> 00:39:58,586
and sacrifice for them,
the things that they value less.

835
00:39:58,689 --> 00:40:00,551
You're removing people's ability

836
00:40:00,655 --> 00:40:02,482
to enrich and improve
their lives.

837
00:40:02,586 --> 00:40:05,379
It is a perfectly natural part
of the human condition.

838
00:40:05,482 --> 00:40:07,310
Adam Smith said, the effort
of every person

839
00:40:07,413 --> 00:40:08,758
to improve their condition.

840
00:40:08,862 --> 00:40:10,206
You know,
he thought it was so basic.

841
00:40:10,310 --> 00:40:13,034
If you deny people
the opportunity to do that,

842
00:40:13,137 --> 00:40:16,137
then you'll have to build
some kind of compulsion into it.

843
00:40:16,241 --> 00:40:18,586
You have to make people
behave in a way

844
00:40:18,689 --> 00:40:21,689
in which they would not
spontaneously behave.

845
00:40:21,793 --> 00:40:25,310
- If someone wants to seek
an alternative to capitalism,

846
00:40:25,413 --> 00:40:28,068
then they're saying,
by seeking that alternative,

847
00:40:28,172 --> 00:40:31,448
that capitalism is a system,

848
00:40:31,551 --> 00:40:33,931
rather then a fact of life.

849
00:40:34,034 --> 00:40:35,793
And they're saying that,
for instance,

850
00:40:35,896 --> 00:40:38,034
that human nature
can be altered.

851
00:40:38,137 --> 00:40:39,655
Fundamentally,
they're revealing themselves

852
00:40:39,758 --> 00:40:41,172
as utopian.

853
00:40:41,275 --> 00:40:42,448
And the problem with utopia

854
00:40:42,551 --> 00:40:44,275
is that it can only ever
be approached

855
00:40:44,379 --> 00:40:45,827
across a sea of blood,

856
00:40:45,931 --> 00:40:47,000
and you never arrive.

857
00:40:47,103 --> 00:40:48,896
- This is my big mantra,

858
00:40:49,000 --> 00:40:51,482
when we leftists
are accused of utopians.

859
00:40:51,586 --> 00:40:53,517
Maybe, but the only real utopia

860
00:40:53,620 --> 00:40:57,068
is to think that,
with some cosmetic changes,

861
00:40:57,172 --> 00:41:01,413
things can go on, indefinitely,
the way they are now.

862
00:41:01,517 --> 00:41:02,620
[crowd sings
'The Internationale']

863
00:41:02,724 --> 00:41:07,034
♪ Arise ye starvelings
from your slumbers ♪

864
00:41:07,137 --> 00:41:11,034
♪ Arise ye criminals of want

865
00:41:11,137 --> 00:41:15,689
♪ For reason in revolt
now thunders ♪

866
00:41:15,793 --> 00:41:17,931
♪ And at last ends the age...

867
00:41:18,034 --> 00:41:20,793
Narrator: Marx died in 1883.

868
00:41:20,896 --> 00:41:22,344
In a speech at his grave,

869
00:41:22,448 --> 00:41:24,448
his long-time friend
and collaborator,

870
00:41:24,551 --> 00:41:25,896
Friedrich Engels, declared,

871
00:41:26,000 --> 00:41:28,862
"His name and work will endure
through the ages."

872
00:41:28,965 --> 00:41:33,172
[singing of 'The Internationale'
continues]

873
00:41:33,275 --> 00:41:35,137
Narrator:
For most of the 20th century,

874
00:41:35,241 --> 00:41:37,172
his name did endure,

875
00:41:37,275 --> 00:41:39,551
though usually
for all the wrong reasons.

876
00:41:39,655 --> 00:41:41,724
Still, there are plenty
of people today

877
00:41:41,827 --> 00:41:43,551
who still believe
we should strive

878
00:41:43,655 --> 00:41:45,448
for an alternative
to capitalism.

879
00:41:47,068 --> 00:41:50,482
- Marx did bring together

880
00:41:50,586 --> 00:41:53,172
concrete economic analysis,

881
00:41:53,275 --> 00:41:56,448
with a certain
emancipatory hope.

882
00:41:56,551 --> 00:41:59,137
The message,
it's still a beautiful one -

883
00:41:59,241 --> 00:42:02,620
maybe you ordinary people
have a chance.

884
00:42:02,724 --> 00:42:04,965
I'm not a great eulogiser,
actually,

885
00:42:05,068 --> 00:42:07,000
of anyone,
to tell you the truth.

886
00:42:07,103 --> 00:42:10,517
But if one were to write
a tribute to him,

887
00:42:10,620 --> 00:42:13,000
one would go back,

888
00:42:13,103 --> 00:42:17,241
to Marx's favourite character
in Greek mythology,

889
00:42:17,344 --> 00:42:22,000
Prometheus,
who gave the earthlings fire.

890
00:42:25,310 --> 00:42:28,931
And that is what Marx
gave citizens

891
00:42:29,034 --> 00:42:30,482
all over the globe.

892
00:42:30,586 --> 00:42:32,344
The fire necessary

893
00:42:32,448 --> 00:42:34,965
to transform their lives,
forever.

894
00:42:35,068 --> 00:42:38,379
[singing of 'The Internationale'
continues]

895
00:42:44,068 --> 00:42:45,965
Narrator: But what value
does Marx have

896
00:42:46,068 --> 00:42:48,310
for those less inclined
to revolution?

897
00:42:50,689 --> 00:42:53,275
Fundamentally, Marx reminds us,

898
00:42:53,379 --> 00:42:55,655
if capitalism doesn't work
for everyone,

899
00:42:55,758 --> 00:42:57,103
it might not work at all.

900
00:43:00,310 --> 00:43:01,482
- There is no doubt

901
00:43:01,586 --> 00:43:04,206
that there have been
significant changes

902
00:43:04,310 --> 00:43:05,413
in inequality

903
00:43:05,517 --> 00:43:07,689
and in the distribution
of income,

904
00:43:07,793 --> 00:43:10,758
which make you pause
about the benefits

905
00:43:10,862 --> 00:43:14,793
of the developments of output
and prosperity that we've seen.

906
00:43:14,896 --> 00:43:18,413
And I don't think you can afford
to believe

907
00:43:18,517 --> 00:43:20,379
that the benefits
of a market economy

908
00:43:20,482 --> 00:43:22,586
in bringing prosperity
will be there,

909
00:43:22,689 --> 00:43:24,448
unless there is
a collective commitment

910
00:43:24,551 --> 00:43:25,655
to keep the system going.

911
00:43:25,758 --> 00:43:27,620
And that does require people
to believe

912
00:43:27,724 --> 00:43:29,620
that everyone will benefit
in the end.

913
00:43:29,724 --> 00:43:33,034
I think some of the ugliness
of capitalism

914
00:43:33,137 --> 00:43:36,862
that he saw in the 19th century

915
00:43:36,965 --> 00:43:40,965
seems to be reappearing
in the 20th and 21st.

916
00:43:41,068 --> 00:43:46,586
In a way, we have to keep
our perspective on this.

917
00:43:46,689 --> 00:43:48,655
Health conditions
are much better,

918
00:43:48,758 --> 00:43:52,241
living standards are starting
from a higher level,

919
00:43:52,344 --> 00:43:55,034
but it is still the case

920
00:43:55,137 --> 00:44:00,068
that things aren't the way
they ought to be,

921
00:44:00,172 --> 00:44:03,379
and they're not moving
in the way they should be.

922
00:44:03,482 --> 00:44:08,586
We have to find a way
of creating jobs

923
00:44:08,689 --> 00:44:10,586
which are broad-based,

924
00:44:10,689 --> 00:44:12,517
which pay reasonable amounts.

925
00:44:12,620 --> 00:44:15,000
But at the same time, you know,

926
00:44:15,103 --> 00:44:19,620
without sort of going against
the basic laws of competition.

927
00:44:19,724 --> 00:44:21,448
Narrator: Marx was right
to see capitalism

928
00:44:21,551 --> 00:44:23,655
as inherently unstable,

929
00:44:23,758 --> 00:44:25,655
and often unfair.

930
00:44:25,758 --> 00:44:27,724
Keynes and Hayek saw that, too,

931
00:44:27,827 --> 00:44:29,758
but Marx was the first.

932
00:44:29,862 --> 00:44:32,241
And, unlike them,
he didn't think

933
00:44:32,344 --> 00:44:34,862
we should find a way
to live with it.

934
00:44:34,965 --> 00:44:36,620
He said capitalism
would bounce back

935
00:44:36,724 --> 00:44:39,206
from crises and reinvent itself.

936
00:44:39,310 --> 00:44:41,551
But, in the end,
a compelling alternative

937
00:44:41,655 --> 00:44:44,586
would appear,
and capitalism would collapse.

938
00:44:46,206 --> 00:44:48,551
For all that rings true,
now, in Marx,

939
00:44:48,655 --> 00:44:51,758
on that, he seems to have been
dead wrong.

940
00:44:51,862 --> 00:44:53,896
Captioned by Ai-Media
ai-media.tv