I laughed when Milton Friedman thinks free market could prevent climate change through climate dividends and carbon tax. Good luck, boyo, your "greed is good" bullshit is what led us to here.
this post was submitted on 28 Nov 2025
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Didn't know much about the guy except that he's a Nobel laureate. Happened to come across a YouTube video where a curious college student asks him about how slavery and colonialism contributed to Western wealth. He had an elaborate answer but within it he actually said Britain did not have slaves and America did not have colonies (for the most part).
Nevermind the fact that America absolutely had slaves and Britain certainly had colonies (he was selective on who didn't have what), Britain absolutely did profit from slavery also.
He added on that Britain spent more on administering colonies than it gained extracting their resources which may be one of the stupidest arguments I've ever heard. How can someone that worships at the altar of capitalism not understand that greed was the obvious motivator? Or is it only the motivator when it fits his narrative?
If this is the messaging we get from our intellectuals, what hope does truth have?
Income from India is the main driver of 18 century British naval dominance but even if we exclude India and the sugar growing Caribbean islands, there was tons of British colonial possessions that didn't directly contribute to the treasury enough to cover expenditures but still benefited the Empire economically and enriched upperclass brits individually. There are maybe a handful of remote islands that could be considered charitable to add to the British Empire; exploitation was the name of the game everywhere else.
Where I'd say Friedman is arguing in bad faith is that the obvious goal of colonialism is value extraction by force or coercion. He may argue that due to inefficiency or resistance it didn't actually produce significant wealth for Britain but the evidence shows otherwise.
That or he may argue that the East India Company (the origin of multinational capitalism) was not colonialism which would be divergent from historical consensus.
Fun fact, Britain had to create taxes in it's East African colonies not to raise income but because British economic interests struggled to recruit workers from people who had everything they needed without the British. Forcing them to pay taxes in currency forced them to accept employment to acquire that currency.
We call that extortion in our part of the world. I assume the British call it that today too.
I'd say coerced wage slavery.
From cold hard rationale, Hayek and Friedman makes sense, but they do ignore reality that circumstances always change. Deregulation made sense at the time of 1970s oil crisis as the economy and welfare state stagnated, but we're now in the age of economic prosperity again, but the wealth is hoarded by the few and act as though austerity still matters.
Not entirely sure about why Friedman's claim that India was costing the British empire more to maintain, but it has also been repeated in many circles. I suspect that the data is not fully contextualised and repeated as if it's the absolute truth. An Indian historian countered the narrative, mentioning that if we include the period of private control of India by the British East India company, before India was formally taken over by the British state in 1858, the total wealth plundered from India is about $1 trillion. The term "loot" is Indian origin, which became part of the English language after East India's violent colonisation. When the British public found out of about the brutal occupation by a private company and were enraged by it, the British state took over the formal administration. But this only happened well after committing crimes against humanity, after a state-sanctioned plunder and massacre that made their private owners and their government enablers rich, while the cost of running another country is taken over by tax payers. It's an early example of "privatise the profit, socialise the cost".
There are several estimates. Some as high as $45 trillion.
Friedman's take has been repeated in many Western circles.
As you've mentioned there were multiple members of Parliament who were directly invested in the EIC and made sizable profits. The EIC managed to extract explotative taxation during the Bengal famine of 1770 (promoting starvation) while shareholders increased their dividend from 10 to 12.5%. The massive transfer of wealth from India, the Atlantic slave trade and Opium sales to China essentially built Britain during this era. It was the seed capital of the industrial revolution.
The British Raj took over after the failed sepoy mutiny in mid 1800s. It was at this point Britain introduced the strategy of the 'civilizing mission', denigrating Indian culture as a justification to the British public to continue colonization. The British public accepted this. It was the independence movement in India that ultimately secured freedom (along with Nazi destruction of British infrastructure).
As we watch power and wealth slowly drift back from West to East and South, African, Indian and many other voices that speak truth on this matter will be heard more clearly.
Often times Westerners are not open to accepting voices from the global south on these matters and portray them as biased. I usual refer to the writings of historian William Dalrymple (the self admitted descendant of colonists) as a starting point to those that feel morally threatened by this history but want to learn more from someone who doesn't feel too foreign.
For those that are open to Indian voices, Sashi Tharoor's writings or his YouTube series 'Imperial Receipts' does a good job capturing the history and scale of extraction.
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What I never understand is, do the billionaires not care about their own children? Or tbh even themselves at this point as it's happening so fast even they will be affected (although they can probably mitigate the effects by moving to one of their 500 houses that's in a safe zone)
although they can probably mitigate the effects by moving to one of their 500 houses that's in a safe zone
That's why they don't care.
Climate change hits the poorest first and hardest (see: hurricanes in the Caribbean and SEA).
Billionaires can fly in, enjoy the sunshine, fly out and not get a drop of water on their skin.
And they'll keep "outrunning" climate change on an individual level, and only feel it when it hurts their net worth*.
*
At which point, they'll just re-organize their investments to exploit clean energy subsidies and real estate wherever everyone is fleeing to when the coasts flood.
Capitalism is kinda like a control system, if you aren't willing to do everything possible for profit you get outcompeted and fall. The billionaires at the top are the ones that truly believe they are doing right, and are building apocalypse bunkers for themselves and their immediate families.
They have bunkers, they have stockpiles of food and medicine, and they have staff to maintain it all. They fully believe they have the means and resources to insulate themselves from all consequences.
We should start planning on fouling their air exchange systems now.
Which they wont, but they believe they will.
do the billionaires not care about their own children?
Ummm...no? I sincerely believe some people are inherently evil. Look at Elon Musk and how he treats his children.
I was watching a documentary on the nature of evil. There is an incarcerated serial killer who acknowledges what he did is evil and wrong, but he doesn't feel empathy. CT scan of his brain showed that the part of the brain associated with empathy is not really active. Having said that, I heard that the longer someone is in power, the more that their brain physiologically changes.
Of course it is more complicated and nurture still plays a role on the person's development, but I think sometimes nature is stronger.
Once down the dark path you begin, forever with it dominate your destiny.
The fact that every billionaire will gleefully kill you, me and everyone to make number go up would, if humans were even a little rational, be enough evidence for their immediate liquidation. Capitalism is providing the best evidence for it's own destruction and yet people just don't see it because they personally aren't starving and freezing right now.
If we dont get rid of capitalism, rich will be the last one to be affected by climate change. Proletariat is as shield for them to face wrath of climate change first
I get this is a meme, but it is trying to talk about something serious. It's worth saying that fatalist arguments are actually beneficial to liberalism and capitalism. Capitalism is not going to kill us all, humans are exceptionally durable. Capitalism intends to kill us all though, whether through the dehumanization it requires to function or its inability to contend with the material limitations of reality. Climate change mitigation is a discussion around minimising the harm this system causes while it dies, and liberals often subscribe to fatalist narratives because they dont truly imagine a world that is not capitalist as one worth living in.
Yep, that's why we need to have revolutionary optimism. Right now, incredible strides are being made by socialist countries like China to combat climate change and push for electrification and sustainability.
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