The Utopian Promise of Self-Checkout Machines
Under capitalism, automation destroys jobs. In a socialist society, it could free us from work and offer untold leisure to all.
488 Articles by: Luke Savage
Luke Savage is a columnist at Jacobin. He is the author of The Dead Center: Reflections on Liberalism and Democracy After the End of History.
On Migrant Rights, Joe Biden Still Has a Long Way to Go
The Biden administration has made some encouraging noises on immigration policy. But activists are tired of talk — they want to see action.
Pete Buttigieg Is Bootleg Obama in the Worst Ways Possible
Pete Buttigieg, a shape-shifting knockoff of the Obama original, has written a book about the importance of Trust — a surprising topic for a politician who elicits suspicion every time he opens his mouth. Can we just let bootleg Obama wander off into obscurity?
The Energy Policy Culture War Is an Absurd Fantasy
What a surprise — the Texas energy disaster has been turned into a yet another culture war scrimmage field, pitting right-wing advocates of fossil fuels against liberal supporters of renewable energy. But the red vs. blue framing conceals something important: when it comes to the climate, Texans are far to the left of their representatives.
Why the Democrats Tied Themselves in Knots During Donald Trump’s Impeachment Trial
The Democrats’ confused and inept handling of the final stage of the impeachment trial revealed the contradiction at the heart of the party’s politics: whether it’s trying to represent bold change or simply a return to the pre-Trump status quo.
Joe Biden’s Climate Policies Are a Step Back From “Death Wish.” But We Need More Than That.
So far the Biden administration’s stated climate policies have shifted the US government from a stance of death-wish climate nihilism to one that resembles a typical center-right European government. But without a sharp move to the left on the economic aspects of climate transition, even that much progress won’t materialize.
Bernie and AOC Are Right: Joe Biden Should Declare Climate Change a National Emergency
For decades, presidents have used their power to declare emergencies to sideline badly needed regulations and entrench the national security state. Now a group of Congress members led by AOC is proposing that those powers be used for good: to force action to avoid a climate catastrophe.
Means-Testing Has Nothing to Do With “Getting Help to Those Who Need It Most”
Lawmakers and wonks who insist on means-testing every government program like to posture as champions of the poor and downtrodden. But the fake Robin Hood act is just a cover for their deep-seated suspicion of the welfare state.
How the Right Won a Postwar Counterrevolution in Economics
The Great Depression thoroughly discredited laissez-faire economics. But over the postwar decades, with the help of generous business funding and political connections, figures like Milton Friedman led a remarkable revival of nineteenth-century economic ideas. They did it by adopting a pseudo-populist rhetoric that celebrated individual choice and autonomy.
New Polling Shows That Millions of Americans Really Hate Wall Street
The GameStop saga was more than a simple tale of upstart traders taking on big business. But it highlighted again how disconnected Wall Street is from ordinary workers — and new polling finds that even more Americans now resent Wall Street.
Why Cable News Hates Medicare for All
From last year’s Democratic primaries to this year’s Biden agenda, TV news coverage of the health care debate is outrageously skewed against single-payer reform. To understand why, we need look no further than their business model.
Perhaps We Should Regulate Deranged Billionaires Like Elon Musk
By one estimate, Elon Musk owns more than a quarter of all active satellites orbiting Earth. Though his fantasy of becoming emperor of Mars probably won’t materialize, we have to scale back the unchecked power of deranged Bond villain types like Musk before it extends from Earth to the skies.
The Gamestop Affair Is Just the Latest Incarnation of the “People’s Capitalism” Delusion
The Robinhood trading app is an attempt to commercialize a powerful but thoroughly fictional myth: that finance can be democratized while ownership and control remain in the hands of powerful capitalists.
The GameStop Fiasco Exposes the Fantasy That Capitalism Can Be Democratic
When tech platforms, regulatory agencies, and social media companies conspire to swat down share purchases that get in Wall Street’s way, they’re doing us all a favor: they’re showing us the ruthlessly hierarchical reality of neoliberalism behind the friendly mask.
Everything You Always Wanted to Know about QAnon But Were Too Weirded Out to Ask
Much of the news these days is unhinged, but nothing can compare, in terms of pure lunacy, with QAnon. The Daily Beast’s Will Sommer, longtime observer of the far right, spoke with Jacobin to explain QAnon’s origins and evolution — and why he thinks the movement is here to stay even if “Q” and “The Storm” are never heard from again.
“I Pretty Much Immediately Discovered How Bad American Health Care Was”
Journalist Libby Watson started a newsletter to document the horrors of the US’s profit-driven health system. She spoke to us about the insurance industry’s windfall COVID-19 profits, Joe Biden’s phantom public option proposal, and how growing up with Britain’s National Health Service made her experiences with America’s grotesque system all the more enraging.
In 2009, Pundits Predicted a New Progressive Era. It Never Came.
We’ll have to wait to find out whether Joe Biden’s domestic agenda will actually reflect the surprisingly progressive noises he’s been making since his swearing in. But the exultant days and weeks surrounding Barack Obama’s inauguration offer a cautionary tale.
Joe Biden Wants to Make Health Care “Secure for All.” He Should Just Make It Free.
In his inauguration speech Wednesday, Joe Biden promised health care that will be “secure for all.” But no amount of rhetorical triangulation can erase the fact that a single-payer system is the only viable alternative to the status quo.
Bernie’s Plan to Give Everyone Health Care During the Pandemic Could Transform Our Health System
Bernie Sanders’s proposal to create a national emergency health insurance plan could have a transformative effect on the national health care debate, long after the COVID pandemic is over. But that plan, along with any other progressive policies, will be rendered moot if Joe Biden sticks to his insistence on seeking Republican support in Congress.
We Should Be Very Worried About Joe Biden’s “Domestic Terrorism” Bill
Joe Biden used to brag that he practically wrote the Patriot Act, the Bush-era law that massively increased government surveillance powers. Given his purported plan to pass a new domestic terrorism law once in office, the danger is real that the January 6 Capitol attack will be used as an excuse to severely curtail our civil liberties.