I see a lot of posts on this sub-Reddit bemoaning specific features of a world capitalist system, but which fail to point to any broader solution other than unionization and legislation, when these are not viable long term solutions.
For example, somebody will talk about automation and it’s effect on job loss, to which the answer is inevitably “implement UBI”. Sure, that might briefly mitigate some aspects of the crisis, but the race to the bottom will never cease as long as the workers remain under the yoke of the same economic system. For example, under, say, a planned economy that does not rely on a small group of elite freeloaders to plan society’s economic output, automation could be used for good. Menial jobs could be progressively phased out while the workers displaced are retrained and provided new employment in their field of choice without the fear of going bankrupt, hungry, or homeless. Why do we need to rely on the rich and the market to do the economic planning on our behalf? They will never produce outcomes favourable to the vast majority of the working class, even with well intentioned legislation and union rights.
My main point is this: if you REALLY want things to change, look for solutions which do not require billionaires acquiescing to whichever watered down demands the workers push through. These meagre concessions will be steadily eroded by a state run for and by the rich. Social democracy is temporary and extremely predatory towards the third world, and is thus not a solution, only a brief concession. The real solution is actual workers’ power at every political and economic strata; we can do it ourselves. If the owners do not show up to the office, they cash a cheque. If we do not show up to work, society does not function.