[randomdata]

> Capitalism is a system in which those who control capital wield the most power

Capitalism has no concern about power. It only speaks to ownership rights.

And, as an aside, what you are envisioning clearly puts the power in the hands of labour. As you said: "Realize capital has no market value without labor to work it."

[dragonwriter]

> Capitalism has no concern about power.

Capitalism is entirely about power.

> It only speaks to ownership rights.

“Ownership rights” are power. Capitalism evolved through the mercantile class under pre-capitalist systems leveraging their then-current power to force changes in the system which durably transferred power from the land-tied aristocracy to themselves.

[randomdata]

> Capitalism is entirely about power.

Surely it is people that are entirely about power?

> “Ownership rights” are power.

Perhaps, but capitalism only describes one of many different ways of organizing ownership. It is not about ownership in and of itself. It turns out that we already have a word for ownership: Ownership. We came up with another word, capitalism, because it means something else.

[dragonwriter]

> > Capitalism is entirely about power.

> Surely it is people that are entirely about power?

Most people are in part interested in power and some people are entirely interested in power, but capitalism is entirely a system engineered for distributing power for the benefit of a particular class.

> Perhaps, but capitalism only describes one of many different ways of organizing ownership.

Capitalism implements (not describes) one particular way of organizing ownership, chosen for the effect it has on the distribution of power in society.

[randomdata]

> but capitalism is entirely a system engineered for distributing power for the benefit of a particular class.

A previous commenter postulated a hypothetical world where capital only has value when labour is utilizing it. It in no way violated capitalism, but clearly labour holds the power in that world. After all, labour could just not use the capital and then take it from the dumpster after it gets thrown away for being worthless.

It is possible other worlds could see capital that is not dependent on labour and use that to take power, perhaps, but that's beyond the topic of capitalism. Nothing in capitalism says that there must be capital that is utilizable without labour.

> Capitalism implements (not describes) one particular way of organizing ownership

Huh? Words can't implement anything. Only people can implement something.

[dragonwriter]

> Huh? Words can’t implement anything.

If we were talking about the word “capitalism”, it would be in quotes; that’s how you make use/mention distinctions in English. “Capitalism” is a word, the thing it describes is capitalism, which is a system, which implements a design that people have made.

[randomdata]

Indeed, capitalism does not implement capitalism, capitalism is the product of what people implemented. And when we talk about capitalism we are talking about a word that describes that.

[Turskarama]

In what world do you think the people who own everything don't also have all the power?

You cannot decouple ownership from politics. If you own the productivity of the nation, you own the nation.

[randomdata]

> In what world do you think the people who own everything don't also have all the power?

A world where "Realize capital has no market value without labor to work it" is true cannot see power reset in the hands of those with capital as it asserts that capital has no value without labour, which means that labour holds all the power.

I don't know what world that was meant to refer to. It did not specify, nor was it it written by me in order to specify now. You may have accidentally pressed the wrong reply button?

> You cannot decouple ownership from politics.

That may be true, but the concept of ownership doesn't come from capitalism. Socialism, for example, also describes ownership. You cannot couple ownership with capitalism.

[Turskarama]

> A world where "Realize capital has no market value without labor to work it" is true cannot see power reset in the hands of those with capital as it asserts that capital has no value without labour, which means that labour holds all the power.

Yes and no, the capitalist needs the labour for their capital to be worth anything, but likewise the Labor needs the tools the capitalist owns to multiply the value of their labour. Since capital gives control of the state (indirectly) the state tends to also support capital which then has a monopoly on violence and can coerce labor through means that the labour itself doesn't have. Historically this has come about in the police engaging in union busting (an example of how capital is power).

[randomdata]

> but likewise the Labor needs the tools the capitalist owns to multiply the value of their labour

Labour doesn't need to multiply its labour, though. Labour remains valuable no matter what.

> Since capital gives control of the state (indirectly)

The state is just people. In a world where capital is worthless without labour, I assume that labour makes up the majority of the population – why would a small group of people sitting on capital that does nothing and is worthless have more power than the majority of the populace who actually bring value to the table?

> which then has a monopoly on violence

In a world where capital is worthless without labour, who, exactly, is going to enact that violence? You need labour to bring the violence...

[Turskarama]

> Labour remains valuable no matter what.

Maybe, but for a somewhat tortured example: if you're a programmer with domain knowledge of a specific application then your value there might be worth $150k a year. If that's taken away from you and you have to learn a new domain then your value might be only $80k per year. If even a computer to work on is taken away from you then your labor is only worth minimum wage.

[randomdata]

Painfully tortured, indeed, but let's try to work with it:

In this world of which we speak, if you take the labour away from the computer then the computer becomes worthless. At which point you can then you can collect the computer from the dumpster to then build yourself back up to being worth $150k per year plus the return on capital value.

Clearly labour holds the power in this world. It can completely destroy the capital owners. The inverse is not true.

[Mechanical9]

Capitalism doesn't have to be concerned with power for it to result in those with capital holding the most power. 'Rights' that are only available to those with capital aren't really rights at all.

[randomdata]

Likewise, math doesn't have to be concerned with resulting in CSAM material being distributed electronically. But it has resulted in that.

What is the takeaway here? Are you suggesting that we should rid the world of math because it might accompany something not liked? Indeed, no more math, no more electronic distribution of CSAM material. Problem solved?