Gangs of America

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♦ CHAPTER NINETEEN ♦So What’s the Alternative?The vision of economic democracy

Somehow we have persuaded ourselves that the capitalist economy must be fueled only by greed. This has become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Only the profit maximizers get to play in the marketplace and try their luck. People who are not motivated by profit-making stay away from it [and] condemn it. —Muhammad Yunus

UP TO THIS POINT, the method of this book has been forensic: sifting through evidence, tracing steps. Peering back as far as the thirteenth century, we’ve reconstructed the origins and evolution of a powerful entity, the modern corporation. In particular, we’ve looked at how courts and legislatures have forged the body of legal privilege that reinforces ...