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this post was submitted on 20 Aug 2023
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Asklemmy
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Profit.
In the ideal situation, resources are transformed into goods with zero waste and with fair compensation for every person involved in that process. Any expense outside of costs and pay for the people involved is either inevitable inefficiency due to our imperfect technology or the laws of physics, or it is some sort of scam, and thus profit itself is a scam.
Profit represents surplus value that can be excersized to either sustain an organization when demand is low or to increase productivity through expansion. If there was no profit then all businesses would be on the verge of collapse at all times
The real purpose of profit is to incentivize investment. Without starting liquidity, industry and business can’t get off the ground.
I'd argue profit is essential to capitalism, which of course is probably what you meant, blaming capitalism I mean. I think charging interest on debt (some of which you are essentially forced to borrow) is what is truly scandalous. Sure it makes sense when it is oversimplified, and told from the point of view of the banks who need to make an honest living by risking money, but money is created from thin air from loans, so the whole thing makes no sense imo.
Profit is older than capitalism; capitalism is a particularly egregious form of it, but it is profit itself - intentional inefficiency in the conversion of resources to usable product, for the purpose of benefiting those creating the inefficiency that I refer to.
In theory, something very close to capitalism could exist without profit - with everyone getting back only a fair and appropriate compensation for their part in the process. It's the 'put in a little and get back infinite returns ' part that makes capitalism specifically a problem.