“You can sell Americans on anything, no matter how wretchedly unsatisfactory it is, by labeling it as progress. That’s what’s being done now, with AI being used as a justification for firing useless workers, deleting unnecessary departments, cutting office staff down to scales that actually make sense, and shutting down the classroom-to-cubicle pipeline that once poured new graduates into salary class jobs. We can expect that process to accelerate dramatically in the years ahead.”
Greer begins by laying out a compelling taxonomy of class in America, four self-explanatory classes defined by this question: how do different groups in today’s America get their income?
1. investment class: income from investments (i.e. capital)
2. salary class: income from a monthly salary with benefits
3. wage class: income from an hourly wage with no benefits
4. welfare class: income from welfare programs
My ten classes: yes, this is more complicated that Greer’s four classes but since power has sources other than income, accuracy demands an accounting not just of income but of power and agency, which is an individual form of power with systemic consequences such as social mobility.
Roth Note: Plausible view of a neo-feudal America. And I thought America did away with the class system, or at least allowed folks upward mobility.
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