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Capitalism As A Cultural Ratchet
- Capitalism acts as a cultural ratchet by meeting demand and then amplifying it through competition and scale.
- This ratchet accelerates cultural change by turning small conveniences into widespread expectations.
Three Examples Of Demand Met
- Air conditioning, birth control and pop music became mass realities because entrepreneurs met latent demand and scaled distribution.
- Seth uses Carrier, Margaret Sanger and the transistor radio to show how technology plus capitalism rewrites daily life.
The Industrial Shift Toward Replaceable Labor
- Industrial capitalism made many jobs trivial and replaceable by optimizing tasks and standardizing work.
- This shift enabled mass production but also devalued worker skill and autonomy.