By Darrell Rankin

On Bernie Sander’s idea of busting up the big banks
Is the idea harmful? Yes. In short, the foxes will continue to guard smaller hen houses.
There are four main reasons why this part of Sander’s platform is harmful or will not work.
It is important to start by recognizing that Sanders calls himself a socialist, whereby today’s aged, dying and deadly capitalist society can be reformed to achieve happy and near-perfect harmony.
News of Sander’s campaign is reaching billions of people globally, so it is important to recognize another truth: Fixing capitalism is not the same as socialism.
Sander’s campaign is sure to renew discussion and thought about the right way to escape the present nightmare, and that means socialism.

* * * * Four reasons
U.S. lawmakers busted trusts in the progressive era (1900-1917), but their efforts did nothing to stop banks and corporations from growing to sizes that dwarf those of the last century.
One capitalist kills many because of objective laws of development, not merely because of sentiments like ‘greed.’
Monopoly capitalism feeds and expands on the firm foundation of the growing social nature of production and the increasingly complex division of labour within production: the need to cooperate.
The need to cooperate and produce for our survival is hindered, negated and crushed by the capitalists who own the banks and factories.
As predicted by Karl Marx, private ownership contradicts the social nature of production on an ever-greater scale.
Today, the contradiction means the hardship, crushed dreams and destroyed lives of the vast majority of workers.
It means the suppression of knowledge (drug and other patents, tuition fees, etc.), military spending, mass impoverishment, enormous underemployment, trade sanctions, the destructive reaction of nature to heedless profit-oriented development, and so on.
Resolving capitalism’s main contradiction requires that working people overthrow the capitalist class and expropriate the monopoly capitalists’ property – smaller capitalists are not the largest source of the main contradiction.
Secondly, curbing the power of finance or bank capital will require perpetual vigilance by masses of people. Making foxes accountable how they run the hen house takes a lot of work. Plus if there are more foxes, there’s more work.
Thirdly, breaking up large banks and corporations is counter-productive. The larger the bank, the easier it is to put people ahead of profit. The problem is not size, but the profit motive. There should no need for ten banks to finance one bridge.
Lastly, involving millions of people in a campaign to eliminate large enterprises and banks in modern capitalism will be disappointing in the end. The power of banks can be curbed. But it will take socialism to eliminate their power altogether.
Socialists can demand to curb corporate power and still remain committed to a socialist society in the longer run. That avoids diverting energy to reforms that will not work.
Sander’s starting idea is that the U.S. has the ‘wrong kind’ of capitalism, which ignores capitalism’s irrevocable laws of development.
The division of corporations into monopoly and non-monopoly strata is an essential and typical feature of modern, ripe-rotten capitalism in many nations.
It is impossible to return to pre-monopoly or competitive capitalism.
Mass protests can curb the power of monopoly finance capital, but ultimately a socialist revolution will have to place power in the hands of workers.
The crucial problem now is which class benefits from these huge behemoth entities, and that concerns state power.
That is the key problem.
There’s nothing wrong with fighting to curb the power of Wall Street. Power is the issue, not the size of banks.
Lasting change will require a socialist revolution and state power by the working class.
State power by workers will open up a real rebirth for the United States and its workers. It would end imperialist plundering, create full employment, improve living standards and rescue the environment.
Socialists want to turn the foxes into hard working chickens.
We don’t need any foxes.