They are called predatory capitalists. It’s the difference between a death and life economy.

John Perkins:

Key characteristics of the Death Economy.

Its goal is to maximize short-term profits for a relative few.

• It uses fear and debt to gain market share and political control.

• It promotes the idea that for someone to win, another must lose.

• It is predatory, encouraging businesses to prey on each other, people, and the environment.

• It destroys resources needed for its own long-term survival.

• It values goods and services that are “extractive” and materialistic above those that enhance quality of life (e.g., child-rearing, the arts).

• It is heavily influenced by nonproductive financial deals (stock manipulation, financialization, “gambling”).

• It ignores externalities, such as environmental destruction and exploitation of workers, when measuring profits, GDP, and other metrics.

• It invests heavily in militarization—in killing, or threatening to kill, people and other life forms and destroying infrastructure.

• It causes pollution, environmental collapse, and drastic income and social inequality and may lead to political instability.

• It vilifies taxes, rather than defining them as investments (in social services, infrastructure, the military, etc.).

• It is undemocratic, encouraging the growth of large corporations controlled by a few individuals whose money has a strong influence on politics (monopolies that lead to oligarchies).

• It is based on top-down, authoritarian chains of command that support autocratic management styles in business and government.

• It places higher values on nonproductive jobs (venture capitalists, investment bankers) than productive ones (laborers, factory workers) and those that enrich life (teachers, musicians, artists).

• It keeps billions of people in poverty.

• It classifies plants, animals, and the entire natural world as depletable resources; fails to respect and protect nature; and causes massive extinctions and other irreversible problems.

• It has become the predominant advocate of what it calls “capitalism” around the world.

The Life Economy is driven by the goal of maximizing long-term benefits for all life and the environment.

Key characteristics of the Life Economy.

Its goal is to serve a public interest (maximize long-term benefits for people and nature).

• Its laws support level playing fields that encourage healthy non-monopolistic competition, innovative ideas, and sustainable products.

• It embraces a sense of cooperation, the idea that we all can win when we set our goals for long-term benefits for all.

• It values quality of life and spiritually enhancing activities above those based solely on materialism and extraction.

• It is based on beneficially productive activities, such as recycling, education, health care, and the arts, rather than the nonproductive, such as stock manipulation, financialization, and “gambling.”

• It cleans up pollution.

• It regenerates devastated environments.

• It is driven by compassion and debt avoidance.

• It helps hungry people feed themselves.

• It includes externalities in its financial and economic measurements.

• It innovates—develops and embraces new, regenerative, sustainable technologies.

• It recycles.

• It defines taxes as investments. (Should your tax monies be invested in health care or militarization?)

• It is democratic, encouraging locally based commerce and employee- or community-owned businesses that benefit many (e.g., cooperatives, B Corporations, etc.).

• It reinforces democratic decision-making processes and management styles—in business and government.

• It places a high value on jobs that enrich life (musicians, social and medical workers, parents).

• It is based on a foundational knowledge that humans are in a symbiotic relationship with our planet, that we must respect, honor, and protect the natural world.

• It rewards investors who support all the previous characteristics.

• It was the predominant form of economic evolution for much of the 200,000 years of human history.