I thought this thread fascinating and wondered if people here had any better suggestions to make since addressing what is technically described as rentierism is key to building our economic future. The problem is, very few understand the term.
In a week where a fogged brain has prevented very little real thinking, this has been one of the few issues that has really engaged me. Rentierism has disguised itself as if it is normal business activity. It is not even close to it, but because it has been able to sow confusion as to its nature and purpose it has become the de facto norm for those seeking to maximise their profits in our economy, leaving the rest of us dispossessed. That is true both politically and economically since the acceptance of rentierism is now normal amongst mainstream political parties. That is why we need to name it, but the aim is not to shame it: the aim should be to eradicate the abuse it creates.
And please accept my apologies if moderation is slow: I am feeling better than I was but it is taking time and rest to get over this bout.
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We most definitely do need a new term. Rent in common parlance is payment for use of a utility which, when negotiated and consensual, is acceptable and hence dulls its toxicity in the minds of most. We are seeking a term for the unearned extraction of another’s resources…I would suggest that ‘capital theft’ is not too strong.
Thanks
In a single word – “parasitism.”
I hope you are now managing to climb out of the debilitating effects of long-Covid, Richard.
It’s true, I gave it that
And no, not yet, to the second bit
Landlord. Landlord Economy something along those lines.
The trouble is the issue is so much bigger than that
I think the term Landlord is completely wrong, and would sow as much confusion as the word Rent. And I give an example , my son and family have lived abroad for the past 12 years, and their modest terraced house in Norfolk is “rented” out…. at below market rate, repairs always dealt with immediately etc etc etc, so he is a Landlord in common English parlance . This is hardly the “Parasitism” mentioned as a possible . I like Parasitic Capitalism best.
Renting need not be bad, so we have to encompass motive
The term needs to be a noun and verb
I think I have my preference but this discussion is helping
Am i correct on thinking that rentiers are those who obtain then exploit a limited and required resource/asset?
In which case ‘asset exploiters’ or ‘resource exploiters’ perhaps.
Thanks
Our maybe just b Resource Profiteers
What about “spongers” and “sponging”?
Good one
Admirably descriptive, but long ago appropriated by right wing propagandists to slander anyone receiving state benefits. How much that usage still resonates I admit I don’t know. The pithy and descriptive “asset stripper” gained pretty good traction for a different tactic of exploitation, though it doesn’t really do for renttaking. Does the jargon of the rentier trade(s) maybe offer any suggestions that might be tweaked and repurposed ?
I remember Slater Walker
Of course, Walker went in to Thatcher’s Cabinet
When I was a lad in the late 50s, I remember some adults complaining that something was being taxed as unearned income. The implication was that they were paying higher tax than money earned in other ways. I have no idea if that was ever the case.
More recently I read ‘somewhere’ that Adam Smith wrote it was money which could be earned in one’s sleep-by rents, tithes and suchlike. In those those days, of course, most people’s earnings were only a little above subsistence. And…he favoured taxing capital before labour.
Normal profit is necessary and desirable. Profiteering is a form of exploitation. By itself the word could seem to an attack on normal profits. Excess profiteering describes the activity but I can’t put my finger on a word to describe the system or an individual. Profiteer is a derogatory term in a way rentier is not. Perhaps why we use the French word but the French pronunciation makes it even more obscure.
There is ‘predatory capitalism’ or financial capitalism ( as distinguished from productive capitalism)
I am hoping for a flash of inspiration. Meanwhile, take it easy and get better.
Unearned income used to be subject to a 15% surcharge
I would do the same thing now as the equivalent of national insurance
Wealth extractors?
They are
How about making a compound word using “Accommodator”.
Housing-accommodator (private, professional)
Office-accommodator (private, professional)
Factory-accommodator (private, professional)
Storage-accommodator (private, professional)
Cleaning-accommodator (private, professional)
To me, accommodator implies someone who helps. Doesn’t fit the bill, I think?
Passive extractionalist/extractinalism
True, but will people get it?
late thought
Carpetbagger capitalist or capitalism.
Some readers may not have heard of the term. In the aftermath of the American Civil War , some northerners came to the defeated southern states to make money out of their misfortune. They had big bags to gather up their gains. Google search speaks of opportunism and exploitation.
Just a thought
But the loot is much bigger now….
So are the bags
Unearned Income isnt a bad one
In the meanwhile…………..
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-63743597
Classic Rent Seeking
Bizarre
An example of what happens when a hardware company tries to become a software company. I agree, it is very bizarre.
As for your original question, I think a phrase containing the word ‘milking’ would be apt. After all, it isn’t the person doing the milking who is really doing all the productive part of things. They are just, well, milking.
🙂
Economic parasite?
The main word that comes to my mind is parasite. I looked up the synonyms and they nearly all fit, although come across a bit inflammatory. Maybe 2 words together sounds better – first a wealth synonym followed by a parasite synonym. For example, wealth parasite, asset sponge, capital leech etc etc.
The parasite list is:
Leech, freeloader, sponge, moocher, sponger, bloodsucker, dependent, henchman, hanger-on, free rider, idler, miser, deadbeat, satellite, sycophant, toady, lackey, flunkey, scrooge, stooge, tightwad, niggard, skinflint, cheapskate, piker, flunky, yes-man
The American economist Michael Hudson wrote a book “Killing the host; How Financial Parasites and Debt bondage destroy the Global Economy. It is how what he calls the FIRE sector, Finance, Insurance and Real Estate, have gained control at the expense of the productive economy.
He uses the parasite analogy. The parasite , of course, by killing the host also destroys itself.
Junk economics is the means to economic suicide.
Richard I will shut up now.
I like parasite
But are we the host?
Parasite has a crystal-clear meaning, so I’d go with “economic parasite” or, if you want to be more graphic, “blood-sucking parasite” or “parasitic blood-sucker”.
I just read through the Twitter thread and I think profit grabbing is a good term for it, and would resonate with people. Or something along the same lines, like wealth snatching.
The word my grandmother, who was a small shopkeeper, would use is “spiv”.
So true
Putting two earlier posts together, unearned income extractors.
This post could change your life! The power of language can not be underestimated. Good propaganda owns the language.
I had never heard of “rent seeking” which sounds benign, but “financial parasitism” frames it appropriately. We hear the same thing when we talk of “government debt”, a neoliberal phrase that causes the West, the Labour Party, and the population, to incorrectly view “National Wealth” in a way that propagates austerity.
Prof. Bill Mitchell has recognised this, and addresses it in his presentation “Training the MMT trainers” (See Module 3) at https://gimms.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/Bill-Mitchell-Training-the-MMT-Trainers-September-2019.pdf
See also his article: “Invoking neoliberal framing and language is a failing progressive strategy (British Labour)”
http://bilbo.economicoutlook.net/blog/?p=43678
Thanks
Kate Raworth was very strong on kicking back at the conventional framing of economics at this recent talk: https://www.lse.ac.uk/Events/2022/11/202211101830/economics
Starting with the first lesson on supply and demand, managing the household, price, the market, externalities; the nonsense of “homo economicus”; and the focus on continual growth as the only important macroeconomic factor.
Absolutely fascinating to hear of cities putting “doughnut” principles – sustainability, regeneration, distribution – into practice today. Including Amsterdam. How can we deliver the basic essentials of life to everyone, without overshooting economic boundaries? And the demand from students to hear about this sort of thing, when the academics are still stuck in the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries.
There is an LSE podcast and video, and more here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ziw-wK03TSw
Kate is good at that stuff
Excellent even
Talking about doughnut economics, have you seen this…
https://goodlife.leeds.ac.uk/
I hadn’t
Worth reading. Thank you
Hope you continue to improve.
This got me thinking; usurey, racketeering, freeloading, carried out by chancers, practicing chicanery. I quite liked the carpetbagging suggestion.There is a lot to do with applying the letter and not the spirit of regulations. There is also something extractive, that got me to bloodsuckers and leeches…but to avoid direct abuse and insults (even though tempting) whilst still having a degree of opprobrium and easy for non specialists..
How about parasitic capitalism?
I tried feral capitalism at one time
My first thought was parasite. However, given that many of today’s disaster capitalists are happy to exploit and keep exploiting until nothing is left, maybe the more specific ‘parasitoid’ is more apt?
Note comments elsewhere on why this does not translate
Free loader
Rent seeker
Rent pickpocket
Economic pickpocket
Economic looter
Econlooter
Wonga looter
Capital sponger
Capital harvester
Contactless capitalist
Unborn-candy seeker
I asked. You delivered…..
Just read this Book … Rentier Capitalism: Who Owns the Economy, and Who Pays for It? By Brett Christophers .
Shocking and unfortunately depressing .
“To understand the inequalities of wealth and power that define contemporary capitalism, read this important book. Rentierism shapes every sphere of our shared lives, Christophers shows, from energy to real estate, aerospace to health care, and entertainment to Airbnb. Tracing the different way each sector is organized to compel payments to those who monopolize its key assets, the book explains how rent takes multiple forms. It is this variability that allows capitalism’s extraordinary profits–and inequalities–to be generated at every juncture.”
–Timothy Mitchell
Added to my bulging reading list
An expression is needed that has some chance of becoming used as standard in the press. Words like “parasite” clearly will not achieve this. Two people have suggested something containing the word “extractor” which has the advantage that in some circumstances extraction is a good thing and so the word will not be automatically rejected.
I would also not specify precisely what is being extracted:
If you call a person or organisation a “wealth extractor” it invites the rejoinder “He/she/it is not a wealth extractor but on the contrary is a wealth creator”
The problem with “unearned income extractor” is that to most people income means personal income but some of the most egregious rentiers are corporations.
I suggest the term “economic extractor”.
Wealth creators who create their own wealth by extracting it from others.
Economic vampire (although that could be a vampire who uses his blood resources frugally).
Too complex to capture in one or two words so maybe needs a ‘strapline’.
Something like:
Parasitic capitalist – someone whose income comes [primarily] from exploiting their assets
Financial manipulator?
I think ‘rentier’ is still the best term. Terms like ‘sponger’, ‘privileged’ and ‘parasite’ are not wrong but IMO too general. The main problem with ‘rentier’, as I see it, is that it’s semi-alien: a French word either not recognised at all or associated purely with the landlord/tenant relationship.
But that can change by more frequent usage, in contexts which make clear we’re speaking of what Ricardo, writing at the dawn of industrial capitalism, called ‘unearned profits’ from monopoly ownership of a vital asset: agricultural land in his day, financial capital in ours.
On making clear that in the FIRE sector dominated West money is ‘rented out’ to extract super-profits just as land or housing was and still is – in both cases regardless of the detrimental effects on ‘the real economy’ – I recommend debt specialist Michael Hudson’s 2022 book, The Destination of Civilisation: Finance Capitalism, Industrial Capitalism or Socialism.
Thanks
Leech Capitalism?
I agree. We just add descriptive adjectives from time to time – parasitic rentiers – thieving rentiers – vampire rentiers (thanks to above comments), mention that it is a social disease. I have been a fan of Michael Hudson for several years but not read that latest book.
“Taking the pith”
“Pith” the important or essential part
Some interesting suggestions. How about a different permutation of words already proposed: “wealth extractor”?
In the economy we live in there is an effective interconvertability between capital and income, as anyone who has (or has had) a mortgage knows. “Wealth extractor” seems to me to carry the crucial implication of “rentier” that there is exploitative extraction of money, more than is reasonably justified by the capital and other inputs.
How about Cuckoos?
RSBP website definition;
https://www.rspb.org.uk/birds-and-wildlife/wildlife-guides/bird-a-z/cuckoo/
“Cuckoos are summer visitors and are well-known brood parasites. Instead of building their own nest, the females lay their eggs in other birds’ nests, especially meadow pipits, dunnocks and reed warblers. When a female cuckoo finds a suitable nest, and the hosts aren’t looking, she removes one of their eggs and lays her own egg in its place. Cuckoo young hatch after just 12 days, and push the hosts’ eggs or babies out of the nest, allowing it to eat all food brought by the host bird. By the time the cuckoo leaves the nest, it is far bigger than the host bird, but the adoptive parent continues to feed the young cuckoo for a further two weeks.”
Sounds similar to a “brood” Rentier behaviour.
Maybe, but would most people get it?
I think everyone understands a Cuckoo would allow someone else to feed its own young, in other words getting a free meal at someone else’s expense/efforts.
Though you have to say Rolling Stone magazine probably got the most famous quote on this subject with its “Giant vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, with its blood funnel jammed down the throats of anything that smelled like money” re its view of of Goldman Sachs….creating a far more vivid image.
It is hard to beat!
🙂
Following on from several suggestions, rent sucker.
If a term which can be popularised is wanted perhaps consider an extreme form. A group who buy a rare asset fail to invest in it so that it declines. Load the debt from the purchase onto the asset. And yet make billions if and when they sell on. Glazerism?
Only known to football fans
And they, I know from family experience, are nit universal
Unproductive Ownership – (within context of what would be productive – adequate investment levels, ‘fair’ price/return etc)
Isn’t the essence of it that rent-seeking is making money primarily from ownership or control of an asset. As opposed to making money by creating goods or services for sale? In which case “unproductive” is apt. I think different terms for different audiences, so perhaps “exploiters” or “parasites” in other venues.
But I’m a little unsure of boundary cases – eg is every interest- bearing account a rent-seeking device? Are the retired living off income from pension savings all rent-seekers? Is this concept well-defined enough?
Good questions
Boundaries are always an issue
Robber Baron – with either of Meriam Webster’s definitions:
1. an American capitalist of the latter part of the 19th century who became wealthy through exploitation (as of natural resources, governmental influence, or low wage scales)
2. a business owner or executive who acquires wealth through ethically questionable tactics
Dire Strait(ers) – Money For Nothing…
Are we looking for a word that grabs a wide, popular, ‘hands on’ public, or an abstract word term that resonate with technocratic, managerial types? (Example: ‘parasite’ vs ‘bloodsucker’; the first defines a general category and the second describes what it actually does in the here and now). My advice is, don’t try to do both at once, they utilise different cognitive process.
In an interesting way this is what divides the Labour Party… Boris Johnson’s genius is to ditch the technocratic language whilst pulling the levers behind the scenes. Watch this difference, it works.
Again it’s not what you think, it’s HOW you think …
Interesting
I was hoping for both
Non-proucers ..?
Non-producers?
True, but that’s also true of most children and many OAPs
Economic traffic wardens?
I smiled, but I don’t think so…
Praestrigiator – meaning: fraud, conjurer juggler, deceiver, cheat.
That is never going to get into popular usage
Maybe we should use the word rentier more often, so it becomes more widely known. It can be simply defined as someone who uses ownership of assets that others need or want to extract money from them without providing goods or services in return.
Otherwise ‘wealth-extractors’ is probably better than ‘free-riders/loaders’, ‘something-for-nothingers’, ‘spongers’.
Beware: when giving talks on my book Why We Can’t Afford the Rich* in Germany and Austria I was told that the word ‘parasite’ was used by Nazis and other anti-semites to attack Jewish business people. As I absolutely reject anti-semitism and as rentierism has no necessary link to religion or ethnicity I now only use the adjectival form and when I know those who I am talking to won’t try to twist the story in this way.
Extraordinarily, in the US, the term ‘rent-seeking’ was hijacked by neoliberals like James Buchanan to attack state organisations, while ignoring private sector monopoly power and rent-seeking.
* Policy Press, 2014
Andrew Sayer
Thanks for the warning
I have your book
Rana Faroohar’s Makers and Takers is well worth reading, looking at the destructive role of Wall Street and the financialisation of so much of business. When businesses are run solely for the purpose of extracting as much revenue as possible whilst minimising investment in the business. Seen most obviously in the privatisation of public utilities where the infrastructure has been allowed to decay whilst profits have been extracted as dividends, share buy backs and executive pay, often funded by loading the business with debt.
Pure ‘wealth extraction’. Nothing new is being created, with the assets – be they people, technology or knowledge – being inevitably run down.
Much/most of what goes on in the City today is merely about speculation in or revenue extraction from existing assets. Trading stocks and shares that are just revenue streams. Speculation in assets. There is very little actual ‘investment’ to create new ‘wealth’ and the associated ‘assets’ in the form of skills, knowledge, infrastructure.
In contrast genuine wealth creation – and I know ‘wealth’ is a value laden term – requires the commitment of capital (private or public) over time invested in building and growing assets – again, people and skills, technology, infrastructure, R&D, knowledge. Just what today’s financial world has or no interest in doing, or even understands.
So I’d go with wealth extractors for the rentiers, in contrast to the wealth creators.
But put wealth in front of both and people will be confused, I fear, although your description is good
Point taken – hence my comment about the term being value laden. However there is plenty of heated discussion about the massively unequal distribution of ‘wealth’ and even use of the term common wealth. So might be one persevering with.
Beats rentier which is term restricted to economists and political nerds!
Last agreed
“Wealth extractor” could sound positive, we all want some wealth.
“Financial/economic parasite” always sounds negative, perhaps too much so, we wouldn’t want to stigmatise people genuinely earning a crust to exist.
Note concerns here on using ‘parasite’
My then partner sold a leasehold 2 bedroomed flat in one of the most desirable post codes outside central London – BN3 in 2001. She had bought this flat which which didn’t meet Building Standards approval in 1996 from an architect, as a qualified bricklayer this didn’t surprise me at all. I arranged a site meeting with Hove’s senior Building Control officer. Mr. Ing. He agreed to give me time to bring it up to standard. In the process I converted it from 1 bedroom to a 2 bedroomed apartment.
Due to it being a ‘leasehold building’ I told my then partner to sell rather than let the apartment – leaseholders are totally at the mercy of the freeholders and can be ripped-off with ease. At that time it would have commanded an annual rent of approx. £8K p.a. Had my partner not sold it, it would now command an annual rent of over £20K and have a sale value of around £450-500K – these are insane figures.
We now live in France in the Tarn and rent a detached 3 bedroomed house with internal garage and large garden, excellent neighbours in a very quiet area, close to all amenities, 40 minutes from Toulouse airport. The rent is controlled like the rest of the EU @ €650 p.m. We now pay zero for the equivalent of council tax/tax d’habitation and only the proprieter pays Tax Fonciere.
If this house was anywhere in southern England the rent would be £25k + per year minimum. The council tax NOW for our 2 bedroomed flat would be in excess of £3500 p.a.
You are being shafted by parasites and doing nothing to change the status quo. I not only have no sympathy for those who ares stupid enough to pay the insane prices of property all over the UK but will laugh myself silly when the whole insane market collapses, which it will. All this could have been prevented in 97 but Tony the Liar and Gordon Gekko had no intention of doing so – Tony now has a property portfolio of over £30 million. BTW, Starmer is a BTL scumbag. The Labour party should be made to change it’s name as it in no way represents working people.
German: rentner a pensioner.
French : person living on private means
English: living on investments
Somerset: evil person grinding down the poor with exorbitant rents and devouring children
or businessperson
I think you are missing the issue
Sorry
Best wishes for your good health Richard.
My vote goes to Robber Baron, or Economic Thief. These can both have an adjectival form viz. Robber Barony, Economic Thievery.
In the 1950’s the shortage of housing following the war was readily taken advantage of by a certain type of specialist spiv, and was called
Noun. Rackmanism (uncountable) The practice of charging extortionate rents for inferior properties, especially to poor, disadvantaged or immigrant tenants.
This was condemned roundly by Conservative and Labour papers alike.
Since then the Conservatives have obviously woken up to the fact that a fresh strain of Conservative voter could be found within the ranks of the newly created ‘Conservative Enabled Rentiers’
I always think of these people as money wasters (though there might be a better way to express this idea). The use of money solely to make more money seems to me to be a flagrant waste of a resource (money) that could be so beneficial when properly used as a medium of exchange.
I’ve been wading through The Wealth of Nations as my bedtime reading and I know that Adam Smith would loathe them because they don’t put their capital to any productive use. For all the good it does they might just as well not have any money at all. But there they are, wasting the world’s money by sucking in more and more of it and just letting it lie idle.
You are right, I am sure, about Smith
Spot on comment – money invested in property produces nothing. Just think how competitive the UK would be now if rents and mortgages were being paid on an average price of property in 1997 – £97,000.
BTL tax advantages should have been removed on day 1 of the Labour government in 97 and back taxed to break the scum who owned these properties. The Netherlands has always had a sensible attitude to property – you can own as many properties as you like BUT you can only live in one – so no second homes. The West country is blighted by holiday homes and it is impossible for working people to buy homes in all the western counties. If you own a property with multi-apartments, the gemente/council will put people on their waiting lists into 50% of them and fix the rent – the Netherlands is not only a very prosperous country but a happy one.
The problem is that Thatcher with her right to buy turned so many into property junkies and like turkeys they will never vote for Christmas.
Money Suckers
A refinement:
noun
moneysucker
1 : a person who sucks money from another without earning it
2 : a person who sponges or preys on another and takes his or her money
But it’s more than money
It is power too
I think I like the suggestion of ‘economic vampire’. It communicates the basis idea of sucking the life out of something for your own good, without producing anything. ‘Asset vampire’ might be more accurate, but I suspect many people don’t really understand the term ‘asset’. Maybe it could be termed ‘vampirenomics’. 🙂