Throughout history, leaders have constructed civilizations based on their notions of equality. This has given rise to the two basic extremes of the social and political system, Capitalism and Communism. All political methods are mixtures of the ’pure’ forms of these ideas. Historically, the difficulties and limitations of each structure have altered the application of these theories. Karl Marx envisioned a utopia governed by the rules of shared wealth and of a self-governing, classless society. While Marxism was a philosophy, rather than a concrete practice, Marx addressed the issue of class struggle present in the Capitalist system by providing an antithesis to its ideals. The way that wealth and status affect human interactions has been studied …show more content…
The exploitation of the lower classes is made easy by the superiority dynamic within the echelon system. In a traditional corporate business, superiors hold more power, resources, and opportunities for the lower positions to improve their standing in the company. Bernie Madoff manipulated this system by promising potential investors profits and returns. Madoff’s influence as a prominent financial advisor allowed for this abuse of power by deceiving the lower tier into investing in a Ponzi scheme. Business Insider discusses that “Madoff managed to fly under the radar for so long (despite multiple reports to the SEC about suspicions of a Ponzi scheme), because he was a well-versed and active member of the financial industry. He started his own market maker firm in 1960 and helped launch the Nasdaq stock market. It was easy to believe this 70-year-old industry veteran knew exactly what he was doing” (Yang, Stephanie). Madoff based the scheme on the exploitation of his heightened position. Like Madoff, David structures an operation to profit from using the influence of the lower class. The business that David operates in An Education is successful due to the sentiments of bigotry in the U.K. during the 1960s. Through the practice of ’blockbusting,’ David and Danny move poor, West Indian families into wealthy neighborhoods causing the neighbors to drop property value for sale. The business operates based on the fear that the lower class will damage the property value. The manipulation of this discriminatory relationship is an example of using the status differences to profit from the existence of the class