Publication Date
2022
Document Type
Book
Description
Oftentimes, greed and capitalism are viewed to coexist and connect interchangeably. Capitalism, in modern day America, has infiltrated the emotion of greed and turned it into an apparently a-historical “human nature”. Aligning with parables from the Bible, which act as foundational precepts of Judeo-Christian societies, greed, understood in general terms, has existed before capitalism, including specific stories of intense interaction between symbolic characters. Since then, societal changes were significant, and capitalism has emerged and established itself as apparently a-historical. National traits amongst society have shaped and been shaped by historical forms of the human psyche, while still upholding general values that have prevailed throughout time. Therefore, today, greed assumed a specific form under capitalism, and the people involved in the "free market" exacerbate this trait as the propensity for the infinite accumulation of abstract wealth. In dissecting psychology in the modern capitalist world, I will demonstrate through core psychological and societal truths, that greed has evolved over time and now operates in conjunction with capitalist ideology and forms of practice.
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Recommended Citation
Kirsh, Hannah, "Capitalism and the Historical Psychology of Greed" (2022). Research Days Posters 2022. 50.
https://orb.binghamton.edu/research_days_posters_2022/50