Episode 233: How US Media Naturalizes Capital Strikes and Helps the Rich Undermine Democracy
“Executives Await Friendlier Climate,” reported The Wall Street Journal in 2010. “Seattle Repeals Tax On Big Business After Opposition From Amazon, Starbucks,” stated NPR in 2018. “Can a socialist mayor and Wall Street coexist? New York is about to find out,” announced POLITICO in 2025.
There’s a common occurrence in U.S. cities and states, particularly during times of recession, depression, and/or elections: the capital strike. Business executives, seeking to seize upon an economically distressed government or community, or to shape the outcome of a mayoral or gubernatorial race in their favor, threaten to do any combination of the following: withhold investment, make mass layoffs, offshore money, halt construction, or simply leave an area for a more friendly jurisdiction.
Sometimes these threats are credible, but most of the time they’re merely rich-guy petulance and hot air. But, regardless of the likelihood of executives to follow through, the existence, recurrence, and prominence of the capital strike threat is an ever-present feature in our political and thus, media environment, with newspapers, financial cable channels and regular cable news routinely echoing threats of capital strike without any pushback.
Assisting the ultra wealthy in their PR campaigns and looming threats, putting the burden on electeds to shape up and satisfy the needs of capital without any deeper analysis of WHY these billionaires and corporations have this undemocratic power, or whether it ought to be the media’s job to naturalize and and carry water for these undemocratic exercises of power.
Indeed, why should businesses and oligarchs have so much power as to manipulate, even cripple, governments? Why is it assumed that they have some specialized value or intelligence and thus need to be courted? And what role does federalism play in subjugating governments to private industry?
On this episode, we examine the past and present of the capital strike as an extortionist tactic, what it reveals about the power of private industry over governments, and how media help major industries get whatever they want by means of a mere temper tantrum.
Our guest is professor and author Kevin A. Young.
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Guest
Kevin A. Young is Associate Professor of History at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. He is the author of the books Blood of the Earth: Resource Nationalism, Revolution, and Empire in Bolivia and Abolishing Fossil Fuels: Lessons from Movements That Won, as well as the edited volume, Making the Revolution: Histories of the Latin American Left. He is also the co-author, with Tarun Banerjee and Michael Schwartz, of “Levers of Power: How the 1% Rules and What the 99% Can Do About It.” (Verso Books, 2020).
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Show Notes
How Capital Strikes Yanked Barack Obama’s Presidency to the Right
Tarun Banerjee, Michael Schwartz, and Kevin Young | August 25, 2020 | Jacobin
Do Billionaires Really Move To Avoid Wealth Taxes?
Teresa Ghilarducci | December 29, 2025 | Forbes
A Wealth Tax Floated in California Has Billionaires Thinking of Leaving
Ryan Mac, Theodore Schleifer and Heather Knight | December 26, 2025 | The New York Times
If Capital Strikes Against Mamdani, Organized Worker Power Can Strike Back
Jesse Hagopian | November 10, 2025 | Truthout
No one leaving New York City because of Mamdani, say two top real estate CEOs
Eric Rosenbaum | November 14, 2025 | CNBC
Relax, nobody's leaving New York
Liz Hoffman | November 6, 2025 | Semafor
Let’s Check In With People Who Threatened To Leave Zohran Mamdani’s NYC
Samer Kalaf | November 6, 2025 | Defector
The Myth That Mamdani Will Cause New York City’s Richest to Leave
Robin Kaiser-Schatzlein | October 23, 2025 | American Prospect
New tax data confirm tax flight is a myth
Emily Eisner | October 9, 2025 | Fiscal Policy Institute
Episode 228: Billionaires as Insta-Experts — How Our Media Conflates Extreme Wealth with Expertise
Nima Shirazi and Adam Johnson | September 24, 2025 | Citations Needed
“Nobody leaves New York”: The wealthy remain in NYC despite Mamdani “freak out”
Garrett Owen | June 30, 2025 | Salon
Who Is Leaving New York State? Part 1: Income Trends
Emily Eisner and Andrew Perry | December 2023 | Fiscal Policy Institute
Behavioral Responses to State Income Taxation of High Earners: Evidence from California
Joshua D. Rauh and Ryan Shyu | May 5, 2022 | Stanford Graduate School of Business
Jon Schwarz | August 25, 2022 | The Intercept
A Crisis without Keynes: the 1975 New York City Fiscal Crisis Revisited
Michael Beyea Reagan | August 12, 2021 | Gotham Center for New York City History
Nima Shirazi and Adam Johnson | April 28, 2021 | Citations Needed
Here Are The Most Outrageous Incentives Cities Offered Amazon In Their HQ2 Bids
Leticia Miranda, Nicole Nguyen and Ryan Mac | November 14, 2018 | BuzzFeed
Episode 19: Lotteryism (Part I) - How a Compliant Press Fuels the Spectacle of 'Winning'
Nima Shirazi and Adam Johnson | December 13, 2017 | Citations Needed
Watch Out, Little Children, the ‘Job Creators’ Are on Strike
Leslie Savan | December 8, 2011 | The Nation
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Transcript
For a full transcript of this episode, go here. You can find transcripts of past episodes, live shows, Beg-a-Thons, Interviews and News Briefs here.
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Credits
Senior Producer: Florence Barrau-Adams
Producer: Julianne Tveten
Production Assistant: Trendel Lightburn
Newsletter: Marco Cartolano
Music: Grandaddy
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