In a new piece for Progress in Political Economy, Michel Feher, Zone founding editor and author of Rated Agency, responds to the recent GameStop controversy. Click here to learn more about his book. Click here to read the full article. An excerpt appears found below:

“In the flurry of hot takes on the GameStop adventure, three common features emerge. First, almost everyone agrees, this is so much fun! That a Reddit community of amateur traders could take on a big hedge fund and win – at least temporarily – is cause for a roaring gotcha. Second, the reactions of Wall Street and more recently of Robinhood – the app used by the Redditors that subsequently sought to deprive them of their victory – are unanimously deemed outrageous: gambling with other people’s money, these predators dare claim, is a serious business that should be left to professionals. One suspects that wounded short sellers do not merely cry over the billions they lost. Equally painful is the fact that, instead of being regarded as cynical geniuses of finance, they have been exposed as not so subtle conmen whose tricks can be foiled by novices. Third, and as we shall argue, unfortunately, most commentators – especially on the left – downplay the political meaning of the Reddit insurgency.”