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Debt is ingrained in America’s way of life
The grander perspective Graeber provides — his overview of 5,000 years of debt — demonstrates that debt is not a neutral social institution. It is first and foremost an institution allowing for the exercise of power. Debt is the foundation of hierarchy and hence much social structure. Its presence marks the divided spheres of our lives: between the “communist” family and small community domains where obligations reflect caring, resist quantification and meld into a richer cultural and moral life, and the larger, grossly more impersonal economy with its rigid demands.
