Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez claims capitalism is ‘irredeemable’

'We should be scared right now because corporations have taken over our government,' she says

(AFP/Getty Images)

Democratic congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez says that she thinks capitalism is “irredeemable”.

Ms Ocasio-Cortez made the comment during an interview at South by Southwest in Austin, where she said that the US should be “scared” that corporations had taken over the country.

“Capitalism is an ideology of capital — the most important thing is the concentration of capital and to seek and maximise profit,” Ms Ocasio-Cortez said during a question and answer session with Bloomberg News.

She continued: ”To me, capitalism is irredeemable.”

Ms Ocasio-Cortez has described herself as a democratic socialist, and said during the panel that recent concerns raised among conservative pundits around “socialism” misses the point.

“Just as there’s all this fear mongering that government is going to take over every corporation and government is going to take over every business or every form of production, we should be scared right now because corporations have taken over our government,” she said.

In describing her economic philosophy for the nation — which she has roughly introduced with her presentation of the Green New Deal — Ms Ocasio-Cortez said that she believes that American workers need their rights protected.

“It’s just as much a transformation about bringing democracy to the workplace so that we have a say and that we don’t check all of our rights at the door every time we cross the threshold into our workplace,” she said. “Because at the end of the day, as workers and as people in society, we’re the ones creating wealth.”