Yes, capitalism requires perpetual growth. When the opportunities for growth through innovation dry up, businesses resort to cutting costs which usually involves cutting quality and hoping most consumers won’t notice.
Incidentally, this is the exact strategy that VC and Private Equity use. They know how the game is played.
This is correct. Capitalism requires perpetual growth because capitalist logic does not apply in saturated markets with excess capital.
Anyone who believes in capitalism must by necessity believe thatcapital produces part capital and part consumer goods and that the rate of capital production must exceed the rate of capital depreciation. But in the face of stagnating population growth this logic must by necessity result in excess capital, threatening investor profit, to which they respond with drastic anti consumer measures.
Incidentally, this is the exact strategy that VC and Private Equity use. They know how the game is played.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enshittification