Was thinking about the distinctions of this and wondering…
Would it be accurate to say that the petite bourgeoisie are on the same ladder as the bourgeoisie? Or to put it in more English terms, would it to be accurate to say that small business owners are on the same ladder as Jeff Bezos? Just on a much lower rung?
Versus, in this analogy, the proletariat (or working class), are not on the ladder at all.
The idea being that the small business owner is in a less organized stage of development toward the same thing as the conglomerate (if this is happening under capitalist rule). Whereas the working class cannot organically develop in that direction (I suppose a few could through stocks, but that seems like on the level of winning the lottery).
Want to make sure I have my metaphors straight.
I did not know that, but either way, what I meant by “started small” is more that Amazon was an operation he started with others. I remember researching in the past that he got significant financial help with it and that most, if not all, of the programming was done by others (I specifically remember researching it to debunk the pro-billionaire mythos that he bootstrapped his way to the top). But it did technically start out as a small business and then grow. As opposed to, like, if he’d simply been handed control over an existing family company or set up for a role in a major company through family connections and education.