In 1939, Erich Fromm argued that capitalist culture imbues the pursuit of economic advantage with moral tensions that harm self and psyche. Since this time, the inner implications of such tensions have been somewhat overlooked by theorists, and not without seemingly good reasons. By many accounts, social and technological developments in the later decades of the 20th century have ostensibly reduced the cultural tensions surrounding profit making and mitigated their inner effects. This article, however, presents a different account. Drawing from literature on culture, self, and subjectivity in the neoliberal era, it argues that the tensions Fromm identified have actually been recreated in new, sometimes more elusive ways that bear substantial inner costs. Moreover, focusing on economic elites, this article analytically explores the agentic implications of these inner costs. It argues that the moral tensions that haunt profit making ironically stand at the basis of capitalist agency, shaping its materialistic default through processes rooted in self.

1939年，埃里希·弗洛姆（Erich Fromm）提出，资本主义文化使追求经济优势的道德张力损害了自我和心理。从那时起，这种紧张关系的内在含义被理论家略微忽略，并且并非没有看似好的理由。从许多方面来看，二十世纪下半叶的社会和技术发展表面上减轻了围绕获利的文化张力，并减轻了其内部影响。但是，本文介绍了一个不同的帐户。它从新自由主义时代的文化，自我和主观性方面汲取文献，认为弗洛姆所确定的张力实际上是以新的，有时更难以捉摸的方式重现的，并承担着巨大的内在代价。此外，关注经济精英，本文分析性地探索了这些内部成本的代理含义。它认为，困扰获利的道德张力具有讽刺意味，立于资本主义代理机构的基础上，它通过植根于自我的过程来塑造其物质主义的违约。