“REFORM” is a word with a varied history. At the beginning of the last century there were many battles among progressives over whether capitalism as a system could be reformed or whether it needed to be abolished. 

Some time in the ’80s with the rise of neoliberalism, with its idea that markets can fix and resolve all social problems and create unlimited abundance, reform began to take on another meaning. 

In corporate capital’s unceasing attack on workers, reform became the code word for a series of changes that supposedly needed to be made in order to guarantee the survival of workers’ benefits which the neoliberal states were continually eroding, the money from which was then ending up in the pockets of corporate board members. See Donald Trump’s recent attack on food stamps, just in time for Christmas.