The Jews have been blamed not only for being greedy and exploitative capitalists, but also for being radical socialists and communists. There are many other examples of that kind: The Jews have been criticized for being too rich (e.g., in Western Europe in the 19th century), and they’ve been criticized for being too poor (e.g., in Eastern Europe at that time).  They’ve been criticized for assimilating, and they’ve been criticized for not assimilating. They’ve been criticized for not having a state (before the founding of modern Israel), and they’ve been criticized for having a state (after the founding of modern Israel). Etc.

Antisemitism, which has kept itself relevant for millennia, is the ultimate shapeshifter. It cynically and opportunistically flip-flops its arguments in order to justify anti-Jewish sentiment no matter what.

Well, at least that’s the popular understanding in the 21st century. However, on capitalism and socialism: It’s actually not so much of a contradiction that the Jews have been strongly associated with the excesses of both capitalism and socialism. After all, many of the most influential of the early socialists were Jews born into rich families. They saw that much of the antisemitism around them was about the Jews as evil capitalists, and their reaction, tragically, was to turn that onto its head: They became socialists, which was in effect an apology for the evil capitalism of their fathers. The Jews had long been on the cutting edge of money and the market. They contributed in a major way to the evolution of capitalism in Europe. For that, the Gentiles should have been appreciative. After all, capitalism brought unprecedented wealth (not only to the upper strata of society, except perhaps temporarily, but to every strata of society). And of course some Gentiles were appreciative. But enough weren’t, and in the late 19th and early 20th centuries many assimilated Jews, again tragically, took to heart the anticapitalist, antisemitic arguments of their Gentile peers.

Karl Marx (1818-1883) is the quintessential example. Despite being Jewish himself—well, despite being a born Jew, which contrasts with his childhood baptism—he was extremely antisemitic. He saw the Jews as the scourge of Europe. To Marx, the Jews were “capitalists” in the worst sense of the term: shamelessly greedy and exploitative.

For centuries, the Jews had been on the cutting edge in the practice of capitalism, which was a great contribution to Europe (at least in the long term). And then suddenly, the Jews were on the cutting edge in socialist theory, which threatened to undo (and eventually did temporarily undo, with untold tragedy as the result) the misunderstood capitalist contributions of their people. Thus: There’s no mystery in why the Jews are popularly associated, at first glance in an inconsistent/contradictory way, with that pair of opposites: capitalism and socialism.