With capitalism, we are able to give money to our friends, our enemies and everyone in between, create wealth for ourselves and support our lazy neighbors. I’d say capitalism is working just fine. – what I say to my friends in defense of capitalism.
Production is the driving force of capitalism. Wealth can be produced, moved around, destroyed. Forgetting production in terms of money, let’s look at production in terms of the needy poor for a moment: food, water, shelter, clothing and I’m throwing healthcare on the list as well.
Lots of people are rooting for new-and-improved socialism. Most of those people seem believe that all the wealth in the world is like water in a pool: some people have lots of water while other people only have a few drops or none at all. Moving on from there out from there, if everyone did the right thing, they would pour all their water back into the pool and we could all share it. And subsequently, all live at the poverty line.
How the aforementioned socialism differs from say, standing in line for four hours for a moldy bag of potatoes, I’m not sure, this socialist/Marxist theory has the best PR team in the world, so it’s pretty darn popular. But the problem with socialism is reduced production. People work hard so they can have stuff. Forcing all of society to live at a certain (lowered) economic level does not motivate hard work. [See welfare.] *I will write at a later date about the fairytale know as the eradication of greed.
We do have a moral imperative to care for the poor. And if not to care for the poor than at the very least to ensure that people are not starving to death. “To whom much is given, much is required.” And we all know that there are people in the world who lack even the basics that we named above. So how does socialism, which results in lowered production, solve any problems for “the least of these”?
Holler if you want to stand in line all day for moldy potatoes! (No one? Really?)
That’s just the thing. If we reduce production in our country, who is going to send money to World Vision and Salvation Army and Mercy Corp? I have three kids that I sponsor through World Vision and I probably wouldn't be able to do that if we lived in a socialist country where I was taxed 50%. But without inordinate taxes, I am actually able to provide three other human beings with food, water, healthcare and schooling!
The fact of the matter is wealthy countries give the most. Poverty in the USA and poverty in Zimbabwe are vastly different, aren’t they?
Why is that?
It’s not because all the wealth is being held by the Americans – it’s because we have a system in place to efficiently produce. Zimbabwe could quite easily become an efficient producer. (Provided their evil “president” Mugabi leaves office, anyway.)
If I could ask all the bleeding heart liberals a few questions, they would be these: If you are persuaded that the whole world is “five people fighting over four cookies”, why are you driving a Prius, buying your clothes from Gap and making a weekly shopping trip to Whole Foods? Doesn’t that mean that eight little girls in Mali will die of malaria and malnutrition this month? How dare you, knowingly, kill eight innocent little girls by your inordinate consumption? Why don’t you stop consuming of your own volition instead of waiting for the government to come along and force you to stop?
Just curious.
9 comments:
Margaret Thatcher said that the only problem with Socialism is that eventually you run out of other people's money to spend.
Profound insight.
Excellent.
I think another version of the Thatcher quote is -- you can only do socialism once.
And one of my personal favorite perspectives is: aren't many people employed, and therefore dependent on the existence of a job, by someone in one of the two top brackets? 2/3 of the new jobs come from small business, who can't easily just raise prices or reduce salaries to make up the tax difference. The solution is usually to, put euphemistically, clean house. Whom does that help?
And your point about charitable giving is right on. I give to Children International because I want to and to my daughter's overpriced school because I have to. If my taxes go up, and inevitably they will soon, I may wind up cutting the amount I give to the former. And frankly, it's an excellently-rated charity in terms of direct funneling to those in need with very little overhead -- I trust them a helluva lot more with my money than the government.
Your last paragraph reminds me of a bit George Carlin did on elitist liberals who wish to 'save everything,' yet what they really are concerned with the most is their little island in society.
Very interesting read.
To a certain extent then you have marginal returns.
Singapore and Hong Kong are the most capitalist places on earth. However if you look at economic competitiveness, Switzerland is at the top.
http://southeastasia.foreignpolicyblogs.com/2009/09/09/se-asia-mid-week-roundup-09-09-2009/#more-2163
If you look at living standard per capita (Humand Development Index), Hong Kong and Singapore do not have the highest living standard, not even close. The more socialist states of Europe do.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Lis...velopment_Index
Just as America's living standard was horrible during the Gilded Age (when we were far more capitalist) but we had children working in factories 16 hours a day and smoke stacks everywhere.
So I think the issue is more complicated. It appears that capitalism is good, but unrestrained capitalism, "laissez-faire", is not good for ordinary citizens.
Capitalism does not automatically mean "freedom" that is a lie.
Singpore is more capitalist than America but their citizens are not free to protest the government, the newspapers are always under threat of trumped up law suits, the judiciary is not independent, but the government is very very pro-business making money.
Hong Kong does not have a fair voting system and really can't select their own leadership at the province level, Beijing does and before that Britain did.
So once again she equates apples and oranges.
I would say your argument is lacking.
There is a big difference between Zimbabwe and America, but a bigger difference between Zimbabwe, America, and Hong Kong.
Dragon Horse - thanks for your thoughts.
You are right about the GIlded Age. I'm certainly thankful that I only have to work 8 hours a day, five days a week, personally. I'm also not much of a true capitalist unless I'm saving for something. That is for a different blog.
That said, in reviewing my post I don't think I said that capitalism equaled freedom. I did insinuate that I was free to give my extra cash to whatever organization I so chose. Also, I think "you lie" is Joe Wilson's line. ;)
The standard of living indexes that I have seen seem to have egalitarianism as the goal. That is most certainly not the goal of capitalism.
Neither was I talking about voting freedoms. Again, your accusation doesn't seem to fit the crime.
I understand that you feel that my view was simplistic. But seeing as that was also a frequent liberal complaint towards Ronald Reagan, I'm going to rock it. Thanks!
If you care to go into more detail, please do. I would love to hear more of your thoughts.
First, I appreciate the fact you are thinking about complex issues, most folks don't, so don't feel I'm being overly critical, I'm just starting my mind. I saw you on Booker Rising. You have said yourself in this sites title you are an “ultra-libertarian” so I hold you to that.
Before we argue about the merits of capitalism, how are you defining it? You definition of socialism is wrong and I will get into that in a minute.
The living indexes are not about "egalitarianism" they are about how many people receive a certain level of education, no how to read, etc. If this is egalitarianism then we should stop asking questions like "how many people are or are not getting proper nutrition". There is a difference between acquiring data and implementing policy to do something.
Let’s also drop the "this was liberal complaint of Reagan" stuff. First off I'm no liberal and Reagan was NOT a great thinker. He wrote no great cited books on conservative philosophy (social or economic), he was a figurehead for a movement who simply applied the ideology of the Heritage Society and great thinkers like George Will and William Buckley. Why so many Conservatives deify Reagan I have no idea, I hope (but I know better) than many liberals will not do the same to Obama. (sigh). Reagan was intelligent enough to surround himself with smarter people though.
"Most of those people seem believe that all the wealth in the world is like water in a pool: some people have lots of water …
These people are mistaken because that is what "appears" to be true in the short term, but in the long-term wealth is not finite. Wealth is created by adding increased value or inventing a new product. In theory...
People work hard so they can have stuff. Forcing all of society to live at a certain (lowered) economic level does not motivate hard work.
That is not socialism; it is communism. I would explain but it would take up far too much space. Communism is forced equality of living standard by a party-state. That is not socialism. At the same time, you can't eradicate greed or social loafing, which is why communism does not work. That being said, every developed nation is a "mixed economy", not socialist or purely capitalist. We have many socialist elements, such as public schools, public parks, public roads, social security, welfare, federal income tax (when I pay money in VA and it goes to help build roads in SC).
“To whom much is given, much is required.”
Really? That sounds like moral/religious justified socialism, Ayn Rand would role over in her grave.
If we reduce production in our country, who is going to send money to World Vision and Salvation Army and Mercy Corp?
So is this not an argument for Laissez-faire capitalism? You do trust people do the right thing without government regulation and interference right? The Gilded Age was the greatest! I myself have always believed everyone is inherently moral and once they acquired resources to their intellect and greedy content they will no doubt share them with the less fortunate. I mean, there was no reason to start welfare, charities prevented all starvation right? No kids starving in the U.S. before Roosevelt...no sir. :-)
it’s because we have a system in place to efficiently produce On the surface this appears true, but reality is far more complicated.
You can have the most open and financially free and efficient system on earth and it will only mean other nations who had a head start (first movers) will come and buy up everything and own your nation and thereby control their politics. A “race to the bottom”, won’t make one developed; no nation (including the U.S.) has developed without some form of "socialist" protectionism that allowed domestic industries to incubate. Problem with that is once they are competitive no one pulls the nipple out of their mouth, so to speak. If you don't believe it, I challenge you to show me a nation that has developed in the last 60 years with no protectionism on its core industries.
For example, Japan did not become the second wealthiest nation on earth due to pure capitalism; there was a lot of socialism and corporatism. Japan's story did not start after WWII, Japan was already one of the most developed nations in the world before WII. Which is another story, but I want you to know that a nation’s development is more complex than what you suggest.
Zimbabwe is ruled by a lunatic, however even if it were not just being "more efficient", they would not make it a developed nation, that is what I mean by "simplistic arguments", it really is to the point of meaningless to say something like that. The only reason you know about Zimbabwe is because some white descendants of Brits are getting forcibly evicted from land their ancestors stole and the media, predominately white, cares about them. There are far worse tyrants in Africa, which we care nothing about because it is “black on black” crime so to speak.
I humbly suggest three books:
The Myth of the Rational Voter: Why Democracies Choose Bad Policies, by Bryan Caplan
Economics is a social science not a hard science because you can't quantify human behavior because people are not rational much of the time. This is why utopianist libertarianism will create a dystopia real quick. If extreme communism is party-state totalitarianism, extreme libertarianism is just anarchy. I think both are bad.
Another book I suggest is:
"The Japan of Today", by Reischauer and Jansen
Just read Part 4 and Part 5 (rest is not necessary)
You will see how a country really develops into a 1st world nation in modern times. Many nations in Asia have or are following this path (including South Korea, Singapore, etc.) Some are now considered developed by the OECD, IMF, World Bank, etc).
Then read:
"The Bottom Billion", by Collier
What you will have then is a base for discussion if you are interested in why some countries are developed and why some are not. Then we can discuss what's "going on" and what's "really going on" and the things these books aren't telling you.
I should probably say that I consider myself in reality a classical liberal, but since that a) doesn’t make a lot of sense when I say “recently converted liberal” and b) no one knows what a classical liberal is. I figured libertarian was the most free thinking but uber conservative title I could come up with. And you’re the first person to ask about it.
Egalitarianism: the indexes scored countries that had the most equality of income higher than those that didn’t. Unless I read them wrong. Because I think this is the wrong approach, I don’t trust quality of living to tell me what I’m interested in knowing. They are measuring information that I don’t think is pertinent.
People deify Reagan because they remember him and they see the results of what he did. I think it is human nature – people tend to judge “good” or “bad” based on mostly on their personal experience.
Communism – You don’t feel as though Norwegians, Germans, French, et al. live at lowered economic level because of their 45-55% tax levels? I guess I tend to think of socialism as incomplete but slowly moving towards communism. I will be sure to make that distinction in the future.
Good point about mixed economies. That’s something I’ve been realizing as I’ve been learning. Never had a term for it before now. Thank you.
“To whom much is given, much is required.” Yes. Jesus said that. I believe it’s a moral imperative – not something that governments should force. I don’t worship Ayn Rand, so she can roll in her grave if she needs to.
Giving – yeah, it pretty much is an argument for laissez-faire capitalism. But I’d rather argue for/towards that (since we both know we’ll never get it) than the opposite. (smile)
What chapter of history were you looking at when you came to the conclusion human beings are inherently moral? I systematically disagree with this statement.
I get what you are saying about protectionism. And I completely agree. Thanks for pointing that out. I will be pondering this for a while. And it’s good. It’s similar to the difference between a democracy and a republic.
I have a 60-year time frame? That sucks. What happened in 1959 that was so important? (smile)
Those three kids I sponsor live in Nigeria, Ghana and Rwanda. I make a point to know a bit about what’s going on in Africa
The Dutch (I find it hilarious) actually have a fairly desirable system, from what I know about it. I’ve never used it, personally. But they also use it a bit less than we do from what I understand. Most women don’t have epidurals when they give birth. (Imagine that in the United States!) They are almost never prescribed anti-depressants. They have an understanding of the fact that life is hard and you don’t need to medicate yourself to survive it. I like that attitude a lot!
That said, thanks for your time. My book list is ever-growing but I will do some research on those titles and see if they deserve to cut in the line. I have Horizontalism by Marina Sitrin, which I cannot wait to read. About the economic collapse in Argentina in 2001.
Hahaha! Make that 1949. Oops.
Also, have decided I disagree with your conclusion that people don't care about black on black violence. Have you ever heard of Invisible Children?
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