Posted on 05/13/2019 5:31:25 AM PDT by Kaslin
With all of the talk about socialism and expanding government entitlements by Democrat candidates, it's clear that many Americans have forgotten the key role free markets and capitalism have played in creating America's amazing success. In fact, there seems to be a cancerous cynicism about the economic engine that's been so critical in maintaining America's position in the world. Even more troubling are the calls for Medicare for all, guaranteed income, a higher national minimum wage, and the higher taxes such changes would require.
Initially, our founding fathers created a government to protect individuals from an over controlling government. They rebelled against over-taxation and government tyranny. The message was loud and clear--"Don't tread on me!"
Capitalism isn't based on greed. It's fueled by human creativity, innovation and the heart of service that rewards people for meeting the wants and needs of customers. For those that are successful, greed is optional but certainly not necessary.
I encourage you to read Rev. Robert Sirico's book, Defending the Free Market: The Moral Case for a Free Economy. It highlights the importance of free enterprise and free markets: "Markets are dynamic; they grow, the people who work in them aim to please the customer, not the power holder. ... Businesses don't thrive by robbing others. They are successful when they have the foresight to anticipate the wants and needs of others and provide goods and services to customers at prices they are willing to pay. ... In
politics, the pie is fought over to determine who gets what portion of the pie; in the market, the pie can grow."
Why does capitalism work? To Sirico, securing property rights in a world of scarcity provides a powerful motivation: "The scarcity of physical things is a feature of the world that we cannot escape. ... We can struggle with each other to grab and keep what we can for ourselves. Or we can use a system rooted in private ownership, which permits us to trade, give gifts, or share based on our own free will. This is a peaceful solution to the problem of scarcity.... The best thing that politicians can do, in regard to property, is to enact and enforce just laws in accordance with natural law-to protect
people from having their belongings unjustly confiscated." Higher taxes on the most productive is another form of confiscation.
Karl Marx summed up the socialist theory in the single phrase "abolition of private property." But the end to private property would usher in a catastrophe, not a socialistic utopia. Rev. Sirico reminds readers: "Greed is not good. But capitalism doesn't require greed. A successful entrepreneur can be motivated by things other than greed. What capitalism can do far more than socialism is prod the person's greedy impulses toward socially useful ends. Under socialism, greed's primary outlet is exploitation-legal or illegal. The greedy man under socialism can't get rich by starting and nurturing a casually useful business. All he can do is become a thief or a cream-skimming government insider. Under capitalism, he has another option: he can excel in a socially useful business. In this way, capitalism provides the greedy person a socially beneficent alternative to exploitation."
Rev. Sirico points out that free enterprise responds to the needs of those they serve: "...Entrepreneurs in a free market-far more than the government
bureaucrat or central planner under socialism-must submit himself to the wants and needs of the consumer if he is to profit. ... The prices and types of products in the market ate guided by the wants and needs of consumers, whose purchases reflect their priorities and values."
In contrast, when visiting Russia under communism years ago, our guide Ludmilla pointed out that when the government is in control, there is no need to serve customers. When bureaucrats rewarded manufacturers for creating more dresses at lower costs, they produced mostly small sizes. Ludmilla protested, "Look at me! Do you think I fit in small dresses?" She answered it herself, "Nyet!"
There was a sign you might have seen at the Columbia and Berkley University demonstrations: "Eat the rich." But if you ate all the rich, what would you have left? Sirico clarifies: "Assuming for a moment that we could redistribute the wealth of the rich without destroying the economy,...if we confiscated all of the wealth of the world's richest 1 percent-every the last penny-we could distribute about $13,000 to every person on the planet-one time. ... How much good would that one-time $13,000 windfall do for the average poor person in the long term?"
For those who support redistribution from those who earn to those who take, Sirico has a warning: "There is a contradiction at the heart of the progressive project of striving toward equality of outcome by redistributing wealth. A tenacious focus on outcomes (as in redistribution to achieve income parity) inevitably leads to treating people unfairly-unequally-by taking from one who has worked and produced superfluous wealth and giving it to one who has not.... In place of a culture of wealth makers (the entrepreneurs and their increasingly productive employees), you end up with a culture of wealth takers."
This isn't just about how much money one can grab for oneself. There is satisfaction in using one's gifts, a sense of accomplishment that comes from earned success, a job well done, and a job that others find valuable. Such success allows people to take care of their family's future. Citizens can develop, share, and using their God-given creative capacities for good. They have the money and resources to give of their treasure to help others. Instead of paying taxes to let an impersonal government to "care" through entitlements, they get to touch the lives of others through their donations and work with charities.
Socialism's goodies aren't free. Socialism doesn't work. Free enterprise does. Let's keep it that way!
A successful entrepreneur can be motivated by things other than greed.
Call it free enterprise, because that's what it is. Let the hard left start its thirty year campaign to demonize the word free, and let them begin now. But this time fight them.
Some hapless and helpless people would be living under bridges except for their families. Government needs to provide for these people. And government needs to take care of the mentally ill, which at the moment is not being done. The poor mentally ill are left to their own devices, panhandling and getting victimized on the street. It is a national disgrace. So yes, we need a form of socialism. We also need to let capitalism work. Our shunning of the mentally ill in our society is a national disgrace and it is not making America great.
And you know when Socialism starts producing misery instead of prosperity, the Socialist pols will claim that the problem is that some people are hoarding X, so we need to go even further and nationalize Y. The Press will parrot it and the fools will buy it, just like the did in Venezuela. Wash, rinse and repeat until we are all living in multi-family hovels without power or running water.
Throw out the Marxist/Leftist term “capitalism” and use “the free market economy”.
It is easy to defend the free market economy because it produces wealth and is freedom in action.
BS - the homeless and mentally ill are victims of socialism and government programs in this country. Because of those actions there are high barriers to entry for people to help them out. There are high barriers to entry for even the homeless to WORK THEIR WAY out because government funding and demands of a minimum wage decrease jobs and make it more difficult for those to make a life.
Government is the problem here.
There’s no example of a successful, stable, free, humane Marxist system on earth.
That’s about all anyone needs to know.
How about, we give the economic system now commonly known as “capitalism” a DIFFERENT connotation?
Call it “personal economic freedom”, or “enlightenment”, or a synonym that captures the meaning of the intention to earn the rewards for initiative and prudent investment in growth.
Because this economic system does adhere closely to the growth of a crop from preparation of the incubating seed bed, to the scattering of the seeds that will constitute the crop, to the tending and protection of that growing crop, to the harvest, and the further utilization of the harvest, including keeping back a portion of the seed to produce another crop in the coming season. The stewards of this strategy to increase and expand the harvest, to be traded to others for various goods and services, are the guardians of the future.
An expectation of that prosperous future is what fuels the enterprising spirit in the quest for expansion and bountiful harvest.
Serious study of agriculture is the essence of this understanding of the cycle of growth that leads to prosperity.
Unless, of course, people just cannot stand prosperity.
This all comes about because children today are taught to believe that they cannot succeed without the government’s help. That any attempt to improve oneself on their own is evil. That any effort they make to be a “winner” demeans others.
Capitalism (and “free enterprise”) cannot exist in that mindset.
I agree.
Ditto on the free market. Simply put, security and freedom are diametrically opposed in a zero sum equation. The more of one, the less of the other. You can have all the free health care, social security, unemployment insurance, free education and so on, but it will be at the cost of your personal property and personal freedom.
I also don’t like the term “greed” as it is used by the left. I don’t see anything immoral about earning a fortune through honest hard work. To me “greed” is to covet what you don’t deserve or own. That would expose the left and their redistribution of wealth as Greedy, which is consistent with their hypocrisy.
what you say is not the answer but you may have identified part of the problem. the high barrier to entry.
democrats operate on envy and the belief that there is one limited pie. Capitalists believe there is plenty for everyone and they enjoy seeing others do well. One of the test for being a decent person is whether you can rejoice in the success of others. If you are resentful, you are a small mean person, such as a Democrat.
“Greed”, “capitalism”, are terms used by the left to exploit guilt, which has the reaction of people wanting to resort to “virtue signal” their morality, which is not in itself moral.
The left has found it is not theft if they can fool you into thinking it is moral to surrender your wealth.
It does make you the fool though.
Capitalism is the most unfair harsh social-economic system there is except for all the others.
Well put.
capitalism is based on and presupposes a rational politics, and a rational politics requires, sanctions, and justifies capitalism. A rational politics is based on and presupposes a metaphysics of reality, an epistemology of reason, and an ethics where the standard of value is the life of the individual, and the individual is an end in himself, and the proper beneficiary of his own action.
A proper rational politics consists of the following principles:
-preservation and protection of natural rights is the main purpose of government
-ordered liberty
-prohibition of force
-sovereignty of the people
-republican representational government
-separation/division of powers
-checks and balances
-limited government powers
-equality of rights, not things
-equality under the law
-equality of class.
Socialism, which is based on and presupposes an irrational and evil ethics of altruism and collectivism, where the standard of value is the life and opinions of the rulers. It also presupposes an irrational and evil politics of statism and force. The irrationality of socialism means that it can neither identify economic laws, nor predict a country’s long range economic future, and so it is doomed to failure. History confirms theory and prove its truth.
A non-communist economist needs to quantify some simple realities.
1) What population can the world sustain with capitalist production and distribution?
2) What population can the world sustain with socialist production and distribution?
True global socialism (as opposed to State Capitalism or welfare state redistribution of capitalist production) would lead to mass die-offs due to starvation, disease, transport and infrastructure collapse, failure of public services, water & sewer systems, etc. The idiots of this world need to face that head on. World socialism = 4 billion deaths.
Imagine if your state DMV was in charge of technological innovation, medical and pharmaceutical research, agriculture, etc. That’s what true socialism would be like.
You can check back into the years Reagan was in office & find out that the ACLU pressured Reagan to shut down all the mental hospitals.
Until those who have such problems are taken off the streets & re-hospitalized, other problems will continue to surface.
The Dems have hamstrung every single effort to get these people into safe places & under treatment.
Add the MILLIONS of illegals roaming the entire country & you have a master recipe for chaos.
Socialism won’t cure this chaos. It will only produce more.
If YOU re so sue that socialism works, please visit Cuba—Venezuela— or other such places & see it up close & personal.
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