In a true capitalist state a business stays in business if it can produce its products, sell them on the free market, and make enough money to cover its costs. The money left over after its costs are paid is profit. Profit is the reason people go into business. It’s really that simple.
Have you listened to your countrymen lately? What are they asking for when they ask the government to punish Wal-Mart? Wal-Mart’s success is destroying mom and pop’s corner store, they cry. We must protect moms and pops from the evil mega store! These same people tried to stop Henry Ford from mass producing cheap automobiles because of the devastation his success was reaping upon the horse and buggy business. Nathaniel Brandon calls this sort of thinking “the divine right of stagnation.” American workers are led by their unions and political leaders to believe they have a right to a job, the same job for thirty years or more. Thinking of this kind squats on the face of reality in a free market economy. Change in a capitalist economy is not determined by the needs of the workers: the skill sets of the workers must change to meet the needs of a changing economy.
I pulled the following off a John Edwards' Why Wal-Mart Must Change website:
Wal-Mart has become much more than just a small corner store in rural America. In the past 10 years, Wal-Mart has grown into the largest retailer in the world -- number 1 among the Fortune 500 -- and is America's largest employer. With more than 1.4 million employees and over $10 billion in profits, Wal-Mart is a giant company with giant responsibilities. First and foremost, Wal-Mart has a responsibility to all Americans to set the standard for customers, workers and communities, and to help build a better America.
Wal-Mart has no responsibility whatsoever “to help build a better America.” Wal-Mart is not a government-owned or financed enterprise. Wal-Mart is a creation of what’s left of free enterprise in this country. Its board of directors has a responsibility to its shareholders…period. A better America will be built by free individuals acting in the pursuit of their own happiness, one Sam Walton at a time. The greatest threat to that future is a cannibal politician with a “vision” and a club.
The truth is that Wal-Mart has let America down by lowering wages, forcing good paying American jobs overseas, and cutting costs with total disregard for the values that have made this nation great. Wal-Mart has needlessly exploited illegal immigrants, faces the largest gender discrimination lawsuit in history, forced workers to work in an unsafe environment, and -- incredibly -- broken child labor laws.
There is no such thing as an “American job.” The who, what, when, where, and why of a cooperation in a free world is nobody’s business but there’s. Nobody is forced to do business with Wal-Mart. Nobody is forced to work at Wal-Mart. Every employee signs on willingly. Every employee can give notice and leave at any time. If wages are low in this country [and I believe they are], the principal cause for this problem is government interference in the first place. The minimum wage laws artificially hold down wages across the economy. It’s an arbitrary, government-created benchmark that enables companies to start employees at ridiculously low wages. “Everybody starts at the minimum wage…you’ll have a review in six months.” Wages and benefits are a private matter between the employee and the employer. If both parties agree to terms they have a contract. If the employee believes his work is worth more than he is currently being paid, he can try to renegotiate that contract. If the employer disagrees and refuses, the employee is free to leave and find better work elsewhere. An employee’s PRODUCTIVITY is what gives him leverage with his employer. Great companies can not afford to lose their most productive workers.
America's largest employer must reflect America's values. But, Wal-Mart will never change on its own. Lee Scott, Wal-Mart's CEO, mistakenly thinks he only answers to a few wealthy shareholders who own Wal-Mart stock. Lee Scott is wrong. Wal-Mart and Lee Scott must answer to the American people.
Free enterprise, capitalism! IS an American value. Mr. Edwards, and statists like him, always forget this crucial American value when they are trying to score points with uneducated, needy voters. They use capitalism in their own personal lives to achieve great material success. Then they rise on the political stage, feeling your pain, bashing the very system that made them possible.
We are the ones who shop at Wal-Mart.
The American people are free to shop, or not to shop, at Wal-Mart. Every business must answer to its customers. Wal-Mart’s success is proof positive that they are giving consumers exactly what they want.
Together, we have the power to change Wal-Mart.
Together, we can hold Wal-Mart accountable and improve our America.
A politician promising to “hold any business” to account is an open threat. Government has only one tool at its disposal in any effort to hold any individual or corporation to account. That is FORCE. Edward’s is promising his constituency that he will club a great company to death so that the American people can collectively pick its bones.
Sunday, October 28, 2007
Sunday, October 21, 2007
Capitalism is Freedom
Want to end corruption in politics? Remove the economy from the of list issues about which politicians should concern themselves.
When people attack capitalism in America today, accusing government of being in bed with certain industries, they are not wrong. Government is in bed with agriculture, energy, transportation, media, insurance, pharmaceutical, and every other aspect of the health care industry. What these critics fail to understand is that what they are attacking is not capitalism. What they attack is what has become of capitalism in American.
Republicans [and Democrats] since the 1890 Sherman Anti-trust Act have been using government to destroy free-market capitalism in favor of [what Thomas J. DiLorenzo, How Capitalism Saved America calls] neomercantilism [or what Noam Chomsky calls] state capitalism, an economic system wherein most property is still privately owned but economic opportunity is doled out by politicians.
Why else would 30,000 lobbyists be working Capital Hill?
For over a hundred years Republicans, the self-proclaimed champions of the entrepreneurial spirit—have been undermining capitalism, free-enterprise, in this country by force. Their weapons? Anti-trust laws, regulatory agencies [FTC, FDA, EPA], and corporate subsidies to name three. There are dozens. Each with the power to prevent market entrepreneurs from competing in free markets, while the politicians give passes to their rent-seeking cronies, the political entrepreneurs, their patrons. [And the Democrats are even worse.]
In a true capitalist state politicians, who produce nothing, are not even at the table. All transactions in a capitalist economy are made freely by individuals exercising choice. If an airlines fails to operate profitably, the airlines goes out of business and sells off its assets. That is justice. There is no tax-payer funded bailout in the name of what’s best for consumers. Nothing a politician can think up can improve upon just, free markets. What is best for consumers is efficiently run airlines. Government bailouts do not promote efficiency in business anymore than welfare checks promote industry and enterprise among the poor. Businesses that fail should be allowed to fail. When a poorly run airline goes out of business, its assets [planes, hangers, pilots, crews, and maintenance personnel] don’t disappear. The assets of the bankrupt company are sold. Perhaps the entrepreneurs who purchase the defunct airlines [with their own money] can turn a profit. Trained pilots, crews, and maintenance personnel may have to change uniforms, but if there is a demand for people with their skills they will not be unemployed for long.
The same is true for any and every other business.
Whether or not a good or service is available for sale is determined by supply and demand. Government has no right to ban a product. Government has no right to tax business transactions, imports or exports. The government has no business interfering in the relationship between an employer and an employee. The government may charge a fee only for some service it has rendered. For example: Government has a responsibility to protect Americans from terrorists. Our government, in order to intercept plotting terrorists or enriched plutonium trying to enter the county illegally, must inspect ships arriving at ports across the country. Government may tax to cover the cost of those inspections.
Except for the courts to settle contractual disputes or to punish criminal behavior, the government has no place in the economy.
If a business fails, it fails. If a farm fails, it fails. If an individual fails, he fails. All kinds of insurance [safety nets] should be owned privately. Businesses, farms, and individuals may choose to manage risk by purchasing insurance. To ask government to stop change in the economy—manufacturers moving overseas, outsourcing, off-shore banking—is to ask the impossible if you cherish freedom.
When people attack capitalism in America today, accusing government of being in bed with certain industries, they are not wrong. Government is in bed with agriculture, energy, transportation, media, insurance, pharmaceutical, and every other aspect of the health care industry. What these critics fail to understand is that what they are attacking is not capitalism. What they attack is what has become of capitalism in American.
Republicans [and Democrats] since the 1890 Sherman Anti-trust Act have been using government to destroy free-market capitalism in favor of [what Thomas J. DiLorenzo, How Capitalism Saved America calls] neomercantilism [or what Noam Chomsky calls] state capitalism, an economic system wherein most property is still privately owned but economic opportunity is doled out by politicians.
Why else would 30,000 lobbyists be working Capital Hill?
For over a hundred years Republicans, the self-proclaimed champions of the entrepreneurial spirit—have been undermining capitalism, free-enterprise, in this country by force. Their weapons? Anti-trust laws, regulatory agencies [FTC, FDA, EPA], and corporate subsidies to name three. There are dozens. Each with the power to prevent market entrepreneurs from competing in free markets, while the politicians give passes to their rent-seeking cronies, the political entrepreneurs, their patrons. [And the Democrats are even worse.]
In a true capitalist state politicians, who produce nothing, are not even at the table. All transactions in a capitalist economy are made freely by individuals exercising choice. If an airlines fails to operate profitably, the airlines goes out of business and sells off its assets. That is justice. There is no tax-payer funded bailout in the name of what’s best for consumers. Nothing a politician can think up can improve upon just, free markets. What is best for consumers is efficiently run airlines. Government bailouts do not promote efficiency in business anymore than welfare checks promote industry and enterprise among the poor. Businesses that fail should be allowed to fail. When a poorly run airline goes out of business, its assets [planes, hangers, pilots, crews, and maintenance personnel] don’t disappear. The assets of the bankrupt company are sold. Perhaps the entrepreneurs who purchase the defunct airlines [with their own money] can turn a profit. Trained pilots, crews, and maintenance personnel may have to change uniforms, but if there is a demand for people with their skills they will not be unemployed for long.
The same is true for any and every other business.
Whether or not a good or service is available for sale is determined by supply and demand. Government has no right to ban a product. Government has no right to tax business transactions, imports or exports. The government has no business interfering in the relationship between an employer and an employee. The government may charge a fee only for some service it has rendered. For example: Government has a responsibility to protect Americans from terrorists. Our government, in order to intercept plotting terrorists or enriched plutonium trying to enter the county illegally, must inspect ships arriving at ports across the country. Government may tax to cover the cost of those inspections.
Except for the courts to settle contractual disputes or to punish criminal behavior, the government has no place in the economy.
If a business fails, it fails. If a farm fails, it fails. If an individual fails, he fails. All kinds of insurance [safety nets] should be owned privately. Businesses, farms, and individuals may choose to manage risk by purchasing insurance. To ask government to stop change in the economy—manufacturers moving overseas, outsourcing, off-shore banking—is to ask the impossible if you cherish freedom.
Sunday, October 14, 2007
Know Limits
Government cannot legislate compassion and expect love to result; nor can government legislate love and expect to create a compassionate society.
Charity, and whether or not to give to a charity, is a private decision made by individuals. Government should never be in the business of charity. There is no such thing as “a generous nation.” Qualities like compassion, generosity, pride, contempt, despair are qualities that can only be expressed by individuals. There is no such thing as a collective brain. Only individuals can decide to be generous, and generous individuals have the right only to distribute wealth they have created. If you want an organized relief effort then all charity should be collected from willing, private individuals and distributed by private organizations.
People who know me and my current financial situation know that I have grown considerable debt since the birth of my twins and the slump in the real estate market. I owe thousands of dollars to members of my family. Without their help over the past months, I really don’t know how I would have made it. I’m sure I would not be living in this house. I am grateful for their help and look forward to paying them back. Clearly, I have benefited from their charity. But—the important thing is—I know I have no right to their charity. And nobody, however well-off they may be, however much blood or history we share, has a moral duty to be charitable to me.
I have the right to ask for assistance in any endeavor. I have no right to demand assistance from anyone.
In fact, no one has the right to demand your charity. Any doctrine that defines charitable giving as a moral responsibility or duty has rendered all giving immoral. Without choice there is no moral question to be answered. There is no difference between giving your money to the thug who has convinced you that his gun is loaded and the preacher who has convinced you that he knows what God wants you to do.
No government has the right to tax your productivity in order to do charitable work. Governments may tax in order to fund only the limited functions of government. They are: 1. To protect the governed from enemies foreign and domestic, that is, to protect the unalienable rights of individuals; 2. To settle disputes between and among free people pursuing their own self-interest in a free, capitalist economy.
Benjamin Franklin, when asked by a group of citizens what sort of government the delegates at the Constitutional Convention had created, replied: ‘A republic, if you can keep it.’ The republic survived two wars with the greatest power on Earth in its infancy, a bloody and destructive civil war fifty years later, and was on track to unprecedented greatness one hundred years after the convention, when Republican “trust-busters” began their assault on capitalism and the intellect. By 1910, great economic enterprises in the United States would survive only with the blessings of well-fed politicians. Shortly thereafter, government acquired the immoral power to tax the incomes of American businessmen and workers, turning free men into slaves of the state a few percentage points at a time. By 1940, Democrats, who wrongly blamed the Great Depression on capitalism [which had not existed in these United States for decades], had developed socialist schemes for the redistribution of the extorted wealth. With each step the politicians grew their power over the producer, and Americans mindlessly embraced a progressively more authoritarian government.
Nobody seems to fear the limitless government they are creating, this un-kept republic.
Charity, and whether or not to give to a charity, is a private decision made by individuals. Government should never be in the business of charity. There is no such thing as “a generous nation.” Qualities like compassion, generosity, pride, contempt, despair are qualities that can only be expressed by individuals. There is no such thing as a collective brain. Only individuals can decide to be generous, and generous individuals have the right only to distribute wealth they have created. If you want an organized relief effort then all charity should be collected from willing, private individuals and distributed by private organizations.
People who know me and my current financial situation know that I have grown considerable debt since the birth of my twins and the slump in the real estate market. I owe thousands of dollars to members of my family. Without their help over the past months, I really don’t know how I would have made it. I’m sure I would not be living in this house. I am grateful for their help and look forward to paying them back. Clearly, I have benefited from their charity. But—the important thing is—I know I have no right to their charity. And nobody, however well-off they may be, however much blood or history we share, has a moral duty to be charitable to me.
I have the right to ask for assistance in any endeavor. I have no right to demand assistance from anyone.
In fact, no one has the right to demand your charity. Any doctrine that defines charitable giving as a moral responsibility or duty has rendered all giving immoral. Without choice there is no moral question to be answered. There is no difference between giving your money to the thug who has convinced you that his gun is loaded and the preacher who has convinced you that he knows what God wants you to do.
No government has the right to tax your productivity in order to do charitable work. Governments may tax in order to fund only the limited functions of government. They are: 1. To protect the governed from enemies foreign and domestic, that is, to protect the unalienable rights of individuals; 2. To settle disputes between and among free people pursuing their own self-interest in a free, capitalist economy.
Benjamin Franklin, when asked by a group of citizens what sort of government the delegates at the Constitutional Convention had created, replied: ‘A republic, if you can keep it.’ The republic survived two wars with the greatest power on Earth in its infancy, a bloody and destructive civil war fifty years later, and was on track to unprecedented greatness one hundred years after the convention, when Republican “trust-busters” began their assault on capitalism and the intellect. By 1910, great economic enterprises in the United States would survive only with the blessings of well-fed politicians. Shortly thereafter, government acquired the immoral power to tax the incomes of American businessmen and workers, turning free men into slaves of the state a few percentage points at a time. By 1940, Democrats, who wrongly blamed the Great Depression on capitalism [which had not existed in these United States for decades], had developed socialist schemes for the redistribution of the extorted wealth. With each step the politicians grew their power over the producer, and Americans mindlessly embraced a progressively more authoritarian government.
Nobody seems to fear the limitless government they are creating, this un-kept republic.
Sunday, October 7, 2007
How easy!
Catering to the needs of the very people they crippled is job security for Democratic officeholders.
Republicans are no better. Rather than rejecting on principal the entire Democratic, socialist platform, Republicans sell out capitalism, too, offering socialism-lite. They call it “compassionate conservativism.” If socialism is poison, compassionate conservatism is slow poison. Either way, liberty is dead in the end if contemporary Democrats and Republicans continue to shape public policy in this country. Like European parliaments our Congress will be deliberating over teaspoons versus tablespoons of socialism.
The Republicans, like the Democrats, are collectivist-altruists and therefore can not come up with a good reason for keeping government out of the charity business. One good reason: Placing hundreds of billions of dollars in the hands of politicians who have produced nothing may have a corrupting influence on the political process. Another good reason: When people accept imagined rights like “the right to health care,” they forfeit actual rights, like the property rights of the individuals who are sacrificed to pay for the “free” health care. Probably the best reason for objecting to any quantity of socialist-poison: Capitalism—that is, an economy free from interference by politicians—works!
The most productive and inventive period in United State’s history occurred during the relatively laissez-faire decades following the Civil War. [To read the entire argument check out Andrew Bernstein’s The Capitalist Manifesto, UPA, 2005.] A parade of geniuses from this period may be sufficient to make my point: Thomas Edison, Samuel Morse, Alexander Graham Bell, Elisha Graves, James J. Hill, Andrew Carnegie, J.D. Rockerfeller, William Jenny, John Roebling, Isaac Singer, Charles Goodyear, Cyrus Field, George Westinghouse, George Eastmen, Wilbur and Orville Wright, Willis Carrier, Robert Goddard, George Washington Carver, David Sarnoff…to name a few of the better known free-thinkers unleashed during this country’s brief experiment with laissez-faire capitalism.
Contemporary Republicans need votes, and for needy voters who haven’t the patience nor inclination to read history or to reason, the socialist message, however irrational and immoral, is very seductive. Nobody doesn’t like free stuff! More importantly, the socialists have convinced the voters they care more. Nobody likes to see humans suffering. The fact that the worst genocides in human history were perpetrated by socialist states in the name of “the collective good” is lost in the cloud of tears and feelings for those in need. Politicians of both parties forget the reason for their existence, [i.e. to protect individual rights] summon up their feelings and their legislative clubs, and deliver to those in need the products of the labor of other people. To the victims of this extortion, the productive, they offer a means through which to repent their “immoral” selfish success.
Republicans define compassion in the same way Christians define love: that it is a cause, not an effect; that it is a duty, not a choice. Like the Democrats, they force this “duty” on all of us. Dripping on about how much they care about the 40 million uninsured Americans, how this reality is unacceptable and how something—anything!—must be done about it, politicians ask their public to feel. And then they act on those feelings. Nobody calls for thinking: reason. Nobody mentions the solution: capitalism. Rather they brew more of the poison that made the mess in the first place: government intervention in the economy, sacrificing individual rights, growing their own power over us.
In every industry where the government refrains from interference [DVD players and fast food, for example], the number of producers grows, availability of the product goes up, and the price of the product goes down. Health care is no different.
Politicians of both parties club productive Americans in the name of compassion. They do their compassionate work with other people’s money! How easy.
Republicans are no better. Rather than rejecting on principal the entire Democratic, socialist platform, Republicans sell out capitalism, too, offering socialism-lite. They call it “compassionate conservativism.” If socialism is poison, compassionate conservatism is slow poison. Either way, liberty is dead in the end if contemporary Democrats and Republicans continue to shape public policy in this country. Like European parliaments our Congress will be deliberating over teaspoons versus tablespoons of socialism.
The Republicans, like the Democrats, are collectivist-altruists and therefore can not come up with a good reason for keeping government out of the charity business. One good reason: Placing hundreds of billions of dollars in the hands of politicians who have produced nothing may have a corrupting influence on the political process. Another good reason: When people accept imagined rights like “the right to health care,” they forfeit actual rights, like the property rights of the individuals who are sacrificed to pay for the “free” health care. Probably the best reason for objecting to any quantity of socialist-poison: Capitalism—that is, an economy free from interference by politicians—works!
The most productive and inventive period in United State’s history occurred during the relatively laissez-faire decades following the Civil War. [To read the entire argument check out Andrew Bernstein’s The Capitalist Manifesto, UPA, 2005.] A parade of geniuses from this period may be sufficient to make my point: Thomas Edison, Samuel Morse, Alexander Graham Bell, Elisha Graves, James J. Hill, Andrew Carnegie, J.D. Rockerfeller, William Jenny, John Roebling, Isaac Singer, Charles Goodyear, Cyrus Field, George Westinghouse, George Eastmen, Wilbur and Orville Wright, Willis Carrier, Robert Goddard, George Washington Carver, David Sarnoff…to name a few of the better known free-thinkers unleashed during this country’s brief experiment with laissez-faire capitalism.
Contemporary Republicans need votes, and for needy voters who haven’t the patience nor inclination to read history or to reason, the socialist message, however irrational and immoral, is very seductive. Nobody doesn’t like free stuff! More importantly, the socialists have convinced the voters they care more. Nobody likes to see humans suffering. The fact that the worst genocides in human history were perpetrated by socialist states in the name of “the collective good” is lost in the cloud of tears and feelings for those in need. Politicians of both parties forget the reason for their existence, [i.e. to protect individual rights] summon up their feelings and their legislative clubs, and deliver to those in need the products of the labor of other people. To the victims of this extortion, the productive, they offer a means through which to repent their “immoral” selfish success.
Republicans define compassion in the same way Christians define love: that it is a cause, not an effect; that it is a duty, not a choice. Like the Democrats, they force this “duty” on all of us. Dripping on about how much they care about the 40 million uninsured Americans, how this reality is unacceptable and how something—anything!—must be done about it, politicians ask their public to feel. And then they act on those feelings. Nobody calls for thinking: reason. Nobody mentions the solution: capitalism. Rather they brew more of the poison that made the mess in the first place: government intervention in the economy, sacrificing individual rights, growing their own power over us.
In every industry where the government refrains from interference [DVD players and fast food, for example], the number of producers grows, availability of the product goes up, and the price of the product goes down. Health care is no different.
Politicians of both parties club productive Americans in the name of compassion. They do their compassionate work with other people’s money! How easy.
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