My argument is that the problem is not with the economics system but with
people. Marxism would work wonderfully if people worked hard and
contributed to society not based on incentives of financial gain but in
reality, it does not work. there is no incentive to innovate or improve
other than altruisitc motives and sadly history has borne out that these
motivations are insufficient
capitalism works well in that it does provide incentives to innovate,
improve, be efficient, etc. I believe that markets make better decisions
than bureaucrats..if the proper costs and prices are assigned to various
activities. The problem arises because we do not assign the right prices
to things. In our system,for example, pollution (if legal) is encouraged
over proper disposal of waste. Clealry, paying someone to haul away your
garbage is more expensive than throwing it out in the street. So if
street dumping is legal, these produers will gain an competitive
advantage, be able to charge a lower price (or have lower costs) and thus
benefit from this harmful action.
Part of this problem, frankly, is our fault (as consumers). We too often buy
the lowest cost or most convenient thing over what is socially best. We
ask for legislation (e.g., banning pollution, child labor or requiring
minimum wage)to protect us from ourselves because we know we can't trust
ourselves. As one former professor of mine stated, we wear very different
hats as consumers than we do as voters/citizens. And this makes for a
very muddled picture in which the price of many goods do not reflect
the true social cost. If people stopped buying things made in "bad" ways,
no one would produce them and the bad things would go away
What is the answer? I have no simple one, except that as long as we live
in a capitalist system, enjoying the great freedom of choice as consumers
that we do, we need to also be responsible in our purchases, exercise our
values in the marketplace and educate others to do the same. No quick
fix, I agree, but it's a start
I also must add that many of the interventions of governemnts exacerbate
this problem. It is a simple rule of economics that if you tax something
you'll have less of it; if you subsidize, you'll have more. Yet the US
governemnt taxes labor (twice, if you include social security, which
taxes a much higher percentage of poor people's income than that of rich
people), and taxes land ownership... things most of us consider good.. while
subsidizing things that cause pollution and deplete resources (such as
facilitating timber, mining, grazing domestically (at a net loss to
taxpayers), plus our
foreign policy of engagement in the middle east to protect our cheap oil
supply)
Go figure! We tax labor twice, then burn up the environment double time to
provide jobs.
This ties in to the idea stated here about the importance
of true democracy. Clealry, the majority's interests are not helped by
these policies
Well, enough of my ramblings.
take care folks
David
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