“Capitalism does work…” ??? I asked for a reference of some credibility, an economist for example, who says that unfettered free-market capitalism as we know it in mass developed markets as we know them works. (‘unfettered, free-market etc.’ aren’t actually new qualifications from me since they are usually included in the common usage of the term ‘capitalism’). Most people don’t use highly abstract dictionary meanings in conversation.
I received not a reference but the usual tautology that capitalism works because it supplies what people want, or in other words, capitalism works because it works. A tautology, real insightful. Real sportscaster like: ‘We’ll win today if we have a good game.’ Simulates TV and passes for conversation. Duh. Sure does work that capitalism, real fine.
So, at what point in the business cycle (since the business cycle is part of capitalism) do people get what they want? At what point did economies during the great depression start giving people what they wanted until WWII (government inspired) kicked started production again? As wealth concentration proceeds (another consequence), which income quintiles get what they want? Hypotheticals are often flawed (an opening, go for it) but if capitalism gave us global warming (because it works) and global warming results in environmental disaster; at what point after the disaster do people get what they want? Sustainability is often included in the idea of what works. In addition, a comparison is often required to flesh out the notion of the idea ‘works.’ Capitalism works, compared to what? A discussion perhaps needs to work on a better works.
I asked for a comparison, and begin by rejecting a usual comparison to the former Soviet economy. It’s not a good comparison since the economy during a large part of the Soviet existence was largely based on forced labour and starvation rations in concentration camps as well as contending with cold war hostility. I expected the reference to Solzhenitsyn would be obvious. The Gulag, in three volumes, for god’s sake, do all the dots have to be connected around here? Well, I guess western economic development also included slavery and genocide in the early days, and now we simply export it, but it’s still not a good comparison. Beside, slavery etc. creates external costs such as wars against terrorism. The former Soviets started paying their externalities, but we in the west perhaps have yet to start paying. I wonder if people get what they want before or after the misallocations of resources to accommodate wars and environmental degradation etc? Would that be before or after external costs associated with these misallocations are paid?
So, does capitalism (including all the free-market qualifications and sustainability concepts etc.) work? Oh, I’d better make ‘global’ explicit as a parameter since the context is high gas prices and the environment. Who says it works?
Without references, I’ll supply Joseph Stiglitz in two or three volumes for the economics. Did he say it works? He said it might work if it’s managed very differently. Managed means INTERVENTION, and the usual meaning of capitalism abhors intervention. For the environment, I’ll supply Jared Diamond in several volumes? Did he say capitalism is sustainable? He said that the environmental results of economic exploitation have to be managed or societies collapse due to the environmental consequences? There are other references, but it’s real hard to make flaky left-wing liberals from either Stiglitz or Diamond.
I know, I know. I never said that capitalism didn’t work, but you never said that it did work either. An honest answer would be that nobody knows, because nobody knows what the context is. What’s the point then? Cheer for our leaders, the cheer leaders of our present policy? Our policies seem predicated upon pretenses of knowledge. That’s hardly cheering. Cheering for cheerleaders, now there’s a concept. If we’re cheering for cheerleaders, then who are the players? The ghosts of our futures perhaps--now there’s another concept. Oh, the rules are part of the game we cheer for, and capitalism can’t be separated from the rules, from government and society, or from economic theory either. One of the rules in play from time to time is no intervention in the market place. Who made that rule?
