This is a test

[pastorlenny]

Many self-appointed defenders of capitalism seem to be embracing an ethical philosophy of finger-pointing.  With one of these fingers, they point to a government that overspends, over-regulates and under-delivers.  With another, they point to the supposed failure of large numbers of individual citizens to demonstrate adequate drive or to

Comments

[lai_choi_san]

Amen

[underlankers]

As always Pastor, good old-school common sense logic and reason.

[pastorlenny]

Old school is how we kick it.

[rick_day]

I find no real issue against this tirade.

[sandwichwarrior]

If this is the case, we can draw two conclusions. One is that all corporate executives are fantastically overpaid. Individuals should most certainly be compensated according to their proven ability. Those who are unable to craft and execute strategies that accomplish goals simply because there are obstacles to those goals have no place in the corner offices of the American enterprise.

Or in the halls of government for that matter. ;)

In all seriousness though.

I defend cpatitalism because on the whole I believe that it has been a produced a net gain for society. One need only examine the standards of living between citizens of the Soviet Union vs. those of the US or the state of "the poor" today vs. the state of "the poor" 100 years ago.

That said, I think that serious problems arise when individuals are insulated from the consequences of thier actions.

"Moral Good" can be used to justify a lot of horrific actions when the person doing the justifing doesn't need to get thier hands dirty.

[underlankers]

No, not really. To say that the United States is not the USSR is true. Neither was any other society when the Soviet Union existed but nobody claims not being the USSR made Mobutu's Zaire a paradise and a haven of prosperity. If defending capitalism is by claiming it's not-communism, then that's only admitting capitalism cannot be anything, it can only not be another thing.

[underlankers]

Or to put it another way, to claim that capitalism produced a net gain by not making the USA into the Soviet Union shows only that capitalism can't produce party-states with military industrial complexes and a penchant to the most violent option nine times out of ten. It shows what capitalism cannot do, not what it is capable of doing

[sandwichwarrior]

All I'm saying is that using a results-based metric capitalism has performed better than any of the proposed alternatives thus far.

[kylinrouge]

Good post. Of course, it falls on deaf ears for those who believe greed is the virtue that leads to prosperity.

[montecristo]

...those who believe greed is the virtue that leads to prosperity.

The identification of that class of people depends entirely upon one's definition of "greed."

[kylinrouge]

Profit to the detriment of society vs profit that benefits society.

[montecristo]

There is no "social benefit." Value is subjective and context dependent. The way to benefit "society" is to allow people to trade freely among themselves according to their value imputations.