Schumpeter's Moment - WSJ.com
Great little column, it has nothing to do with my title other than that is what it made me think of. Capitalism is the only thing that creates growth and individual freedom, BUT, it also creates differential wealth (rich and poor) and it isn't perfect -- crashes come with it, no matter how much we want to avoid them. It relates to our "ultimate dilemma" as humans -- one we don't really get to play in except as parents for children, and in the case of a decision to take our own life -- which certainly doesn't "work" in that death is hastened rather than avoided.
The bottom line is that we have to find ways to ENCOURAGE risk -- in going to school, investing money, starting a business, inventing something or a host of other "risky behaviors". Cases where effort or capital or both is put to some use where "the outcome is uncertain". In the real world, that is true in **ALL** cases. BO and the MSM will tell you "Social Security is certain" -- but if North Korea puts an ICBM into DC at the wrong time, or some nasty strain of influenza hits -- or more likely, they just muck up the economy enough, it ISN'T "certain". Humans don't deal in positive certainty -- only negative. See death.
Well put, and BO is taking us away from the spirit of capitalism at warp speed!
Great little column, it has nothing to do with my title other than that is what it made me think of. Capitalism is the only thing that creates growth and individual freedom, BUT, it also creates differential wealth (rich and poor) and it isn't perfect -- crashes come with it, no matter how much we want to avoid them. It relates to our "ultimate dilemma" as humans -- one we don't really get to play in except as parents for children, and in the case of a decision to take our own life -- which certainly doesn't "work" in that death is hastened rather than avoided.
Where that becomes troublesome, however, is the moment when
government comes to be seen as the sole source of security. What we,
the public, need to understand is that the best guarantor of security
is not government. It's economic growth. While we want to believe
otherwise, the cold fact is that government can't guarantee economic
permanency. Nobody, and nothing, can.
Pragmatically speaking, we must figure out how to increase people's
sense of security without making government itself bigger or more
powerful
The bottom line is that we have to find ways to ENCOURAGE risk -- in going to school, investing money, starting a business, inventing something or a host of other "risky behaviors". Cases where effort or capital or both is put to some use where "the outcome is uncertain". In the real world, that is true in **ALL** cases. BO and the MSM will tell you "Social Security is certain" -- but if North Korea puts an ICBM into DC at the wrong time, or some nasty strain of influenza hits -- or more likely, they just muck up the economy enough, it ISN'T "certain". Humans don't deal in positive certainty -- only negative. See death.
So what about the ultimate Schumpeterian challenge: Can capitalism be
saved? France's President Nicolas Sarkozy in October 2008 proposed a
brilliant formulation. He said: "The financial crisis is not the crisis
of capitalism. It is the crisis of a system that has distanced itself
from the most fundamental values of capitalism, which betrayed the
spirit of capitalism."
Well put, and BO is taking us away from the spirit of capitalism at warp speed!
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