In Defense of Capitalism
Posted By Rich Bryant on October 24, 2009
Lately I have observed any number of our leftist US leaders denouncing the “evils of capitalism” and simultaneously suggesting that if we would just launder our money through the government that life would be so much better. Pardon my cynicism, but I can’t help but be just a little suspicious when the fox proposes to stand watch over the hen house(!)
Until last night these thoughts had been simmering more in my subconscious than they had been finding their way to my voice and keyboard. However, last night I happened to accompany my wife on a shopping trip to look for a new (and much-needed) dish washer, and while standing there in the store considering the dish washers on display before us I experienced what I can only describe as an epiphany.
The catalyst for my catharsis was a combination of my astonishment at the wide range of choices in dish washers that our capitalist system had humbly laid out before me to consider. There were dish washers there from a variety of manufacturers and at a wide range of prices. Those occupying the higher price tiers offered more quiet operation, more control and maybe a little longer service life. All of this variety and affordability was a direct result of the economic competition that exists both between manufacturers and stores. It is quite obvious that they are all working very hard to please me, the consumer.
And, as I stood there contemplating this, a helpful and energetic young man employed by the store introduced himself and offered to help us to understand the various benefits offered to us by each product (some benefits would not have been so obvious without his assistance). Fortunately my wife was there to “talk shop” as I continued my own less pragmatic musings on the nature of our shared “capitalist experience”.
Those musings turned now to the young salesman himself, and how capitalist forces were at work to cause him to be supremely informed about the products he represented and, more importantly, to try hard to please both us and his employer. The result was not only a pleasant experience for us, but for this young man as well. I then considered that this young man was but one person in a virtually endless procession of people working diligently behind the scenes to ultimately present these dish washers to us for our consideration. I marveled at the realization that all this was taking place just so that manufacturers and stores would have some modest probability of selling us a dish washer for what seemed an amazingly low price for such an important household device.
Unlike politicians, the economic force of capitalism cannot help but work tirelessly behind the scenes 24×7 to provide us all with a wide range of choices for products and services to better our lives. Capitalist organizations are striving constantly to offer us better products at better prices – and to please us in any number of other ways.
It is to our own disadvantage (if not to our own peril) that we listen to those self-servicing political voices that would seek to stifle capitalism in order to detour the flow of money through their own money-grubbing hands.
Ask any Russian who happened to survive “communism”.
Comments