[MD] Why Profit Is Moral

[Arlo Bensinger]

[Platt to Khaled]
No. "If you protect a man from folly you will soon have a nation of fools." 
---- William Penn

[Khaled replied]
Dante forgot an 8th level.

[Arlo]
Don't sweat it, Khaled. Arguing that there is something greater than money 
and profit with a mercantilist is like arguing Christ is not divine to a 
christian. Of course, snake-oil salesmen will always tell you that selling 
snake-oil is moral. This is their reason, if they can screw a little old 
lady out of her money, they are actually doing her a favor because she was 
too stupid to have that money anyways.

The trouble is, aspects of daily life continue to increase in complexity. 
No one has the "smarts" to read and understand everything. And the elderly 
are particularly susceptible to misunderstanding things related to 
technology. It is not "folly" that leads to the situation you describe, but 
the fact that things change and few are able to keep up, let alone 
understand, with the complexity. This makes fertile ground for the 
snake-oil salesman.

The "if you are ripped off, you deserve to be ripped off" attitude of the 
mercantilists is mere evidence of that to them "money is the measure of man".

Arlo