[MD] Capitalism

[plattholden at gmail.com]

Hey Mary, 

Over the course of human history, profit-seeking business leaders, 
scorned as greedy capitalists, have done more to preserve human life 
and lift human beings out of poverty than all the churches, charities and 
government welfare programs combined. It is economic ignorance that 
impels critics to vilify society's benefactors. These benefactors deserve 
our gratitude and praise for without them there would be a lot fewer 
people alive today and a lot more poverty. Any number of reasons can 
be cited for the success of capitalism in improving human life all over 
the globe, but Pirsig nailed it when he wrote:  . 

"A free market is a Dynamic institution. What people buy and what 
people sell, in other words what people value, can never be contained 
by any intellectual formula. What makes the marketplace work is 
Dynamic Quality. The market is always changing and the direction of 
that change can never be predetermined. The Metaphysics of Quality 
says the free market makes everybody richer-by preventing static 
economic patterns from setting in and stagnating economic growth. That 
is the reason the major capitalist economies of the world have done so 
much better since World War II than the major socialist economies." 
(Lila, 17)

Regards,
Platt


On 15 Feb 2010 at 14:44, Mary wrote:

> Hi Platt & all,
> 
> [I said earlier]
> if we don't trust the government we can
> > vote them
> > > out.  Not a perfect or speedy solution, but better than nothing.  We
> > have
> > > no
> > > power over rapacious corporations.
> 
> [Platt replied]
> > Sure we do. We don't have to buy products from corporations we don't
> > trust.
> 
> But we do have to work for them.
> 
> Maybe I can't afford or don't want to move.
> Maybe I can't find a job in my field anywhere else.
> Maybe I can't find a job doing anything anywhere else.
> Maybe I can't afford to be without health insurance.
> Maybe I am too old to be looking for a new job because I would cause a new
> employer's health insurance costs to go up.
> Etc. 
> 
> Maybe it would be better if there were a few laws with teeth regulating how
> corporations could conduct business with respect to their customers, the
> environment, and their employees.  
> Maybe it would be better to not be at the mercy of the judgment of a distant
> board of directors we do not know, will never meet, and who have no idea
> what and how much their employees actually do every day.
> Maybe it would be better if corporations had a legal obligation to treat
> their employees with fairness, and we had recourse if they did not.
> 
> Maybe it would be better not to think about the Catch-22 a white-collar
> "exempt" (meaning exempt from the labor laws for benefit of you
> non-Americans) finds himself in, be grateful to not be among the mass of the
> unemployed, and just get over it. ;)
> 
> Cheerfully getting over it,
> Mary