The argument for free enterprise is won at “free”. And the thing that enterprise must be
liberated from is, of course, government.
When people are free (from government) to produce, own,
exchange, store, transport, invest, save, buy, sell, invent, work, and consume
in any manner they see fit, the most possible prosperity is delivered to the
widest possible number of people in the shortest possible time. This is the lesson that economic history
teaches to those who will observe and learn.
And it is not difficult to understand why it is so - 310
million distributed brains focused on rational self-interest have a higher
aggregated IQ than do a few dozen civil-service central planners whose
priorities are more time off and early pension.
Apologists for central planning may have a different answer for
that free-from-what question; probably “greed” or “monopoly” or “corporate
predation”. But monopoly power is a
grant from government in nearly every case, and corporate predation can only
occur when government paves the way.
As much as it might like to, the socialists’ evil nemesis
Walmart can’t raise prices on a whim – not because there is a government, but
because there is a Target. Meanwhile, the
sugar cartel can charge three times world market price because of U.S. government
protection.
Human beings must cooperate to survive; we were organizing ourselves
into civil societies and engaging in trade in order to sustain and protect
ourselves for tens of thousands of years before there was government as we know
it. Our brains are no larger today than
they were 35,000 years ago, and our ancestors’ capacity for learning and
innovation was no less potent than ours.
They did not love their children any less than we do, and
yet all of the technology we depend on to save our sick children came into
existence in only the last 200 years. In
fact, most of the material things that we find indispensable to modern living were
unavailable to all but the last seven or less generations of humans. Why? What happened to suddenly turn the fight
for survival into the pursuit of happiness?
America
happened, with its free enterprise system and its Constitutionally-limited
government. For the first time in
history, people owned themselves and the fruits of their labors. They kept what they produced instead of
turning it over to a king, priest, dictator, warlord, tribal chief, colonial
governor, general, emperor, commissar, or entire village.
People who can keep the surplus they produce, produce in
surplus; those who can’t, don’t. The
word economists use to describe this phenomenon is “duh”.
And America
would not have happened but for two other seminal events – the Protestant
Reformation and the invention of the printing press. Religious freedom and freedom of speech were
the necessary precursors for the establishment of political and economic
freedom. More freedom is good, less
freedom is bad and yes, it is really that simple.
You don’t need a Ph.D. in economics or commerce to test that
theory. Simply look at any of the most
miserable and impoverished countries – North Korea will suffice – and run
down the list of what else they don’t have besides prosperity: religious
freedom, freedom of speech, gun rights, freedom of association, political
freedom, economic freedom.
And then look at the countries whose living standards are
rising the fastest – China will suffice – and ask yourself: why there and why
now? What changed to lift them out of abject poverty, starvation and oppression? The government changed, that’s what.
It rejected central planning and embraced free enterprise; and
the results have been nothing short of miraculous. Since 2000, the United States created roughly 6
million new businesses; the Chinese started an astonishing 43 million. The
shift from government enterprise to private enterprise in China has transformed the economy so that 70% of
China’s
output is now generated in the private sector.
Free enterprise has raised the average manufacturing wage in
China
from 58 cents per hour in 2000 to nearly $6 per hour today. Let’s connect the dots for the UW grads: government
lets go of the rope, 43 million new businesses are formed, the economy is 70%
liberated, and wages go up 10-fold in a decade.
Get it?
Meanwhile, our government is tying us up with more rope,
business start-ups have slowed to a trickle, government takes a bigger share of
GDP each year, and wages (measured in tangible value, like ounces of gold) have
plummeted over the last decade. The
Chinese are not kicking our butts; we are sitting on their foot.
North
Korea has roads and schools and free health
care and food stamps and public transportation all those other things the “you didn’t
build it” crowd thinks made this country great.
So did China
when it was wasting two generations on a failed system that relies on someone
else to “make that happen.” What
happened is that tens of millions of people starved to death and millions more
were killed for complaining about it.
China
is not perfect, but it is better in every way since government started to let
go of the rope. If you melted down all
the Olympic medals won by China
during their communist years, you couldn’t make a bicycle. This summer they will carry home more gold
than is probably left in Ft.
Knox.
The Olympic Games remind us that choice and competition make
us all better – and the Games also remind us why “equality of outcome” makes us
all worse. Michael Phelps has way too
many medals; nobody really needs that many, so by modern liberal standards he
is a greedy and selfish bastard who should be occupied.
And I don’t have any gold medals, so how do we spread Mr.
Phelps’ wealth around to me? You could
pass a hundred laws and a thousand executive orders that say I swim as fast as
Michael Phelps and it would not make it so.
The only way that we could achieve equality of outcome – the only way - is
to force Michael Phelps to slow down.
That is what socialism does to our most productive
wealth-generators. And slowing them down
does not make the less productive more productive, it just makes them feel
better about their lack of productivity.
It gives the envious a temporary reprieve from their jealous tantrums while
they look around for something else to covet.
Free enterprise doesn’t care who wins and by how much. It lets each of us discover how high is up
for us. And when our enterprise is free
from government, most of us discover that up is a lot higher than we could have
ever possibly imagined.
When we liberate
ourselves, we learn that the only real disadvantage we ever had were the people
who told us we couldn’t compete, couldn’t win, and shouldn’t try. Don’t listen to the slow swimmers and those who covet.
Liberate
yourself instead; you will be glad you did.
“Moment of Clarity” is a
weekly commentary by Libertarian writer and speaker Tim
Nerenz, Ph.D. Visit
Tim’s website www.timnerenz.com to find your
moment.
