By Ben Shapiro
Wednesday, January 08, 2014
It took capitalism half a century to come back from the
Great Depression. It's taken socialism half that time to come back from the
collapse of the Soviet Union. In New York City, avowed socialist Mayor Bill de
Blasio has declared that his goal is to take "dead aim at the Tale of Two
Cities" -- the gap between rich and poor. In Seattle, newly elected
socialist city Councilmember Kshama Sawant addressed supporters, explaining,
"I wear the badge of socialist with honor." To great acclaim from the
left, columnist Jesse Myerson of Rolling Stone put out a column telling
millennials that they ought to fight for government-guaranteed employment, a
universal basic income, collectivization of private property, nationalization
of private assets and public banks.
The newly flowering buds of Marxism no longer reside on
the fringes. Not when the president of the United States has declared fighting
income inequality his chief task as commander in chief. Not when Senate
Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., has said that America faces "no
greater challenge" than income disparity. Not when MSNBC, The New York
Times and the amalgamated pro-Obama media outlets have all declared their
mission for 2014 a campaign against rich people.
Less than 20 years ago, former President Bill Clinton,
facing reelection, declared "the era of big government" over. By
2011, Clinton reversed himself, declaring that it was government's role to
"give people the tools and create the conditions to make the most of our
lives."
So what happened?
Capitalism failed to make a case for itself. Back in
1998, shortly after the world seemed to reach a consensus on the
ineffectiveness of socialist schemes, economists Daniel Yergin and Joseph
Stanislaw wrote that the free market required something beyond mere success: It
required "legitimacy." But, said Yergin and Stanislaw, "a system
that takes the pursuit of self-interest and profit as its guiding light does
not necessarily satisfy the yearning in the human soul for belief and some
higher meaning beyond materialism." In other words, they wrote, while
Spanish communists would die with the word "Stalin" on their lips,
"few people would die with the words 'free markets' on their lips."
The failure to make a moral case for capitalism has
doomed capitalism to the status of a perennial backup plan. When people are
desperate or wealthy, they turn to socialism; only when they have no other
alternative do they embrace the free market. After all, lies about guaranteed
security are far more seductive than lectures about personal responsibility.
So what is the moral case for capitalism? It lies in
recognition that socialism isn't a great idea gone wrong -- it's an evil
philosophy in action. It isn't driven by altruism; it's driven by greed and
jealousy. Socialism states that you owe me something simply because I exist.
Capitalism, by contrast, results in a sort of reality-forced altruism: I may
not want to help you, I may dislike you, but if I don't give you a product or
service you want, I will starve. Voluntary exchange is more moral than forced
redistribution. Socialism violates at least three of the Ten Commandments: It
turns government into God, it legalizes thievery and it elevates covetousness.
Discussions of income inequality, after all, aren't about prosperity but about
petty spite. Why should you care how much money I make, so long as you are
happy?
Conservatives talk results when discussing the
shortcomings of socialism. They're right: Socialism is ineffective, destructive
and stunting to the human spirit. But they're wrong to abandon the field of
morality when discussing the contrast between freedom and control. And it's
this abandonment -- this perverse laziness -- that has led to socialism's
comeback, even though within living memory, we have seen continental economies
collapse and millions slaughtered in the name of this false god.
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