Today a lot of news coverage is being given to the auto industry. President Obama has been emphasizing the need to continue to support this crucial industry to the US. One of his claims and one of others as well is that the auto industry is an important symbol of capitalism and of our country. On the one hand the auto industry has done a lot to transform the middle class, build up our country and to transform the way we live and travel. While I agree there will be economic ramifications if the industry fails I do not think it is as essential to what it means to be American as we are sometimes led to believe. I really question if making cars and in turn making money is really what the US is all about. Certainly part of what has made this country the great melting pot is people seeking a better life, seeking their fortune. This country was also founded by and continues to be infused with people seeking a freer life, a life where they can just be. Some of that freedom is economic freedom but it is also religious and political freedom.
Is capitialism and industry what makes this country great, or is it something more. Is capitialism simply a means to an end or has it become and end in and of itself? Now maybe more so than ever we have a chance to make a statement about what is really important to this country. Many people are concerned, and probably legitmately so about the increased government control of different industries, especially the financial sector. They worry that we are sliding slowly towards communism or socialism. Whether or not that is true I would raise this question, has our capitialistic system with its emphasis on the bottom line and making as much money as possible really faired better? I mean, financial institutions of all sorts have shown a clear desire and emphasis on how much money they can make for their shareholders, but they have done so at the expense of our communities. Homes lie empty because of poor lending practices and taxpayers are paying the price in the form of bailouts and other financial reprecutions.
I am not saying cut the auto industry lose, or let the banks fail, nor am I saying that we need the government to step in and make changes, what I am saying that we as citizens need to remember that money is not everything, that what makes this country, or any country great is something more. In the end, we are the shareholders, we, or people like us are the ones these companies are trying to make money for. If we take seriously shifting our priorities we can make a difference. We can send a message that capitialism is not the end, but simply a means to something great, something that makes this country great, freedom.
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Words can so easily become mixed around in our ubiquitous media. This may either be the result of misunderstanding (lack of research)or bias on the part of the many different authors and re-authors of a story. I don't think that it was ever meant that the auto industry is the "symbol of capitalism". What is meant that the Government taking over of the auto industry may be a sign of the end of capitalism. That the role of the government in private industry will extended beyond a limit that threatens the fundmental existence of capitalism.
There exists within capitalism the notion of risk and return. That is the return you receive is inversely related to the risk you accept. However, the risk threatens the possiblility of any return at all. If you take on risk and succeed, the free market will reward you with bountiful returns. If you fail, you may lose everything you invested. Those that fear the threat to capitalism see the government comprimising the basic principle of risk and return by assuming the loss after so many have gained so much on the short-run returns.
Truly, a pure capitalist society has never existed just as a pure communist society never truly existed. What we have is a mixed economy that favors capitalism but recognizes that private industry cannot provide all things to every one. The idea of what the government should provide and what the free-market economy should provide for itself has changed over the years.
When compared to all other types of economies, it is easy to argue that capitalism is the preferred system. Freedom and capitalism are very complimentary of each other. Capitalism replaced fuedalism as the primary form of economy in the western world. With freedom and capitalism, each citizen has the power to determine his or her own destiny. There is no pre-determined destiny or class system from which you are born or determined to belong to at a very premature and subjective age - such as exists in communism or socialism. This has been known as the "American Dream". Whereby you are only limited by the amount of effort you are willing to give and blessing you receive. A child born into a poor family has the ability to choose to accept being poor or pursue the middle class or even the very upper class.
If you were to read the bios of the wealthiest people in 2007 according to Forbes, you would find that most started out very humbly delivering newspapers, shining shoes or other jobs of the poor class into wich they were born. The rest were experts in the obscure science of financial derivatives.
There seems to be a notion spreading that capitalism is the root of the problem. Not true. The biggest problem has been GREED. Now that is a sin that, along with its 6 siblings, has been around much longer than capitalism and will survive any change to our economic philosophy. Still, do not leave out the others: Lust, Gluttony, Sloth, Wrath, Envy & Pride. Review the list, define the terms and you will see that each has contributed significantly to the current state of fear. Capitalism is not the means to the end. The sin of man is.
Further, it is not the corporations, the companies, or the industries that create problems. It is people. Though, it is easier to blame institutions than people. These institutions only exist because the consumers or employees allow them to exist. Let's hope they don't exist because some politicians pocketed a lot of money to keep them in existence for the special interests of a select few. Or because the employees who disagreed with conflicts of moral principle changed there point of view to either maintain their stake in it or to enrich themselves even more.
By focusing on what is truly important and obeying basic principles of how we should and should not behave, we can maintain the American dream for ourselves and for our posterity. More idealistically, we could try to understand what motivated a courageous few to risk so much against such odds in 1776.
Don't blame capitalism. People are to blame for the problems. Let's hope the right people have enough courage to solve the problems. Courage to do what is right even when doing so requires personal risk.
I think in many ways Rodney has said better what I was trying to say, that really when it comes down to it, what makes us great, or what makes us fail is people. We can look at systems and prop them up or tear them down, but if we the people doing the creating or the destroying do not look to our own flaws we will merely see them echoed in what we do.
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