Capitalism: The Ultimate Empowerment
Liberty is the true backbone for empowerment, for it gives one the opportunity to stand up for oneself. But somehow history has deleted liberty from capitalism and framed it as an evil entity that breeds chaos. Yes, indeed in a society where there is unbridled capitalism there will be chaos — Utter chaos! Because that’s how 7 billion people finding expression to fulfill their desire would look like: colorful, chaotic, and dynamic, like the forest. And forests are forever. Unlike a tamed garden that will go berserk at the first sigh of a storm, forests nurture life. The Leftist idea that we as a society need to be governed is a misplaced idea. If the world doesn’t need a supreme leader and can be run by independent countries governed by their respective authority — Then why can’t countries be run by independent states? why not states by independent cities, why not cities by independent districts, why not districts by independent neighborhoods, and why not neighborhoods by free
individuals? This is the motto of capitalism — if you want to fix something, don’t pick someone else’s pocket. Fund your own schemes. This is highly empowering.
But the moment you step there. People ask questions. But never pay attention to the answers.
What about the increasing gap between the rich and the poor? In a society that blooms with unbridled capitalism, this gap would increase exponentially.’ If so, How will it empower us socially and economically? — They ask.
Now, consider the Gini coefficient index which measures the proportion of income inequalities: 0% indicating absolute equilibrium, and 100% meaning total inequality (which for obvious statistical reasons can never be attained). You must have heard the staged lie that the Gini is out of the box and rising. Well, the fact is - the stats indicate that too. From the early 19th century to the early 21st century the index did rise from near 40 to near 70. Upon further inquiry, one will find that during the early nineteenth century, 35 percent of the global inequality found by the Gini index was due to differences across national borders. At the same time, 65 percent of the inequality was generated by differences in incomes within each country. But by the early twenty-first century, 85 to 90 percent of the inequality was due to differences across national borders, while only 10 to 15 percent of inequality was due to income differences within each country. In other words, the main source of inequality in the world has changed from within-border inequality to cross-border inequality. The cross-border income inequality rise is subject to multitudes of reasons — historic distribution of wealth, differences in the availability of resources and the potentiality of the resources, psychological mindset of the citizens that affects productivity, State intervention through foreign trade policies, subsidization, predatory pricing, and so on. It thus is not fair to compare the figures of cross-border income differentia. But, what’s rewarding is that the industrialization and silicon revolution ‘exponentially’ decreased the income inequality within borders contrary to popular belief. Look at poverty. In the early 19th century the percentage of people below the standards of living was a staggering 81% which now has decreased to 18%. When I say, below the standards of living — I mean ‘Charles Dickens’ poor. Now, if that’s not a clear demonstration that Capitalism is empowering, then what is!
Not only socially, but also economically, people have been lifted out of sheer
servitude. The standards of livings have been increased drastically. And wherever there are traces of Leftist Intervention in the society one is sure to find oppression. That is the nature of socialism. Humans are myopic by nature, they can’t look beyond a certain level of complexity. Now, in this condition, if you hand them over a city to plan, or a whole country to govern, and expect them to make the many complex economic evaluations which themselves do not obey mathematics, then they are bound to make errors even with the best of intentions. And we blame the consequences of all such errors on capitalism. No! But I guess we don’t deserve such reasons. Capitalism is for the future. And when it shall show its true colors -
People shall see it for what it actually is.