Mistaught & Hoodwinked

Thanks to a long time member of our group for sending us 1) the clip below from The Economist that provides the results of a GlobeScan poll & statistics re the decline of capitalism's popularity throughout the world & 2) his reflective afterthought qualifying his opinion of the accuracy of The Economist's presentation.  I provided the above graph showing capitalism is more popular in China than in America..  This message is important to us right now because we are living it & have a chance to do something about it. 

 

I have seen the results of similar polls in recent years that confirms the GlobeScan stats regarding American's under 25 - something like 60% favor capitalism & 40% favor socialism - right in line with the poll below. 

 

This is indicative of just how brainwashed people who have attended government schools have become over the decades.  They have been mistaught & hoodwinked.

 

All of this of course goes against the teaching of Ayn Rand who believed that capitalism is the only moral economic system, i.e., the only one consistent with individual rights & a free society.

 

Professor Friedman wrote "a myth has grown up that free market capitalism ... is a system under which the rich exploit the poor.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  Wherever the free market has been permitted to operate, wherever anything approaching equality of opportunity has existed, the ordinary man has been able to attain levels of living never dreamed of before.  Nowhere is the gap between rich & poor wider, nowhere are the rich richer & the poor poorer, than in those societies that do not permit the free market to operate....Industrial progress, mechanical improvement, all of the great wonders of the modern era have meant relatively little to the wealthy.  The rich in Ancient Greece would have benefitted hardly @ all from modern plumbing: running servants replaced running water.  TV & radio - the patricians of Rome - could enjoy the leading musicians & actors in their homes, could have the leading artists as domestic retainers...These achievements have been made available to the masses conveniences & amenities that were previously the exclusive prerogative of the rich & powerful."

 

Just consider that a middle class person in Europe lives below the standard of living of someone in America living @ the so-called poverty level (see Heritage Foundation info below).  Many architects & engineers in Europe can only afford to rent apartments - not own their homes like we do in America.  The recently jailed IMF chief is a socialist - he was arrested in his trans Atlantic flight first-class seat after spending his time in NYC in a $3,000 per night luxury suite - talk abut a gap in society.  He could not care less if the people he represented lived in cardboard shacks.

 

Take any third world country & ask yourself which gives the people a better chance @ the life you have in America - following socialism or free market capitalism?  It is easy to complain when you are surrounded by all of America's wealth, but take a step back & look @ what system got you to this point.  You will also see why the elites are trying to take it from you.

 

Robert Rector of the Heritage Foundation provides the following stats re people defined as "poor" by the Census Bureau, taken from various government reports:

• Forty-six percent of all poor households actually own their own homes. The average home owned by persons classified as poor by the Census Bureau is a three bedroom house with one and a half baths, a garage, and a porch or patio.
• Seventy-six percent of poor households have air conditioning. By contrast, 30 years ago, only 36 percent of the entire U.S. population enjoyed air conditioning.
• Only 6 percent of poor households are overcrowded. More than two thirds have more than two rooms per person.
• The average poor American has more living space than the average individual living in Paris, London, Vienna, Athens, and other cities throughout Europe. (These comparisons are to the average citizens in foreign countries, not to those classified as poor.)
• Nearly three quarters of poor households own a car; 30 percent own two or more cars.
• Ninety-seven percent of poor households have a color television; over half own two or more color televisions.
• Seventy-eight percent have a VCR or DVD player; 62 percent have cable or satellite TV reception.
• Seventy-three percent own microwave ovens, more than half have a stereo, and a third have an automatic dishwasher.

For more please click on ReturnToExcellence.net & look up the May 15, 2009 posting entitled To The Socialists Of All Parties & the responses posted on May 26, 2009.

 

But the worst part of socialism to me is that it cheats people out of reaching the potential in life they were born to live. They will never experience the thrill & triumph of high achievement - the highs of life - so that to reverse paraphrase TR - everyone's place will always be with those cold & timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat. As such the true cost to any socialist society, namely the opportunity cost, is more than just enormous - it is literally unimaginable.

 

From The Economist:

 

Rising debt and lost output are the common measures of the cost of the financial crisis. But a new global opinion poll shows another, perhaps more serious form of damage: falling public support for capitalism,. This is most marked in OUR country that used to epitomize free enterprise. In 2002, 80% of Americans agreed that the world's best bet was the free market system. By 2010, that support had fallen to 59%, only a little above the 54% average for the 25 countries polled. Nominally Communist China is now one of the world's largest supporters of capitalism, at 68%, up from 66% in 2002. Brazil scores 68% too. Germany squeaks into top place with 69%.

 

France, one of the world's strongest economies, continues as an anti-capitalist outlier. Only 6% of French "strongly" support the free market down from an already puny 8% in 2002. Add those who "somewhat agree" with capitalism's superiority and the figure is 30%, down from 42% in 2002. Turkey (another free market success story) had the same level of support then, but it has dropped even lower, to a mere 27%. In Europe only Spain seems to buck the trend, rising from 37% in 2002 to 51%. Indians, on paper big winners from the free market reforms, appear unimpressed: support has dropped to 58% from 73%.

 

Capitalism's waning fortunes are starkly visible among Americans earning below $20,000. Their support for the free market has dropped from 76% to 44% in just one year.

 

Doug - As an afterthought, I feel that the research conducted by GlobeScan is probably accurate only if one assumes the following:

 

1. Those polled in their respective countries represent the educated class (which form a tiny minority in countries like China, India, Pakistan, Indonesia , Turkey et al.).

 

2. The clarity in phrasing the questionnaire, which hopefully included business regulations, bribery, corruption, and influence peddling.