Posted on 04/21/2010 5:40:29 AM PDT by Kaslin
I won 19 Emmy Awards by reporting a myth: that business constantly rips us off -- that capitalism is mostly cruel and unfair.
I know that's a myth now. So I was glad to see the publication of "The 5 Big Lies About American Business" by Michael Medved.
I invite him on tomorrow's Fox Business Network show to talk about that.
"You can only make a profit in this country by giving people a product or a service that they want," he says. "It's the golden rule in action."
Medved used to write about the movies, so he's familiar with the businessman as villain. I'll play a clip from the movie "Syriana," in which an oil tycoon makes this ridiculous speech:
"Corruption keeps us safe and warm. Corruption is why you and I are prancing around in here instead of fighting over scraps of meat out in the street."
"What's interesting," Medved commented, "is that in the old days, Hollywood would have businesspeople who were very positive: George Bailey, the Jimmy Stewart character, is a banker in 'It's a Wonderful Life.'"
No longer. Today's movie capitalists are criminals or playboys. Apparently, Hollywood writers think it's plausible that CEOs have lots of time to sip cocktails and chase women.
"In school, we all studied a book called "The Theory of the Leisure Class," which ... indicted the leisure class and these people who were out there exploiting other people and really had nothing to do except sit on their yachts and go to their swimming pools and their vacations."
In real life, that's nonsense.
"The higher up on the income scale you go, the less leisure time you have. You make money in this country by working hard."
Medved's second myth is that when the rich get richer, the poor get poorer. This is the old zero-sum fallacy, which ignores that when two people engage in free exchange, both gain -- or they wouldn't have traded. It's what I call the double thank-you phenomenon. I understand why politicians and lawyers believe it: It's true in their world. But it's not true in business.
"If you believe that when the rich get richer, the poor get poorer, then you believe that creating wealth causes poverty, and you're an idiot," said Medved. "One of the things that I hate is this term 'obscene profits.' There are no obscene profits ... . (The current economic downturn shows) "that when the rich get poorer ... everybody gets poorer."
Myth No. 3: Government is more fair and reliable than business.
"Remember the last time you went into Starbucks, and then remember the last time you went into the DMV to get your license," Medved said. "Where did you get better treated? And it's not because the barista is some kind of idealist or humanitarian. She wants a tip. She wants you to come back to the Starbucks ... ."
But the left doesn't get it.
"This is the suspicion of the profit motive -- the idea that if somebody is selflessly serving me, they're going to treat me better than somebody who wants to make a buck," Medved said. But "(i)f you think about it in your own life, if somebody is benefiting from his interaction with you ... it's a far more reliable kind of interaction than someone who comes and says I'm in this only for you."
Myth No. 4: The current downturn means the death of capitalism.
"Capitalism is alive and well," Medved said.
I'm also bugged when people argue that today's problems prove that capitalism "failed." What failed? We had a correction. A bubble popped. But from 1982 to now, the Dow rose from 800 to 11,000. Had it happened without the bubble, we'd say this is one of the great boom periods.
Medved added: "This is one of the biggest lies -- the idea that because of capitalism, we're all suffering. ... Poor people in America today, people who are officially in poverty, have a higher standard of living in terms of medical standards, in terms of the chances of going to college, in terms of the way people live, than middle-class people did 30 years ago. It's an extraordinary achievement of technology and of the profit sector.
Watch out! Any good word about Medved may get you flamed on FR!
Furthermore, notice that Liberals always and only make emotional appeals...because they have no effective logical or rational arguments.
The Leisure Class exists, but it doesn't consist of working executives. It is mostly made up of people who inherited wealth from working businessmen, and to lesser extent of those who made a pile and quit working. But this second group is rare in America, as most successful entrepeneurs take the money they made selling their business and start another.
Much of the true Leisure Class spends its time sitting around complaining about how evil business and wealth is. Seldom motivates them to give up their own unearned wealth, however.
“It’s a Wonderful Life” was not the best example to cite in this case. The dishonest, greedy, bad guy in the movie is Potter, the bank owner ~ in real life and even worse in the dream sequence!
And, the truly hilarious part is that most of those who talk about or write about “evil capitalism” are actually profiting from it. Geez, are they thick as bricks or what?
Capitalism works best in a competative environment. Liberals don't do well in a competative environment. This is why Liberals oppose capitalism.
Logic is foreign to them
And the villain who throws widowed mothers of small children into the midnight snow has been around for centuries in drama.
The difference is the amount of media that people are exposed to these days is orders of magnitude greater than the very occasional stage play of yesteryear.
So the mantra of the eeeevil company owner has become ingrained in the minds of too many people. I have rarely followed any soap operas, but a generation ago, they were the daily companions to millions of people. I doubt if there ever was a hero company president in all the years of those shows.
It's what I call the double thank-you phenomenon. I understand why politicians and lawyers believe it: It's true in their world. But it's not true in business.
This observation is far deeper than a casual essay statement. It is a corollary of the Prisoner's Dilemma's logical ramifications, which itself is a corollary of Godel's Theorem.
In essence it says that imagination, creativity, and faith operate outside the bounds of tete-a-tete game theory. Similarly Man is made in the image of the Creator. And we do not mean here to be maudlin.
There was a post on FR the other day that mentioned "innovating our way out of recession." Same thing.
Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Barbara Boxer, etc. who have produced absolutely nothing worthwhile in their lives, are soooo far over their pseudo-intellectual heads that any intervention in society by them is destined to be a disaster. A really really good manager knows something of this.
And we do see light on FR, although even here the dark ages still infiltrate.
It could have been all different, but the horrific arrogance of Harvard, the CFR, the LEFT, killed us, in this nation. Perhaps others will emerge from the darkness.
Johnny Suntrade
I have read Veblen’s Theory of the Leisure Class several times. He is right! We do have a leisure class. He was wrong about who is in that class. The leisure class are leftwing trust funders, managers of large foundations, the MSM elite, the Hollywood elite, the Kennedys, and of course Senator Kerry. I am sure FR’s could add to that list.
ping
I guess Liberals are just a bunch of nutty academics who love their hypotheses so much that they don't care that they can't stand up under examination.
Seems like a form of insanity to me.
Of course, a big portion of liberals are not the true believers, but those who use them purely to gain power. I'm not sure where Obama falls out on this continuum...but I am pretty sure he is an evil SOB.
He is also an arrogant p o s
No longer. Today's movie capitalists are criminals or playboys. Apparently, Hollywood writers think it's plausible that CEOs have lots of time to sip cocktails and chase women.
Art imitates life, or is it the other way 'round?
I myself was talking to an employee last month, and could hear some stress in her voice. Asking what the problem was she told me that she and her husband had encountered an unexpected $500 payment to close the sale on their new home, and that they had no way to obtain that extra money. She could not even borrow it from her parents. Even though we certainly felt it in our own budget, I wired her $500 on the spot.
I guess I am an evil capitalist(?)
ANSWER: Skinny
He is arrogant beyond what I have ever seen in the humans I have known (and he's done absolutely nothing to have earned it).
I don't doubt for a moment that he's mentally ill (including but not limited to psychopathic narcissism)...but there is something beyond even that.
I think he's cut a deal with the Devil.
Whether such a thing is possible or he only believes it is possible seems to be irrelevant. He appears to believe he is on a cosmic mission...and it is clearly not a mission sponsored by the God of Israel.;-)
Add public education.
I like Medved even thought I disagree with a number of his positions. There are a number of people on this forum who demand that any conservative agree with their personal beliefs one hundred percent. No one can agree with anyone on one hundred percent of the issues.
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