The capitalistic system has lifted mankind out of mass poverty

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I just finished reading the Barnes & Noble College Outline Series book “Western Civilization to 1500" by Walther Kirchner. I bought it way back in the late 1960's and have just gotten around to reading it. The book has set me thinking. Through the ages, for thousands of years, up until relatively recently, the vast majority of mankind have been very poor people (poor peasants or slaves) living in very simple, rudimentary houses eking out a very hard living with none of our modern conveniences. In the ancient civilizations of Egypt, Sumer, Babylon, Assyria, Persia, Greece, Rome, etc. there were a few wealthy and powerful people, a rather small middle class consisting of artisans, etc., and a very large class (comprising probably 90% or more of the population) of ordinary people who were mostly poor peasants and slaves living in poverty. (A large percentage of the people in those civilizations were slaves. There has always a lot of wars through the history of man and it was a usual custom for the winners to sell the losers into slavery.) In medieval Europe there weren’t many slaves but the masses were peasants working on the land of some lord (the lord furnished him protection and he worked for the lord) and in many cases were serfs without the right to leave the land. If you or I had been born back in those times the chances are we would have been born into the peasant or slave class and we would have had hard, poverty-ridden lives. In the modern world that we live in where a very large portion of mankind has all that modern technology, modern industry, has given us (radio, television, automobiles, airplanes, cell phones, the internet, gas heat, air conditioning, kitchen ranges, refrigerators, running water, toilet facilities, medical procedures and cures, etc.), a world where most of us have so much that we ought be thankful for, I think it is interesting that so many people are so very unhappy, angry, dissatisfied. In my own country, America, where modern technology has given the masses of people so much there is so much anger and dissatisfaction, especially among the college elites and the young people. What does all of this mean? I think it says something about human nature. It is a thing to reflect upon. What is it that makes people angry, dissatisfied, and hateful? If you give them everything, they are still not happy. They will find something to make them unhappy. They will find something to complain about. They will see that I have more than they do and become envious. They will want to see me taken down. In America capitalism and private enterprise has given people so much. Yet a whole lot of people here in America want to see our system taken down, destroyed, replaced. Replaced with what? Marxism. Marxism is the good, pure, great system. In actual fact Marxism is a really bad, ugly system, a really oppressive system, that has been tried many times and just doesn’t work. It has been responsible for great cruelty and ugliness and the murders of many, many millions.

What does one make of all this? Where does all of this come from?

It comes from our school system. It comes from our teachers — elementary school teachers, high school teachers, and college professors. Teachers hating Capitalism, enamored with Marxism, indoctrinating our youth. Teachers using their position and power to mold malleable minds.

And it comes from the mass media and Hollywood, forces pushing the liberal line, the liberal narrative, all of the politically correct positions, the liberal lie.

And it comes from the masses all wanting to be up to date and modern, all wanting to be politically correct, all wanting to be in the latest fashion with regard to their beliefs and attitudes. They don’t have the independence of mind and strength of mind to oppose the crowd.

And while it has been happening conservative people have sat around, watched it happen, done nothing, allowed it to happen. Young children are taught in elementary school that homosexual sex is fine and parents are silent. In a moral society such a thing would bring protests, demonstrations, riots in the streets.

I am convinced of the perversity and badness of human nature. Of the naivete and foolishness of human nature. I think most people don’t like themselves very well and take out their frustration and anger on others. They listen to all of the wrong voices and follow all of the wrong roads.

Does our system have problems and defects? Yes, of course. All political and economic systems have problems and defects. That is not the question. The question is which system works the best, gives the best results, and is best to live under.

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The characteristic feature of modern capitalism is mass

production of goods destined for consumption by the masses.

The result is a tendency towards a continuous improvement in

the average standard of living, a progressing enrichment of the

many.

Ludwig von Mises

The capitalistic system has lifted mankind out of mass poverty.

It is this system that in the last century, in the last

generation, even the last decade, has acceleratively been

changing the face of the world, and has provided the masses of

mankind with amenities that even kings did not possess or

imagine a few generations ago.

Henry Hazlitt

The whole gospel of Karl Marx can be summed up in a single

sentence: Hate the man who is better off than you are. Never

under any circumstances admit that his success may be due to

his own efforts, to the productive contribution he has made to

the whole community. Always attribute his success to the

exploitation, the cheating, the more or less open robbery of

others. Never under any circumstances admit that your own

failure may be owing to your own weakness, or that the failure

of anyone else may be due to his own defects - his laziness,

incompetence, improvidence, or stupidity.

Henry Hazlitt

Not since the days of the Hitler Youth have young people been

subjected to more propaganda on more politically correct

issues. At one time, educators boasted that their role was not

to teach students what to think but how to think. Today, their

role is far too often to teach students what to think on

everything from immigration to global warming to the new sacred

trinity of "race, class and gender".

Thomas Sowell

The first socialists were the intellectuals; they, and not the masses, are

the backbone of Socialism.

Ludwig von Mises

Socialism destroys the incentive to produce, dampens the human

spirit and results, ultimately, in less for everyone.

David Limbaugh

Socialism (modern liberalism) is not in the least what it

pretends to be. It is not the pioneer of a better and finer

world, but the spoiler of what thousands of years of

civilization have created. It does not build; it destroys.

Ludwig von Mises

See Some thoughts on economic and political philosophy. The relative merits of capitalism v.s. socialism.

July 2020