Have you ever bought a scratch-off lottery ticket hoping to get rich only to find out you did not win and instead have some opaque pigment stuck under your fingernail? It reminds me of doing the very least amount of work while trying to get the biggest payout. There is no easy get rich quick scheme, yet many try.
Work done well takes time, skill, determination, persistence, ingenuity, and a mind to do it exceptionally. Free market Capitalism allows a person to go from poverty to wealth in one generation, but you must do the work. No other social-economic system allows for this advancement in the human condition.
When I was a kid, I had a paper route. I delivered the Los Angeles Herald Examiner after school and the Sunday edition on the weekend. The papers were delivered in a bundle to my parent’s doorstep. I would fold each paper with a rubber band, otherwise the papers would come apart as I flung them into my customer’s yard. I had to purchase them from my boss.
I soon figured out I was in the hole before I began. I bought a handlebar delivery bag for my Schwin Sting Ray and purchased the rubber bands. I also discovered I had to go to the door of my customers to collect payment monthly. Now, it was not only money I had invested but also my time.
I thought about my expenses. The cost of rubber bands could be expensive and there was also maintenance on my bike. I learned from another paperboy that I didn’t need rubber bands. He taught me how to fold and tuck the paper in such a way that would secure it. So, when I would fling the paper into the customer’s yard it did not fall apart.
One day while collecting payment for delivery, a customer asked me if I could “porch” their paper for a quarter tip. My response was, “Heck Yes.” That solved another problem. The Sunday paper was bigger, and I could only get half of the folded papers in my bag. I would have to go home and get the other half and deliver them. That took more time. If I did not have to fold the papers, I could take them all on my bike and not have to go back home while I was out delivering. In addition, I could walk the paper onto the customers porch and charge them for this service.
I learned early on about the Trader Principle of trading value for value. As a paperboy I invested in a business, kept my costs low, and gave the customer what they wanted. I paid my employer on time for the papers they delivered and learned how to manage a paper route. Three groups of individuals benefited from this experience, the customer, my employer, and me.
This job taught me personal responsibility at an early age. It taught me the importance of delivering the paper on time. It also taught me to be creative. By learning to fold the weekly paper I eliminated the need for rubber bands, delivered the Sunday paper unfolded onto my customers’ porches, and charged for the value-added service.
The lesson here is “trust” by all parties can only be found where freedom abounds. The same holds for Capitalism, which is moral because it is congruent with human nature, allows for voluntarily serving others, and being rewarded for one’s time and work. There are no guarantees that work will give you success, yet, certainly, you will not have success without the ability to work in a system that allows you to keep the fruits of your labor.
As Thomas Jefferson said, in his first inaugural address in 1801, “a wise & frugal government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government; and this is necessary to close the circle of our felicities.”
Capitalism is the only social system congruent with man’s nature which endows him with the individual right to pursue his own life, survival, and well-being. Therefore, it is morally superior to any other alternatives such as collectivism or statism. Therefore, the only role for government is the protection of rights. When a government, special interest groups, or an individual take what is not theirs because of some need it is a violation of rights. To paraphrase Francisco d’Anconia’s idea in Ayn Rand’s opus, Atlas Shrugged, the desire for the unearned is the root of all evil. Said differently, those who seek the benefits of wealth without earning it through the productive efforts of their own work, are indeed malevolent.
https://kimmonson.com/featured_articles/capitalism-works/?vgo_ee=eOYRncGGSMKBOojxDBigrCaYVdFjvNNM2egXxQjOdsbEuHTPdLiOpw0M%3AUU45DfKtEwo4okksJH6%2BSFaEwJWBwVky
