FQ.08.05: Favorite Quote for This Week

There is no denying capitalism’s record. Market economies have succeeded over the centuries by thoroughly weeding out the inefficient and poorly equipped, and by granting rewards, to those who anticipate consumer demand and meet it with the most efficient use of labor and capital resources. Newer technologies increasingly drive this unforgiving capitalist process on a global scale. To the extent that governments "protect" portions of their populations from what they perceive as harsh competitive pressures, they achieve a lower overall material standard of living for their people.
—Alan Greenspan, The Age of Turbulence, pp. 268-9.

Comments

[Jose]

Steve,

Here's a good one -

“The burgeoisie, by the rapid improvement of all instruments of production, by the immensely facilitated means of communication, draws all nations into civilization.”

- Karl Marx

Marx certainly understood the power of capitalism, didn't he?

Have a great Super Bowl weekend. Go Giants! (I'm a sucker for the underdog ;-).

Jose

[William]

Steve,

I love that quote. And to Jose's point: Marx understood the power, and even the necessity of capitalism as a transitional structure.

He thought that we could do "better" after we had gone through
a capitalism phase.

I think his understanding of the problems of capitalism were quite on the mark, given the time when
he made those assessments.

That being said: His prescriptions for those problems, in a word, sucked.

Thomas Sowell in "Incentives and Decisions" has quite a bit of decent material in this regard.