Not Your Father?s Economic Theory

My friend Austin Russell wrote the below piece and, not having a blog to write on, asked me to put it up for him:

Yesterday morning, The Wall Street Journal published a recent interview with Raghuram Rajan, former Chief Economist of The International Monetary Fund. Rajan, like so many of his contemporaries, asserts what has become the most prominent of modern economic truisms: ?Some people” says Mr. Rajan, “are concluding that Capitalism doesn?t work.” Rajan’s words could be permanently included as a sub-title to the bible of modern economic theory.

Rejoicing in victory, advocates of a socialized economy continue to parade the collapse and subsequent recession of 2008 and 2009 as undeniable proof that Capitalism has failed its human masters and must now be replaced by regulation under the firm but benevolent rule of modern philosopher kings. Private individuals and corporations have demonstrated their incompetence and inability to manage their own affairs and must now bow to the rule of the better educated aristocracy. Apparently, “Yes We Can” applies only to the publicly anointed, whom, after ascending political office, must turn to their constituents, and continue “But you my friends, cannot.”

Capitalism is nothing more than a name for the political philosophy expressed in our very own Declaration of Independence. The truths that we hold self-evident, “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness,” are the very foundation of Capitalism which allows individuals to dictate their own destiny without the intervention and regulation of a monarch or aristocracy. To reject Capitalism is to reject freedom-the freedom to succeed and the freedom to fail. While it is true that individuals will make mistakes, the alternative–stiff government regulation and control–only frustrates and discourages innovation in the name of protecting individuals from themselves. And so, just as the loving and protective parent must eventually learn to let her child grow into adulthood and independence, so too, governments must allow citizens to make their own decisions, to govern their own lives, and define their own destinies.