In a recent interview, libertarian and newly elected Argentina President Javier Milei explained, in simple terms, why capitalism (aka free markets) grow economies, while socialism (aka social justice) destroys economies (I was unable to source the original, so I don’t know where this took place or who the interviewer is, this one was posted on 𝕏 .
Pretty simple stuff. Worth a watch (1:38 mins):
And, not only is this a really this simple concept to grasp, but it also doesn’t need to be taught, either; it’s human nature. Nobody wants to work for free. Even kids know this. An employer tells a 16 year-old at his or her first job that they’ll be working for 8 hours but only getting paid for 7 (govt theft notwithstanding), and the kid’ll likely tell them to pound sand.
But unfortunately, theft is also human nature; taking what others produce is the easy way, much easier than actually producing value oneself. And when freebies from the government become part of the deal, it’s also human nature to accept the spoils—and so the pool of producers begins to decline, while the pool of non-producers begins to grow, until a tipping point is reached where the producers can no longer support the non-producers. So the productive class begins to protest, and so the government must use force and violence to keep the workers working to support the government and their non-working supporters. After that, needless to say, things start getting really ugly.
This truth, this natural result of socialism, brings to mind the famous quote from :
“A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship.”
So when the government starts stealing more and more from the productive class—assuming they don’t revolt and end the nonsense—then, just like the kid mentioned above, they’ll either stop producing at the point of seizure, or leave altogether to find more favorable conditions elsewhere. (Or in the case of revolt, they might all be killed off or imprisoned by the government’s military and/or police forces). Then eventually, all that’s left are the non-producers/parasites, with nothing left to steal, nobody left to leech off of, and the entire economy collapses.
Milei also points out the obvious reality in order for the government to enforce equity, since everyone can’t be rich, they have no choice but to instead force everyone to be poor.
Like I said above: pretty simple stuff.
And finally, I thought I’d share a graphic I made years ago to illustrate this very point, which is now floating around all over the internet:
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