- "I don't know, man, this article about the benefits of having emergency supplies makes some good points, but at the bottom of the article there are a bunch of links to companies selling emergency gear. The web site is just trying to scare people into buying the stuff so it can make a few bucks."
- "Yeah, she seems to give some good advice about the need to buy some gold and silver coins to hedge against inflation, but at the end of her newsletter she gives information on how you can buy them through her coin company. She's just hawking her merchandise."
- "Collection plates in church? Telethons for Jesus? What a scam. How distasteful to mix money with matters of the spirit."
Think about it for a moment. In America, aren't we all trying to make a buck? Don't we all need to make a buck? Don't we live in a market economy, where aside from ascetic monks who beg for food on the outskirts of town, each and every one of us has some service to sell or some merchandise to hawk? If so, why do anti-establishment information sources and their self-advertising get such a disproportionate amount of flak simply for selling stuff, while Obama's latest speech to the nation is supposedly far more virtuous than the mere peddling of wares? At least when someone is trying to sell something, they're usually up front about it. You either buy it or you don't -- end of story. It's the people who are giving away something for "free" -- the people who claim to be above the base, selfish act of economic trade -- who make me wonder what their deal really is. As Henry David Thoreau wrote in Walden,
There is no odor so bad as that which arises from goodness tainted. It is human, it is divine, carrion. If I knew for a certainty that a man was coming to my house with the conscious design of doing me good, I should run for my life, as from that dry and parching wind of the African deserts called the simoom, which fills the mouth and nose and ears and eyes with dust till you are suffocated, for fear that I should get some of his good done to me -- some of its virus mingled with my blood.
Perhaps people who have 9-to-5 jobs in Cubicle Land and despise them (which is a heck of a lot of people) are so cynical that they think (a) making money and (b) making a positive difference in the world must always be mutually exclusive activities. What a sad, jaded attitude to take regarding human action. Yes, some people spend most of their time making money. Yes, other people spend most of their time trying to make a positive difference in the world. And yes, still others actually manage to do... both.
Are you still with me? Or did I just blow your mind?
Believe it or not, doing good in this world is not always a losing proposition. It can often be profitable -- sometimes very profitable. Some people have actually figured out how to combine a moral spirit with an entrepreneurial aptitude (either by cultivating both within themselves, or by teaming up with others), and they have made a very comfortable living engaging in voluntary trades with people who believed -- and still believe -- that their lives have been improved because of these trades. The success of these "moral entrepreneurs" sets an example worthy of praise by those who see value in human action inspired by human spirit.
Let the anti-establishment "gold bugs" make a living by selling us gold coins that we want to buy. Let the prophets of the dangers of centralized government feed their families by selling us emergency supplies that we wish to purchase. Let the preacher live in a house instead of a cardboard box by providing spiritual services that his congregation is willing to pay for. Let's not automatically criticize people who successfully combine morality with good business sense, as if the mere combination of the two is an inherent violation of reason and humanity.
Despite its ostensibly altruistic motives, Big Government is selling something: you -- down the river, that is. In the name of liberty, I advise you not to buy.
As the Mises folks would put it, the practice of making money via capitalism is a positive difference in your community, in and of itself. The only thing President Obama could "sell" to me that I would be interested in buying is less government, but that's not what he's selling.
ReplyDeleteI presume the second quote at the top of your post came from the discussion we had the other day. In that case, I remarked that the newsletter came across as hypocritical; at least one author was talking about how the dollar is likely to hyperinflate until it's worthless, but later in the same newsletter there's a mention of gold and silver coins — which of course they will sell you for those soon-to-be-hyperinflated dollars. All I was saying was that those particular authors had the wrong approach. More convincing would have been something like, "Because of all the upcoming inflation, it's a good idea to keep about 10% of your portfolio in hard metal, such as gold and silver coins. We sell them; here's the number." To be fair, some of the authors in the newsletter took that approach, but others did not.
I would never want to see anyone's right to sell legitimate products and services taken away; that's the antithesis of freedom. As you said, let them sell us products and services we're willing to buy. But let's also not forget that there are scammers out there; there is nothing wrong with a little caution and skepticism on the part of the consumer. Just as a business has the goal of making a reasonable profit on the goods and/or services it sells, consumers have the goal of getting the best product at the best price without getting ripped off or scammed. The reputation and credibility of a business matters greatly, especially in the presence of competitors. Consumers are very wary of that, and they should be.
Yes indeed, our discussion the other day was the inspiration for the second quote (and one of the inspirations for the overall post topic) :)
ReplyDeleteGood point regarding the need for consumers to be wary of scammers. I guess the reason I didn't mention "little" scammers like certain televangelists, coin dealiers, survivalists, etc., is because I wanted to focus on the biggest scammer of all: government. The scams that Bush and Obama have pulled on the American people -- whose cost is in the trillions of dollars -- makes all the other "little" scammers combined look like a drop in the bucket.
The current national debt in the U.S. is almost $11 trillion dollars. That represents an average of over $35,000 per U.S. citizen. When's the last time a shady televangelist or infomercial host scammed you out of $35,000? And the best part is that you and I didn't even do anything to get slammed with that $10 trillion national debt. At least when you get scammed by a "little" guy, it's generally your own fault for forking over your hard-earned money. With the government, they make you fork it over.
Anyone who invested with a scammer (or is that alleged scammer?) by the name of Madoff lost far more than $35,000. So much for government regulation saving consumers from financial ruin...
ReplyDeleteYou raise a valid point — anything that goes against the free market, our government does best. Wasteful spending, pollution, regulation, nationalization, theft, coercion... the list goes on. And of course, it's all in our best interest, and you're unpatriotic if you even think about protesting or resisting. If it takes away freedom and cripples the free market, our government is numero uno.