Reiland also quotes from Ludwig van Mises's "The Anti-
Capitalist Mentality":
"Many people, and especially intellectuals, passionately
loathe capitalism. In a society based on caste and status,
the individual can ascribe adverse fate to conditions
beyond his control. In ... capitalism ... everybody's station
in life depends on his doing ... (what makes a man rich is)
not the evaluation of his contribution from any 'absolute'
principle of justice but the evaluation on the part of his
fellow men who exclusively apply the yardstick of their
personal wants, desires and ends ... Everybody knows
very well that there are people like himself who succeeded
where he himself failed. Everybody knows that many of
those he envies are self-made men who started from the
same point from which he himself started. Everybody is
aware of his own defeat. In order to console himself and
to restore his self- assertion, such a man is in search of a
scapegoat. He tries to persuade himself that he failed
through no fault of his own. He was too decent to resort to
the base tricks to which his successful rivals owe their
ascendancy. The nefarious social order does not accord
the prizes to the most meritorious men; it crowns the
dishonest, unscrupulous scoundrel, the swindler, the
exploiter, the 'rugged individualist'".
In "The Virtue of Prosperity", Dinesh D'Souza accuses
prosperity and capitalism of inspiring vice and temptation.
Inevitably, it provokes envy in the poor and depravity in
the rich.
With only a modicum of overstatement, capitalism can be
depicted as the sublimation of jealousy. As opposed to
destructive envy - jealousy induces emulation. Consumers
- responsible for two thirds of America's GDP - ape role
models and vie with neighbors, colleagues, and family
members for possessions and the social status they endow.
Productive and constructive competition - among
scientists, innovators, managers, actors, lawyers,
politicians, and the members of just about every other
profession - is driven by jealousy.
The eminent Nobel prize winning British economist and
philosopher of Austrian descent, Friedrich Hayek,
suggested in "The Constitution of Liberty" that innovation
and progress in living standards are the outcomes of class
envy. The wealthy are early adopters of expensive and
unproven technologies. The rich finance with their
conspicuous consumption the research and development
phase of new products. The poor, driven by jealousy,
imitate them and thus create a mass market which allows
manufacturers to lower prices.
But jealousy is premised on the twin beliefs of equality
and a level playing field. "I am as good, as skilled, and as
talented as the object of my jealousy." - goes the subtext -
"Given equal opportunities, equitable treatment, and a bit
of luck, I can accomplish the same or more".
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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