One of the things that I find so fascinating about the TV show Downton Abbey is the look at the historical context that would ultimately be the beginning of the end of the British aristocracy in the early part of the 20th century. The characters themselves mostly embrace the change, or are at least aware that it's happening. While a work of fiction, it's interesting to see the way people, "upstairs" and "downstairs," see their place in society.
Growing up as an American, I'm no stranger to capitalism and a free market, though our current state is... weird. The concentration of wealth bothers a lot of people, and over longer periods of time, history has shown that concentration isn't sustainable and leads to a destabilization of a society. That has nothing to do with whether or not I think it's right; history is what it is. I've seen it argued that we have a new, developing aristocracy. I'm not sure I entirely buy that. What's interesting about free market capitalism is the way it succeeds and fails.
In the failure category, we need only look a few years back to the "great recession" (apparently some call it this now). The free market was responsible for that mess, with plenty of blame to go around. The banks took on stupid risks, consumers took those stupid risks, and the government let it all happen after a decade or two of deregulation. The crazy consumption economy got out of whack, specifically around buying houses. That leads to a strange moral question: Can the market be "trusted" to do the right thing without oversight? I think the answer is, "Of course not," but like everything in life there's a continuum of options and it isn't clear what the "right" amount of regulation is.
On the other hand, you can see where the market does figure things out. Maybe these are just anecdotes, but as we've shifted so heavily toward a service economy, I find it interesting when a company like Costco starts paying their people more, independent of any government say-so, and reports that it has made them wildly successful in terms of retention and satisfied customers (presumably because of the satisfied employees), which positively affect the bottom line. One could argue that warehouse retail is not a high skill job area, but yet we have an example of spending more to attract and retain the right people. That's the market figuring it out, without intervention.
These issues do create a class system, even if it's not to the extreme of an aristocratic society. What I find completely messed up is how this plays into politics. Let's be clear, both sides operate on fear principles to get you on board. The right wants you to believe that the government wants all your money and people are trying to kill you. The left wants you to believe that more social programs, including more education, will save you from being poor. I can't explain it, but the folks so keen on the right seem overwhelmingly to be people who would benefit from a little socialism and don't make enough to be heavily taxed, while the left leaning people need the money and less taxes. The influence of money on politics sucks, because at the end of the day, both sides can essentially be bought and sold by corporations and the wealthy.
Capitalism and macroeconomics are complicated, and I wish I would have studied them more in college. As much as I believe that capitalism is the right thing, I don't believe it can go completely unregulated. Despite my lack of strong faith, I also find the focus on consumption as the ultimate measure of our national success to be somewhat alarming (especially coming from the flag-waving, self-described Christians, who of all people should understand the value of charity and compassion).
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