I left this answer:
The answer is simple: Avoid exploiting employers for a paycheck.
The great thing about living in a capitalist society—to the extend we have a capitalist society (see Crawford below)—is that you are free to choose your associations based on your own self-interest. This includes your economic associations. Since nature imposes upon man the requirement to work to survive, capitalism is good (morally and economically) because it gives you the freedom to choose the best deal for your labor among many options. If you don’t want to be “exploited”—i.e. work for someone—you can create your own job by starting your own business.
Of course, then you run into the problem of having the labor you expend in building and running your business exploited by your employees for a paycheck and your customers for a product. But at least you can then exploit them back, by expecting labor from your employees and payment from your customers!
By now the absurdity of the question is obvious. A capitalist society is by definition the opposite of exploitation; that is, it is a system of universal voluntary cooperation. Unlike socialism—the forced exploitation of all by all—capitalism is based on voluntary trade, not slave labor and profiteers on slave labor. Under capitalism, you can just say no to “exploitation”—to any trade, association, or cooperation that you deem disadvantageous or “exploitative”. Try saying no to a socialist program—say, to Social Security, in which case you’ll end up in prison; or to collectivization (government takeover) of your farm, in which case you’ll end up dead.
Capitalism won’t relieve you of the necessity to work, any more than capitalism can relieve you of the effects of gravity. The law of gravity and the law of work or die are both irrevocable laws of nature. What capitalism will give you is freedom from physical coercion from any source, and the right to keep the product of your labor. Capitalism is voluntarism. Socialism in all of its manifestations grows out of the barrel of a gun.
Related Reading:
Who are the Real Job Creators? Hint: It's Not the 99%
Atlas Shrugged—Ayn Rand
What is Capitalism?, essay and audio, from Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal—Ayn Rand
To Whom Does the American Worker Owe His Prowess?
Productivity, Not Labor unions, Created the Middle Class
The Capitalist Manifesto: The Historic, Economic and Philosophic Case for Laissez-Faire—Andrew Bernstein
What is Capitalism?, essay and audio, from Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal—Ayn Rand
To Whom Does the American Worker Owe His Prowess?
Productivity, Not Labor unions, Created the Middle Class
The Capitalist Manifesto: The Historic, Economic and Philosophic Case for Laissez-Faire—Andrew Bernstein
3 comments:
The concept of law is interesting. We refer it to natural phenomena involving cause and effect. Such phenomena are permanent, timeless and unchangeable, except for man-made cause and effect. We also refer the concept to man-made cause and effect, which, though natural, are temporal and changeable, so we declare laws about them and we can change these laws.
Since these declared laws are matters of human choice, they have a moral aspect. Those that are in line with the requirements of human life and are necessary, are moral. Moral laws formally established as the basis of government are specifically nothing but laws forbidding initiatory physical force. That's the only thing that makes them moral.
Those that are not in line with the requirements of human life are immoral and must be changed or eliminated. Immoral laws can be honest mistakes. But, today, they're usually deliberately arbitrary, because observing the requirements of human life gets in the way of nefarious motives. In this respect, they are not mistakes, but deliberate evil.
Such laws are criminal plans. When formally established by legislation, executive order or judicial decision, they are the highest order evil by the highest order criminals, a major league above any mafia. They infest, infect and displace moral law and, thus, government, with criminal plan and a criminal regime.
"But, today, they're usually deliberately arbitrary, because observing the requirements of human life gets in the way of nefarious motives. In this respect, they are not mistakes, but deliberate evil."
This is undoubtedly true. We're way beyond the point where "But they meant well" has any validity.
I'm glad somebody besides me sees it's deliberate evil. It's crime displacing law and government. What do we do about it, when, and how? I think the election of 2020, or maybe even of this November, 2018, will answer those questions.
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