QUORA: '[W]hy do we ignore all the examples of capitalism failing, like the major divide between the wealthy and the poor in the US?'

QUORA: People will often use Venezuela as an example of socialism not working. But why do we ignore all the examples of capitalism failing, like the major divide between the wealthy and the poor in the US?

I posted this answer:

Whatever other “examples of capitalism failing” the questioner has in mind, the “major divide between the wealthy and the poor” is not one of them.

Economic inequality is indicative of capitalism’s greatest virtue; that people are free, through work and trade, to individually prosper as far as their ability, ambition, values, goals, personal circumstances, and moral character will carry them.

Prospering through work, no matter how great or modest the level of wealth, comes not to the detriment but to the benefit of others. Prospering involves trade, and trade involves a win-win outcome—the mutually beneficial exchange of value for value. It necessarily follows that personal betterment involves the betterment of everyone one trades with. The level of a person’s earned wealth correlates to the value added to the economic lives of others. To become wealthy is to create the most value for the most people. It’s a fact—and you can see this all around you—that the primary path to wealth under capitalism is to cater to the needs and desires of “the masses.” Any attempt to equalize economic outcomes necessarily involves cutting down and destroying individuals according to their productive ability, ultimately spreading poverty, not the wealth. That’s why the first victims of socialism are the poor, and the second victims are the soon-to-be-poor middle classes—because productive achievement is progressively cut down in the name of economic equality.

It’s true that in today’s world, some people get wealthy through government favors. But that’s the result of today’s mixed economies, not capitalism, which forbids government economic favoritism. The bottom line is that socialism fails because compulsory economic equality is built into its DNA. Capitalism succeeds because economic inequality flourishes.


Related Reading:

What is Capitalism?--Lead essay of the book Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal by Ayn Rand

QUORA: 'How is becoming a billionaire even possible, chronologically?'

Becoming Steve Jobs: The Evolution of a Reckless Upstart into a Visionary Leader--Brent Schlender and Rick Tetzeli

The Capitalist Manifesto: The Historic, Economic and Philosophic Case for Laissez-Faire--Andrew Bernstein

Equal Is Unfair: America's Misguided Fight Against Income Inequality--Don Watkins and Yaron Brook

Atlas Shrugged--Ayn Rand

Economic Equality vs. Political Equality: Which is Your America?