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MaternjiYaron Brook - Capitalism & Inequality
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“Inequality is a phenomenon of freedom, it is a phenomenon of capitalism, to the extent that it is based on merit, it is something that should be celebrated, not condemned.” Yaron Brook, Executive Director of the Ayn Rand Institute, gives a summary of his remarks from our 2016 National Student Symposium. He presents a moral argument for capitalism, explaining that freedom is the solution to poverty and that inequality in itself is not a problem.
Source: The Federalist Society YouTube channel.
Transcript:
At a panel on inequality and capitalism. I think what differentiates my position is I take a moral view of this issue. Fundamentally, I believe in liberty, I believe in freedom and I believe in whatever outcome freedom generates is the right outcome. There is no right level of inequality, and there is no right level of equality. I think the Left believes that equality is some kind of ideal. I take the position that the redistribution of wealth in and of itself is immoral and wrong. And actually harmful, both to the people whom the money is being taken away from, but also to the recipients of welfare. When you give people a check, who haven't earned that money, they just get a check because they are live, you are basically diminishing their incentives to work, and by diminishing their incentives to work you are diminishing their ability to have a life, to gain pride, to gain self esteem from the fact that they are taking care of themselves, of the people that they love. And in a way the welfare state institutionalizes people into poverty, instead of really helping them flourish as human beings.
And I made the point that inequality shouldn't matter. That inequality indeed doesn't matter. The gap between the rich and the poor is not the problem that we face. We might have problems with mobility among poor people, their ability to to rise up, and we might have problem of cronyism at the top, and we need to fewer those problems, but inequality in and of itself is not an issue. Indeed, inequality is a phenomenon of freedom, it is a phenomenon of capitalism, to the extent that it is based on merit, it is something that should be celebrated, not condemned.
See below for links to differing views on Capitalism and Inequality.
Links:
Full Panel: http://www.fed-soc.org/multimedia/detail/capitalism-and-inequality-event-audiovideo
Capitalists, Arise: We Need to Deal With Income Inequality http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/09/opinion/sunday/capitalists-arise-we-need-to-deal-with-income-inequality.html?_r=1
https://berniesanders.com/issues/income-and-wealth-inequality/
https://ari.aynrand.org/issues
