Fraud, deception, dishonesty, etc. are some of the attributes of the human animal that we must do without. Yet, the capitalist principle of "profit maximization" actively promotes them in every aspect of our lives. The case of Tort Reform in USA is an example:
1. The Case of Tort Reform.
A common way to maximize profit is to make a product good-looking, but leave its defects hidden out of sight. The defect may be an intentional obsolescence incorporated into the product or it may be a post production realization. It may damage the consumers, and even cause deaths. Yet, instead of correcting it, the corporation tends to enter a denial state.
Almost always, the company compares the cost of correcting the defect versus the cost of its legal litigations, and takes the less costly route instead of an immediate correction.
Almost always, the injured consumer takes this opportunity to milk the company as much as it can, with the help of less-than-honorable lawyers. Then, the public distrust of the big business compels the jury to reward the consumer far beyond the damage it suffered.
As a part of public interests, the role of the government is to make sure that the businesses and the public don't screw each other. Yet, while one government agency tries to protect the consumer against the businesses, the businesses pay off the law-makers huge sums of money to write the law in such a way that it protects the businesses against the consumer.
A rational approach would be to provide the Department of Justice the right of access into the company records, and the responsibility to represent the victim(s) in the court while the victim's private lawyer safeguards the victim's interests.
The courts can impose three penalties on the deceptive business; compensatory, punitive, and criminal: to compensate the victim(s) fairly, jail the responsible corporate officers, and impose a huge punitive penalty to warn the other businesses. The private lawyer's fee would be derived from the punitive penalty. However, most of the punitive money would be paid to the government treasury.
Unfortunately, the case of tort reform is being fought by the businesses and the lawyers, each in its own interest. The politicians paid by the corporations want to make it difficult for the consumer to sue or win. The politicians paid by the lawyers want otherwise. Almost always the rational solution is off the table. Who wins depends on who buys more law makers.
2. Capitalism, communism, and an alternative.
Capitalism has created the modern industrial growth, the rich (bourgeois), and the low-income employees (the serfs).
It was the unfairness in capitalism that gave rise to the creation of communism. Yet, communism proved to be a medicine worse than the disease it aimed to remedy. Therefore, the failure of communism does not vindicate capitalism.
The prospect of profit maximization drives every CEO and most people to silence their conscience in order to succeed in business and politics. The positive aspects of capitalism is overshadowed by many negative ones. Here are a few examples:
The discovery of the faulty tires in the summer of 2000, the forced recalls in every industry, and the corporate denials are the stuff of the evening news every night. Even though for every business caught in doing wrong, many get away.
The gross disparity in incomes is a common place. The capitalist market rewards a dumb boxer or a ball player with millions of dollars annually whereas it did far less for Edison, perhaps the greatest inventor in history.
Profit justifies the making of movies loaded with crime and porn, and promoting them among children. There is a lot of profit in making plenty of guns for people to kill each other. But the lack of profit turns away the drug companies from producing "orphan drugs" to treat rare diseases.
The purpose to a commodity is to serve a public need. The capitalist prostitutes this lofty purpose for the sake of profit, and the communist abuses it for the sake of creating jobs for everyone. There are better ways to provide jobs for everyone without abusing the public need.
3. Thank the Poor for being Poor.
Capitalism promotes consumption because higher consumption brings higher profits. Likewise, democracy promote consumption because people vote for a candidate that promises more to consume.
Running as the democratic candidate for president, Gore, a self proclaimed conservationist, changed his tune, and instead of saying that we must reduce our use of energy (as in the case of SUV cars), and said we must make more energy available for the public to have fun.
Think... how much natural resources are used and how much pollution is generated in making a television, a car, or a camera, etc. We must thank the have-nots for not having what we have. Because, if they did, the earth would have become uninhabitable by now.
Not having an income is the greatest economical fear for everyone. Therefore, everyone must be guaranteed a job. Yet, this is what communism tried and faltered. It did so because it ignored the market, and provided equal pay for unequal works.
Capitalism does not guarantee a job for everyone, and forces millions to suffer poverty. It works with the market, and pays unequal pay for equal works while providing everyone with insecurity.
There is no reason to suffer the ill effects of communism and capitalism. What we have failed to experiment is to make the job market a public property so to guarantee everyone a job, and pay each according to each's productivity; thus the incentive to be productive.
Below, check the unidirectional competition (Unicomp), a just alternative to capitalism and communism.
DATED: 9 October 2000
NOTE: The article above is from "Thus Speaks Zarathustra", a 4-volume book (presently not available) by Behrooz Bassim, MD. This book is a 21st century sequel to Nietzsche's 19th century masterpiece. Other pages from it on the internet are:
Abortion
Artificial
Color & Flavor
Capitalism
Civility
Darwin
Was Right So Was LaMarck
Democracy
or Isocracy
Etymology
of sacred, etc
God,
Who?
Guns
in USA
Homosexuality
Honesty
Me
Intelligence
Monetary,
A Unique Unit, A unique
Particle
Physics, Grand Spectrum
Plight
of the Mice
Politician,
The American
Race
& Class
Sermon
Sham
Justice
Soul
Is Mind
Unidirectional
Competition
Universal
Army
Universal
Language
Zarathustra
CONTACT: bassim@usadatanet.net