Expert Market Forces

When I think about the problems facing our country and our planet today, I wonder how we are going to solve them. One thing that makes me less sure of our ability to react is the corrupting influence of capitalism on common sense.

America is in love with capitalism. You often hear people talk about letting market forces sort out how things should be. However, I believe that market forces often lead us down the wrong path. While we have never had a society controlled strictly by market forces, there is a widespread belief that we have, and many people act as if this would be the ideal situation. There have always been tariffs, taxes, incentives, shelters, and other government programs that have tainted the purity of the market, and government has often hinged on which levers to pull and which buttons to push to shape and direct markets.

There are many things that market forces cannot do. From public infrastructure like roads and bridges to public institutions like libraries, there are no market forces that drive the investment by government in making a better society. Yet it would be hard to argue that American businesses would be anywhere near as successful if it were not for the vast transportation and communications networks that have served it over time and that were often built with pubic money. Can you imagine using market forces to defend our nation? There were societies in the past that hired mercenaries whenever they were threatened, but did not keep a professional or standing army around during times of peace when they did not feel threatened. Those states are gone now, wiped out by states or empires that understand the need for armed forces funded at the expense of the central government (which in turn was supported by taxes or plunder of the states they overran).

Some things are not driven by market forces. Things like military intelligence and scientific research into subjects like climate change will never be funded by private corporations. If you argue that only the market forces are necessary to direct our efforts and drive our country into the future, my question is what happens when profits for a few conflict with the well-being of the majority or the long term survival of the planet.

In a recent Common Sense podcast by Dan Carlin, he talked about the way that we do not guarantee a degree of expertise by electing officials. Often, the people that get elected are serving market forces at the expense of the greater good of the public and without a thought towards a long term sustainable course for the country and the world.

One disturbing trend in our government is the tendency to treat corporations as if they are individuals and extend rights to them to protect them over the individual rights of private citizens. Since when does an enormous corporation need protection from individuals? The most galling of these rights is the right to spend unlimited amounts of money on politicians in the form of campaign contributions. These contributions were deemed a form of speech and the corporations were extended the right to free speech that an individual has, and voila! unlimited campaign contributions from corporations. How is this good for society? It is not. This is simply a matter of market forces, in this case the need of corporations to influence government in a way to make it easier to make profits free from interference by government. Market forces may have won this round, but surely this is not good for the direction of the country. If we are to ever get control of our elections elections again, we will have to reverse the control of elections by corporate money.

Our democracy has been co-opted by market forces.