"Good Capitalism, Bad Capitalism"

The Wall Street Journal's David Wessel looks at different forms of capitalism:

Capitalism's Vigor May Hinge On Confronting Its Risks, by David Wessel, WSJ: ...[C]apitalism as practiced in the U.S. is different from the capitalism practiced in, say, Singapore or Saudi Arabia. "Capitalism...takes many forms, which differ substantially...in their implications for economic growth and elimination of poverty," three economists write in "Good Capitalism, Bad Capitalism." The book identifies four strains of modern capitalism and argues the U.S. version is particularly well-suited to creating and exploiting innovations that boost living standards. ...

The book was written by William Baumol, an eclectic New York University economist ...; Carl Schramm .. of the Kauffman Foundation and a recovering health economist and insurance executive; and Robert Litan, an economist-lawyer who was a budget and antitrust official in the Clinton administration. ...

Their taxonomy goes like this: In state-guided capitalism, the government decides which industries get investment, and it often controls the banks and usually emphasizes exports. No country falls exclusively in any one camp, but think of China, much of Southeast Asia and India and, to a degree, Japan. This approach has helped economies propel themselves from also-rans to the first tier. Problems emerge ... when these economies catch up and no longer have a clear path ahead. They tend to invest too much in the wrong places, stick too long with yesterday's winners...

In oligarchic capitalism, prevalent in parts of Latin America and the Arab Middle East, power and wealth are held by a few, and economies are organized to make them, not the general populace, richer. This approach has little to recommend it.

Then there's big-firm capitalism, in which big private enterprises dominate. Think much of Western Europe, South Korea, with its chaebols (conglomerates), Japan, to a degree, and the U.S. in the era of John Kenneth Galbraith's 1967 "New Industrial State."

"At its best, [it] generates sufficiently large cash flows to finance...continuing, incremental improvements in products and services," the authors write. "At its worst, big-firm capitalism can be sclerotic, reluctant to innovate, and resistant to change."

Finally, there is entrepreneurial capitalism, in which small and innovative firms are significant. Think the U.S., Ireland, Israel, Taiwan and, increasingly, the United Kingdom. Forming a company is easy, socially useful entrepreneurship is rewarded, institutions provide incentives for innovation and growth -- a catch-all that encompasses everything from openness to trade to sound bankruptcy laws to effective antitrust regulation.

Given the Kauffman Foundation's mission to promote entrepreneurship, it's no surprise Messrs. Baumol, Litan and Schramm conclude the "best form of capitalism" blends elements of the entrepreneurial and big-firm strains. The former provides the oomph to imagine and invent technologies that propels economies; the latter provides the money and organization to refine and mass-produce them. The secret to prosperity, then, is for other economies to find their own ways to be more like the U.S. ...

In their book, ... the three touch too lightly on an issue about which Mr. Litan has written previously. As he puts it in an interview: "An entrepreneurial society is going to be more of a high-risk society."

The strengths of U.S.-style capitalism are apparent. ... But the risks are apparent, too: workers who lose jobs and find new ones that pay far less and lack health insurance, widening disparities between economic winners and losers, challenges posed by stiffening competition from low-wage, increasingly skilled workers abroad, and schools that aren't improving as fast as the economy is changing.

Preserving the strengths of American capitalism requires finding a way to reduce the anxiety and harm posed by such risks without losing the entrepreneurial vigor. That's the hard part.

Sounds like some "insurance capitalism" is needed in the mix of entrepreneurial and big-firm capitalism to make the blend more palatable.

Comments

[reason]

I'm wondering if they have any evidence for their categorisation. Why for instance isn't the US seen as heading in the direction of oligarchic capitalism? Why hasn't he considered the "curse of oil" problem (i.e. narrowly controlled resource rentals pushing up the exchange rate to expense of development). Where do the Scandinavian countries fit into this schema? It seems like of of hand waving to me.

[evagrius]

It's the Myers-Briggs inventory of capitalist personality!

[Scott Ferguson]

evagrius says...

"It's the Myers-Briggs inventory of capitalist personality!"

Except the MBTI has some actual research behind it...

[kharris]

"...and economies are organized to make them, not the general populace, richer."

One value of this effort is the recognition that, even within the realm of capitalism, "economies are organized." There is no "natural state" of economic activity, no "free market" and no "free trade." Some groups are advantaged, some disadvantages by the way that "economies are organized." In debates about regulation, taxation, transfer of wealth and the like, it is disingenuous to pretend otherwise. It is disingenuous to meet efforts to rejigger the way the economy is organized with accusations of class warfare, unless one is willing to admit that warfare is always underway, and that the howling is coming from the winners under today's rules for organizing the economy.

[ilsm]

Organization, in terms of economy, is a code word.

It allows the one man to hoard while another man starves.

The pursuit of happiness at the expense of others.

[Miguel]

"Finally, there is entrepreneurial capitalism, in which small and innovative firms are significant. Think the U.S., Ireland, Israel, Taiwan and, increasingly, the United Kingdom."

Proportion of active population self-employed

http://www.oecdobserver.org/news/fullstory.php/aid/1988/OECD_in_Figures_2006-2007.html

Contry self-employement
Greece 30,1
Turkey 29,1
Mexico 28,5
Korea 27
Italy 24,9
Portugal 23,5
Poland 20,4
New Zealand 17,8
Ireland 16,6
Spain 16,5
Czech Republic 15,3
Iceland 14,1
Belgium 13,6
Hungary 13,3
United Kingdom 12,7
Slovak Republic 12,6
Australia 12,6
Finland 12
Austria 11,8
Germany 11,2
Netherlands 11,1
Japan 10,2
Sweden 9,6
Switzerland 9,3
Canada 9,2
France 8,9
Denmark 7,8
United States 7,3
Norway 7,1
Luxembourg 6,5

US is one of OECD countries with less self-employment. These seems to indicate that the big-firm is, probably, also very (if even more) powerful in US.

[dissent]

The very same folks who argue that the US is entrepreneurial I would bet have supported the current climate of lax anti-trust and merger enforcement. The last 24 years of such have resulted in a high degree of monopsony and oligopsony, markets with one or few buyers. The Atlantic had an article on WalMart in the last couple of years which revealed that an extraordinary per cent of WalMarts major suppliers had gone bankrupt. I think at least 75%. (It's behind the wall.) You get the point.

The lack of class mobility, industry consolidation, these are not only related to increasing inequality, they are harmful to entrepreneurial business.

[calmo]

Well, how organized are you?
kharris says...[that someone else once said]

"...and economies are organized to make them, not the general populace, richer." This organized?
How about as organized as Wessel who thinks we should be at least as tidy as this:Given the Kauffman Foundation's mission to promote entrepreneurship, it's no surprise Messrs. Baumol, Litan and Schramm conclude the "best form of capitalism" blends elements of the entrepreneurial and big-firm strains. But is he worried about the general darkening prospects of capitalism (I don't see any Marxist scholars is in this group rattlin on about it, you?) with this overview:The strengths of U.S.-style capitalism are apparent [esp for WSJ readers]. ... But the risks are apparent, too: workers who lose jobs and find new ones that pay far less and lack health insurance, widening disparities between economic winners and losers, challenges posed by stiffening competition from low-wage, increasingly skilled workers abroad, and schools that aren't improving as fast as the economy is changing. Or is he organized enough to recognize that there could be hordes of better writers reviewing books and commenting on economic matters that would gladly work at a fraction of the cost...esp if WSJ changes hands.

[Jim Harrison]

Which political economy is most viable will depend on when (or whether) the era of general growth comes to an end and issues of allocation become more salient than issues of production. Since it looks like the human population will probably crash over the next century, I'm guessing that the most relevant model for economics will be musical chairs.

[aging boomer]

Excessive capitalism can be just as distructive as excessive communisim. I mean liquidity..Should we be nervous?

[Tom Geraghty]

More numbers?

Revenues per firm, US

1967 - $765,167
1997 - $804,370

Employees per firm, US

1967 - 9.5
1992 - 18.8

Type of Enterprise

Percent of Total
1967 1997
Proprietorships 71.4% 72.6%
Partnerships 10.6% 7.4%
S-Corporations 2.4% 10.4%
Corporations 15.6% 9.5%

I dunno, looks like (numerically anyway) small firms were at least as important in 1967 as they were in the 1990s. Firm scale doesn't seem to have changed all that much (at least on average).

[ilsm]

TB,

So sure of yourself!

"the size of the pie is growing."

So is the size of the slice for your poor person growing at all, or nearly as much as your beneficient wealthy person's slice?

"We have fewer poor directly BECAUSE we have wealthy."

The wealthy are so generous, far too kind.

No, we have better off poor, we have higher concentrations of hoarded resources in the top .1%.

[cm]

dissent: "The very same folks who argue that the US is entrepreneurial I would bet have supported the current climate of lax anti-trust and merger enforcement."

Of course, "entrepreneurship" being one of the preferred euphemism for gutting business regulations, as much as "ownership society" is in the social domain.

[cm]

But then those are not really different domains. It's all "The Economy".

[calmo]

Actually Wessel reviews a book rather than as Mark puts it:David Wessel looks at different forms of capitalism: and believes it is some sort of practice with nationalistic flavors, no?][C]apitalism as practiced in the U.S. ... Where are the Marxist scholars out there who can set this man straight?
[Ok, alienated from this discussion.]
Some worshiped old Greek philosopher opined that it is the mark of an educated person to draw appropriate distinctions. So here we have it: US capitalism, China Capitalism, Mexico....constituting a self refutation for this Wessel reviewed trio.
Where is the talk about the transnationals, the co-venturing, the trade agreements, the role of fx? the military?
I don't think the hard part is here:Preserving the strengths of American capitalism requires finding a way to reduce the anxiety and harm posed by such risks without losing the entrepreneurial vigor. That's the hard part. I think that "vigor" is entirely absent in this painful review of an even worse glimpse at capitalism. He must have got a free round from the authors...who need all the help they can get...and that is the hard part: no free round for me.

[Lafayette]

dw: The book identifies four strains of modern capitalism and argues the U.S. version is particularly well-suited to creating and exploiting innovations that boost living standards ...

And, hmmmn, how would the WSJ define “boosted living standards”. More millionaires per square inch? P/E ratios above 100?

I suspect the criteria would be highly financial in nature, whatever they were. After all the GDP per person is higher in Singapore than the US, but the former is not listed amongst their “entrepreneurial class” of countries.

If I’ve chosen Singapore as an example, it is because there is a singular difference between the US and that country. The size of internal markets is quite different. Internal markets which springboard products to global class revenues are more likely to occur in the US than Singapore.

The workforce in hi-tech industries as a percentage of the total is anywhere from 1% in Iowa to 8% in California. Right in the middle of the dot.com boom, in 1997, as a percentage of GDP, the US was estimated at a bit more than 6% of GDP-related hi-tech component.

Wow, they wrote a book about how hi-tech was at the source of "boosted living standards" in the US?

Certainly a "must read" book if there ever was one ...

[Dunk]

-- Think Beyond :)

INTRODUCTION – Your Dreams Fulfilled

The following ideas and concepts have the potential to radically change your world for the better. Every aspect of your life could be enhanced and every dream you have could become a reality.

Every hope you’ve ever conceived,
Every need you’ve ever known,
Can easily be achieved

Welcome to the growing group of people on this planet who want more from life…
STAGE 1 – Understanding the physical world

The world exists outside of our heads. It’s there to be analysed and understood. It’s not a hard task. The organic material between your ears, your brain, is more than capable of understanding the current world situation.

You are connected.
You are not alone.
You are part of this world.
You have the solution within you.
The world needs you to do your part.
You need you to do your part.

You are connected to every one else on this planet. You may not feel it, but it’s a fact. A fact that can not be refuted, proved wrong, or even sensibly denied. Anyone that does deny it can be ridiculed, and you’ll see why…

Did you have a cup of tea this morning? Have you ever had a cup of tea? Do you drink coffee? If you’ve had any of these experiences, or you’re familiar with the concepts then the ideas below are going to make so much sense to you, and have such an impact on you and your life, that you’ll be asking why you’d never thought of it sooner and then you’ll be demanding that everyone begins to think it too.

Imagine the cup of tea that you had this morning and the process of creating that cup of tea. You took a cup, you boiled some water and you took a tea bag and placed it in that cup or in a tea pot. Now, stop for a second to imagine what that tea bag is, what it means and what it represents.

For that tea bag to exist at all, humans, no matter how far away or close to you, need to that have ploughed a field, planted tea bushes, tended tea bushes, nurtured them through their growth cycle, harvested the leaves, dried the leaves, packaged the leaves, transported the leaves and finally stacked the leaves in a shop where you could purchase them. You know all of these things to be solid, undeniable and verifiable facts.

You are connected to all of those humans in that chain of production as without them, you could have no tea bag. For you to have something as simple as a tea bag to put in a cup, to begin to make tea, there may have been thousands of humans involved. That Tea Bag is a result of their labours and their endeavours, no matter how unseen by you. The Tea Bag should have HumanityTM embossed on it. Those humans have lives, they exist. They have had a direct impact on your life as you are able to enjoy a cup of tea. You are connected to them. They are connected to you.

For, if it was not for you, using their tea bag, the fruits of their labours, their lives would be dramatically different.

And remember, that’s just the tea bag. Think about the kettle that you boiled the water in. Where did the water come from? And did you use gas or electricity to heat the water? Where did that energy supply come from? How many miles of pipes and pumps and wires had to be used? How many connected humans were involved?

And this is all so that you can have a cup of tea! You can now see that you are part of the collective of humanity on this planet, you are not alone; welcome to the realisation.

STAGE 2 – How we currently operate

The collection of humanity on this planet, though highly efficient at getting you the basics like tea and coffee, is currently organised in a very self defeating way.

You and I work for different companies. The companies that we work for may very well be in competition. Companies are only there to make a profit for the company. That is their role. That is their reason for existing. Someone had an idea to make money, and they started a business. All very well as far as it goes. However, now, at this period in our history, the idea of individual companies, working alone to produce the “next big thing”, is something that is holding you and I back from realising our full potential. That is, full potential of the productive capabilities of humans, of humanity, on this planet are being squandered by competition and the profit motive.

Again, this is very easy to demonstrate and again, it’s undeniable.

For example, take two competing drugs companies; you work for one and I work for the other one. Both companies are in business to make a profit and as such they are pouring millions of dollars into research and development to find the next big cure for blindness, diabetes, cancer, heart disease, paralysis, HIV, or pick an ailment or condition that’s close to your heart.

We know that the humans that make up the work force of these companies are members of the collective of humanity that brought us the humble tea bag. So we know that each member of that collective would benefit from a break through in any new treatment; you and I included. ¬¬

So let us assume that the solution that both of these companies are working on will take 10 years to develop. Now what if, after 5 years, the company that you’re working for has half of the solution and the company that I’m working for has the other half of the solution? As a collective, as humanity, we have the whole solution. You know half of it, and I know half of it. So, in theory, we could actually bring it to the other members of the human collective directly. That is after 5 years, not 10. We could half the time that it currently takes to share the break through, as we have all the pieces.

That is, we, as a collection, have done all the work we need to do as both halves of the solution are now known. However, given the fact that we are working for companies that are in competition, for greater and greater profits, the solution will not flow to the members of the global society as no one company owns the whole solution. In theory it will take each company another 5 years to fully understand the solution thus any benefits for humanity are delayed by that time. Even then the companies will only release a product if they can realise a profit from it.

We have just worked out how, with this one example, capitalism is not best suited to the needs of you and I and humanity. In case you think this is just a one off, let us examine the case of mobile phones and competition within that sector..

Mobile phones, at least in the UK, are used for 3 main tasks; sending text messages, making phone calls and sending multi media messages such as pictures and sound files.

You are more than aware of these functions and I dare say you’ve used at least one of them and if not, you know people that have. Now, in the UK there is competition, again, from Orange, O2, T-Mobile, Vodafone etc, etc. Each of these providers may erect separate radio masts to build their coverage foot print. So potentially we could have 4 or more different masts covering the same geographical area because each of the operators wants coverage in that particular area, of course. That’s competition.

No matter which provider you choose to be your mobile phone carrier the service you get at the end will be very much the same from one to the other. You’ll be able to make and receive phone calls and send and receive text messages etc. The major criteria that you’ll have used in your decision will be how many minutes and text messages you get for your monthly outlay.

So instead of distributing mobile phone capabilities to each geographical area once, we, as an unconscious act of the collective and as a direct result of competition and the profit motive of Orange, O2, T-Mobile etc, have actually rolled out enough radio masts, computers, switches and cables to cover each geographical area 4 or more times. However, if we had, as a collective, been working towards providing for the collective, instead of working within competing companies, we could have covered the UK 4 times over in the time that it took us to do it once. We all could have had the benefits of mobile communications sooner than we actually did.

At this stage in our human development we are holding back the potential of humanity on this planet by organising in competing companies. We are holding ourselves back from achieving. We are wasting time. We are squandering our resources. We are distracting ourselves from our full potential.

The current system discards and overlooks a huge number of humans on this planet as they have no practical benefit to the current system; capitalism.

If you condone the current organisational method, in light of this logical evidence, then you are part of the problem. The world needs you to rethink, and understand that a shift in emphasis from working for competing companies and their profit motive to actually working for humanity would bring untold freedoms and benefits to you, your family, your friends, your loved ones, your neighbours.

You are part of the solution if you take these concepts forward. Tell more people about them. Spread them around. Your future depends on it.

STAGE 3 – Imagine The Future

So now we’ve discussed the idea of the collective and of humanity wasting time it’s time to consider what it could mean for us to organise ourselves differently.

Imagine a place and time when all of our endeavours as humans are used for our benefit. No more working for some company’s profit. No more distractions from the needs of humans. No more impediments to you getting exactly what you want from this life. No more antagonism amongst humans. An understanding that each human, if they play their part in the collective, can reap any and all of the rewards of that collective.

Imagine the number of people we can also bring into the system to work towards the goals of the collective. All those people that are currently disregarded by the system; the countless millions in “under-developed” [have you ever asked yourself why?] countries.

With all of these extra resources, we can half the working week or even make it two days long or so. Who knows how we will decide to organise the massive resource on this planet that is the collective community of humanity.

And no enlightened community of humanity would ever decide to make any decision that did not best fit the needs of the community as that would be akin to suicide. Only the best decisions for the collective would be made. Think what that would mean for governmental organisations? Would we require them? Maybe we’d need some form of “commodity request list” or “goals list” that we could all view and prioritise, with the most obviously important goals being raised to the top of the list with ease. How about eradicating famine, poverty, diseases, war, global pollution etc? What about planting trees to form lungs for the planet? What about designing technology that can clean the atmosphere?

If we organise ourselves with us as the priority then all the material items that we struggle to collect just now such as houses, cars, gadgets, and even just the basics of food and water will flow to us as a logical consequence. Far from compromising or goals and our desires, by organising for humans, we can achieve them all! And more importantly we can bring the endeavours of every human on the plant to bear for our well being. Each human who is cast aside by the current system of capitalist production and its insatiable drive for greater and greater profits will be brought into the global collection of working productive humanity and they will be able to influence and bolster that global community. Hence, all of our lives become infinitely better and immeasurably easier.

The solution needs you. It needs everyone you know. So how big is this task? Can we do it? Well, the maths says we can.

The population of this earth is somewhere in the region of 6,000,000,000 (6 Billion or 6 Thousand million). So that makes any effort you make alone, as an “individual”, equivalent to 1/6 Billionth of the effort needed to realise all of your hopes and dreams.

However, if in the first instance, you can tell just 10 people, of this way of thinking, and they feel as passionately as you do about it, and they set themselves the same goal of just telling 10 people, then the numbers soon become very large indeed;

You – 10 – 100 – 1,000 – 10,000 – 100,000 – 1,000,000 – 10,000,000 – 100,000,000, 1,000,000,000, The World!

Just 10 iterations! That is, just 10 times the process of telling 10 folk and the whole world would know! So the chain that you start, by telling 10 folk about these ideas and about your passion for them, will only have to be repeated 10 times and we can all share in the understandings!

You have the solution within you. The world needs you to do your part.
You need you to do your part.

When you know how it works; it’s easy to change the world!

[whatever..]

There is no perfect system, Capitalism is the default from which all the systems emerge. No civilized society ever aspires to remain in this default state. Imagine doing away with all the regulations... you'd have 10 year old kids working in factories instead of studying in school.

[Sanket]

I conducted an analysis of the revenue growth rates of Fortune top 20 for the years 1967-2007 and there average growth rate was around 8%, higher than the growth rate of US economy in nominal terms. So, if USA was a big-firm led capitalist state in 1967, it is one now.

[jenna kelvin]

Yes! We can all raise ourselves by our bootstraps! All we need do is ascend to the top of billion-dollar foundations while never criticizing the Federal Reserve which transfers trillions and physical property via inflating and deflating bubbles.

http://austrianeconomicsentrepreneurship.wordpress.com/2009/05/31/the-epic-failure-of-the-kauffman-foundation-under-carl-schramms-anti-austrian-fiat-leadership/

Austrian Economics & Entrepreneurship
Leading the Entrepreneurial Renaissance« Welcome to Austrian Economics & EntrepreneurshipThe Epic Failure of the Kauffman Foundation and Entrepreneurial Capitalism under Carl Schramm’s Anti-Austrian, Anti-Entrepreneurial, Anti-Founding Fathers Fiat Leadership
“If ye love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquility of servitude greater than the animating contest for freedom, go home from us in peace. We seek not your counsel, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you; and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen.” –Samuel Adams to Carl Schramm the Statist who Exalts Capitalism and Wealth over Liberty, Jefferson, Hayek, Mises, and the Constitution

While Carl Schramm tries to tell us that our freedom comes from postmodern Capitalism and thus the Federal Reserve, Thomas Jefferson, like the Austrians, tells us the Truth, “The God who gave us life gave us liberty at the same time; the hand of force may destroy, but cannot disjoin them.” –Thomas Jefferson

Judging by the title of a recent Wall Street Journal piece which mocks the great Schumpeter while misappropriating his name, “Schumpeter’s Moment
Capitalism remains the foundation for economic growth and freedom,” it appears that Carl Schramm would like to rewrite Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence as follows: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by Capitalism and the Federal Reserve with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.”

Carl Schramm, in all his well-funded fiat arrogance, dismisses the supreme wisdom of America’s original entrepreneur–Benjamin Franklin:

Freedom is not a gift bestowed upon us by other men, but a right that belongs to us by the laws of God and nature. –Benjamin Franklin

This will be the best security for maintaining our liberties. A nation of well-informed men who have been taught to know and prize the rights which God has given them cannot be enslaved. It is in the religion of ignorance that tyranny begins. –Benjamin Franklin

Men will ultimately be governed by God or by tyrants (Schramm and his Harvard MBAs/legal team). –Benjamin Franklin

Rebellion to tyrants is obedience to God. –Benjamin Franklin

Whoever would overthrow the liberty of a nation must begin by subduing the freeness of speech. –Benjamin Franklin

Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become more corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters. –Benjaimn Franklin

Interestingly enough, the above quotes come from a story at the Mises Institute: http://mises.org/story/1144

I have looked through all the centrally-controlled Kauffman blogs (growthology/entrepreneurship.org), and it seems none of them link to the Mises institute, for some odd reason. Mises and Hayek warned us about this subversion of truth that would arise from time to time as those with ambitions overshadowing their talents seized control of $2.5-billion-dollar foundations. It is truly dangerous to have a Statist redefine entrepreneurship in the image of the Federal Reserve’s monetary policy, as counterfeiting moeny and creating wealth are opposing endeavors.

If we are to save entrepreneurship, we must oppose Schramm’s billion-dollar-funded statist views, which buy him first-class tickets, honorary degrees and awards (from institutions including UI and Rochester). We must oppose Schramm’s armies of sycophantic Harvard MBA Buzzword bloggers with the more exalted, natural views of Hayek, Mises, and the Founding Fathers who exalt God over Schramm’s Mammon/Capitalism as to worship Capitalism is to worship Mammon and thus the Federal Reserve which creates Mammon from thin air and thus orchestrates the Congressional bailouts for the rich:

“God grant that not only the love of liberty but a thorough knowledge of the rights of man may pervade all the nations of the earth, so that a philosopher may set his foot anywhere on its surface and say: This is my country.” –Benjamin Franklin

First, the population was dumbed down through a politicized and substandard education system based on pop culture, rather then the classics. Americans know more about their favorite TV dramas then the drama in DC that directly affects their lives. They care more for their “right” to choke down a McDonalds burger or a BurgerKing burger than for their constitutional rights. Then they turn around and lecture us about our rights and about our “democracy”. Pride blind the foolish.

These past two weeks have been the most breath taking of all. First came the announcement of a planned redesign of the American Byzantine tax system, by the very thieves who used it to bankroll their thefts, loses and swindles of hundreds of billions of dollars. These make our Russian oligarchs look little more then ordinary street thugs, in comparison. Yes, the Americans have beat our own thieves in the shear volumes. Should we congratulate them?

–http://english.pravda.ru/opinion/columnists/107459-0/

Recently I dipped into the writings of Carl Schramm–a supposed cheerleader of entrepreneurship who seems to have wired hundreds of millions to our bloated, failing, student-debt-exalting universties and their BMW-driving administrators (central planners), instead of funding entrepreneurs and innovation (is it any wonder we are living through the greatest fiat bubble ever known to mankind! what is the ROI on all of Schramm’s programs–I imagine it is negative–the univeristy administrators who receive millions will of course tell you it is positive, but look at how much the debt and debauchery is augmenting, and central planners hide all their failing in debt and debauchery)–and I had to laugh at the title, “The Entrepreneurial Imperative: How America’s Economic Miracle Will Reshape the World (and Change Your Life) (Hardcover).” Ha!

America’s “economic miracle” is definitely reshaping the world and changing the lives of millions who are losing their homes, families, jobs, and marriages; as Schramm and all his good Anti-Austrian Statist friends/Harvard MBAs are bailed out by the taxpayers who they just ripped off in the “entrepreneurial” dot-com and housing bubbles, fueld by the Fed’s inflation and deflation. This is not the form of honorable entrepreneurship favored by the Austrians, but, instead, its very antithesis. Again, because Schramm is serving his quest to win the Nobel and receive accolades from his Statsit friends, he must deny and demolish the Jeffersonian wisdom and context, which influenced the true Austrians:

I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man. by Thomas Jefferson

“If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all property until their children wake up homeless on the continent their Fathers conquered…I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies… The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs.”

Then, I picked up Schramm’s somewhat indecipherable GOOD CAPITALISM, BAD CAPITALISM. In the index I looked to see what pages Mises and Hayek were mentioned on, only to find they were completely absent from the book! How one can write a book on capitalism without mentioning two of the most influential and enduring economists is beyond me! Hayek won the Nobel in Economics, and he and Mises founded an entire School of economics! Had Schramm never heard of them? That would be like the Beatles claiming that they had never heard of Elvis! What can drive a man to avert his eyes from the Truth? What can drive a man to dedicate his life to covering up the Austrian’s brilliance with insipid writings of his own and bought-and-paid for billion-dollar bloggers?

Fast forward to today when I came across Schramm’s WSJ article, Schumpeter’s Moment: Capitalism remains the foundation for economic growth and freedom.

Right there the title places the cart in front of the horse, for, as Hayek, Mises, and our Founding Fathers noted, freedom comes from God; but then, Schramm, as a postmodern Statist, is not allowed to mention Hayek, Mises, nor Jefferson while campaigning for the Nobel under the Fed’s strict guidelines.

Who has done more for freedom–Thomas Jefferson or Carl Schramm? Who has done more for economics–Hayek, Kauffman, and Mises or Carl Schrammm and his growthology bloggers who must seek to dsiplace and discredit Hayek and Mises, as when the truth ends, teh worst rise to the top? Who has done more for entrepreneurship–God, Mises, Moses, our Founding Fathers, and the entrepreneurs who are losing their homes and ...

http://austrianeconomicsentrepreneurship.wordpress.com/2009/05/31/the-epic-failure-of-the-kauffman-foundation-under-carl-schramms-anti-austrian-fiat-leadership/