In Defense of Capitalism — Transcript

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1. 0:00Is your life being wrecked by the “super-rich”?
2. 0:03The super-rich.
3. 0:04Who are they and what are they doing to us?
4. 0:07What are they doing to us?
5. 0:09Whatever it is,
6. 0:10people say just the fact that the rich
7. 0:12have so much is itself immoral.
8. 0:15Immoral and wrong that the top one-tenth
9. 0:18of 1% in this country own almost as much wealth
10. 0:22as the bottom 90%.
11. 0:29They want to condemn the people
12. 0:31that actually have moved civilization forward.
13. 0:33Yaron Brook of the Ayn Rand Institute is annoyed
14. 0:35that today’s “democratic socialists”
15. 0:38say rich people got rich by taking money from others,
16. 0:42In fact they,
17. 0:43Actually improved the standard of living
18. 0:46for everybody on the planet.
19. 0:48How is that possible?
20. 0:49How could it improve everyone’s living standard?
21. 0:52Isn’t there a fixed amount of money in the world
22. 0:55so when rich people grab a lot,
23. 0:57there’s less for everyone else?
24. 0:59No! Because wealth can be created.
25. 1:03We have basically made about $2 a day
26. 1:06for 100,000 years.
27. 1:08In other words we could eat what we farmed
28. 1:11and that was it.
29. 1:12And then something amazing happened
30. 1:14about 250 years ago.
31. 1:15A few countries tried capitalism.
32. 1:18For the first time, people were allowed to
33. 1:20profit from private property.
34. 1:22That changed everything.
35. 1:24Division of labor let people produce more with less,
36. 1:27and then they traded to get even more.
37. 1:30Wealth increased with every innovation.
38. 1:33Cargo transported by ship used to stored in barrels,
39. 1:36in sacks, in wooden crates and offloaded by hand.
40. 1:40Economist Don Boudreaux points out that
41. 1:42enormous wealth was even created
42. 1:45by the invention of the shipping container.
43. 1:47With it came a wave of specialized technology
44. 1:50that dramatically increased productivity in shipping
45. 1:52Workers today are super human compared to
46. 1:54their brethren on yesteryear.
47. 1:55We went from carrying bags on our backs
48. 1:57to lifting the equivalent of two school buses
49. 2:00with mere flicks of our wrists.
50. 2:02Most of this innovation began just 250 years ago.
51. 2:06250 years ago we suddenly discovered
52. 2:09the value of individual freedom.
53. 2:11We suddenly discovered the value of leaving individuals
54. 2:14free to think, to innovate,
55. 2:16to produce without asking for permission,
56. 2:19without getting the state to sign off on it
57. 2:22and we call that the Industrial Revolution.
58. 2:24Industrialists, the people who owned the factories,
59. 2:27employed hundreds, sometimes thousands, of people.
60. 2:31And they made enormous profits
61. 2:34And how does that benefit your fellow man?
62. 2:37And ever since, politicians have complained
63. 2:40about those profits.
64. 2:41In Ayn Rand’s novel, Atlas Shrugged,
65. 2:43state officials demand that industrialists
66. 2:46explain how their getting rich helped others.
67. 2:49I do not owe you an answer
68. 2:51but I could tell you in a hundred ways.
69. 2:53Thousands of jobs, billions in revenue,
70. 2:56fueling our economy despite your efforts.
71. 2:59Hank Rearden was right.
72. 3:01Capitalism created new wealth.
73. 3:03We got much, much, much richer
74. 3:07and it's hard to imagine how much richer we got
75. 3:10of electricity, of running water,
76. 3:11of the things we all take for granted today,
77. 3:13but we didn't have 150 years ago.
78. 3:16And yes, some people complain about inequality,
79. 3:18but everybody got richer.
80. 3:20Even the poor got richer.
81. 3:22In the past several hundred years,
82. 3:23we’ve gone from a society where people
83. 3:25hoped to get jobs that required long hours
84. 3:28of hard manual labor.
85. 3:31To one where almost everyone
86. 3:32has what they need to live
87. 3:34and more people have leisure time
88. 3:36to do things like watch movies.
89. 3:39[music]
90. 3:40You’re a wizard Harry
91. 3:41I mention Harry Potter because
92. 3:43Brook bought lots of Harry Potter books,
93. 3:45but he says he’s not poorer for it.
94. 3:48J. K. Rowling became a billionaire
95. 3:50and I got poorer by thousands of dollars and yet,
96. 3:53nobody really thinks of themselves as poorer
97. 3:55for having read Harry Potter.
98. 3:56It made my kids happy.
99. 3:57How much is that worth?
100. 3:58So I am actually better off
101. 4:01for having spent those many dollars on those books.
102. 4:05Under capitalism, that applies to every transaction,
103. 4:08because capitalism, unlike socialism, is voluntary.
104. 4:12I’d like a pretzel.
105. 4:14We see this every time we buy something
106. 4:16The seller is there for his own self-interest.
107. 4:19And so am I. So why do we both say thank you?
108. 4:22[Thank you, thank you]
109. 4:24Because he wanted the dollar more
110. 4:25than he wanted the pretzel.
111. 4:26I wanted the pretzel more than the dollar.
112. 4:28The transaction doesn’t happen
113. 4:30unless both of us think we win,
114. 4:33and that way, voluntary transactions create wealth.
115. 4:37Thank you. Thank you
116. 4:39Since the Industrial Revolution…
117. 4:41We have more than doubled our life expectancy.
118. 4:43We have dramatically increased the quality of our life
119. 4:47and we are wealthier than anybody could have imagined
120. 4:51Made possible by private property
121. 4:54and capitalism which people hate.
122. 4:57People don't like it. Because, you know, it takes
123. 5:01real responsibility over your own life
124. 5:03to achieve something
125. 5:05and unfortunately our educational system
126. 5:07has taught us that since we don't sacrifice
127. 5:09enough because we're basically too self-interested
128. 5:12to sacrifice enough, the state must now intervene
129. 5:15and force us to sacrifice for our fellow man.
130. 5:18And that belief that sacrificing for others
131. 5:20is more moral is what gives socialism strength.
132. 5:24It’s not so tough to share your stuff.
133. 5:27Every priest, every philosopher,
134. 5:29every mother has taught us
135. 5:31that to be selfless is good.
136. 5:33Selfless is good.
137. 5:34No mother actually means that, right?
138. 5:37No mother actually wants you to be last in line.
139. 5:40They all want you to be first in line,
140. 5:42but they tell you that because they think
141. 5:44that's what nobility is.
142. 5:45But the people who do for others are not more moral
143. 5:49because they're wasting the one life that they have.
144. 5:51Lots of us see morality as helping other people.
145. 5:56If your house burnt down.
146. 5:57Neighbors in America
147. 5:58have always helped their neighbors.
148. 6:00I though you Objectivists didn't approve of that?
149. 6:04Ayn Rand was never against charity.
150. 6:06What she said was that was not the major virtue in life
151. 6:10and that you should voluntarily have a choice
152. 6:14about who you help and who you don't.
153. 6:17The key is that somebody else's need
154. 6:18is not a moral claim against your life.
155. 6:21Your life is yours.
156. 6:23Today’s socialists say self-absorbed Americans won’t
157. 6:26help the poor and the sick.
158. 6:28That’s why government must force everyone to give!
159. 6:31Otherwise the weak and the poor will suffer and die.
160. 6:35But indeed the weak and poor under capitalism
161. 6:38has done better than in any other system.
162. 6:39It's a fantastic system that is fundamentally moral
163. 6:43because it allows individuals
164. 6:46to pursue their own happiness.
165. 6:48Your pursuit of your own well-being
166. 6:49which is a virtue in and of itself
167. 6:51also helps the world be a better world.