Free Enterprise Produces The Want For Consumption

"What a country wants to make it richer is never consumption, but production.  Where there is the latter, we may be sure that there is no want of the former."

John Stuart Mill (1806 - 1873)

Isn't that interesting?  This sounds suspiciously like supply-side economics.

As we know that consumption makes up the better part of Gross Domestic Product (what a country produces in a year), and some say it's over 60%, how does that consumption come about unless there is something to consume?

So the question is, what is the best means of getting something to consume?

What kind of economies do it better?  Controlled economies or free-market economies?  It's the new/old debate all over again - socialism or capitalist free enterprise?

Look at history.  Look around the world.  How are the countries controlled by dictators and bureaucrat planners doing?  How has the U.S. been doing these past few years while sinking deeper and deeper into socialist planning? 

What does the future hold for growth, and investment?  What has made up a larger and larger portion of the GDP in the past few years?  Production (and therefore consumption) or gubment spending?

Even though productivity has been redefined by the gubment planners, and GDP has been redefined by the gubment planners, and unemployment has been redefined by the gubment planners, ad nauseum.

Why all the changes?  To rewrite history!  If history can be rewritten (and by history we mean back to 1929) then the current condition can be redefined!  It's simple!

GDP was never intended to measure the economy's well being, but since WWII that is pretty much how it has been used.  And the contents that go into it's measurement are a bit like a soup recipe.  But the soup recipe had not changed until the last couple of years!  Now new ingredients are being put into the soup!  But these are not substantial new things.  "They" want it to appear like real "investment."  But instead, it's a bit like adding smoke.  Better put - it's a bit like adding smoke and mirrors.  And to add to the fun, pay no attention to the man behind the curtain...

What's new in the GDP soup pot?  Such important criteria as adding Hollywood royalties, and revenues from scientific R&D.  Real investment, don'tchano!  You want to pump up GDP, how about a sugar high?  But the sugar high has to be redefined way back.  If not adding it now doesn't look right.  The economic GPS is being force to, um, recalculate.

But why the sugar?  To cover up the severe unemployment circumstance that is still anemic even though IT  has been redefined!  To paraphrase one economist, whose name sounds a bit like Shrugman, we are creating a permanent class of jobless Americans.  How can they consume if they are jobless?  Easy - what they consume is magically provided!  They are entitled to it, after all.  And the rest of us can only shrug.

But again, why the sugar?  Because if the GDP looks sweet the cattle in the pen won't take so much notice.  Gee, doesn't that sound a little like how the wondrous health care system was foisted upon us?  Truth can't be a part of the mix or the agenda won't get passed?  Boy, that "revelation" got quickly swept under the rug!

But will adding the smoke and mirrors to the soup pot, the so-called sugar high, spur production?  Think carefully.  With so many jobless or underemployed (notice all the part-time jobs "created" that are counted to sound like full-time jobs?) how much money will there be for the cattle in the pen to spend on, well, on production?  Think carefully.  Will those having to pay abnormally huge premiums and deductibles for their new and wondrous health care plans (mostly to fund those who will be "subsidized") have discretionary incomes to be buying and buying all the new production?  Think carefully. 

So, Mr. Mill has it right.  How would it be said today?  Let's see - how about, "If you like your slow economy, you can keep it!"

How about a clever twist on the quote above?

Free enterprise produces 

the want for consumption! 

Mill was one of the most influential political economists of his century.  He certainly demonstrated that supply-side economics grew economies.  A very good book, a collection of his writings, can be found here.  

Free Enterprise And Self Expression Go Hand In Hand.

"A virtue of the free enterprise system is that it offers every individual the greater opportunity for self expression."

Lawrence Fertig (1898 - 1986)

Notice the key word there - greater.

There is greater opportunity for self expression in a free enterprise condition.  And he says that is "a" virtue, meaning one of many, "a virtue of the free enterprise system."

If history's best and brightest have shined in free enterprise economies, it is because there they were left free to express themselves.

If history's best and brightest inventions and innovations shined in free enterprise economies, it is because there they were left free to be expressed!

The idea in a free enterprise system is to put yourself out there.  Take a risk, find a way to introduce an idea (in the form of good or service) and express it!  See if others have the same reaction to receiving it as the purveyor of the idea thought they would! 

Sometimes it wins and sometimes it loses.  But at least, AT LEAST, in a free enterprise economy there is the environment in which to try.  If a bureaucrat or agency decides what will be offered, there is little room for invention or innovation.  There is a "lesser opportunity for self expression," to paraphrase Fertig's quote above.

History has shown us consistently that this is the case.

In fact, in a command and control economy, and name your label - socialist, communist, fascist, and the innocuous "managed" - self expression cannot be tolerated.  The gig is that everyone be the same!  Well, except for a certain few.  The certain few are the elect, the chosen, the put above and the wondrously smart.  To describe this condition, one author conceived of an Animal Farm  and barnyard and called those self chosen the "two legs." 

At first the Two Legs were really four legs, like the other animals, and criticized the humans controlling them - the humans who walked on two legs.  But then some of the four legs who decided that they were indeed elect, chose, put above and wondrously smart needed to find a way to set themselves apart and they did so by walking on two legs. 

AT THAT POINT SOME ANIMALS PORTRAYING THE 'TWO-LEG' CONCEPT 

WERE SAID TO BE GOOD.

And walking on four legs was said to be not so good.  At least not any longer.  And those four legs all needed to conform, and be the same.  There was to be no self expression among them.

There COULD be no self expression among them!  That was not a part of the formula!  They were not free.  And self expression was not a virtue the four legs enjoyed.  Their ability to express themselves, in the form of songs and chants, was controlled by the Two Legs.  Everything was Two Leg Approved!

The brilliance of the simple quote at the start is in its simplicity.  Virtues abound when there is free enterprise.  Such a concept, and therefore the virtues, extends far beyond the economic aspects.  It extends into the very fabric of the society.  Everyone is made free and can enjoy freedom's gift.

Free enterprise and self expression go hand in hand.

Period.

Free Enterprise Encourages The Proliferation Of The Extraordinary

"One machine can do the work of fifty ordinary men.  No machine can do the work of one extraordinary man."

Elbert Hubbard (1856-1915)

While describing himself politically as an "anarchist and socialist," Hubbard apparently understood that free enterprise is the way to go in business!

Going into business with John D. Larkin, he helped to found The Larkin Soap Company in 1875.  The company was innovative in many way, including being one of the pioneers in the mail-order business.  This method of sales soon became known as "the Larkin method."

The Larkin method involved two things - door-to-door sales and mail-order sales, both of which had "premiums" attached.

A premium consisted of soap which came in its own box.  They produced three soaps - a so-called "Sweet Home" yellow laundry soap and a bathroom soap, called Oatmeal Creme.  A color picture of the company's logo came in every box, and a certificate for a free gift.

The premiums soon became an important part of the business.  Hubbard proposed making the mail orders smaller, offering only three cakes of soap.  The premium that came with the next  order of bath soap was a handkerchief, towels with the laundry soap or one-cent coins.  The soap packages were sold for 10 cents, so this amounted to a 10% premium.  The idea took off.

Soon the Larkin Company became one of the first large-scale manufacturers to eliminate their wholesalers, retailers, salesmen, and brokers.  This was quite innovative!

Hubbard then introduced a "combination pack" and a $10 box of soaps.  It contained enough laundry and bath soap to last a family about a year.  The $10 was roughly the equivalent of one week's pay.  So the  premium included with the purchase amounted to $10, and could be redeemed for any of the then hundreds of products in the Larkin catalog.  The Larkin idea crystallized into a company motto:   "From Factory-to-Family: Save All Cost Which Adds No Value."  Selling the products directly to the consumer like this the savings could be passed on to the consumer, so purchasers felt like the products were "free."

Further, the Larkin Company introduced cooperative buying clubs, and consumers felt a part of the family.  Called "The Larkin Club," soon it allowed consumers to purchase products on an installment plan, with interest attached, and you can see the development of what is so common in today's business environment.  Small Larkin Clubs developed in towns and neighborhoods where 10 families could each contribute a dollar to join their own little club and enjoy club savings and their own special club product savings and premiums.

Catalog offerings expanded to include "pure" foods, glassware, leather goods, pottery and furniture.  This became a huge part of the marketing plan and helped the company survive the economic downturn of 1893.

The company peaked in sales in 1920, to an eventual low in 1939, and done in by the depression it ceased operations in the 1940s.  Among the corporate changes it introduced to its employees, and American business, included paid vacations, a thrift plan, life insurance, medical benefits for illnesses, tuition for attending night school, free coffee, lunch, and an annual summer picnic.  It even created its own chapter of the YWCA in 1905.  Quite innovative!

No anarchy or socialism here!  The success of mail order as a marketing idea was soon picked up by many other companies.  Its other ideas are rife in our modern marketing and sales companies.  Elbert Hubbards' ideas and innovations extraordinarily changed the business climate nationwide.  His statement above rings true today, for people and machinery.

Free enterprise encourages the proliferation

 of the extraordinary.

Free Enterprise Creates More Efficiently, And More Cheaply, And More Abundantly

“Every man has a property in his own person. This nobody has any right to but himself. The labor of his body and the work of his hands are properly his.”

John Locke (1632 - 1704)

Protecting the individual from tyranny and protecting individual rights is the very basis behind the idea which established the United States of America.

Private property, including the property of the person, is integral to that idea.

What is the point of coming up with an idea, developing it, creating a new product or service, and risking one's fortune to implement it into the market place, only to have it acquired and stolen by a tyrant?

And what if that tyrant is indeed the gubment, or gubment-sanctioned business?

This is the very basis of natural rights, God-given, Constitution-protecting, natural rights.  Life, liberty, pursuing happiness, self preservation and protection - natural rights.

Natural rights are natural!  They simply are.  They are not created by the human mind, or laws, or regulations, or somebody's idea of how others should behave.  They simply are.

Natural rights are also the very basis behind the idea of free enterprise and free-market economics.

We own our ideas, in the natural rights sense!
We own our liberty, in the natural rights sense! 
We own our persons, in the natural rights sense!
We own our happiness, in the natural rights sense!

They are private, they are protected, and they are God given.

Business works better when it is free to act.  Does that mean with impunity, stepping unfairly on any slower slug that gets in its way?  Of course not.

We are a society based on the rule of law.  Laws are to define limits, and provide guardrails preventing the over reaching of some who think it's their "right" to smash another.  We have no right to smash another.

There must be a careful balance, however, between those rights to act for oneself and those laws which limits such actions.  Some behavior is unnatural, and some laws which limit behavior are unnatural.  Laws should never be unnatural.  Laws can and should flow freely, naturally, and not be an unfair imposition of feelings.  If my competitor for a very similar product or service to mine is gathering more market share, I am in no position to demand a law to hold him back.  My competitor should be able to act freely in an environment so long as it is lawfully fair.

When gubments choose an industry for political gain (pick your industry) and support and sustain it, and at the same time prevent and hold down another industry of lesser political gain (pick your industry) it is not lawfully fair.  It is unnatural.  It leads to cronyism.  It is the beginning of tyranny, if not tyranny itself.

If one industry provides the same ends more efficiently, more cheaply, and to more people than another, the dictates of the natural course of property rights and God-endowed rights would say to go on!  What is gained by holding it back?

Free enterprise creates more efficiently and more cheaply, 

and more abundantly.

Free Enterprise Provides Stuff You Do Need, And Plenty Of It

“I wanta buy stuff.  Stuff I don't need.  Stuff settin' out there, you jus' feel like buyin' it whether you need it or not.  Uncle John.”

John Steinbeck (1902-1968) - from The Grapes of Wrath

Does that quote not just comment on the human condition?  Is that not a great free enterprise quote?

Uncle John is just like the rest of us.  How many of us have stuff in our homes that we bought but don't need?  Buying it was a whim. It was an impulse buy.  

Notice how some things in stores are put right where you walk in or on the way to the cash registers?  The stores are hoping for impulse buying!  And they're good at it.

We all have our definition of rich.  Be it income or what is put away "in the bank," we all seem to have our definition of rich.

Reading this you might have yours, and I bet it differs from mine.  And the other guy's.

As to this being a good free enterprise quote, why not?  What does free enterprise do?  It provides opportunity to offer "stuff" - goods and services - to a market hopefully full of buyers who will want that stuff.

And sometimes the stuff is really dumb, or offered at a prime moment in time during which it would be purchased.  We look back on some fad purchases now and really wonder why.

Remember the Pet Rock?  Mood rings?  Go Go Boots?  Flower stickers?  Did you ever buy Sea Monkeys?  I HAD to have an ID bracelet in junior high school.  I still have it!  I'm going to bet, but don't know, that the multi-colored, cover-the-entire-body-with-tattoos fad will upset a lot of people in a few years who have them now.  Or the huge-hole earrings.

Some fad purchases seem to hang on.  Who doesn't have the big nose with black mustache and glasses combo?  Go on, admit it.

That's what free enterprise is all about!  The freedom to offer a good or a service and a free market responds.  Socialist-depressed societies don't seem to come out with too much of those faddish things.  They have enough problems coming up with enough basic consumer goods and services, like toilet paper, or healthy meat, or medicine.  There is no socialist world-wide contribution of inventions and improvements because there is little basic. When you can't provide the basics, how can there be contribution to the world?

Free enterprise provides stuff you don't need, "stuff settin' out there, you jus' feel like buyin' it."  Not only that, but

Free enterprise provides stuff you do need, and plenty of it.

Free Enterprise Is Founded Upon And Created By Freedom

Everything that is really great and inspiring is created by the individual who can labor in freedom.   

Albert Einstein  (1879-1955)

Einstein was visiting the United States in 1933 when Hitler came into power.  At that time many of the people of Germany thought their new Chancellor was a clown and a joke who would not get very far or be around for very long.  They were wrong.

Einstein read a different writing on the wall and was smart enough not to return to Germany, settled in the United States, and became a naturalized citizen in 1940.  Many German scientists fled Germany as well.  They had lost their civil service jobs, including teaching in universities.  Despite the huge brain drain it would cause, the new anti-Semitic laws forced them out of their jobs.  It's said that Germany lost 25% of its theoretical physicists, either through the legally-imposed exodus or because they left voluntarily and out of fear.  Some had to flee with nothing but their minds.

They, too, saw the same writing on the wall as Einstein and left seeking freedom.  It is interesting that few in politics saw what these scientists did. 

Freedom?  They left to seek freedom?  These were creative people!  They were well aware that it is a free society that produces an atmosphere conducive to creativity, and the development of intellectual property safe from tyrannical hands.  

Hence the quote above.

A free market is just as important to intellectual property as it is to any form of property and private ownership.  Private property is as integrated with freedom and free markets as it is with anything.  It forms the very basis of freedom.  

And economic freedoms are aligned and integrated with private property in all its forms as they are with anything.  They cannot exist without private property.

Free enterprise spurs free thinking, and creativity, and societal advancement.  

Free enterprise is founded upon and created by freedom.

Free Enterprise Is Not A Scam Or A Big Can Of Spam

Think about a can of SPAM!

Words mean things.
Concepts mean things.
Ideas mean things.

People try to spin word meanings, or make others think words mean things that they don't, but the words, concepts and ideas still mean what they mean.

And meanings change over time!  It isn't spin - that's what language does!  When I was a young Boy Scout I liked spam!  It was a great, campfire breakfast food.  Now that I am an old curmudgeon I don't like spam so much.  The meaning has changed.

Now an application, or "app," isn't what I do to apply for something necessarily.  It can also mean that I am searching for something that conveys another something to me electronically.  And now "swiping" something, like my credit card, is an action business demands we do.

But, some definitions that have always been still are.

In my college economics dictionary, which I still have, but don't always refer to, there are definitions that apply today.  For example,

FREE ENTERPRISE - an economic and political doctrine holding that a capitalist economy can regulate itself in a freely competitive market through the relationship of supply and demand with a minimum of governmental intervention and regulation.

SOCIALISM - a theory or system of social organization that advocates the vesting of the ownership and control of the means of production and distribution, of capital, land, etc., in the community as a whole.  (FYI - Marx said that socialism was simply a temporary middle step between the demise of capitalism and the implementation of communism.)

Even in the definitions spin is at play!  Notice free enterprise is "economic and political doctrine," and socialism is "social organization."  

Yes, free enterprise is something that is adhered to or believed, like a religious doctrine, and socialism is a benign attempt to organize a community!

And then come the organizers trying to wrest the free-market aspect from the system and impose what they "feel" should be regulated in a free-market aspect system.  And all the while still saying they advocate and promote the free market!  

So, to sum it up, AND ALL THIS DESPITE PROFOUND HISTORY TO THE OPPOSITE, the organizers want all to know that the free market cannot regulate itself, free enterprise practitioners certainly cannot regulate the "community" ownership "as a whole," and they, (the ubiquitous THEY) are in charge of bringing bigger and better and fairer and more wonderful to us all.  There is never any force here, or ever "the big lie."

Let me paraphrase, from the organizers we hear - if you like your free enterprise you can keep it, everything we have ever wanted will be brought to each one of us more abundantly and more cheaply, and we have to pass humongous laws implementing socialism  so we can find out what's in the laws because, after all, you didn't and can't build that.

Oh, and we must love the former FOUR LEGS  in the barnyard who have appointed themselves the new TWO LEGS  in the barnyard, so they (the ubiquitous THEY) can direct the rest of us incompetent FOUR LEGS  in the barnyard, who are expected to follow, obey, believe, and chant the mantras of the newly self-appointed TWO LEGS  in the barnyard.  THEY are the smartest, ever.

What a diaper load!  What a scam and a big can of spam!

Free enterprise is not a scam or a big can of spam.

Free Enterprise Is The Natural Course And Cannot Be Resisted

“We may brave human laws, but we cannot resist natural ones.”

Jules Verne (1828-1905)

If we humans are about nothing less we are about defining our behavior.

We love to create rules and laws.  We love to create standards and practices.  We love to have blueprints, and designs, and boundaries, and on and on and on.

And why not?  Things often work much better when organized and when expectations are set.

But sometimes human laws overwhelm us.  They can impose difficulties and create minutia and complexities that are hard to understand and hard to keep up with.  And then we can be punished for not understanding or knowing the laws!

But we trudge on.  As Jules Verne says, we "brave human laws."  

Some of what the Founding Fathers suggested, and tried to define and defend with a document, was that there are certain natural laws that tyrants for thousands of years tried to ignore.  And they imposed themselves, or their system and methods, on their populace, creating subjects, slaves and set ups that were (or are) contrary to natural law.

The American Revolution was not a war.  It was the statement that we were setting up a society as far from that previous, expected tyranny as possible.  The American Revolution set up systems conforming to natural laws of freedom, where such laws provided guardrails and were yet freeing at the same time.  They set up expectations where the citizenry could act more freely, without being acted upon.  They set up a legal system where laws were not based on whims but ethics and are moral codes.  They set up an economic environment that promoted free enterprise and voluntary exchange.  And they set up a government that is representative, defined by the rule of law, and which decentralized power equally among different branches.  They set up a gubment that was LESS about force and coercion and MORE about an endowment of natural laws and rights.

Hence, the American Revolution was more about individual rights and limitations on gubment, a gubment that did not force but where individuals could grow and become and multiply their talents.  The American Revolution was an idea that was exceptionally different than anything that had previously been experienced by mankind.

AND IT HAS WORKED.

This has been referred to as American Exceptionalism.  And, according to Jules Verne's thinking, such laws cannot be ignored.  They cannot be trifled with.  They cannot be overcome without an eventual revolution.  We humans cannot resist them.  Therefore ...

Free enterprise is the natural course of the human experience 

and cannot be resisted.

Free Enterprise Extends The Sphere Of Individual Freedom

“Democracy extends the sphere of individual freedom, socialism restricts it. Democracy attaches all possible value to each man; socialism makes each man a mere agent, a mere number. Democracy and socialism have nothing in common but one word: equality. But notice the difference: while democracy seeks equality in liberty, socialism seeks equality in restraint and servitude.”

Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859)

Asked to come to America by the French Monarchy to study prisons and look at the change from an aristocratic order to a democratic one, he stayed less than two years.  He did actually visit a couple of prisons, but spent most of his time traveling around the country observing and visiting with the populace.

De Tocqueville was a strong supporter of liberty and freedom.  He published his thoughts on Democracy in America  in two books.  (They can be downloaded for free to your mobile library!)

He basically found American politics and American democracy to be a balance between the individual and the community.  Reading his books one sees his distaste for politicians.

De Tocqueville often compared society in America with socialism (flaring more popular in Europe in his day) and aristocratic rule. Hence the quote above.

He had a lot to say about the different types of "equality" sought in democratic and socialist societies.  Obviously de Tocqueville would have gotten along with Churchill who said that socialism seeks equality in misery.

And so, the taffy pull continues.  

So, to play with the de Tocqueville thoughts quoted herein, which do you want?

• Freedom or restriction?
• Individual value or being a number in a cog?
• Equality in liberty or restraint and servitude?
• Equality in light or darkness?

Those who pretend to want "equality" always have a personal agenda.  They aren't seeking equality as much as to recreate it.  To put forth their views they use (AND CHANGE THE MEANING OF) big-thinking words like discrimination, diversity, life, medicinal, and rights to make their narrow cases.  And while doing so pretend that everyone agrees with them!  And if you don't agree with them, well, you, YOU, are in a miniscule and detestable minority!  You, YOU, are on the "wrong side of history!"  You, YOU, should be shunned and silenced.

How many times lately have you heard that your traditional values are on the "wrong side of history?"

Explain what in the world "wrong side of history" means!  I know, it's big thinking, but vacuous.  They can't explain it either, but that doesn't matter.  They are always "assessing and reassessing."  Another big-thinking phrase, but vacuous.  And slogans!  Don't forget the slogans!  Oh, and rhyming chants.  We need more chants!  With all the braying and bleating, honking and oinking, it's a regular animal farmyard out there!

Free enterprise extends the sphere of individual freedom.

Free Enterprise Shines As A Bright Beacon On A Hill

"Each of us must become candles in the darkness of collectivist ideas.  The brighter we each shine through our understanding and ability to articulate the meaning of freedom, the more we will be beacons that can attract others."

Richard M. Ebeling

Foundation for Economic Education

Collectivist ideas.  What are collectivist ideas?

Basically collectivism has to do with private property.  It is that all property belongs to "the group," and nothing is owned by any one individual.

But it is more than that.  To be understood collectivism has to be contrasted with individualism.

The very foundation of our country concerns the concept of individualism!  We believe in, and our "leaders" swear to protect, a document that defines self evident, divine, unalienable rights!  These rights protect the individual, preserve each individual's freedoms, at the very EXPENSE of the collective!  The document in fact RESTRICTS the power of the gubment collective.

These rights are unalienable, meaning you cannot separate them, remove any of them, or pay attention to one as more important than any other.  They are a package deal.

The tyrannical collective, big gubment, seeks to grow.  Its tyranny can be soft and hard.  Its growth can be subtle or visibly flagrant.  It seeks the establishment and preservation of itself.

>  It grows through bureaucracy, creating departments and, as Mr. Jefferson states in one of the articles of the Declaration of Independence, "[erects] a multitude of new offices, and [sends] hither swarms of officers to harass our people, and eat out [our] substance."  

>  It grows as politicians create and grow their agendas with money, yes money, in the form of spending and entitlements and bailouts and subsidies and pork.  These agendas grow with money taken from the individual to spend on the collective agenda.  

In short, the real struggle in our society today is collectivism versus individualism.  Imposition and control versus individual freedom.  Public (meaning gubment) property versus private property.  Restriction and curtailment of rights versus unalienable, self-evident, individual rights.

One might say, to use a familiar modern movie icon, it is The Dark Side versus The Force.

Notice The Dark Side  tries to control by any means - the lie and evil doings, hidden manipulation and deception, murderous war and control.  Its advocates are mean, will do damage, can be picked out with flashy uniform or shocking appearance and seek their control agenda.  It seeks darkness.  It's proponents reject light and do not "shine."

The Force  is felt, it is subtle, it is available to anyone who seeks it, and it flows freely when one learns how to use it.  One can be trained in its use.  Its advocates are humble, dress plainly, follow a strait and narrow path, and seek peace and goodness as their agenda.  It seeks light.  It's proponents seek light and "shine."

And so, Dr. Ebeling's statement as regards today's struggle between collectivism and individual freedom remains as a battle that has been around for a long time.

It is the struggle between a dark end with no promise and a light that follows a principle with a promise.

I prefer this place:  "Ye are the light of the world.  A city that is set on a hill cannot be hid."  We proponents of free enterprise should be unashamed and welcoming beacons encouraging others our way.  Come and enjoy what we desire!

Free enterprise shines as a bright beacon on a hill.

Free Enterprise Strives To Work, And Win, All The Time

"Winning is not a sometime thing; it's an all the time thing.  You don't win once in a while; you don't do things right once in a while; you do them right all the time.  Winning is a habit.  Unfortunately, so it losing.  There is no room for second place.  It is and always has been an American zeal to be first in anything we do, and to win, and to win, and to win.  I firmly believe that any man's finest hour - his greatest fulfillment to all he holds dear - is that moment when he has to work his heart out in a good cause and he's exhausted on the field of battle - victorious."

Vincent Thomas Lombardi (1913-1970)

What could possibly be more American than trying to win all the time?
What could possibly be more American than trying to be first place?
What could possibly be more American than working so hard in a good cause and, in the end, finding oneself victorious and exhausted on the field of battle?

What could possibly be more representative of free enterprise than those three thoughts? 
What could possibly be more representative of free enterprise than an economic setting that encourages those three thoughts?
What could possibly be more representative of  free enterprise than people with the Lombardi mindset thriving in the marketplace?

And what could possibly be more representative of AMERICAN FREE ENTERPRISE than this further Lombardi quote:  “The quality of a person’s life is in direct proportion to their commitment to excellence, regardless of their chosen field of endeavor.”

There is a reason the football Super Bowl trophy is called The Lombardi Trophy.

The Founding Fathers envisioned a country that ennobled the Lombardi ideals, created a political and an economic environment that encourages it, and drew up a political plan and a document that preserved those God-given freedoms, ideals, and rights.  And they pulled it off.

No society ever prospered that strove instead for ever-growing and intrusive gubment.
No society ever prospered that strove instead for ever-growing regulation, taxation and gubment control.
No society ever prospered that strove instead for ever-growing entitlements and gimmes.

No society striving for those less-than-ideal environments ever found its populace working with Lombardi "zeal," ever found its "finest hour," or ever found fulfillment of all it "holds dear." 

Indeed, no society striving for those less-than-ideal environments ever found itself "exhausted on the battlefield - victorious."


Instead, those societies have found themselves on the trash heap of history.

BECAUSE THOSE SOCIETIES DIDN'T WORK.  THEY CHOSE LOSING HABITS.

FREE ENTERPRISE STRIVES INSTEAD TO WORK,

AND WIN,

ALL THE TIME. 

Free Enterprise Is The Rough Road To Easy Street

"It is a rough road that leads to the path of greatness."

Lucius Annaeus Seneca (4BC - 65AD)

Obviously this kind of a quote can be used in many contexts, and it is perfect for the concept of free enterprise.

Doing something for yourself, being your "own boss," creating an entity from nothing and struggling to develop it - and all of the other things it takes to make it in a free-enterprise environment is nothing if it is not a "rough road."

But is it worth it?

Those who can navigate the free-enterprise maze and come out the other end would say yes!  Those who cannot keep afloat and perish in the business environment would say no!  They, and the other deriders of free enterprise and capitalism, would also scream the other words - unfair!  Unjust!  Unlevel playing field!  Etc.

Change, innovation, increasing knowledge, and staying in the forefront of all that it takes to stay in business and thrive requires constant effort.  You can't merely find the yellow-brick road (or Seneca's path to greatness) and push on in the right direction to the great fortune to be found!  There are head winds, side winds, muddy puddles, ice and snow, torrential rains, highway robbers, unexpected break downs and costs, road hogs and the rest.  One must anticipate and be ready to combat anything to stall the business progress moment to moment.   

The road that leads to the path of greatness is a rough one and an unpredictable place.

So why do it?  Why seek out this "rough road," and search for the "path of greatness?"

Why not sit back and wait for others to provide our bread and butter?  And let someone else take care of our needs from cradle to grave?  And be the same as everyone else?   And not develop our talents and interests?  Or learn the same things, say the same things, use the "proper" words, and think only the "proper" thoughts?  AND TAKE THE EASY ROAD TO EASY STREET?

Seneca would say that is an easy one!  Because his philosophy was that none of that leads to the path of greatness.  There is no EASY ROAD to greatness.  The easy road never gets us to EASY STREET.

Free enterprise is the rough road to easy street.

A Free Enterprise Parable And A Historical Struggle

A parable is a story, or poem, which is used to illustrate a moral or spiritual point, and reveal a hidden meaning.  It comes from the Latin word, parabola, which means comparison, discourse, or placing side-by-side.

When parables are employed, different people understand them on different levels and arrive at different interpretations.  One reason for this is background, but another is feeling.  Sometimes we simply feel the spirit of something and it touches us.

This is the MacGregor escutcheon, or coat of arms.  It features a tree and a crowned sword.

The story is told that in the 12th century the Scottish king was attacked by a wild boar during a hunting trip.  Sir Malcolm MacGregor asked permission to protect the king and was given permission with the statement, "Een do and spair nocht."  This would translate something like - do, and spare nothing.  Sir Malcolm then took an oak sapling and dispatched the boar.  This phrase became the MacGregor motto until the 18th century.

The tree is a symbol used in many eras and cultures.  It can symbolize food, purity, spiritual strength, spiritual struggle, strength itself, life, growth - and on and on.

One historical struggle has been between free enterprise and gubments!  John Kenneth Galbraith, not known as a political conservative, once said, "The great dialectic in our time is not, as anciently and by some still supposed, between capital and labor; it is between economic enterprise and the state."

And so it is. 

Consider this parable.  And as you do, consider this great and historical dialectic (argument) between free enterprise and the state.  And in particular between free enterprise and the imposition of socialism.

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THE PARABLE OF THE TWO TREES

There once were two trees that lived side by side.

The one had a very comfortable life.  It lived in a greenhouse.  It was very well cared for by an elderly gardener.  The gardener knew just what to do to help the tree to grow and develop.  It was given plenty of water that included lots of nutrition.  It never wanted for water.  The temperatures in the greenhouse were controlled.  Windows were opened when it got too hot.  Heat was provided when it got too cold.  Shades were drawn when the sun grew too uncomfortable.  Its limbs were regularly pruned and it was beautiful.  It did not have to struggle for anything!  It lived in a pot and did not have to send down deep roots.  It never experienced strong winds so its limbs were weak.  Its bark was thin because it had plenty of water, had no enemies and was never too hot or cold.  The elderly gardener loved the tree.

The other tree's life was very hard.  It had to care for itself as there was no gardener to care for it.  It had to send down long roots to search for minerals and water.  That was sometimes hard to come by.  It experienced the very cold of winter and the very hot of summer.  Its limbs were never pruned and it had a somewhat disheveled appearance.  It developed bark that was necessarily thick and hard, needed to battle disease, insects and the elements.  All in all, it had learned to cope with all of that.  And it took care of itself, as best it could.  The tree was happy.

The two trees were close enough that when the windows were opened they could talk.  The tree in the greenhouse would often mock the other.  It would brag about its comfortable life and living conditions.

"Look at me!  My life is very easy.  I am well cared for.  I want for nothing.  My needs are all provided.  The gardener loves me.  I am happy!

And you - look at you!  I watch you struggle and strain for water.  I watch you fight against the heat and cold and strong winds.  You are besieged by insects and animals and birds.  You are never trimmed and some of your branches go this way and that way.  You never get a rest.  You should be in here where all is well!"

The other would answer.  "Yes, it is hard here.  Sometimes I envy you.  But it is not all so bad.  I have strong roots and a good foundation.  I send my limbs this way and that to get more light, and to protect against the strong winds.  True, my life is more difficult, but I am happy.  I am able to provide for myself."

Things went on like this for some time.  The one tree derided and scoffed and the other patiently went about insuring its survival.

Then, one day, the elderly gardener died.
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Jay wrote this original parable, and published it here on his free enterprise blog.  One of Jay's genealogical lines is the MacGregor Clan.