Harry Binswanger, a man who either was, or wishes he had been, Ayn Rand’s sex poodle, has penned a column for Forbes that, were it satire, might be one of the greatest examples of the genre since Swift’s “A Modest Proposal.” Alas, although it is titled “Give Back? Yes, It’s Time For The 99% To Give Back To The 1%,” it is written entirely in earnest.
His other essays, written entirely in earnest, include such gems as “Insider Trading is a Right: Don’t Shackle The Knowledge Seekers” and “By Eliminating Failure, The Government Robs Us of Success,” and other gentle, loving handjobs to laissez-faire capitalism. Or, more accurately, anarcho-capitalism.
Now, Binswanger is an easy target. Probably not something I should even waste time on–and I wouldn’t, save for the fact that I do think it’s worth it for people to know exactly what people like Binswanger, and other followers of Objectivism, like Rand Paul and Paul Ryan, actually think of them.
I admit that I’m an idealist–I want to live in a glorious fantasy land where all humans are treated equally, and with dignity and respect, I want to redistribute the wealth of the nation, I want a world with no violence and no war–and although that feels like an impossible goal, I’d rather strive for that with the hope of landing somewhere in between here and there. They are also idealists. Except in their ideal world, everyone is either a sadist or a masochist, and not in a sexxxy way.
Let’s take this shit apart, shall we?
It’s time to gore another collectivist sacred cow. This time it’s the popular idea that the successful are obliged to “give back to the community.” That oft-heard claim assumes that the wealth of high-earners is taken away from “the community.” And beneath that lies the perverted Marxist notion that wealth is accumulated by “exploiting” people, not by creating value–as if Henry Ford was not necessary for Fords to roll off the (non-existent) assembly lines and Steve Jobs was not necessary for iPhones and iPads to spring into existence.
Consider that sacred cow intact and un-gored. Yes, on the whole, in order for anyone to accumulate a vast amount of wealth, or a vast amount of power, someone helped them, and someone was screwed over. Henry Ford would not have made a dime if people did not have roads to drive on, if he had to put every one of those cars together himself. Henry Ford contributed cars to us, but he was also in cahoots with Germany during WWII and provided them with military vehicles. He was also, you know, kind of a Nazi. Steve Jobs would probably have a little less money if he manufactured his iPhones and iPads here in America, rather than “exploiting” child labor in other countries.
For the record, however, Henry Ford believed in a living wage. Why? Because he realized that if he wanted to make money, he needed the people who worked for him to be able to buy his cars.
Let’s begin by stripping away the collectivism. “The community” never gave anyone anything. The “community,” the “society,” the “nation” is just a number of interacting individuals, not a mystical entity floating in a cloud above them. And when some individual person–a parent, a teacher, a customer–”gives” something to someone else, it is not an act of charity, but a trade for value received in return.
Yes, there is a “community,” there is a “society” and there is a “nation.” If the nation did not “collectively” use our tax money to educate our children, then very few people would be qualified to work for these glorious, genius enterprises. If we do not “collectively” take care of our people and our children, if people do not have the qualifications necessary to hold these jobs, then no one can profit off of their labor. No one succeeds in a black hole.
It was from love–not charity–that your mother fed you, bought clothes for you, paid for your education, gave you presents on your birthday. It was for value received that your teachers worked day in and day out to instruct you. In commercial transactions, customers buy a product not to provide alms to the business, but because they want the product or service–want it for their own personal benefit and enjoyment. And most of the time they get it, which is why they choose to continue patronizing the same businesses.
Yes, it is from love. It’s also because feeding, clothing, and educating children is necessary to sustaining our society. When a child is fed, clothed, and educated, we all benefit. We benefit because that child is less likely to turn to crime as a means of supporting his or herself. We benefit because that child may go on to do a lot of good in this world, for all of us.
All proper human interactions are win-win; that’s why the parties decide to engage in them. It’s not the Henry Fords and Steve Jobs who exploit people. It’s the Al Capones and Bernie Madoffs. Voluntary trade, without force or fraud, is the exchange of value for value, to mutual benefit. In trade, both parties gain.
Each particular individual in the community who contributed to a man’s rise to wealth was paid at the time–either materially or, as in the case of parents and friends, spiritually. There is no debt to discharge. There is nothing to give back, because there was nothing taken away.
To quote Noam Chomsky, ”The idea of “free contract” between the potentate and his starving subject is a sick joke, perhaps worth some moments in an academic seminar exploring the consequences of (in my view, absurd) ideas, but nowhere else.” Not all “proper human interactions” are win-win. In most cases, one side wins quite a bit more than the other. A rich person has benefited, more than most, from the cumulative contributions of people they don’t even know and will never meet. Steve Jobs benefited from the work of actress/inventor Hedy Lamarr, and there was certainly no direct contract between the two.
Well, maybe there is–in the other direction. The shoe is on the other foot. It is “the community” that should give back to the wealth-creators. It turns out that the 99% get far more benefit from the 1% than vice-versa. Ayn Rand developed the idea of “the pyramid of ability,” which John Galt sets forth in Atlas Shrugged (ed- Oh just go to the site for that whole excerpt. Too long to post here, and also Rand gives me hives).
For their enormous contributions to our standard of living, the high-earners should be thanked and publicly honored. We are in their debt.
The whole pyramid thing has actually always been one of my major issues with Capitalism. I don’t like the idea of a pyramid. I don’t like the idea that we live in a system which requires that the vast majority of people in a society be at the bottom of that pyramid. That is literally systemic inequality, and the idea of a serfdom just isn’t my jam. But let’s let him continue.
Here’s a modest proposal. Anyone who earns a million dollars or more should be exempt from all income taxes. Yes, it’s too little. And the real issue is not financial, but moral. So to augment the tax-exemption, in an annual public ceremony, the year’s top earner should be awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor.
Imagine the effect on our culture, particularly on the young, if the kind of fame and adulation bathing Lady Gaga attached to the more notable achievements of say, Warren Buffett. Or if the moral praise showered on Mother Teresa went to someone like Lloyd Blankfein, who, in guiding Goldman Sachs toward billions in profits, has done infinitely more for mankind. (Since profit is the market value of the product minus the market value of factors used, profit represents the value created.)
A modest proposal, indeed. It’s about one step away from eating the babies of the poor. You want to celebrate Goldman Sachs? A company that profited off of the mortgage crisis that screwed the entire country? A company that made money off of betting that Americans would fail? A company that used the bailout money we gave them to give its top earners $1 million dollar bonuses? Screw you. Tell me how that makes them in any way superior to Al Capone? Tell me, what is the difference between robbing a 7-11 and robbing the American people?
To say that those of us who have not been lucky enough to make a million dollars should be the only ones responsible for contributing to this country’s welfare is completely sick.
Value created is a lot more than how much money you’re able to make. The idea that someone’s value as a person ought to be tied to how much money they make–or even, yes, how hard you are willing to “work” is essentially inhumane. We are more than wage slaves. There is no amount of value a single human being can provide to the world that ought to entitle them to buy a golden toilet seat while someone else is starving. That, in itself, is an act of violence.
I have respect for everybody. You bet your ass I have respect for a janitor, for the person who rings up my groceries, for the server that brings me my dinner at a restaurant. They all add value to my life and to the lives of others. We could not live in a society full of Lloyd Blankfeins. Everyone can’t be Steve Jobs– otherwise, we’d all have to bus our own tables. So I believe that everyone is important, and should be valued.
Instead, we live in a culture where Goldman Sachs is smeared as “a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity.” That’s for the sin of successful investing, channeling savings to their most productive uses, instead of wasting them on government boondoggles like Solyndra and bridges to nowhere.
There is indeed a vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity: the Internal Revenue Service. And, at a deeper level, it is the monstrous perversion of justice that makes the IRS possible: an envy-ridden moral code that damns success, profit, and earning money in voluntary exchange.
An end must be put to the inhuman practice of draining the productive to subsidize the unproductive. An end must be put to the primordial notion that one’s life belongs to the tribe, to “the community,” and that the superlative wealth-creators must do penance for the sin of creating value.
And Ayn Rand is just the lady who can do it.
Jesus Christ, this Harry Binswanger is a sick puppy ain’t he? Little ironic that there’s actually a form of dementia called Binswanger’s Disease, I suppose. Isn’t he lucky that he was born with two arms and two legs? Isn’t he lucky that CUNY Hunter, a college supported by taxpayer money, was willing to give him some of that that money to spread his views? Isn’t he lucky he was born a straight, white male in a society that privileges straight white males? Isn’t he just lucky?
I’m lucky. I was born healthy, to kind, supportive, loving parents who were financially able to take care of and provide for my sister and me. I have an awesome job that allows me to be clever for an actual living. I do not believe in god, but I believe that I had better wake up every morning and say THANK YOU to whatever forces in the universe, economic or otherwise that have allowed me to go on for this long. I need to say THANK YOU, because my biggest “problem” right now is that I feel chubby and my iron deficiency has been out of whack lately.
I do not believe that everyone who is not a millionaire is just lazy. I worked with very rich people for a very long period of time, and I can tell you, many of them are not just lazy, but also painfully stupid. I have seen people who were born dirt poor, in crappy situations, who worked harder than I ever did in school, who were smarter, and funnier, and who just got beaten down by a world that didn’t care to value them. People contribute more to this world than just the way they make money. We should value each and every person, and that means that yes, just by virtue of living in this country alone, they should be guaranteed food, shelter, clothing and health care. I’m a little sick of Republicans talking about how much they value “life” when it comes to a freaking fetus, and then turning around and trying to cut food stamps by $4 billion.
I don’t believe that someone who works two minimum wage jobs just to get by and to support their family is lazy. That particular, insidious notion, is what is turning our country into a nation of unsexy sadists and masochists. Instead of “rewarding” the rich for all the glorious value they’ve provided, with tax breaks and a low minimum wage, we need to reward all the people that actually work for a living to provide us with the small things that make our lives livable.
image
(Fire) due to John Waters championing of the film, but I didn’t actually get to see it until last night. I’m always interested in seeing something that John Waters is enthusiastic about and I reckon that quite a few of you feel the same way. If so, then you need to get your hands on 
