| Mr Khan said: In addendum, look at what the various socialist policies have done in America and Western Europe. They have checked the excesses of robber-baron style capitalism by helping to enforce minimum living standards across the board. How much has social unrest diminished in America since the New Deal, or how much more stable have Western European societies become since the early 20th century? The "consequentialist" evils of the 20th century were a reaction to the rapaciousness of 19th-century liberalism: the Marxists were those who had always been poor and merely saw the serf-lord replaced by the mill owner as the master of their fate. The Fascists were those small producers who had had some measure of success in the old system, crushed by an unfeeling marketplace against which they could not hope to compete. |
Is it these policies or was it natural economic growth and the reduction of scarcity which has reduced civil unrest? Could it be that the United States and Western Europe became so productive after the Great Depression that the populations were never destitute? I don't credit the stability to legislation, but to human innovation and ingenuity reducing prices of necessities. If anything, this progress has existed despite the New Deal, not because of it. Of course, in the short term, the New Deal benefited those it chose to benefit, and repressed any socialist revolution, but in the long-term the story is different.
Question: Why doesn't there exist rober-baron capitalism in the free-markets of Hong Kong and Singapore? Shouldn't they be riddled with this social unrest and destitution among the poor?
