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Capitalists and the Ethics of Contribution

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2020

N. Scott Arnold
N. Scott Arnold*
Affiliation:
The University at Alabama at Birmingham, University StationBirmingham, AL35294U.S.A.
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Extract

To paraphrase Freud, what do socialists really want? It is undoubtedly difficult to give a complete answer to this question that all socialists would be satisfied with, but there are some common elements that can hardly be denied. First and foremost among these is the elimination of capitalism; the elimination of capitalism would seem to require the elimination of capitalists (qua capitalists). Why might that be desirable? Well, many reasons might be offered, but one is suggested by the very nature of capitalism.

Type
Research Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Philosophy , Volume 15 , Issue 1 , March 1985 , pp. 87 - 102
Copyright
Copyright © The Authors 1985

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References

1 Schweickart, David Capitalism or Worker Control? An Ethical and Economic Appraisal (New York: Praeger Publishing 1980) 20Google Scholar

2 lbid.,11

3 ‘Parasite’ is a fairly strong term; it seems accurate, however, as a description of something which fastens itself on an organism in such a way that it can systematically take without, on balance, giving. It is true that some parasites are beneficial, but that is not the sense in which the term ‘social parasite’ is used (See J. V. Stalin, Collected Works, passim). Since Schweickart does not use this term, it is unclear whether he would endorse the remainder of the argument to be offered below. His reluctance to use such strong terminology may stem from his generally commendable tactic of being as non-polemical as the subject matter permits. Nevertheless, the argument that follows is worthy of consideration in its own right.

4 I owe this point to Roger Garrison.

5 To see all exchange as involving reward and sacrifice (in the moral sense) on the part of the participants is intimately connected with an outmoded conception of exchange (dating back to Aristotle) as involving the swapping of equivalents. This conception of exchange pervaded classical economics (including Marx's economics) until the subjectivist-marginalist revolution in the late nineteenth century. For a clear and decisive refutation of this conception of exchange, see Eugen Böhm-Bawerk, Karl Marx and the Close of His System, edited with an introduction by Sweezy, Paul M. (‘Reprints of Economic Classics;’ Clifton, NJ: A.M. Kelly 1973)Google Scholar Ch.IV

6 See Samuelson, Paul A. Economics, seventh ed. (New York: McGraw-Hill 1967) 591–4Google Scholar 7 Schweickart, 25

8 The first bourgeois economist to appreciate the economic significance of time was Eugen Böhm-Bawerk. See his Capital and Interest, trans. Huncke, G.H. and Sennholz, H.F. (South Holland, Illinois: Libertarian Press 1959).Google Scholar First published in 1902. The first pure time preference theory of interest can be found in the writings of Frank Fetter. See the following: ‘The “Roundabout Process” in the Interest Theory’; ‘The Relations between Rent and Interest’; ‘Interest Theories, Old and New’; ‘Interest Theory and Price Movements’; These and other essays by Fetter are reprinted in Fetter, Frank Capital, Interest, and Rent, edited with an introduction by Rothbard, Murray N. (Kansas City: Sheed, Andrews and McMeel 1977).Google Scholar The most up-to-date statement of the pure time preference theory of interest can be found in Rothbard's, Murray N. Man, Economy, and State (Los Angeles: Nash Publishing 1970), Ch. 6Google Scholar

9 This example presupposes that the market does or can determine which projects create and which projects squander social wealth. Socialists seem to accept this insofar as they allow market forces to allocate scarce resources. (Schweickart's own alternative to capitalism is a form of market socialism.)

10 quoted in Schweickart, 16

11 I would like to thank Greg Pence, Theodore Benditt and the referees at the Canadian Journal of Philosophy for helpful comments on earlier drafts of this article.