Capitalism - an economic system characterized by private or corporate ownership of capital goods, by investments that are determined by private decision, and by prices, production, and the distribution of goods that are determined mainly by competition in a free market.
Socialism - 1 : any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods
2 a : a system of society or group living in which there is no private property b : a system or condition of society in which the means of production are owned and controlled by the state
3 : a stage of society in Marxist theory transitional between capitalism and communism and distinguished by unequal distribution of goods and pay according to work done
I bet you are shocked by that title huh?! I was too! My wonderful husband and I got away this weekend for an overnight date. This meant we had time to talk about alot of things. Saturday night while sitting in the public hot tub at the hotel we struck up a conversation with 2 couples from our great neighbor to the north - Canada. One of the topics we got on was our health care issue and their government run health care. They didn't have two many bad things to say about it (not that I am advocating ours by any means!!!). I expected them to say how awful it was, and the pure awfulness (not a real word) was just not there. Sunday was we were leaving TC we were talking about it again, and a thought came to mind.
Capitalism will lead to Socialism because of the greed of man. What socialism does, is it legislates morality. Because the basic instinct of man is not toward good, but toward evil (Genesis 6:5), (1 Timothy 6:9-11). We are dealing with the abuse of capitalism in the United States right now. The rest of the world has been dealing with in for alot longer, and are closer to and already involved in Socialism to various stages. You see America and Americans seem to think that people will do the right thing, because we are all basically good right? Wrong as the above verses state. People will do what is best for them. If they can make money, more money, and more money, then that is what they'll do, regardless. Therefore we have issues like: Bailouts of the banking industry, why? They wanted more money. We have thousands and thousands of people in bankruptcy, why? They wanted bigger and better (this is a general statement, I know there are those that did their best, but still had to file). We drove through the little town of Manistee, where there is a Casino. There is a Check N Go there, Why? Because then the person with a gambling problem can quickly cash their check and head over to the Casino. The person that owns the Check N Go, doesn't care about the gambler. They care about making money. How about Lawyers who chase ambulances with frivolous lawsuits? How about people who sue companies when they order hot coffee and spill it on themselves? (Here's some other interesting lawsuits) There are governments that are so corrupt that they will allow their people to starve, and little babies that have to wait years to be adopted by a loving family, why? Because they want to keep the money for themselves. Are you seeing it here? So here we are in the US. Our government sees the imbalance in our land and says we need to make it even - socialism.
Why do I say all this? It's just an observation. That's it. Just another lesson for me into the heart of man. How without God we are corrupt. (Romans 3:22-24) , (Romans 3:9-10) No matter how pretty the package is, or how good you try to be in and of yourself, without God we are evil, and every bent our our hearts are toward evil, and governments will try to legislate morality to no avail.
I hope I haven't freaked anyone out, and you're all now thinking I'm a flaming socialist! No way! I love Capitalism and all it can mean. I'm just a realist who sees the heart of man without God, and is beginning to understand. We wish those that made gobs and gobs would give unselfishly to others in need. We wish doctors didn't charge so much for services. We will Insurance companies would stop over charging doctors! We wish pharmaceutical companies would place a reasonable price on medicine, the list goes on and on. But they are free to do as they chose within the context of Capitalism, hoping they will do the right thing. Hummm.........
5 comments:
Such an interesting post and quite true. My husband has his own business and runs it as close to God's ways as is humanly possible and he comes across all sorts of issues - people trying to make money all the time and will even lie to get what they want. It's pretty scarey. I was reading in Genesis this morning, about when God destroyed Sodom & Gomorrah and was thinking that things were bad then just as they are now, but the BIG difference was that (I presume) people were people of their word. If they said "Yes" then they meant 'yes'. Unlike now - people are not as moral as they used to be, which is so sad. We do live in uncertain times in almost every way we can think of, BUT praise God that He has warned us of these things and as long as our focus stays on Him and with His grace, we'll come through it. One day, we will be sat with the Lord chatting about these things !!
Well, this is very interesting. I've never thought about it in this way but after reading I do believe you are right. Mans heart is full of sin and with that comes greed. Good post, Kim.
Wow! That was a really interesting post, and I love the connection between our depravity and capitalism to socialism. Thanks for making me think...
Xandra
You and your DH had a fascinating discussion! We talk about these kinds of issues regularly. (e-Dad has a strong political bent.) It's interesting to run into your thoughts on this topic here.
The darkness of evil and greed in man's heart in this country has been exposed in a most uncomfortable way. It's been hard for e-Dad to admit his great disappointment in the US! (As a Canadian expat. perhaps my view has been less rose-colored than his, since he's a native-born American.)
Political systems seem doomed to fail. I seem to recall that God wanted to be King over Israel, but the people wanted an earthly ruler. God warned them that all sorts of bad things would happen if they didn't obey the Law...
Good food for thought!
Have a blessed Thanksgiving!
Hugs, e-Mom :~D
I have ton of Milton Friedman worshiping friends. They whine because our country recently took a light turn towards socialism, as always they are freaking out and they see red everywhere now, in reality with now have a government that supports capitalism with a social stance. And I've told them, it's the corporation's fault our government is slightly socialist now, libertarianism only works until people get fed up with it, therefore it's capitalism abuses that lead to socialism, and business execs are the ones that kill a good thing entirely out of greed.
BTW, having to verify every 90 seconds i am not a robot is a PITA.
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