Money

You know the best things in life are free.  But you can give them to the birds and bees.

Arthur Brooks has some worthwhile thoughts about capitalism .  Here it is in a nutshell: (1) Success makes us happy; (2) in a capitalist economy, we tend to measure success by money; so (3) money makes us happy, and more money makes us happier.

Take the case of billionaire Larry Ellison, founder of Oracle. The world’s 14th-richest man, he would need to spend more than $30 million per week, or $183,000 per hour, just to avoid increasing his wealth. Further, he would have to spend it on items with no investment qualities, meaning that, unless he sets his money on fire, or (better yet) gives it away, he simple cannot not be filthy rich. Yet he continues to slave away, earning billion after billion. Being rich, and having more than the average Joe, simply cannot be driving Larry Ellison. It is the will to succeed and create value at greater and greater heights.

Who enjoys the benefits created from the slaving of Bill Gates (worth $58 billion and counting), Warren Buffett ($62 billion), and all of America’s other success-addicted, ultra-rich entrepreneurs? We all do: As long as fortunes are earned—as opposed to stolen, squeezed from governments, or otherwise extorted from citizens—this is good for all of us. Oracle has not made Larry Ellison a rich man without any benefit to society. The firm currently has tens of thousands of employees, people with well-paying jobs to support their families. The company has introduced technology that has benefited all parts of the economy, and it has paid billions to its shareholders. And we can’t forget that Oracle has rendered generously unto Caesar, year after year: In 2007 alone, it paid $1.2 billion in corporate taxes, totally apart from the personal taxes paid by Ellison and his employees. * * *

Brooks might have added that Ellison, Gates and people like him also give lots of money away.

I have some more thoughts in the same vein.  One reason why money works so well as a success generator is because in a market economy it can get you anything you want. In other words, it’s really markets that make us happy.

Another great thing about money: in order to get it in a market economy, you have to sell things to other people. In order to do that, you need to provide them with something that increases their happiness. Compare war, for example. Now, to be sure, that gives capitalists incentives to create wants. But that’s not necessarily a bad thing. After all, if you don’t want anything, what’s going to make you happy?

Brooks concludes:

[C]apitalism is the best system to allow people to succeed on their merits in the economy—and we know that it is success that truly does bring happiness. Capitalism, moored in proper values of honesty and fairness, is a key to our gross national happiness, and we should defend it vigorously.