The Social Cost of Capitalism
Paul Craig Roberts
Few, if any, corporations absorb the full cost of
their operations. Corporations shove many of their costs onto the environment,
the public sector, and distant third parties. For example, currently 3 million
gallons of toxic waste water from a Colorado mine has escaped and is working
its way down two rivers into Utah and Lake Powell. At least seven city water
systems dependent on the rivers have been shut down. The waste was left by
private enterprise, and the waste was accidentally released by the
Environmental Protection Agency, which might be true or might be a coverup for
the mine. If the Lake Powell reservoir ends up polluted, it is likely that the
cost of the mine imposed on third parties exceeds the total value of the mine’s
output over its entire life.
Economists call these costs “external costs” or “social
costs.” The mine made its profits by creating pollutants, the cost of which is
born by those who had no share in the profits.
As this is the way regulated capitalism works, you can
imagine how bad unregulated capitalism would be. Just think about the unregulated
financial system, the consequences we are still suffering with more to come.
Despite massive evidence to the contrary, libertarians
hold tight to their romantic concept of capitalism, which, freed from
government interference, serves the consumer with the best products at the
lowest prices.
If only.
Progressives have their own counterpart to the
libertarians’ romanticism. Progressives regard government as the white knight
that protects the public from the greed of capitalists.
If only.
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