Private decisions in markets supposedly are morally and economically better than any public or collective action. As a result the sense of the “we” that binds a society together and gives us reason to belong is being lost. We take refuge in looking after number one, because there is no sense in, nor reason for, doing anything else. Societies, unlike individuals, do not die. But the cancer of inequality produces results that are equally catastrophic. Trust evaporates. There is no sense of common purpose. Creative social, economic and political interaction and deliberation becomes impossible. Capitalism distorts itself and ceases to innovate. Electorates become vulnerable to extreme populism from left or right. Anyone with the capacity to own capital in an era when the returns exceed those of wages and output will quickly become disproportionately and progressively richer. The incentive is not to be a risk-taker, but rather to collect rents from the assets you hold – from property to patents: witness the explosion of buy-to-let. Our companies and our rich don’t need to back frontier innovation, or even invest to produce; they just need to harvest their returns and tax breaks. Tax shelters and compound interest will do the rest. Capitalist dynamism is undermined, but other forces join to wreck the system. The rich are effective at protecting their wealth from taxation, so that inevitably the proportion of the total tax burden shouldered by those on middle incomes has risen. Societies where brute luck – of inheritance or of being vested with disproportionately extravagant share options – determines lifestyles and life chances are not just unfair, they become gummed up and unstable. — Will Hutton, author How Good We Can Be. ARTICLE: ‘Inequality has become a challenge to us as moral beings’ (Jan 25, 2015). theguardian/books/2015/jan/25/inequality-has-become-challenge-how-good-we-can-be-extract-will-hutton?
Posted on: Mon, 26 Jan 2015 10:03:34 +0000
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