|
Can Christians Be Capitalists
Can Christians Be Capitalists'
by A K Whitehead
For reasons of space, we have to be very concise in this article.
By Christian we mean people who put Christ first in their lives
as their guiding principle. These are not those who call themselves
Christians but who live independently of the Body of Christ.
What Is A Capitalist
A capitalist is one who owns capital. From an economics perspective
capital is not money or finance. Capital is what is used to produce
goods or services: machinery, tools, equipment, etc. It used to be
said that the distinctive feature of a capitalist is that he can wait,
in distinction from a worker who cannot wait because
what he acquires from his work is what he needs to live from week-to-
week or month-to-month.
Labout And Capital
To be a capitalist, therefore, one must have the means to wait. Mainly this
is because goods and services all come into being only through some
process of production. And such processes inevitably involve time and
therefore waiting. This is the initial source of the capitalists market power,
and the inherent cause of labour's market weakness. One sees this power
struggle in every industrial dispute, especially when it engages the ultimate
strategy of the strike, when called by labour, or the lockout, when called
by capitalists.
Capitalists And Markets
There is another aspect attached to waiting which is central to the
question we are discussing. How do capitalists behave within a competitive
market environment'
Behaviour is considerably determined by the market. His basic objective
is to survive. What does his survival depend on' Profits. Without profits
About Doorway PagesSo how do you position your web site at the top of search engine results ' Use doorway pages. Doorway pages, also ..... he will not continue into the long run.
On what do profits depend' There are many parts to this answer, but the
principle components are efficiency and establishing a market advantage.
The latter, in turn, depends on out-thinking and out-performing competitors.
That means producing at a high quality level or, what amounts to the same
thing, a lower real price level.
This takes us to the real nub of the question we are addressing. Where
markets are highly competitive, out-performing competitors is difficult.
So long term survival is difficult because every organisation will be
pressured into using the same most, efficient technology and prices will
be competed to levels which produce relatively low levels of profit.
No-one likes this kind of situation because it is constantly threatening to
the long term objective of survival. Yet, conditions of uncertainty are the
norm. And market capitalists do not like uncertainty. They have always
and will always attempt to reduce uncertainty. They do that by, one way
or another, getting rid of the competition. It is a remarkable paradox that
the greatest argument in favour of a market system, its competitiveness,
is the one thing which market participants spend their time trying to get rid of.
Eliminating Christianity In The Market
Eliminating competitors unavoidably means eliminating Christianity from
the market environment. Competitors are got rid of by driving them out
of business before one's own organisation is driven out. And that is the
major principle involved in long term survival. Historically it has frequently
involved illegal means, but in any case it involves taking every advantage
and using every possible means to outreach and eliminate competitors.
In The Wealth Of Nation published in 1776 at a very early stage
in the development of market capitalism, Adam Smith, who coined the
phrase about ......
Read More ...
|
