Odličen in zelo pedagoško poučen komentar ekonomista Marka Thome o tem, zakaj kapitalizem kot sicer čudovito učinkovit sistem potrebuje intervencije države – za ublažitev kriz, ki vedno prizadenejo najšibkejše, ter za večjo redistribucijo dohodkov, ki zmanjšuje družbeno neenakost. Določena stopnja neenakosti je koristna, ker spodbuja večjo kreativnost in večje vložke posameznikov, toda povečana neenakost v povezavi z zmanjševanjem socialne mobilnosti povzroča, da mnogi talenti ne morejo priti denimo do primerne izobrazbe in primernega zdravstvenega varstva. Zaradi tega pa celotna družba ne more optimalno izkoriščati svojega najpomembnejšega resursa, to je človeškega kapitala.
Thoma se zato v sozvočju s progresivnimi, liberalnimi ameriškimi ekonomisti zavzema za več redistribucije in progresivno obdavčitev, kar – zelo ilustrativno – primerja z zavarovanjem. Tudi pri požarnem zavarovanju vsi vplačujemo premije, do odškodnine pa so upravičeni samo tisti, ki so utrpeli škodo. Nič drugače ni glede socialne varnosti.
Spodaj je nekaj odlomkov, priporočam pa, da preberete celoten komentar.
Capitalism is the best economic system yet discovered for giving people the goods and services they desire at the lowest possible price, and for producing innovative economic growth. But there is a cost associated with these benefits, the boom and bust cycles inherent in capitalist systems, and those costs hit working class households – who have done nothing to deserve such a fate – very hard. Protecting innocent households from the costs of recessions is an important basis for our social insurance programs.It is becoming more and more evident that there is another cost of capitalist systems, the inevitable rising inequality documented by Thomas Piketty in “Capital in the Twenty-First Century, that our social insurance system will need to confront
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Protection against the rising inequality that comes with capitalists systems can be justified similarly. There are winners who succeed largely on luck – the wealth of their parents for example – and the unfortunate who, try as they might, are not able to achieve the same success. As former UC Berkeley economist and current chief economist at Google, Hal Varian, says, “If luck plays a substantial role in the determination of income, it makes sense to have a progressive income tax, creating a form of social insurance in which the lucky subsidize the unlucky.”
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Some degree of inequality is needed to provide the incentives that make a capitalist system work, but inequality has risen far past what is needed to induce the effort that makes the system function. Would those at the very top of the income distribution – where inequality is increasing the most – really work less if they only received $250 million instead of $350 million per year for their efforts?
At some point, one I believe we’ve passed already, the benefits of inequality in terms of incentives are surpassed by the costs. As Joseph Stiglitz argues, “Inequality leads to lower growth and less efficiency. Lack of opportunity means that its most valuable asset – its people – is not being fully used. Many at the bottom, or even in the middle, are not living up to their potential, because the rich, needing few public services and worried that a strong government might redistribute income, use their political influence to cut taxes and curtail government spending. This leads to underinvestment in infrastructure, education, and technology, impeding the engines of growth.”
Capitalism is a wonderful economic system, but it is not perfect. Government intervention is needed to soften the impact of recessions, to overcome market failures, and to offset the rising inequality that threatens capitalism’s ability to serve the vast majority of households to the fullest possible extent.
Vir: Mark Thoma, The Fiscal Times
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