Someone who thinks well of himself is said to have a healthy self-concept and is envied. Someone who thinks well of his country is called a patriot and is applauded. But someone who thinks well of his species is regarded as hopelessly naive and is dismissed.
– Alfie Kohn
Much has occurred of recent that is bound to make people question the validity of our nation’s reliance on our traditional economic system. There are also those who would say that nothing has really changed – that capitalism and the ups and downs therein are just the way of the world. There are some, however, who believe it’s time for something different – that the capitalist ideals to which we hold so firmly, even in our time of hardship, are no longer suitable to a 21st-century United States.
When our nation was young, it was known as “the land of opportunity,” a place where, if you worked hard, you would eventually be able to live a prosperous life and find happiness. However idealistic that may have been, today, even if you work your hardest, there’s no guarantee in the least that you will be able to get by, much less prosper.
To an extent, the market is a boon to this nation. It cannot be denied it was one of the primary reasons our country rose up out of its birth as a developing nation to its current place as a world superpower. The vaunted competition that gives rise to the innovations that have kept the United States at the forefront of technology and development has served us faithfully through the years.
But then, we are not a developing nation anymore. We have reached the point where we no longer have to live by the cutthroat ways we have used in the past. Instead of operating on the belief that we are all on our own, we can help each other, and all rise together, rather than one by little one.
The key element in capitalism is the idea that “you get what you work for.” But this credo is quickly becoming reversed. Poorer people may have to work three jobs just to make rent, while trust fund babies are born with silver spoons in their mouths and slide by on the gold-encrusted coattails of their parents.
The United States, especially for the last decade, has slowly and steadily begun to give up on that promise of a better life for those willing to work for it.
Our system now fosters the idea that those who have nothing somehow deserve it – that they weren’t working hard enough, or that they are just one of those who “fell through the cracks.” But, in a country as rich and as powerful as the United States, allowing millions to fall through the cracks is unacceptable.
Once, when I was in the airport waiting to pick up my brother, I overheard a man who had volunteered in the Peace Corps talking about the time he spent working in Ghana. What stuck with me was his talks of people who were utterly floored when they found out there are homeless and starving people in the United States.
I’m not talking about taking to the streets demanding liberation of the proletariat and the end of the bourgeoisie. What I am talking about is universal health care. I’m talking about government regulation to ensure no more abuses like those that brought us to this point. I’m talking about making this nation no more about “every man for himself,” and perhaps bringing it back to our country’s motto: “Out of many, One.”
We have spent trillions on a pointless war when we could have been spending that money to ensure everyone gets an education. Or medicine. Or food. Instead, because of our vaunted free market, we’re spending a trillion we shouldn’t have to spend to get it back on its feet. We can sit back and say, “Well, it’s never going to change, and we can’t fix it.” Or, we can recognize that for the cop-out idea it is, and see that we have the potential and the means to actually bring about the changes this country needs. We need to realize we can be better. We have the capability to be more than our basic selves. We can work for the betterment of everyone, instead of just ourselves.
We will get out of this recession, and when we do, going back to (pardon the pun) business as usual is not going to cut it anymore. The world has changed over the past century and our economy, along with our society, needs to change with it. Otherwise, we are doomed to repeat a past we refuse to learn from.
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