Defending the Wicked Part 5: The Rich Capitalist Pig

The rich capitalist pig is the member of society who is extraordinary wealthy. He has so much money that even if he uses it non-stop for his own consumption he will never run out of it. These rich capitalist pigs are often vilified by others, "no one needs to have that much money", they say. The capitalist pigs are also seen as the ultimate symbol of human greed. But the most serious of all accusations against the capitalist pigs is that they got their money at the expense of everyone else in society.

The first argument against the capitalist pig that he does not need this much money is an argument in favor of tyranny. The moment you propose that people are not allowed to own so much money you are implying that there will be an entity, in this case the state, that will rob these people at gunpoint of their money. The state will say, "it is wrong for people to own this much money therefore you must hand over it to us because we are allowed to own this much money". Not only is this proposal self-defeating it is tyrannical. The idea of stealing rich people's money by the argument "they have too much", is also entirely unAmerican. The Declaration says, "the right to pursue happiness". Perhaps these rich capitalist pigs are happy with this amount of wealth, if so, they are pursuing their own happiness. Suggesting a system which robs the rich under the excuse "they have too much money" is to violate the central ideas for what America is supposed to stand for.

The accusation that rich capitalist pigs are greedy is just ridiculous. Capitalist pigs are ordinary people, and ordinary people are either greedy or not. Some capitalist pigs are greedy but not all of them are. You cannot accuse capitalist pigs of greed if greed is not inherent in the nature of being a rich capitalist pig. Not all rich people are greedy, in fact many of them are very charitable. The most famous rich people would definitely include: John Rockefeller, Andrew Carnegie, Bill Gates, and Warren Buffet. All of whom were philanthropists. In fact, here is a larger list of billionaires who have have agreed to give away at least 1/2 of all their money to charitable causes either now or until their death, this list definitely includes Bill Gates and Warren Buffet who together gave about 45 billion dollars to charitable causes as of yet - probably more in the future. And as we are on the topic of greed I want to bust a myth about America. America has been accused by other countries, usually from Europe, of being greedy. I find that statement just laughable. If America is greedy then all the countries in the world must be misers compared to America. The amount of charity that leaves America far exceeds than all countries in the world. How dare one call America greedy? This figure is still true even if one looks at charity as a percentage of national wealth. In 2009 America has raised about 300 billion dollars in charitable causes not just for itself but also for around the world (see here). Whenever there is a natural disaster anywhere in the world America, accused for its greed because it has so much money, has always been the very first country to help. If you want to call America fat, go ahead, that is true, if you want to call America stupid, okay, maybe you are right their too, but the one thing you cannot accuse America of being is greedy, not when you compare it to all other countries. So this accusation about greedy capitalist pigs is not only an irrelevant argument non-inherent to the nature of capitalist pigs it is also factually incorrect.

What is more surprising, at first, is that even if the rich capitalist pigs are the most greedy people in the world they are the most productive members of society! There are two means to acquire wealth, the political and the economic means. The political way is theft, you take away money from one group of people to yourself. The economic means is selling a product or a service that people want. The rich capitalist pigs that many people hate acquire their wealth not through political means but through economic means. The way you become a billionaire, through economic means, is by coming up with something that people very much want. That means to acquire billions of dollars it must be the case that you brought billions of dollars of prosperity to the world. It is true that the greedy rich capitalist pig does not think of others but only thinks of himself but what is so counter-intuitive is that his own greed can promote so much prosperity for the rest of the world. Even if Bill Gates was not a charitable capitalist but was greedier than the greediest Jew he would still be more productive than almost anyone else in the world. Because to acquire all that wealth he must get that money from people. The only reason why people would give Bill their money is because he is able to satisfy their desires efficiently.

The last point mentioned above is the fundamental fallacy of economics. And that is that free trade is a zero-sum game. If Bill Gates is extraordinary rich then it must be that the people around him are poorer. No, that is not true. He made a product that people brought, he exchanged something for that wealth. It was his product that benefited the entire world in the billions. In this manner free trade is a positive-sum game, we benefit and Bill Gates benefits. The fact that Bill Gates is a rich capitalist pig does not imply that we are poorer as a result. We are richer too, our standard of living goes up because of his hard work. So yes, it is true, the rich get richer, but the poor get richer too because for the rich to continue to earn their money they must exchange something of value to the people for their money. This is however not true for thiefs and politicians who get rich from political means, with them it is true that their wealth implies our lose, because they have not given us anything of value, or less value, in return for it. Thus, even if rich capitalist pigs were greedy, which is not a good criticism for the above reasons, they would still be most productive members of society. And this is not even mentioning all the jobs that they have created through their entrepreneurship. Thus, the argument that rich capitalist pigs get their wealth at the expense of the poor is a terrible argument.

As we can see now the rich capitalist pig is not evil, there is nothing about him that suggests his nature to be evil. In fact, he is nothing but a prosperity and an economic bonus to any society. It is in this manner that the rich capitalist pig is actually a hero and not a villain - as many people make him out to be.