They begin with a richly researched account of the efforts of American businesses in the first half of the 20th century to shape public opinion on issues including child labour, utility regulation and, later, the New Deal. The campaign they sketch is closer to propaganda than mere lobbying, encompassing everything from pamphlets and radio shows to a purge of unfriendly textbooks from universities.
In the end, though, child labour was outlawed, utilities were regulated and the New Deal reshaped America’s economy—suggesting that the bid to convert America to market fundamentalism was by the middle of the century looking like a flop. Greater intellectual credibility was needed, so businesses helped bankrolland bring out “The Road to Serfdom”, his denunciation of collectivism and central planning.
The result, the authors argue, was a society primed for the Reagan revolution of the 1980s. After that, the book shifts into a critique of the past four decades of free-market economic policy, with particular attention to financial and environmental deregulation, the loosening of antitrust enforcement and free trade. Readers familiar with the debates on these issues will find all this less original than the preceding chapters and occasionally one-sided.
Nonetheless, they succeed in chronicling a concerted effort by American business to shift public opinion in favour of free markets. The question remains, though: has it worked? The authors may be right that business helped usher in the golden age of Reaganite economics. Yet America Inc has not exactly secured the people’s love.
Just 14% of Americans say they have “a great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in big business, down from 34% in 1975, according to data from Gallup, a polling firm. That puts it ahead of Congress but behind the presidency . From the offbeat comedy “Office Space” in 1999, to Lord Business in “Meanwhile a survey released in 2020 by Edelman, a research firm, found that 47% of Americans felt “capitalism as it exists today does more harm than good in the world”, hardly a resounding endorsement.
Unethical quasi-capitalism is closer friends with communism than actual capitalism.
I blame our education system
After socialism infiltrates for decades.
A return to the Mixed Economics would restore the balance.
i believed in Regan
Its easy to see unregulated capitalism has done immense damage to humanity. From Perdue Pharma who's opiod marketing led to the deaths of 0.5 million Americans, to the ClimateCrisis which oil companies spent decades trying to conceal. And 'Citizens United' has made it 10x worse.
That's until they start living in a communist state. Surveys can be biased depending on the knowledge base of those being surveyed
more simply, i think it needs some adjustments, we could start putting money and ethics on the same level. Is It utopic? isn't It?
👍🏽
While living in the most prosperous country in human civilization.
Us gov : like we care.. 😏
Ya think!
When Capitalism is corrupted to its core, that's precisely what it is, harmful. Governments have reneged on their duty to ensure via laws that corruption stays out of Capitalism.
Oh my gosh ✨🥤🍿 the world would be controlled by those, you know, wild celebrities
Did the authors hold interest rates constant over time? Getting ~%16.5 “risk-free” returns in 1981 really sealed the deal for some savers. With capitalism you get out what you put in, and then some.
Seriously.. ppl had enuf of the BullSh*t! I mean really .. who rushes out of bed at ungodly hours to make the boss Rich/Richer? Ppl trying to stay Alive! Those taking boatloads of BS to pay bills are stuck. How many quit during that GreatResignation?
Which means publications like THE ECONOMIST have not done their job. Capitalism is responsible for countries around the world escaping poverty. For curing disease. The American Dream. Maybe make that a headline.
Then why do people run from socialistic countries to capitalistic ones, and never the other way around?
shingaiRndoro
It’s not capitalism that’s bad. It’s the people who are bad. When the righteous rule the city rejoices.
Capitalism is the best of the worst systems. I think that a “social capitalism” looking at results and profits respecting people's limits and the well-being of people and the community is the way. Easy, isn't it?
The Leftist-Marxists in American 'Education' have been effective
Kkkkk assinado um socialista !!! Esse povo é doentio…
Like all GOP policies, it was simply welfare for corporations marketed as freedom.
It depends to whom you ask.
CSandbatch
let me guess, ecommunists - you think markets should be LESS free
The Big Myth campaign was a fantastic success. Over the last 40 years, 50Trillion dollars of wealth has been transferred from ( what was) the middle class to the ultra wealthy As a result, most Americans are financially insecure now. The goal has been achieved. 🙁
Well, of course. Go back to his transformation under the GE handlers, which he did for his own financial health. From Democrat SAG president B-grade actor to GOP corporate shill selling out labor, unions and the middle class for his own benefit.
Of course. Corporations have bent to the pressure of wokeism and will usher in a parallel economy based on small businesses working in a consortium model.
Back in Reagan years it was “What’s good for General Motors is good for the United States”. Now not so much; it’s more like “It’s good for China”
The only reason free markets don’t work is because the government is always there making sure they aren’t free
Reagan & his 'trickle down economics' was a huge con on America, it only benefited the Rich. Screwed over the rest of us. GQPLies
the propaganda is from the Economist featuring such biased left-wing 'liberal' authors of the study. the only myth is that socialism/communism works
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