Lyndon Furst's
A Different Perspective
"On Getting My Nose Tweaked"
POSTED 7/1/09
On Getting My Nose Tweaked
I stepped into it quite innocently last week. I had just arrived at Hopper’s for my weekly Optimist breakfast and greeted the guys at the center table. (They are the ones who settle all the township problems early in the morning.) “Hey Furst,” one of them said to me. “That other guy really told you a thing or two in the paper today!” At first I did not know what he was talking about, but soon realized it was the “other columnist” in this fine newspaper.
As soon as breakfast was over I rushed to get a copy of the paper. Sure enough, Other Columnist did indeed have a thing or two to say about my attempt at a scholarly analysis of the current economic situation in our fair republic. You might say that I got my nose tweaked pretty good.
Now before I make a feeble attempt at defending my own position, let me say that I have a good deal of respect for Other Columnist. He is well educated and has an inquiring mind. He reads thick books containing big words, many of which I cannot pronounce much less know the meaning of. I have known him a long time and consider him a friend. Like many of my friends, I sometimes agree with Other Columnist on political matters and sometimes I don’t. This is one of the times I do not agree with him.
Other Columnist accused me of desiring an egalitarian state of things where everyone is equally poor. He needs to read my writing more carefully. I do believe that our Creator considers us all of equal value but, short of the New Earth, we will not all enjoy equality of outcome from economic activity. What I have proposed is a system which rewards productive labor more than speculation and manipulation of the markets. I consider management as productive work and believe good management should be rewarded with good pay. Conversely, poor management should not be rewarded with huge bonuses. Regardless of what Other Columnist’s Wall Street Lawyer (WSL) friend says, I am sticking with that view, at least for the present time.
Speaking of the WSL, I would expect him to defend the shenanigans of Wall Street investment banks. That is where he makes his money. Of course the government played a role in the current mess when they required mortgage companies to lend to people who had no means to repay their loans. But remember, it was a Republican controlled Congress which enacted that bit of folly. Also remember that it was the relatively unregulated investment institutions that invented mortgage backed securities and other risk concealing instruments which provided them a great deal of unearned wealth. That is what accelerated the financial meltdown in America as well as the rest of the world. WSL conveniently forgot to mention that little item.
Other Columnist and I are in agreement when he says “an honest earning of money gives meaning to life.” Over the years I have lauded the work ethic in several of my columns. I oppose an economic system that rewards people for scheming, speculation, and manipulation. I also oppose a system that gives money to certain classes of people who feel their position in society entitles them to it. In this group I include chronic welfare cheaters, market speculators, Wall Street investment bankers, and the spoiled offspring of the super rich.
All economic activity results in the redistribution of wealth. In a free market system, some people will end up with more wealth than others.. That is not necessarily bad as long as all who have the ability to engage in productive labor get the opportunity to do so. Also a civilized society should have some sort of mechanism to assist those who do not have the ability to work.
From my perspective, the better economic systems give the better rewards of wealth to those who do the most productive work. On the other hand, systems that give the least rewards for good work, while benefitting the indolent and exploiters of other peoples’ labor, are not in the best interests of society. Unregulated free markets tend toward the latter. Overly regulated markets are just as bad. Finding the middle ground is the challenge to which business and government leaders must give their best energies if we are to be restored to a state of economic prosperity.