Big_Bird
Joined: 31 Jan 2003
Location: Sometimes here sometimes there...
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 Posted: Wed Jan 16, 2008 4:26 am Post subject: Unsubstantiated prejudice masquerading as economic analysis |
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| Complaints that Europeans are biased against capitalism ignore the facts about the European economy and the social injustices and economic inequalities in America |
The World According to Wall Street
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Foreign Policy magazine in the US complains this month that "in France and Germany, students are being forced to undergo a dangerous indoctrination. Taught that economic principles such as capitalism, free markets and entrepreneurship are savage, unhealthy and immoral, these children are raised on a diet of prejudice and bias. Rooting it out may determine whether Europe's economies prosper or continue to be left behind."
The article, written by Newsweek's European economics chief Stefan Theil, is titled Europe's Philosophy of Failure. In fact, Europe is doing quite well by any objective measures, and it seems somewhat counterfactual to cluck on in this unbalanced way just as the US economy, buoyed only by a continuing flood of Chinese money, teeters
on the edge of a crash, as subprime mortgages and derivatives trading erode the financial foundations of Wall Street.
Undaunted by reality, Foreign Policy continues complaining about Germany and France:
Millions of children are being raised on prejudice and disinformation. Educated in schools that teach a skewed ideology, they are exposed to a dogma that runs counter to core beliefs shared by many other western countries. They study from textbooks filled with a doctrine of dissent ... . Extracting these children from the jaws of bias could mean the difference between world prosperity and menacing global rifts.
Shocked, shocked, as only the country that gave the world Enron, the savings and loan scandal and the almost obligatory half-billion-dollar CEO golden parachute can be, the magazine inveighs: "In both France and Germany, for instance, schools have helped ingrain a serious aversion to capitalism. In one 2005 poll, just 36% of French citizens
said they supported the free-enterprise system ... . In Germany, meanwhile, support for socialist ideals is running at all-time highs - 47% in 2007 versus 36% in 1991."
Portentously the article concludes: "A biased view of economics feeds into many of the world's most vexing problems, from the growth of populism to the global rise of anti-American, anti-capitalist attitudes."
This unsubstantiated prejudice masquerading as economic analysis is pervasive in the US business world. I once interviewed the CEO of an American company that had subsidiaries in Holland and Scotland. He complained that in Holland he had to provide six weeks holiday for the staff and six months of paid sick leave. And although it was not so bad in Scotland, it was far worse than in the US, where he only had to offer two weeks vacation and 10 days sick leave.
I asked him which were his most productive and profitable plants. Holland, Scotland and the US last, he replied. And he could not see the connection. This quasi-theological horror of creeping "socialism" permeates American business, whose leaders have a vision of a Europe mired in perpetual recession.
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My apologies to MindMeToo et al in advance: I will no doubt fail in my duties as the OP (whatever they are deemed to be) as I probably won't have much chance to comment on this thread. Scrolling down with my one free arm while I'm breastfeeding is generally as much as I can do most days. But I thought it was an interesting article and might generate some good discussion. |
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