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By Froilan Vincent D. Bersamina
IS free-market capitalism already dead? With the global financial
crunch triggering massive government intervention, most people would
say “yes.” But for modern-day Objectivists inspired by Ayn Rand,
a Russian-born American novelist and philosopher who died in 1982,
free-market capitalism never exists in any country in the
world—not today and even in the last half-a-century.
In her magnum opus entitled Atlas Shrugged, a
1,200-page book published in 1957 and now Amazon’s number 1
bestseller, Ayn Rand clearly delineated the difference between
free-market capitalism and statism. The book, which centers on the
striking question—“Who is John Galt,” tells what happens in
case of massive government intervention.
John Galt, one of the heroes of Atlas who
invented a great motor that generates electricity out of static
energy, vowed to drain the brains of the world by leading an unusual
strike after the government issued regulatory laws that not only
choke business, but also disregard individual liberties. For 12
years, a number of great industrialists and business tycoons
disappeared after being recruited by John Galt and his two best
friends—Francisco D’Anconia, an heir to a great wealth, and
Ragnar Danneskjöld, the antithesis of Robinhood.
In the world of Atlas, the United States has
fallen in the hands of socialist thugs and collectivist politicians
who issued regulatory laws like Anti- Dog-Eat-Dog Act that aims to
destroy free-competition, Anti-Greed Act that intends to
redistribute wealth, Equalization of Opportunity Act that prevents
anybody from establishing more than one business, among others.
These fictitious edicts actually have ominous
parallels in the actual world. Just recently, the US government
issued the $700 billion Emergency Economic Stabilization Act and the
Auto Industry Financial and restructuring Act that aim to impinge on
the free-market system.
Most people see parallelism between the events
in Atlas and the current global financial turmoil that severely hit
developed countries like the US, Great Britain, France, Australia,
Germany, among others.
Sales of Atlas peaked during the first four
months of 2009, making it one of the most read books in the US
today. People at Ayn Rand Institute (ARI) credit this surge in the
sales of Atlas to Washington, which issued socialist economic
policies that include bail-out plans and stimulus packages to save
financially troubled banks and auto companies at the expense of
American taxpayers. Amid the global economic crunch, everybody seems
interested in getting a copy of Atlas.
According to Stephen Moore, columnist of Wall
Street Journal, “Many of us who know Rand’s work have noticed
that with each passing week, and with each successive bailout plan
and economic-stimulus scheme out of Washington, our current
politicians are committing the very acts of economic lunacy that
Atlas Shrugged parodied in 1957, when this 1,000-page novel was
first published and became an instant hit.”
But for some Filipino intellectuals like Dr.
Benito Teehankee, what we need is “moderate” government
intervention. “Free-market capitalism should be moderated by
government intervention when the common good requires. The
Philippine Constitution, in particular, calls for fair markets based
on social justice— free markets will not achieve so government
plays a role,” he told The Manila Times.
For Filipino Ayn Rand readers like Ayn Rand
Parel whose father, who gave her the popular name is an admirer of
the author, “Atlas Shrugged gave me the secret of man’s
purpose—to achieve his own happiness.”
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