~ Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, The Communist Manifesto
Showing posts with label books - The Communist Manifesto. Show all posts
Showing posts with label books - The Communist Manifesto. Show all posts
Jun 12, 2016
Marx and Engels unwittingly explain the benefits of free trade
The bourgeoisie, by the rapid improvement of all instruments of production, by the immensely facilitated means of communication, draws all, even the most barbarian, nations into civilization. The cheap prices of its commodities are the heavy artillery with which it batters down all Chinese walls, with which it forces the barbarians' intensely obstinate hatred of foreigners to capitulate. It compels all nations, on pain of extinction, to adopt the bourgeois mode of production; it compels them to introduce what it calls civilization into their midst, i.e., to become bourgeois themselves. In one word, it creates a world after its own image.
~ Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, The Communist Manifesto
~ Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, The Communist Manifesto
Oct 6, 2008
Martin Masse: Karl Marx would be proud of the bailouts
In his Communist Manifesto, published in 1848, Karl Marx proposed 10 measures to be implemented after the proletariat takes power, with the aim of centralizing all instruments of production in the hands of the state. Proposal Number Five was to bring about the “centralization of credit in the banks of the state, by means of a national bank with state capital and an exclusive monopoly.”
If he were to rise from the dead today, Marx might be delighted to discover that most economists and financial commentators, including many who claim to favour the free market, agree with him.Indeed, analysts at the Heritage and Cato Institute, and commentators in The Wall Street Journal and on this very page, have made declarations in favour of the massive “injection of liquidities” engineered by central banks in recent months, the government takeover of giant financial institutions, as well as the still stalled US$700-billion bailout package. Some of the same voices were calling for similar interventions following the burst of the dot-com bubble in 2001.
“Whatever happened to the modern followers of my free-market opponents?” Marx would likely wonder.
~ Martin Masse, "Bailout marks Karl Marx's comeback," Financial Post, September 29, 2008
If he were to rise from the dead today, Marx might be delighted to discover that most economists and financial commentators, including many who claim to favour the free market, agree with him.Indeed, analysts at the Heritage and Cato Institute, and commentators in The Wall Street Journal and on this very page, have made declarations in favour of the massive “injection of liquidities” engineered by central banks in recent months, the government takeover of giant financial institutions, as well as the still stalled US$700-billion bailout package. Some of the same voices were calling for similar interventions following the burst of the dot-com bubble in 2001.
“Whatever happened to the modern followers of my free-market opponents?” Marx would likely wonder.
~ Martin Masse, "Bailout marks Karl Marx's comeback," Financial Post, September 29, 2008
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