The Equality Myth

How real progress and civilization depend on competition and inequality

(Source: Getty Images)

Bill Bonner, reckoning today from Youghal, Ireland...

The American Elite Establishment has launched three major initiatives so far this century. All were based on lies, mistakes, and corruption. All were failures.  

“Weapons of mass destruction” led off. There were none. But the US squandered $8 trillion and thousands of lives looking for them.

Then came Ben Bernanke’s whopper: “If we don’t do this [pass a $700 billion boondoggle bill] we may not even have an economy on Monday.” As reported yesterday, it led to $44 trillion in additional debt since 2008.

Then came the campaign to stop COVID. Pfizer made a fortune from its experimental new drug. The Guardian: 

Pfizer made nearly $37bn (£27bn) in sales from its Covid-19 vaccine last year – making it one of the most lucrative products in history – and has forecast another bumper year.

But it didn’t stop the virus. And ‘the science’ now tells us what we suspected all along – that natural immunity is better than a vaccine and we would have been better off letting the young and the healthy get the virus and get over it, rather than shooting everybody up with drugs and turning vaccines into a political issue. Meanwhile,  shutdowns and mandates cost trillions of dollars more, along with stunted lives, drug overdoses, depression, suicides, and broken marriages.

Where did the feds get the money to throw down these ratholes? First, it was real money from taxing citizens and borrowing their savings. Then, when that wasn’t enough, the Fed filled the gap with fake money, ‘printing’ $8 trillion of new money since 1999.

Wholesale Lunacy

And now… rising prices! Who could have seen that coming?  

Even as to inflation, they were wrong. First, they thought the problem was “too little inflation.” Then, they said they wouldn’t have to ‘normalize’ until 2024.  Then, they said inflation was ‘transitory.’ And now they say they are going to raise rates – as much as one full percentage point! – next month. 

Here’s the latest from US News & World Report:

Wholesale inflation rose 1% in January, twice as much as forecast as producers saw the prices they pay showing no sign of a slowdown, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported on Tuesday.

Economists had expected an increase of 0.5% for the month. On a yearly basis, prices rose 9.7%, the same as in December. 

And now… onto the next losing proposition!

Yes, the feds might have been wrong about almost everything so far this century… but there are still a lot more things they can be wrong about.

The nation’s chief executive signaled one of them in his SuperBowl comments.

"The whole idea that a league that is made up of so many athletes of color as well as so diverse, that there's not enough African American qualified coaches to manage these NFL teams, it just seems to me that it's a standard that they'd want to live up to. It's not a requirement of law, but it's a requirement I think of just some generic decency."

We have no idea what ‘generic decency’ is. Old fashioned decency is good enough for us. But why would it be more decent to have a Black head coach than a White one? Equality?

Even a casual observer can see that NFL coaches tend to be White, whereas the players tend to be Black. In the name of equality, Biden chose to focus on the apparent disproportion of White coaches, suggesting that it was somehow indecent. But if it was indecent to have too many White coaches, why was it not indecent to have too many Black players?

Depending on Inequality

‘Equality’ doesn’t exist in nature. No two snowflakes are exactly alike. Nor are two people. And Thank God. Imagine if we were all tipped into a gray porridge of perpetual mediocrity! Distinctions are what we want… not equality. One is smart, another dull. One is fast, another slow. One comes from a good family; another is a gutter rat.  

Progress and civilization depend on inequality. We choose one baker over another because we judge his cakes superior... unequal to those of his competitor. We put our money with a money manager whom we believe will give us returns above those of the others on offer. And we don’t want an NFL team that is just as good as the others. We want one that wins.

One of the propositions, adjacent to ‘equality,’ is ‘racism.’ It purports to explain unequal results in American society. If Blacks are generally poorer than Whites it is because the latter hold the former back. It must be a comfort to some people to think so; it excuses them from responsibility for their own lifestyle choices. And it must be a source of pleasant indignation to others; it gives the White elite another big stick to beat the ‘deplorables’ over the head with. But is it true?  

Capitalism is (theoretically) color blind. Investors want more money; they don’t care who brings it to them. Businesses, too, want sales and profits above all else.  But now, in this Enlightened Age, businesses are supposed to care about other things – about the planet, for example… and having a ‘diverse,’ racially balanced workforce.    

But Biden’s “equality” and (sotto voce) “anti-racist” suggestion would require us to believe something extraordinary. Apparently, NFL owners are able to put aside their inherent racism when they hire players. And pay them huge amounts of money. The highest paid player, for example, is Patrick Mahomes, who gets $45 million per year as quarterback for the Kansas City Chiefs. And there are 19 other players in the NFL who earn more than $20 million per season.

But then, when they go to hire their coaches, for some inexplicable reason, the ‘white privilege’ kicks in… and they hire a White man!  

It could be a very strange and sophisticated form of racism. And team owners who want to heed Biden’s call, and follow ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) guidelines, may do perfectly well. (Maybe coaches don’t really matter very much.) But if we were betting on the SuperBowl… we’d put our money on the old fashioned, decent capitalists. We’d bet on the team that hires the coaches and players who are most likely to move the ball across the goal line.

Regards,

Bill Bonner

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