Can We Save American Capitalism by Steven Pearlstein, Essay Example

Why is capitalism in trouble?

The primary foundation of American Capitalism is based upon the condition by which the resources of the nation are explored and developed further for the sake of providing what the people need and what the companies want to acquire which specifically includes a relative rate of profit from their market share. For many years, the said system was able to provide a distinct impact on how the national economy of the United States have fared in the field of local and international economic competition. Considerably, this process has fueled the overall condition of the country’s economy. In this case, money, as the main commodity for determining such status of economic stability, has also become a source of power especially when it comes to living a good and satisfying life.

This is the primary reason why capitalists are considered as the primary leaders of the society. Most often than not, social decisions including political decisions are empowered by such power that capitalists have over the people and over the community as a whole. This is why it is important that for the American capitalism to work, people have to retain trust in the system that connects the capitalists with the overall social operations in the community. At present, Pearlstein points out how the trust of the people towards the government has specifically diminished. This posts a distinct danger on the way by which American Capitalism is operating to continue developing the nation’s economy through specifically empowering the people’s trust into the system.

What are the solutions discussed by Pearlstein?

As Pearlstein points out, the continuous application of a free market has become rather impractical. He points out that it is important to recreate the framework of the American capitalistic system of operation. While balancing political and economic power of the government may be considered efficient, its realization is assumed as specifically impossible at some point; hence the author points out the need to think differently. The imbalance in the distribution of wealth seems to be a sad truth about the situation, nevertheless, it is assumed that it is an evidently important part of keeping the American capitalism work. Through the existence of immigrants who are at the level of taking a distinct opportunity in getting employed in low-edged labor work. He points out that the effective distribution of labor and making sure that the talented ones work for the highest positions that are able to fuel economic and industrial developmentto be able to create more organizations and thus crate more work opportunities for the working population.

What is your position and why?

Regarding the different propositions of Pearlstein, there is specifically a distinct indication on why economic imbalance is necessary. The power that money provides the rich ones gives them the capacity to establish more organizations that could provide more job opportunities to other members of the society. The need to provide manpower for such organizations is necessary to be able to sure that the organizations would be able to generate the needed profit as desired by the owners. Relatively, this fact has been an ongoing truth in most economies around the globe. It is noted however that in this case, a lot of individuals are left at the lower edge of the economic pyramid left out to simply accept work opportunities that may provide meager earnings. This however is necessary to be able to keep both the macro and micro economic systems in the country to operate freely. Considerably, while it is agreeable that such situation is unavoidable, it is still important to make sure that people who are at the lower edge of the economic-pyramid be given the chance to experience a good and satisfying life by getting what they need through the help of the government agencies that are designated to create health programs, education policies and other operations dedicated to attend to the basic needs of the society. Only through this would their interest in working further be kept.

References

Galbraith, J.K. (1963). American Capitalism really (Plicn Edition ed.). Harondsworth: Penun. p. 28.

Pearlstein, S. (2012). Can we save American Capitalism? http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/can-we-save-american-capitalism/2012/08/31/800de6be-f04e-11e1-ba17-c7bb037a1d5b_story.html. (Retrieved on February 4, 2014).