The article traces the evolution of thoughts of a common man like me -- over time -- spanning more than six decades between youth and senility. I got rudimentary groundings on ‘communism’ while in school. Dialectical and historical materialism appeared to be so scientific, flawless and inevitable. Human society is an organic entity.  It explains the evolution of society with scientific reasoning and historical perspective -- as it became manifest to a young mind, then. The initial stage of human society is ‘primitive communism’ before the concept of private ownership emerged. Afterwards, it passed through stages of slavery, feudalism and capitalism. Imperialism, an offshoot of capitalism was there, too. After shaking off the shackles of imperialism we are under capitalism now, with some smatterings of socialism in between. The world is mostly capitalistic barring a few countries like China, Cuba, Laos and Vietnam. We do own private property but the main economic activity is governed by the capitalists, who own means of production i.e. machineries and factories. They constitute a small part of the society, the rest are workers and farmers. The workers produce finished goods out of raw materials, with the help of machineries, owned by the capitalists. The cost of finished goods is more than the combined cost of materials and wages of workers – giving a margin of profit to the capitalists. So, the capitalists go on accumulating wealth; the working class gets enough for subsistence only. Economic disparity begins along with clash of conflicting interest. The capitalists are ‘oppressors’, as they want to extract maximum profit and the workers are ‘oppressed’ as they are pressurized to produce more for less wages. In Bengali we used to call capitalists as ‘shoshak’ literally meaning ‘sucker’ who sucks blood like a leech. At one stage the discontented workers will overthrow the capitalists to advance to the next stage of social development known as socialism prior to reaching the final stage of communism, in which private ownership will cease and means of production will be collectively owned by the society and distribution will be according to individual need – establishing an ideal society where oppression of one class by another will come to an end. The question of economic inequality will vanish forever. This is the historically and scientifically determined stages of social evolution, I learnt.

I used to devour soviet literature and yearn for the day when we too would be under communism. My first disillusionment with communism occurred by reading Dr. Zivago, a novel by Boris Pasternak. Reading it in late fifties I didn’t find any reason why the communist regime was compelled to ban the book. Innocuous murmurs against the establishment, by a section of people, are a common thing in any society. Writer’s job is to reflect the sentiments of the people; he didn’t incite people to revolt against the state. In a social order where such freedom of expression is suppressed, I decided not to aspire to be in such a society. I stopped reading communist literature altogether. But, inwardly I still felt communism is bound to come as it is historically predetermined. And used to hate the capitalists as ‘shoshaks’.

My enlightenment dawned when I entered polytechnic institute. In addition to teaching engineering disciplines, a special short term course on entrepreneurship was introduced to enable students to start their own business.  I started studying entrepreneurship and found that without the ‘shoshak’ class no economic development is possible. Now, we call them entrepreneurs, not ‘shoshak’ – creators of national wealth.  However, they are driven by profit motive – you may call it ‘greed’ too, if you like.

The trouble starts when concentration of wealth becomes skewed – only a small fraction of population possessing major portion of wealth. It creates social tension and as experts say impedes further growth as well. Here, I take you to Nicholas Kristof’s kindergarten.

 “Imagine a kindergarten with 100 students, lavishly supplied with books, crayons and toys.

Yet you gasp: one avaricious little boy is jealously guarding a mountain of toys for himself. A handful of other children are quietly playing with a few toys each, while 90 of the children are looking on forlornly — empty-handed.” (1)

This is no doubt over-simplistic approach of explaining a very complex topic – yet, it matches reality on the ground to a great extent. Here, the kid is assumed to be greedy. But he had motivation to grab all the toys, boldness to do it and took risk of being roughed up – prime qualities of entrepreneur. The rest of the kids didn’t have any of such traits; they were resigned to the circumstances as we common folks are. He was enterprising. So, it’s natural he would get the bounty, and we --unadventurous lot-- remain empty handed.

Obviously, the economic status of the capitalists remains higher than the commoners. The objection arises due to inordinate disparity between a few rich and the majority poor. Currently this inequality is acquiring astronomical proportion.

How this disparity is  legitimized can be assessed from the letter David Siegel, owner of Westgate Resorts, wrote to his 7000 employees on the eve of US election, warning them in clear terms, if, as a result of their voting pattern, taxes of rich Americans are raised, they would be fired. The purpose of raising tax of the rich is partially to smoothen the steepness of the rich-poor divide. Parts of the letter reproduced below verbatim, as it explains in essence the spirit of capitalism justifying inequality.

“...I started this company over 42 years ago. At that time, I lived in a very modest home. I converted my garage into an office so I could put forth 100% effort into building a company, which by the way, would eventually employ you. We didn't eat in fancy restaurants or take expensive vacations because every dollar I made went back into this company. I drove an old used car, and often times, I stayed home on weekends, while my friends went out drinking and partying. In fact, I was married to my business — hard work, discipline, and sacrifice...

.. .what most people see is the nice house and the lavish lifestyle(I possess now). What the press certainly does not want you to see, is the true story of the hard work and sacrifices I've made...

 … Just think about this – most of you arrive at work in the morning and leave that afternoon and the rest of your time is yours to do as you please. But not me- there is no "off" button for me. When you leave the office, you are done and you have a weekend all to yourself. I unfortunately do not have that freedom. I eat, live, and breathe this company every minute of the day, every day of the week. There is no rest. There is no weekend. There is no happy hour... If any new taxes are levied on me, or my company, as our current President plans, I will have no choice but to reduce the size of this company. Rather than grow this company I will be forced to cut back. This means fewer jobs, less benefits and certainly less opportunity for everyone…

…The people that overspent their paychecks suddenly feel entitled to the same luxuries that I earned and sacrificed 42 years of my life for...

…You see, I can no longer support a system that penalizes the productive and gives to the unproductive. My motivation to work and to provide jobs will be destroyed, and with it, so will your opportunities. If that happens, you can find me in the Caribbean sitting on the beach, under a palm tree, retired, and with no employees to worry about”. (2)

This is the story of every entrepreneur, delineating characteristics of a capitalist. They are married to the enterprise – a 24X7 hrs job, while the workers slog from 9 to 5 only. It’s assumed that Siegel used socially approved ethical route unlike Dhirubhais, Jindals and Vadras. How the wealth could be distributed equitably? Is the argument for equal distribution of wealth, just? David Siegel can afford to retire comfortably, whereas the workers without jobs cannot. Revolution is not the answer. Russian revolution failed. In any public undertaking the efficiency is below par – it’s everywhere in any government enterprise. In the market economy they cannot compete. They run into recurring losses.  We have so many sick PSUs in India. They are sick simply because they are not run by entrepreneurs or professionally trained manpower or because of political interference. Now, the government is getting rid of them one by one.

Siegel’s letter indicates disgust of the rich for government regulation.  And without regulation, runaway greed cannot be reined in and inequality lessened. Clearly, entrepreneurial spirit and state regulation are at loggerheads impacting on development with social justice. So far, a common working ground acceptable to both sides not found or explored. Or will it remain a utopia? If at all, it may be at the cost of no growth or slower growth.

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The insertion"I possess now" and the italicized empahsis is mine

References:-

 (1) Why Let the Rich Hoard All the Toys by Nocholas Kristof     http://www.sunherald.com/2012/10/11/4238704/nicholas-kristof-why-let-the-rich.html downloaded on 18/10/2012 at 1515 hrs IST.

(2) CEO to Workers: You’ll Likely Be Fired If Obama Is Re-elected By Robert Frank http://www.cnbc.com/id/49356069/ downloaded on 18/10/2012 at 1500 hrs. IST.