Virtues and Vices

My brother sent me this quotation from  Sir Winston Churchill:

 "The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent virtue

 of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries." 

My reply to my brother was: The inherent virtue of government is that it is able to mint or 

print money, thereby making capitalism possible. The inherent vice of government is 

that it spends money, thereby making capitalism necessary.

Headline in my local newspaper this morning: "Lingering joblessness poses long-term 

risk: Economists say nearly 5 million jobless for so long warrants action." That is where

capitalism is supposed to step in and make use of the money. Why hasn't it done so?

Actually it has done so. It has made use of the money to purchase machinery and robots 

that can do the job faster, better, and cheaper than people. Better yet, the machines and 

robots don't form unions, bargain for better wages, strike, ask for pensions or require

health care insurance. That is their virtue. Their vice is that they don't buy anything.

Of course there are still some jobs that are too menial to mechanize or roboticize and 

some that are too high-level to give away. Thus we still employ waitresses and doctors, 

janitors and teachers, office boys and CEOs, footsoldiers and Generals. These jobs will 

remain with us for a while longer.

So how can we employ all those people for whom capitalism has no use? My suggestion: 

Turn the vice of government into a virtue. Hire the unemployed as legislators. Expand the 

legislature to include all citizens not otherwise employed. Give them a button to push, 

tune them in to C-Span and let them vote. Pay them as we do our current legislators. 

Then they will have money to spend on the stuff the capitalist machines produce and 

everyone will be happy. Except the taxpayers. But that will be all of us.