In his op-ed Don’t buy canard about spending, Alan Cobb of Americans for Prosperity writes about the illusion that government spending creates economic growth.
It’s an important topic, as we’ve just been through nearly a year of Obama stimulus spending, and people are wondering if the effort has paid off. Locally in Kansas, spending advocates argue that reducing Kansas state spending will cause economic growth to suffer. Even more locally in Wichita, city council members and city hall bureaucrats argue that government is responsible for managing economic development in Wichita, some going so far to proclaim that free people and free markets have failed and can’t be trusted.
In yesterday’s Wichita Eagle, Wichita businessman Fred Berry takes issue with Cobb, and this disagreement provides a useful illustration of the difference between government and private action.
Cobb wrote this: “If I take $20,000 from my neighbor and hire a gardener, the economy certainly hasn’t grown by $20,000. It’s simply been a shift of money.” Cobb is illustrating the effect of government spending.
Berry wrote: “But let me use Cobb’s example in a different way. Suppose he and his neighbor decided to share a gardener, because neither needed one full time. Because Cobb’s garden was twice as large as his neighbor’s, he agreed to pay two-thirds of the cost.”
What’s the difference between the two examples? It’s simple: Cobb is illustrating a government-coerced transaction, while Berry uses a voluntary transaction.
There’s a world of difference between the two. Voluntary transactions are the way that wealth and prosperity are generated. These transactions happen because both parties believe they will be better off if the transaction takes place.
This leads to what John Stossel has termed the “weird double thank you moment” when people engage in voluntary trade: One party says “thank you,” and so does the other. This happens at the grocery store and nearly everywhere people are making voluntary exchanges that benefit both parties.
But when you pay your taxes, do you say “thank you?”
Milton Friedman has written and lectured extensively on the topic of free markets. Here’s an example from his monumental work Capitalism and Freedom:
Fundamentally, there are only two ways of co-ordinating the economic activities of millions. One is central direction involving the use of coercion — the technique of the army and of the modern totalitarian state. The other is voluntary co-operation of individuals — the technique of the market place.
The possibility of co-ordination through voluntary co-operation rests on the elementary — yet frequently denied — proposition that both parties to an economic transaction benefit from it, provided the transaction is bi-laterally voluntary and informed.
Exchange can therefore bring about co-ordination without coercion. A working model of a society organized through voluntary exchange is a free private enterprise exchange economy — what we have been calling competitive capitalism.
It’s surprising to me that a businessman — here I specifically do not use the word “capitalist” — like Fred Berry would fail to recognize the distinction between free markets and government coercion. I guess I should not be surprised, as Berry made large campaign contributions to the Wichita school bond campaign in 2008, and the public schools are definitely unfriendly to capitalism. In addition, he has made contributions to enemies of capitalism like Wichita Mayor Carl Brewer and city council member Janet Miller.
For more explanation of how free markets work from Milton Friedman, view the video below.