The fact is we are all greedy to a certain extent, this is not a bad thing a priori. Here I use greed as a synonym of ambition because I don't see much difference between them. I suppose they are both defined roughly as wanting to achieve a better result for yourself beyond what most other people would deem is enough. Whatever that means. Try defining "enough", if you can. You'll find inevitably, with no exceptions, that it boils down to what you think is appropriate for oneself or another, it's only your opinion, nothing more.
So my point is that greed is not a bad thing in and of itself. It pushes people to achieve more and to dream of big things. This is how we got Henry Ford's automobiles, Steve Jobs's computers and so forth. People had big dreams and ambitions. If greed is then nothing more than aspiring to achieve more than you "really" need, how on earth is this a bad thing? I want two cars, instead of just one. How is this bad? Most people need one car (well, they don't really need them, do they?), I want two. So I'm willing to work twice as hard to earn it. No big deal. The "greedy" desires I have are not the malice. The only question relevant here is what means I am employing to achieve these desires. Am I willing to do the honest labor and work for my goals, or am I willing to steal and cheat to get there. This is the only thing that is relevant. Whether the goals themselves are more than one needs or not is completely irrelevant and, really, none of anyone's business. Also, greed is not a prerequisite of being a bad person. By that logic, one could just define a flat screen TV as something you really need and therefore wanting to have it is not a consequence of greed and stealing it is not a vice. By the same token, working hard and long hours to buy a fifth car is evil and should be punished. It doesn't work that way. It's not greed that is the issue here, we're all greedy. It's just that some poeple will employ honest and some poople will employ dishonest means to achieve their goals.
Let me illustrate this with a quick example. EasyJet, a low-fare British airliner, earned an after tax profit of £121.3 million and carried 48.8 million passengers in 2010. This means they made a profit of exactly £2.49, which is €2.84 or $3.94, per passenger. So I was curious what the other side of the trade was, how much did the customer benefit from their services. I went to Orbitz.com and looked for the cheapest flights between today and the end of October and compared the fares to Easyjet's for one particular route. This is the result I got:
A comparison between EasyJet flight fares on EasyJet.com and the cheapest other airliner as found on Orbitz.com on October 15th in USD.
It is true that EasyJet requires an additional payment of $21 for luggage, but sometimes hand luggage will suffice, especially if you are traveling for a week or less. But let's suppose you do pay that $21. And an additional credit card fee of $21. There are also cheaper ways of payment but let's suppose the worst case scenario. On the other hand, Orbitz and the other airliners may also require some additional fees, I didn't look into that so I cannot be sure. But the bottom line is that for every passenger, the "greedy" EasyJet capitalists profit 3.94$, while the passenger profits at a minimum a whopping $58.25. In addition to this, every passenger who voluntarily flies with any airliner obviously profits from the transaction since otherwise they would have held on to the money and not taken the flight.
So what protesters against profit and capitalism are really saying is take those $3.94 of profit out of the capitalist's pocket and put it into mine to add to the $58.25 of profit that I am already making. They're not saying eliminate all profits, what they are saying is reduce the other person's profit and increase mine! Who is the greedy bastard (you may use pig, swine or bastard interchangeably) here then?
Ni komentarjev:
Objavite komentar