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POV: What Is Capitalism?
by Ayn Rand | November-December 1965
In Pursuit of Wealth: The Moral Case for Finance
by Yaron Brook | September 30, 2017
Inequality Doesn't Matter If We’re All Paid According to the Value We Create
by Don Watkins | October 18, 2016
Who Cares about Inequality?
by Don Watkins | April 28, 2016
Equal Is Unfair: America’s Misguided Fight Against Income Inequality
by Don Watkins | April 19, 2016
Economic Inequality Complaints Are Just A Cover For Anti-Rich Prejudice
by Don Watkins | April 14, 2016
Equality of Opportunity Doesn’t Exist in America — and That’s a Good Thing
by Don Watkins | April 06, 2016
Inherit The Wind . . . And Not Much Else
by Don Watkins | April 05, 2016
Equal is Unfair: America’s Misguided Fight Against Income Inequality
by Don Watkins | October 20, 2015
Religion in America
by The Editors | December 05, 2014
Religion vs. Freedom
by Onkar Ghate | December 03, 2014
Debate: “Inequality: Should We Care?”
by Yaron Brook | May 08, 2014
Economic Inequality: Who Cares?
by The Editors | March 25, 2014
Our Poverty Problem?
by Don Watkins | March 11, 2014
Is Inequality Fair?
by Yaron Brook | March 05, 2014
Government tries to do too much: Opposing view
by Don Watkins | January 26, 2014
“You didn’t build that,” conservative style
by Steve Simpson | December 09, 2013
Why Do 1.4 Million Americans Work At Walmart, With Many More Trying To?
by Doug Altner | November 27, 2013
Atlas Shrugged Is A Book About Pride In One’s Work, And The Success That Results
by Steve Simpson | November 08, 2013
Bernie Madoff, Steve Jobs, and Wall Street Greed
by Don Watkins | September 26, 2013
Justice Department should let US Airways & American Airlines merger proceed
by Tom Bowden | August 16, 2013
What Are The Search Results When You Google ‘Antitrust’?
by Tom Bowden | April 18, 2013
To Be Born Poor Doesn’t Mean You’ll Always Be Poor
by Yaron Brook | April 12, 2013
We Should Be Embarrassed by the Sequester Debate
by Yaron Brook | March 20, 2013
“Give Back” Is One of the World's Most Impoverishing Commands
by Yaron Brook | March 12, 2013
Capitalism in No Way Created Poverty, It Inherited It
by Yaron Brook | February 25, 2013
3 crucial lessons Ayn Rand can teach us today
by Yaron Brook | February 02, 2013
Capitalism without Guilt
by Yaron Brook | January 21, 2013
President Obama Duels With Ayn Rand Over What Makes America Great
by Don Watkins | October 29, 2012
Why Ayn Rand’s Absence From Last Thursday’s Debate Benefits Big Government
by Yaron Brook | October 15, 2012
The Virtue of Employee Layoffs
by Yaron Brook | September 06, 2012
Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged: A Paean to American Liberty
by Don Watkins | August 17, 2012
President Obama vs. My Grandfather
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The Dog-Eat-Dog Welfare State Is Lose-Lose
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Changing the Debate: How to Move from an Entitlement State to a Free Market
by Don Watkins | July 02, 2012
Private Equity Firms Want Acquisitions To Profit, Not Fold
by Doug Altner | June 05, 2012
Opposing view: Celebrate private equity
by Don Watkins | May 29, 2012
The “On Your Own” Economy
by Don Watkins | March 09, 2012
What's Really Wrong with Entitlements
by Don Watkins | February 21, 2012
Happy Birthday, Ayn Rand — Why Are You Still So Misunderstood?
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America Before The Entitlement State
by Don Watkins | November 18, 2011
How Did Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged Predict an America Spinning Out of Control?
by Onkar Ghate | October 31, 2011
What We Owe Steve Jobs
by Don Watkins | October 06, 2011
What’s Missing From The Budget Debate
by Don Watkins | July 12, 2011
Does America Need Ayn Rand or Jesus?
by Onkar Ghate | June 29, 2011
When It Comes to Wealth Creation, There Is No Pie
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It’s Time To Kill The “Robin Hood” Myth
by Yaron Brook | May 06, 2011
Using Ayn Rand's Values to Create Competitive Advantage in Business
by John Allison | April 04, 2011
In Defense of Finance
by Yaron Brook | February 15, 2011
The Tea Party Will Fail — Unless it Fully Embraces Individualism as a Moral Ideal
by Tom Bowden | January 21, 2011
How About Tax Reparations for the Rich?
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The Guilt Pledge
by Don Watkins | September 22, 2010
How To Succeed In Business: Really Try
by Don Watkins | September 13, 2010
The U.S. Anti-Business Epidemic
by Don Watkins | August 17, 2010
Atlas Shrugged’s Timeless Moral: Profit-Making Is Virtue, Not Vice
by Yaron Brook | July 20, 2010
Capitalism: Who Needs It — Ayn Rand and the American System
by Yaron Brook | June 09, 2010
Apple vs. GM: Ayn Rand Knew the Difference. Do You?
by Don Watkins | March 02, 2010
Commercialism Only Adds to Joy of the Holidays
by Onkar Ghate | December 18, 2009
Why is Ayn Rand Still Relevant: Atlas Shrugged and Today’s World
by Yaron Brook | August 10, 2009
The Corrupt Critics of CEO Pay
by Yaron Brook | May 2009
America’s Unfree Market
by Yaron Brook | May 2009
Energy at the Speed of Thought: The Original Alternative Energy Market
by Alex Epstein | Summer 2009
Is Rand Relevant?
by Yaron Brook | March 14, 2009
Stop Blaming Capitalism for Government Failures
by Yaron Brook | November 13, 2008
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by Yaron Brook | June 26, 2008
Vindicating Capitalism: The Real History of the Standard Oil Company
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by Tom Bowden | November 20, 2007
The Influence of Atlas Shrugged
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The Morality of Moneylending: A Short History
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Say “No Way!” to “Say on Pay”
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Atlas Shrugged — America's Second Declaration of Independence
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Net Neutrality vs. Internet Freedom
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Why Are CEOs Paid So Much?
by Elan Journo | May 11, 2006
To Outsource or to Stagnate?
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Ayn Rand's Ideas — An Introduction
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Capitalists vs. Crooks
by Elan Journo | July 22, 2002
Forgotten Heroes of 9/11
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Religion vs. America
by Leonard Peikoff | 1986
The Sanction of the Victims
by Ayn Rand | November 21, 1981
Egalitarianism and Inflation
by Ayn Rand | 1974
The Moratorium on Brains
by Ayn Rand | November 14, 1971
What Is Capitalism?
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Is Atlas Shrugging?
by Ayn Rand | April 19, 1964
The Fascist New Frontier
by Ayn Rand | December 16, 1962
America’s Persecuted Minority: Big Business
by Ayn Rand | December 17, 1961
The “New Intellectual”
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Capitalism vs. Communism
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Government And Business in Voice for Reason
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Who Cares about Inequality?

by Don Watkins and Yaron Brook | April 28, 2016 | FEE.org

The division between classical and modern liberals is often represented as paralleling the tension between liberty and equality. Where classical liberalism saw individual liberty as the driving force behind peace and prosperity, the modern variety puts more emphasis on equality. But this is a false dichotomy. The only kind of equality that is possible is also the only kind that matters: political equality.

Political equality refers to equality of rights. Before the creation of the United States, every system of government had taken for granted that some people were entitled to rule others, taking away their freedom and property whenever some allegedly “greater good” demanded it. The Founders rejected that notion. Each individual, they held, is to be regarded by the government as having the same rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness as any other individual. So long as he didn’t violate other people’s rights, he was free to set his own course and live on his own terms.

By making the government the guardian of our equal rights rather than a tool for the politically privileged to control and exploit the rest of society, the Founders transformed the state from an instrument of oppression into an instrument of liberation: it liberated the individual so that he was free to make the most of his life. (Unfortunately, they failed to fully implement that principle, above all by allowing the continued existence of slavery, which was a clash of principles that nearly tore the country apart in a civil war.)

Political equality is what made America a land of opportunity. In a world where there were no special privileges and no special obstacles, each individual was free to rise as high as his ability and ambition would take him. This political equality inevitably went hand in hand with economic inequality, as the ability and ambition of some people took them further than others. There was no contradiction in that fact. Political equality has to do with how the government treats individuals. It says that the government should treat all individuals the same — black or white, man or woman, rich or poor. But political equality says nothing about the differences that arise through the voluntary decisions of private individuals. Protecting people’s equal rights invariably leads to differences in economic condition, as some people use their freedom to create modest amounts of wealth while others reach the highest levels of financial success.

Historically, Americans haven’t cared about economic inequality. But that is starting to change. Why? Because there are very real problems in today’s economy — problems that threaten the American Dream — and alarmists have placed the blame for these problems on economic inequality. According to them, the rich are rigging the system in their favor, and the rest of us are stagnating as a result.

There are genuine barriers to opportunity today, and the deck is becoming stacked against us — but not because “the rich” are too rich and the government is doing too little to fight economic inequality. The real threat to opportunity in America is increasing political inequality.

In a land of opportunity, an individual should succeed or fail on the basis of merit, not political privilege. You deserve what you earn — no more, no less. Today, however, some people are being stopped from rising by merit, and others are securing unearned wealth through political privilege. But the real source of this problem is that we have granted the government an incredible amount of arbitrary power: to intervene in our affairs, to pick winners and losers, to put roadblocks in the way of success, to hand out wealth and other special favors to whatever pressure group can present itself as the face of “the public good.” Some of these injustices do increase economic inequality, but it isn’t the inequality that should bother us — it’s the injustices.

When a bank or auto company that made irrational decisions gets bailed out at public expense, that is an outrage. But the root of the problem isn’t their executives’ ability to influence Washington; it’s Washington’s power to dispense bailouts.

When an inner-city child is stuck in a school that doesn’t educate him, that is a tragedy. But the problem isn’t that other children get a better education; it’s that the government has created an educational system that often fails to educate — and that makes it virtually impossible for anyone but the affluent to seek out alternatives.

The same goes for countless other ways the government gives special privileges to some people at the expense of others:

  • Cronyism — whether in the form of bailouts, subsidies, government-granted monopolies, or other special favors — benefits some businesses at the expense of competitors and buyers.
  • Occupational licensing laws in fields as varied as hair-braiding and interior decorating protect incumbents from competitors by arbitrarily preventing individuals from freely entering into those fields.
  • The minimum wage raises some people’s incomes at the expense of employers and customers as well as other low-skilled workers, who are priced out of the labor market and thrown onto the unemployment rolls.
  • The welfare state openly deprives some people of their earned rewards in order to give other people rewards they haven’t earned.

We are living at a time of immense political inequality thanks to a government that has grown far beyond the strict limits defined by the Founders. Of course people will try to influence a government that has so much arbitrary power over their lives, and of course those with the best connections and deepest pockets will often be the most successful at influencing it. The question is, what created this situation — and what should we do about that?

Economic egalitarians tell us that the problem is not how much arbitrary power the government has, but whom the government uses that power to help. They say that by handing the government even more power and demanding that it use that power for the sake of “the 99 percent” rather than “the 1 percent,” everyone will be better off.

Only when the government is limited to the function of protecting our equal rights can people rise through merit rather than through government-granted privilege. The cure for people seeking special favors from the government is to create a government that has no special favors to grant.

What’s required to save the American Dream is not to wage war on economic inequality but to recommit ourselves to the ideal of political equality. We need to liberate the individual so that each of us is equally free to pursue success and happiness.

About The Authors

Don Watkins

Former Fellow (2006-2017), Ayn Rand Institute

Yaron Brook

Chairman of the Board, Ayn Rand Institute