Héroes

Relacionado con la creencia de tanta gente de que las cosas en el mundo están cada vez peor, les dejo este paper de Johan Norberg en Cato’s Letter sobre la importancia de los entrepreneurs.

Parece mentira, una broma de mal gusto, pero para muchos el problema parece ser que, en gran parte del mundo, incluyendo a amplios sectores del “mundo en desarrollo”, la gente come (y consume) demasiado. En la actualidad, mucha gente tiene la oportunidad de comer todos los días como si se tratara de una fiesta. Les pido perdón, pero para mí el verdadero problema es que a pesar de todo, no seamos capaces de reconocer los beneficios de la libertad:

I think of a paragraph in Ludwig von Mises’ book Human Action, where he says that the market economy does not need apologists or propagandists. The best argument for the market economy can be found in the epitaph of Sir Christopher Wren, the architect who built and is buried in St. Paul’s Cathedral: “si monumentum requiris, circumspice” (if you are looking for a monument, look around you). Look at what he built. Look at his vision. You are standing in it right now.

That, I think, is the best defense that the market economy can ever hope for—that people look around and ponder the amazing things and opportunities that entrepreneurs and businesses have given the world during the last 200 years. Just look around at the health, the wealth, the technologies, the opportunities, and the food on your plates. Could any of that have been possible for a king or a queen 200 years ago?