February 14 is the day set aside for people to show their appreciation to loved ones, other people (and things) that have made some affectionate impact on their lives at some point. Where and how Valentine’s Day came to be is irrelevant to this premise. Karl Marx will be turning in his grave today, seeing capitalism get another $787billion lifeline to prove him wrong. The devil is in the details, they say, please read carefully.In the wake of the global financial meltdown, the United States economy is not the only one coming to a grinding halt. The global economy as a whole is on trial here, the ingenuity of capitalism in its finest form. If we fail (capitalism I mean), another depression will probably be all the proof we needed to reiterate the evils of a free enterprise. Just before you label me a communist, remember that the stimulus package in the United States is designed to stimulate more than just the domestic economy; instead an economically ruinous free market system whose ‘collapse’ has had a much wider effect across the board.
In the crossroad argument to jumpstart the world economy, Democrats and Republicans are deadlocked on which plan would be the best way forward. Believe it or not, even the Libertarians (Bob Barr included) are reluctant to append their signature to either versions of the stimulus plan, although they agree that government spending is warranted to save a failing economic system. Capitalism is on trial here, and just in case you get red tulips and stargazer lilies from an unknown sender, at least now you know who it is from. Whether 838 billion or 819 billion, it is very difficult (not impossible) to state the case for any one recipient of this stimulus package, but in the bigger picture, I still argue that the real beneficiary is capitalism.
Reasserting authority on the economy would mean spending on different levels and that is what the Obama administration hopes to do. The stimulus bill has gone through several changes, 40% tied to government spending, the rest split between tax cuts and state spending; and is a humungous victory for Barack Obama’s presidency. Even bigger beneficiary is the free market economy which brought us to this point in the first place. Just a couple of days ago the Federal Reserve unveiled a $1 trillion program aimed at revitalizing lending to consumers and businesses. Don’t mistake that for free lunch either, because it’s actually a lot farther away from freebies. Last November there was a $200 billion effort to lend money to investors to purchase securities backed by debt such as credit cards and auto, student and small business loans. Term Asset-Backed Securities Loan Facility (now called the Consumer and Business Lending Initiative), are all parts of an audacious plan to resuscitate a broken system.
It’s the days for love, our tax money and future is at stake to bail out ‘free enterprise’. The logic of this affectionate economic gesture is that rescuing the ailing US economy has a long way to go to restore consumer confidence on Wall Street, Main Street, and just about everyone in between. The other side is that no one really knows how this is going tow work, except that we know the answer to the alternative (doing nothing=0).
For that reason alone, the success of the stimulus package ought to be measured less by the ‘evident achievements’ and more by the principal beneficiary, capitalism.
