People who live in poor countries have to be entrepreneurial even just to survive.
Ha-Joon ChangRead
Once you realize that trickle-down economics does not work, you will see the excessive tax cuts for the rick as what they are -- a simple upward redistribution of income, rather than a way to make all of us richer, as we were told.
Interpretation
This quote critiques trickle-down economics, arguing that it leads to wealth accumulation for the rich rather than benefitting everyone.
Ha-Joon Chang's quote emphasizes the flaws in trickle-down economics, which claims that benefits provided to the wealthy will ultimately trickle down to the rest of society. He argues that instead of creating a more equitable wealth distribution, these tax cuts primarily serve to exacerbate income inequality, effectively redistributing wealth upwards rather than enriching the population at large.
In practice
In a discussion on economic policies, one might use this quote to highlight the inefficacy of tax cuts for the wealthy.
People who live in poor countries have to be entrepreneurial even just to survive.
The widely accepted assertion that, only if you let markets be will everyone be paid correctly and thus fairly, according to his worth, is a myth. Only when we part with this myth and grasp the political nature of the market and the collective nature of individual productivity will we be able to build a more just society in which historical legacies and collective actions, and not just individual talents and efforts, are properly taken into account in deciding how to reward people.
Equality of opportunity is meaningless for those who do not have the capabilities to take advantage of it.
The higher education system in these countries (US, Korea etc) has become like a theatre in which some people decided to stand to get a better view, promoting the others behind them to stand. Once enough people stand, everyone has to stand, which means no one is getting a better view, while everyone has become more uncomfortable.
There is no such thing as a free market.
[Good managers] know that people have 'good' sides and 'bad' sides and that the secret of good management is in magnifying the former and toning down the latter.
There are only three ways by which any individual can get wealth — by work, by gift or by theft. And, clearly, the reason why the workers get so little is that the beggars and thieves get so much.
For it is an essential difference between capitalist and socialist production that under capitalism men provide for themselves, while under Socialism they are provided for.
Wherever there is great property there is great inequality. For one very rich man there must be at least five hundred poor, and the affluence of the few supposes the indigence of the many. The affluence of the rich excites the indignation of the poor, who are often both driven by want, and prompted by envy, to invade his possessions.
Central planning didn't work for Stalin or Mao, and it won't work for an entrepreneur either.
Unless you reduce the long-term spending burden, you cannot cut taxes in any lasting way, but can only shift the burden of taxes from the present to the future.
A healthy economy is largely a result of a reasonable balance between consumption today and consumption deferred, and it's pretty clear that balance has been ridiculously out of whack for a while.
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