Why Conservatives Should Abolish Prices
You deserve to live in a community, a country, and a world of responsible people. Despite that fact, our world is infested with crimes such as property damage, gang violence, and reckless wars. Crisis after crisis happens. In response, our governments have imprisoned criminals, deported cartel members, and even assassinated dictators, but to no avail. Law and order policies merely stop new instances of an endless flow of violence. We trim these weeds that keep growing back.
Have you ever wondered why crime keeps happening? It takes a depraved system to make people so careless that they become murderous. Well, the original sin might surprise you. It is the very thing you rely on whenever the charity of others falls short. The problem is the need for money in exchange for goods and services.
When something or someone has a price, a major issue will arise. Those who cannot afford will have to go without. Consider a family unable to pay rent for a large enough home, or a small business unable to pay wages for a potential employee. That is because the owner of that home would need money for its upkeep, while the unemployed person would need money to survive. All of this creates a need for overall markets to reach equilibrium, a compromise between these parties. Not everyone is currently satisfied, especially those who are deemed unworthy of employment.
Think of an area you associate with violent crime. Chances are that their unemployment rate is high. For example, the unemployment rates in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank in Israel/Palestine in 2022 were 45% and 13%, respectively. (Source: PCBS | The Results of the Labour Force Survey,2022) Since practically everything has a price, some unemployed people become desperate for any way to make money. They steal. They sell illegal drugs. They make deals with hateful gangs or governments to take hostages or launch terrorist attacks. They have resorted to illegal actions because they found no other way to support themselves with capital blocked off.
One possible alternative is the creation of an economic system that puts people’s needs first. This means guaranteed employment, housing, food, water, health care, and media access. This does not mean governments have to take over industries and forsake our Bill of Rights freedoms. Instead, we can just insist that the inputs for these necessities be free like the necessities themselves. Employment might even increase, even if not everyone wants to find a job right away, because more people would be able to access currently unused capital. Production could continue and even innovate more than ever before without the chains of profit-seeking holding back productive people.
Yes, the profit motive is a problem. You might think that people deserve to receive lots of money from their hard work or investment, but that is only needed because everything has a price. You need money because the stores you go to need money, and so on. We have been stuck in this cycle for thousands of years. It is time for a change. It is time for us to have free access to what we need and the capital that creates these goods and services. We can create societies in which we, our friends, and our neighbors will prosper!
