Capitalism Essay

Greed is real, it exists. There is no clear definition for greed, nor is it the aim of this paper to offer one. While from an open economic perspective investors compete and aim at maximizing their profitability; from a religious perspective it is argued that greed is a moral problem, associated with and increased by capitalism. We know that, producers in an open market compete do accumulate wealth. Likewise, consumers, seek their desired goods, though their preferences may vary. So what is the problem with such a market relationship? It is established from experiences that, capitalism contributes to stark socioeconomic inequalities in a society. Consider the United States as an example. Capitalism polarizes a society economically: the very

These patterns can be clearly observed in the capitalist economic environment where persons with higher economic capital dominate persons with lower capital. The goal is to maximize profit; minimize costs. Economists define opportunity cost as the value forgone every time we do something. In simple words, economists allocate a monetary value to each second we spent. In a response to a popular question asked about Bill Gates, the world’s richest man in the U.S as of the year 2015, is it worth for Bill Gates to pick up a 100 dollar bill? This is the economist’s response: “With a worth of $72 billion, a 6% rate of return would earn Gates roughly $114.16 per second he is alive, making it a poor investment for Bill Gates to bother picking up a $100 bill if he dropped it” (Reports, 2013). Calculating Gates hourly income results in $6,849.6 per hour while his fellow citizens have a minimum hourly wage of $7.25 (Officials, 2015). Bill Gates’ one hour income is almost equal to 6 months income of an ordinary worker. Such economical gap between two individual citizens is the ultimate result of self-centered and greedy behavior of a capitalist

The social and economic lack of justice created by capitalism can be attributed to the greed which it feeds. Capitalists and their sympathizers can argue that economic gap between the richest and poorest can be largely due to the degrees of hard-work. However, such arguments often downplay the greed factor. Conversely the solutions proposed above are based on Islamic economic principles which take many factors into consideration; hence, the aim is to create a more equal social and economic order than the one established by the capitalist order. Our greed would not have driven us evil – purely bad – if we would have an open eye to see our neighbors dying from hunger, cold…etc. It is further mentioned in the Holy Quran that “The greatest holy war is the war against your own inner selfish desires, wants and