A friend of mine posted a link to an essay on a site called "The Morality of Profit." The site actually promotes a wide array of opinion, but this particular essay held that:
"A society is moral if it both allows man to fulfill his potential and, in utilitarian terms, creates the most good. Fortunately, a society based on the profit motive can achieve both of these factors. By acknowledging the fundamentals of human nature -- that man is intrinsically self-interested -- and channeling it towards productivity through a system based on such an understanding, both individuals and societies will develop and grow."
I beg to differ. Under this logic, the unbridled application of the profit motive would create the most moral society -- and history shows us instead the Gilded Age. Unrestrained capitalism may produce the most wealth, but the wildly unequal distribution of that wealth guarantees that some will have more opportunity to fulfill their potential than others. The reality is that the more the profit motive rules, the less moral the resulting society.
I would have to be a blithering idiot to ascribe no good to the profit motive, nor acknowledge the multitude of positive human endeavors in which it plays an indispensable part. The transcontinental railroad, for example, allowed for the wholesale destruction of the buffalo, sealing the fate of the Plains Indians. But it also linked two sides of the continent -- the epitome of an inevitable development. I would not be writing this without the internet and 10,000 inventions that preceded it -- many motivated by the desire to make money. Societies in which there is no profit motive mostly do not work -- witness North Korea. (I say "mostly" because many small communitarian societies in which there is no profit motive have worked very well. Native American tribes are a prime example.)
Without the profit motive we wouldn't have much in the way of mining, oil and gas, skyscrapers, bridges, food production, housing, biotech, retail, fashion, banking and air travel -- in short, all the elements of modern industrial society. It is also an indispensable part of any realistic solution to third world poverty -- though ironically so, as this poverty is almost always inextricably linked to the legacy of rapacious colonialism.
But the fact is that the best things we do as human beings are never motivated by the desire for profit. Not one poem is written, symphony composed, or masterpiece painted. Miep Gies did not hide the Frank family for money, nor was it the reason Mother Teresa tended the sick of Calcutta. It's not why 99.9 percent of all athletes pick up a football, swim a mile, or run a marathon. It's not why you read to your kids at night, tend to an aging parent, or stage an intervention for a drug-addicted friend.
Here are two lists. One denotes 10 things done solely with profit as an overriding motive; the other, 10 things in which the desire for profit plays little or no part. (If there is a related consequence, I put it in parentheses.)
Profit-Motivated
1. The Slave Trade (Civil War)
2. The Triangle Shirtwaist Fire
3. The Iraq War
4. Sex trafficking
5. Blood diamonds
6. The arms trade
7. The drug trade
8. The genocide of Native Americans
9. The destruction of rain forests
10. Off-shore drilling (The BP Disaster)
Little or No Profit Motive
1. Motherhood
2. Affection
3. Volunteering
4. The Arts
5. Play
6. Twelve-step Programs
7. National parks
8. Exploration
9. The Olympics
10. Education
The profit motive may be necessary, but "moral" hardly seems like the right adjective for it. Loan-sharking is not moral. Strip mining is not moral. Sweatshops are not moral. A world in which making money reigns as a supreme expression of morality would be a sorry utopia indeed. Greed may be inevitable, but the urge to accumulate as much as possible should be far down on the list of traits a society should ever want to anoint as one of its highest values.
Follow Mark Olmsted on Twitter: www.twitter.com/MarquisMarq
He uses the plural form of 'fundamental' and would do well to consider the other fundamentals! I was an elementary classroom teacher. I learned much about 'fundamentals of human nature' from children, many from what would be called "high needs" families. Among "intrinsic, innate, spontaneous" inclinations I witnessed, over and over, were compassion, and a strong sense of fair justice, without "abandoning essential humanity" of the "offender".
Children hope adults will use their power to support needs and talents, and practice justice that is fair, non-vindictive, and respectful of all persons.
Children are themselves prepared to deliver these to one another, and to adults. They instantly offer support and cooperation when need arises. (I am not suggesting children don't exhibit also "intrinsic self-interest", or other less than helpful behaviors, but strongly suggest they are in 'better balance' than many in the adult world.)
When children witness the "powerful adults" behaving unkindly, without justice, or with greed or high selfish motivation, their faces show concern.
Children don't know about "profit," in a money sense, until they are taught how "important" it is. They would "give away the store" in response to need in a heartbeat!
As another here has observed, "profit" need not be thought of only in material wealth terms. Definitions of both "profit" and of "self-interest" can be broadened easily to 'assign' value to service.
Two quick comments.
When we define profit in purely monetary terms we invite distortion of its capabilities as a motivator. Even when people have a drive to gather excess wealth for their private advantage there almost invariably is also a need, though perhaps less obvious, that can be expressed in any of a variety of ways, to leave a legacy for the future, and I suspect that part of the motivation is to help society in general profit from their efforts.
Which brings up the second point. Invariably, as most businesses find, when we focus solely on short-term profit bad things happen.
We need to redefine profit in broader and longer terms, if we do that correctly the whole of mankind can profit from our combined efforts, and individuals can profit by having clear and relevant measures of success, not necessarily exclusively monetary in nature, but financial profit would no doubt play a big role, at least until civilization becomes a lot more civilized than it is at the moment.
I appreciate where they're coming from, but this kind of thinking ignores the fact that the desire for money tends to bring out the worst--not the best--in people. For every rich guy that wants to give all his money away, there are 20 who have no such intention or desire. They didn't make all that money so they couldn't enjoy having it--even when they have far more than they could ever need to satisfy every conceivable want. There are studies that say the very rich give away less of their income, as a percentage, than the poor.
Relying on a profit‐driven motive, based on unregulated markets to distribute profits and
wealth, leads to an immoral outcome. Unregulated markets lead to inequality, creating a
moral dilemma of unequal distribution of resources. The global community has a moral
responsibility not only to the human population, but also to the corporate community, to
regulate markets for the purpose of ensuring a sustainable future.
The bottom line is that the global economic order is changing, the global social order is changing, and hence, the market system needs to change with it. Changes in the market
system are needed to promote greater consideration for the common good by altering the
market ethic from an extrinsically based, individualistic approach, to one motivated by
intrinsic, mutually beneficial results.
Moral profit will only be realized when we are accumulating riches for all of humanity, rather than a select few. As society gains more intellectual depth as a collective entity, profit will become moral. If not, then immoral profit will be humanities legacy, for it will extinguish our own existence.