As we live through a global pandemic, is free
market capitalism endangering the world?
New York City Mayor Bill DeBlasio argued that
“This is a case for a nationalization, literally
a nationalization, of crucial factories and
industries that could produce the medical
supplies to prepare this country for what
we need.”
The Atlantic published a think-piece arguing
“There Are No Libertarians In An Epidemic.”
Mic.com joined in with a similar message,
and the further-Left Jacobin Magazine and
The Nation both argued that now more than
ever we need to socialize medicine.
And of course such takes abound in exponential
amounts on social media.
This isn't just an American problem.
The South China Morning Post, a Hong Kong
based newspaper that has been regularly accused
of being a mouth piece for the Chinese Communist
Party since their purchase by Alibaba Group
and Jack Ma, a member of the CCP, published
a letter attacking “the laissez-faire approach
to the economy” for supply shortages along
with a whole host of social ills, asking for
the government to “step in.”
The truth is just the opposite.
In China, America, and nations around the
globe, catastrophic government failures have
allowed this virus to become a crisis, and
it’s businesses that are successfully stepping
up to save lives.
As America faced a mask shortage, Honeywell
started two new manufacturing facilities to
produce N95 masks, over time multiplying their
production by 5 times.
Facebook donated 720,000 such masks, Goldman
Sachs 600,000, and Apple 10 million.
Meanwhile, the federal government had 1.5
million of them sitting in a warehouse, incapable
of figuring out how to release them in a timely
manner.
Jockey International expanded their production
of medical gowns and donated 10,000 scrubs
to frontline medical workers in New York.
United Technologies donated 90,000 pieces
of personal protective equipment to FEMA.
MyPillow converted their call centers to help
with the pandemic and converted 75% of their
manufacturing to producing facemasks.
Similar stories are occurring around the world.
In the UK famed vacuum tycoon James Dyson
designed an entirely new ventilator and manufactured
15,000 of them.
In Japan, Sharp converted their TV factories
to produce surgical masks.
Foxconn the same in China.
While the CDC was producing defective test
kits in insufficient numbers, it was private
companies like LabCorp and Quest Diagnostics
that developed and rushed to market functional
test kits.
That’s according to reporting from The New
York Times, usually no friend to free market
perspectives.
It was also The New York Times that broke
the appalling story of how early on in the
international spread of Coronavirus, the government
prevented doctors in Washington State, funded
by the private Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation,
from testing samples from people suffering
flu symptoms to determine if they were actually
positive for COVID-19.
Both the state and federal governments refused
to provide approval for weeks; when out of
ethics concerns the doctors began testing
the samples illegally, they discovered a case
in a local teenager, but by then he’d already
had far too much time unquarantined and was
likely infecting others.
The teenager’s school shut down, but even
then the state government told the doctors
to “stop testing.”
They went to the FDA to get their test approved,
but the FDA told them approval wasn’t possible
because the lab wasn’t certified under CMS
regulations.
After an “extraordinary and rare” plea
was made to the FDA commissioner, he responded
that they must still submit the tests for
emergency authorization.
But even the emergency process takes far too
long, with one doctor complaining “this
virus is faster than the FDA” as he was
asked to mail documents instead of email.
Where our government has stepped in to take
positive action, they’ve often failed miserably.
The federal coronavirus relief bill provided
$25 million to keep the Kennedy Center operational,
yet even with that massive amount they laid
off staff, leading lawmakers to try to claw
back the subsidy.
In New York, the state government experimented
with exactly what Mayor DeBlasio wanted: nationalizing
the production of hand sanitizer.
Governor Cuomo claimed they can produce it
cheaper than private enterprise.
How was that possible?
Modern slave labor paying prisoners 16 cents
an hour to produce the product.
The most successful government interventions
seem to have been getting out of the way.
Americans for Tax Reform logged over 400 regulations
that have been waived to help with the crisis,
many of which it’s baffling why they ever
existed to begin with.
That includes waiving regulations that prevented
the development of telemedicine, now more
needed than ever.
This freeing of enterprise to fight in this
crisis is a clear story of the success of
capitalism.
And I haven’t even yet mentioned the everyday
examples we take for granted.
We have Amazon, Postmates, and more making
it possible to survive while social distancing.
We have the internet and phones allowing us
to stay connected with our friends and family.
We have computer technologies allowing many
of us to continue our employment remotely.
Imagine how much worse the unemployment crisis
would be without capitalism!
To pick this time of all times to say the
free market is failing us is sheer lunacy.
I’m Jake Klein.
For more, watch our video on Chinese Communist
Party responsibility for the Coronavirus crisis.
Thanks for watching!
