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Billy Dyar
Professor Alex Sterling
English 221
13 May 2015

Positive Solutions to Capitalism

Capitalism is often considered the best system for economic development and growth. It
has been shown as a consistent wealth generator, natural marketer, and elevator for the standards
of life overall, but under certain circumstances it falls short. With a bit of refining and proper
understanding, core economic values in America such as competition and free market may help
mitigate capitalism or at least divert it in a more positive direction for the current and future
generations to come.

One of the known values that feeds capitalism in America is materialism. The article
Can Thrift Bring Well-Being? A Review of the Research and a Tentative Theory by Tim
Kasser talks about the current values people have in todays materialistic society and what should
be done about it, implying the need for core value replacement:
This consumer mindset or materialistic value orientation (Kasser, Ryan,
Couchman, & Sheldon, 2004) increases the probability that people engage in
behaviors that support consumer capitalism, such as: spending their time
shopping, learning about available goods and services, replacing functional but

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older goods with the latest thing, paying other people for services that were once
taken care of within the household, and buying on credit. (1)
Despite the typically ephemeral pleasures it gives an individual, materialism is one of the
problematic core values America has set in place. The ideal circumstance of materialism is a
person with whole collections of material objects that most people could only ever dream of
owning, plus access to infinite finances simply to obtain more. It encourages the urge to place a
higher priority to obtain, maintain, and dominate interpersonal relationships. As an example of
current materialism, imagine an American family of four who cant afford food, can barely make
rent each month occurring, and cant afford health insurance for any member of their family.
However, if one were to look inside the familys apartment, which they can barely afford in the
first place, one may see a big-screen TV, a new car, brand name clothing and accessories, and all
the trendy gadgets. This kind of value not only endorses impulsive spending, but it also reflects
conspicuous consumption. According to the American Heritage Dictionary, the meaning of
conspicuous consumption is the acquisition or display of expensive items to attract attention to
ones wealth or to suggest that one is wealthy. Impulsive spending and conspicuous consumption
happens due to priority or competition. Americas value of materialism is in need of limit to be
set in place. Therefore, materialism should be frowned upon because it will affect not only
Americas culture, but it will also affect the capitalism itself through consumer spending. In
general, it is the consumers who stand to lose. Problems like foreclosures and consumer debt
tend to occur when excessive spending on materials is the core value.

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To counteract one of the current value problems America faces, people need to replace
materialism with another value called thriftiness. Tim Kasser elaborates in his article the reason
thrift is a solid counter to Americas value of materialism:
The idea of thrift stands in contrast to many aspects of this economic systems
ideology as it encourages people to save rather than spend, to avoid debt rather
than purchase on credit, to reuse or repair objects rather than buy new ones, and to
develop their own skills rather than rely on the services of others. While thrift is
neither conceptually nor empirically just the opposite of materialism and
consumerism, its historically important place in U.S. culture has nonetheless been
worn away as consumerism has become increasingly important. (1)
If America were to revise the core value of materialism as a whole and instead instill thriftiness,
it may help improve Americas economic system by redirecting capitalism to a more manageable
degree. Fixing the negative value of materialism with a positive view, the belief that peoples
material objects are more of their results of labor gives people the rewarding satisfactory for their
hard work. Coming back to Tim Kassers article, it describes the effect of the current mindset of
a consumer without any sense of thriftiness as a value:
Numerous studies show that to the extent people believe that wealth, money, and
possessions are important goals to strive towards, they also report lower life
satisfaction and vitality, fewer experiences of pleasant emotions, greater
depression, anxiety, and substance abuse, and more frequent experiences of
unpleasant emotions. (1)

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Materialism impacts nearly every person in America, and arguably any person who wishes to be
immersed in American culture. If the new generation of people inherits these values, materialism
will be passed on to the next generation and so forth. The majority of people, especially those
straddling the poverty line, must implement thrift for their well-being and for the current
direction of capitalism to improve America overall.

Another American core value capitalism perpetuates is competition. David Callahans

article Take Back Values explains values in many perspectives. One of them is about
competition in the free market:
Competition is an unquestioned virtue within market ideology and has been a
prime mantra of conservatives for thirty years. It is seen as a foundation not just
maximum prosperity but also of individual greatness. Freedom, in the
conservative worldview, is a state of pure competition where there are no checks
on individual striving. Taken too far, though, competition is poisonous to peoples
ethics. (15)
Americans grow up in this environment at a young age. Whether it be academically and
professionally, it is fine to be competitive to a certain extent, but there needs to be a revision of
competition so that the Americans core value does not implode, so to speak. On another note,
Americas professional ethics have been in the decline due to the ferocity of competition. Simple
things like overbilling are a common error in virtually any type of business. Another good
example addressed by David Callahans article is a compiled result of competition through
research study with negative effects:

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Americans are under intense pressure to do well academically and professionally,

starting at a very young age. High school students believe they must go to a good
college if they want to survive in an economy where the best jobs are hard to get
and even harder to keep. (15)
While the standards of competition in America may shoot for a higher education, job, or income,
which is good to a certain extent, the value of competition currently takes it a bit too far. With
increasing requirements in education and income inequality on the rise continually, this makes
the average American unemployment rate a bit higher. According to the National Center for
Education Statistics, the employment rates of college students are below average since the year
2000 till 2013:
Between 2000 and 2013, the unemployment rate for individuals without a
bachelors degree was generally higher than the rate for their peers with at least a
bachelors degree. This pattern was consistent for young adults (ages 20-24), 25
to 34 year olds, and 25 to 64 year olds. In 2013, for example, the unemployment
rate for young adults was 29.2 percent for those who did not complete high
school, 17.5 percent for those whose highest level of education was high school
completion, and 12.2 percent for those with some college education, compared
with an unemployment rate of 7.0 percent for those with at least a bachelors
degree. This pattern of higher unemployment rates corresponding with lower
levels of educational attainment also generally held across males and females for
each age group from 2000 to 2013. (Boushey and Hersh 1-2)

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If America can work on an updated and revised version of competition as a value, this can
change the standards that are set in place in jobs and education to bring a more positive play in
capitalism.

Another reason that causes the value of competition to increase is the free market. The
free market ideology has been increasing economically and culturally, but essentially fair play
and honesty have been decreasing in American values. Industries have become dog-eat-dog.
Workplace theft is continually on the rise, as quoted in Callahans article, Many companies now
rank all their employees once or twice a year; some automatically fire those who fall in the
bottom 10 percent. (15). This level of competition also results into greed in some cases.
Callahans article also mentions a greed outcome of competition:
Many doctors, for example, are unethically accepting payments from
pharmaceutical companies-a problem highlighted by major government probes
recently of Pfizer and AstraZeneca. In sports, steroids and other performance
enhancing drugs have penetrated into more areas of competition, notably in
baseball. (15)
What happened to the honesty and fairness in the workplace? America needs to first set the value
of competition in a positive direction. Once that has been set in place, equality is more likely to
be encouraged. Perhaps it will even encourage the lesser known American value of volunteerism.

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One negative impact of capitalism on America that cannot go unnoticed is the growing
income gap. A report article by Heather Boushey, who is a Senior Economist, and Adam Hersh,
who is an Economist at the Center for American Progress, writes on the income gap inequality:
Over the past several decades, the United States has undergone a remarkable
transformation, with income growth stalling for middle class while incomes of
those at the top continued to rise dramatically compared to the rest of the working
population. (1)
Later, Boushey and Hersh continues:
Families in the middle class have also pulled away from those at the bottom, but
achieved these modest income gains only by working longer hours, increasing
their labor supply-particularly among wives and mothers-and increasing
household debts to maintain consumption as wages failed to keep pace with
inflation. (1)
Another issue regarding the income gap and decline of consumer wealth in Wall Street known as
the Great Recession. Elaborating on the Great Recession a bit, the definition of The Great
Recession is a sharp decline in economic activity during the late 2000s, which is generally
considered the largest downturn since the Great Depression. The term Great Recession applies
to both U.S. recession officially lasting from December 2007 to June 2009 and the ensuing
global recession in 2009. The economic slump began when the U.S. housing market went from
boom to bust and large amounts of mortgage-backed securities and derivatives lost significant
value. With all the negative impacts such as the Great Recession and the income gap inequality,
capitalism can not only benefit from revisions and changes of values, but also from the current

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course of capitalism system itself. Loopholes in the capitalism tax system have been exploited
and it effects not only the people, but the government as well. If the loopholes in the system are
fixed, then the result will be positive on both sides, such as the government and the people.

Overall, Americas values need tuning and possibly even a complete overhaul. The
values such as competition and materialism should be revised and put into practice for a better
direction of capitalism and the free market. Volunteerism should be encouraged. If the
American people can balance materialism and competition core values with thriftiness, honesty,
fairness, and prosperity, America will, ironically, see more people living richer lives, but beyond
the limitations of money. If America implements thrift into materialism and volunteerism for a
positive outcome in competition, this will bring capitalism to a positive direction.

Work Cited

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"conspicuous consumption." American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth

Edition. 2011. Web. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company 13 May.
2015 http://www.thefreedictionary.com/conspicuous+consumption
Employment rates of college graduates U.S. Department of Education, National Center for
Education Statistics. (2014). The Condition of Education 2014 (NCES 2014-083) Labor Force
Participation and Unemployment Rates by Educational Attainment. 13 May. 2015
http://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=561
"dog-eat-dog." Dictionary.com Unabridged. Random House, Inc. 13 May. 2015.
<Dictionary.com http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/dog-eat-dog>.
The Great Recession Investopedia. Investopedia US, 31 July 2014. Web. 13 May 2015.
Kasser, Tim. Can Thrift Bring Well-Being? A Review of The Research And A Tentative
Theory. Social & Personalilty Psychology Compass 5.11 (2011): 865-877. Acadamic Search
Complete. Web. 15 May 2015
Callahan, David. Take Back Values. Nation 278.5 (2004): 14-20. Academic Search Complete.
Web. 13 May 2015
Boushey, Heather, and Hersh, Adam S. The American Middle Class, Income Inequality, and the
Strength of Our Economy Center for American Progress 17 May. 2012, Web. 13 May 2015