Responsible Capitalism.

Hi

There are some very divise views on here.

Capitalism is always bad according to some.

The Bosses keep the workers down.

This not always true, it is not a given.

An example.

We have a local businessman, started off with nothing, left school at 14.

He is now a Multimillionaire.

He has built a Local Club and Sports Centre here in the village, cost him over £2 million.

He has donated it to the village.

He subsidises the Childcare there, pre and after School.

The public transport here is appalling, he subsides the Dial a Ride Bus.

When the local Doctor retired, the surgery was in his house, leaving the locals with a horrendous journey to the two nearest towns to get to the nearest Surgery.

He built a completely new Medical Centre at a cost of £1.37 million, complete with a Dispensary, and gave it to the Village.

He has recently built a new development of 8 one Bedroom Bungalows next to the Medical Centre for local oldies.

He subsidizes the rents, they are very low.

He has a villa in Spain, he gives it free of charge, including airfares, to locals who cannot afford a Holiday.

His only stipulation is that if you can work, you should.

I have no arguments with this at all.

Re: Responsible Capitalism.

That man is a rarity unfortunately, many would be secreting their money overseas.

I am not opposed to capitalism, I am apposed to rampant greed and the ideology that says management are valued at what they can get away with.

Re: Responsible Capitalism.

I had one view of capitalism based on Marx's predictions (which I read about when studying economics). I then heard of Ayn Rand and became intrigued as to how someone could sit there and say that altruism is a bad thing. Following this I read her book - the "Republican bible" Atlas Shrugged out of interest and she does illustrate her points very effectively in her work of political fiction. Because of course without the capitalist "greed is good" mentality we would have no goods and services available. So nowhere locally to buy food or clothes or to fix your plumbing etc. Of course they also provide employment. Maybe it's a bit like the wealthy lord of the past providing employment to servants but it's still a livelihood of some sort. A planned economy just doesn't have the flexibility to do this effectively. It's just that the free market cannot be totally free. There must be some controls from the state. At the moment I don't feel that exists.

So now I have two points of view. One is that we do need people who set up businesses to provide these things and the other than the whole system is always going to exploit workers, be in here or on the other side of the world, and inevitably it will meet itself on the way back. Although presently it buys time until the next technological revolution.

I'd love to know how the local businessman made his millions.

Re: Responsible Capitalism.

There are more such people around. Bill Gates has invested a fortune into trying to reduce food poverty and public health in deprived countries. He stated in a radio interview (it may have been desert island discs) that he has more money than he needs for his day to day living so he may as well use it for something good. But there have been benign capitalists going way back. Such as the Rowntree foundation or Port Sunlight. I'm not sure if these were privately owned firms. But it's the shareholder culture that makes it difficult to give back to workers/society.

Re: Responsible Capitalism.

Hi

He left school and worked for his Mum, they had one cattle wagon.

He now owns Grocontinental and it is privately owned, no shareholders, just him and his kids.

The Medical Centre

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P40qOruoBBk

His latest warehouse.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3HxO596cOew

The bungalows.

http://www.whitchurchherald.co.uk/ne...sidents-85210/

The family history.

http://archive.commercialmotor.com/a...grocontinental

He lives 4 doors away from me.

He never buys a new car, he considers them a waste of money, he still buys his veg on the market and dresses in jeans and a jumper.

There is absolutely no side to him at all.

He chats happily away to Zac and Derek, my Polish friends, who stay from time to time with me, they earn their living from salvaging second hand car parts.

Re: Responsible Capitalism.

Countries that shun Capitalism are very poor in many ways to the determent of the standard of living.

The most successful manufacturer and exporter of goods Communist China has embraced Capitalism. They are happy to spend a fortune sending their Students to UK Universities as well.

It is not a sin to make a profit or we would all be working for a big apple.