In 1917, Bolsheviks under Lenin seized control of Russia in the famous October revolution, ending a short-lived experiment with constitutional democracy and replacing it with a one-Party socialist state. As the revolution swirled through the streets of St. Petersberg, a girl of 12 watched many of the events from the balcony of her family’s house. That girl was Alyssa Rosenbaum, who ultimately left Russia for America and became the writer we know as Ayn Rand .
Atlas Shrugged is
a revolutionary work, but the revolution it represents is diametrically
opposed to the one she lived through as a youth. In the eight years
before she left the Soviet Union in 1925, Rand lived through the
economic chaos and desperate poverty it caused, as the communists
nationalized businesses and expropriated private wealth. Her father was a
pharmacist, and Rand was in the shop when soldiers arrived to close the
business and seize the property, depriving the family of work,
property, and income. In the years before she left, she lived through
the tyranny of statism, as the communists used every means to expand
their power—including secret police, terror tactics, and executing
enemies or shipping them to Siberia. Under the new communist regime,
more and more of private life was politicized, including speech, ideas,
and education.
Rand was appalled by this system. She was appalled not merely by
its visible effects on herself and the people she knew. She was appalled
by the underlying ideology of communism, especially the ideas of moral
collectivism that made communism possible and were used to justify it as
a noble ideal. Even as a child, she knew there was something horribly
wrong in the idea of sacrificing the individual to the collective,
breaking eggs to make an omelet.
Her first published novel, We the Living, offers a
portrait of Russia in those years and of the crushing effects of
communism on people of ability, ambition, and independent spirit. But Atlas is
her fullest and deepest portrayal of the issues involved. It goes far
beyond the specifics of any particular type of system—communist,
fascist, communitarian, whatever—to deal with the essence of
collectivism.
And, more importantly, to present the essence of individualism,
including the capitalism system of economic freedom. What she meant by
capitalism is not the mixed economy characteristic of all the
industrialized countries, in which the government consumes a third or
more of all production, and heavily regulates the rest. She meant
laissez-faire, “with a separation of state and economics, in the same
way and for the same reasons as the separation of state and church." The
function of government is solely to protect individual rights,
including property rights. When it redistributes wealth, nationalizes
industries, or regulates voluntary transactions among consenting adults,
it commits the moral fallacy of socialism, the fallacy of treating the
individual as a means to the collective good.
Rand's great achievement was to offer a vision of capitalism as a
moral ideal. Her characters illustrate the virtues of rationality,
production, and trade—and the vices of parasitism and power. The
narrative dramatizes the struggle of producers against parasites and
predators, and traces the consequences of that struggle across a whole
society. And the meaning of these events is put into words, in speeches
by various characters that lay out a new philosophy and moral code of
individualism. In its characters, its plot and its philosophical themes,
Atlas is about a new revolution, a capitalist revolution. It is truly The Capitalist Manifesto.
What I’d like to do this evening is explain a little more fully
what I mean by the novel’s revolutionary character. I’ll begin with the
narrative, which tells the story of a kind of revolution, and then turn
to the core ideas of the book. The story
As a novel, Atlas has the form of a mystery story. We
follow two major characters, Dagny Taggart and Hank Rearden, as they try
to find answers to the puzzles of their world. Dagny is the
Vice-President of Operations of Taggart Transcontinental, the largest
railroad in the United States. Rearden is the head of a
steel-manufacturing company that he started from scratch and built into
the best-run, most profitable company in the industry. As the story
opens, Rearden has just started producing a new alloy he invented,
called Rearden Metal; and Dagny is his first customer. She wants to have
rails of the metal to replace a branch line in Colorado, where many new
factories have located and need better transportation for their
products.
Dagny and Rearden are surrounded by people who put obstacles in
their way. Dagny’s brother James is the president of the railroad; he is
afraid to rely on his own business judgment, and he fears and resents
those who do; he is more of a political type, spending most of his time
on public relations, and scheming how to use political connections to
get government subsidies, or government regulations that harm competing
railroads. Orren Boyle, head of a steel company competing with Rearden,
is a crony of James Taggart and operates the same way. He never delivers
steel on time or makes a profit, but he has great press and political
connections.
There’s also Wesley Mouch, Rearden’s “man in Washington,” who sells
Rearden out at a key moment by going along with a kind of antitrust law
aimed at Rearden. And there’s the State Science Institute, whose
Machiavellian, power-hungry director attacks Rearden Metal, without
evidence, as a possible danger to the public.
Over and above the obstacles that villains like these place in the
way of Dagny, Rearden, and other genuine producers, there is something
palpably wrong with the world. The society seems to be in some sort of
decline. Buildings and machinery are in disrepair, things break and
don’t get fixed, businesses close or cut back, competent people are hard
to find. Economically it seems like a recession, but there’s a
recession of the spirit, too, a mood of despair, futility, and
resignation captured in what has become a popular expression: “Who is
John Galt?” An odd thing about this state of affairs is that a number of
highly talented people seem to be disappearing, including some
prominent achievers at the peak of their success.
Working against seemingly impossible odds, Dagny succeeds in
completing the Colorado branch line, which she has named the John Galt
Line in defiance of the general mood of despair. Rearden works closely
with her—it’s the first showcase of his metal—and they soon become
lovers. Rand’s description of the first run of the John Galt Line is one
of the most vivid and powerful things she ever wrote: vivid in
describing the train’s motion as it hurtled through the mountainous
terrain; powerful in the inner reflections Dagny has about the personal
meaning of the experience, as a celebration of her achievement.
Unfortunately, the triumph is short-lived. The government’s control
over the economy has been growing. The public resents the business boom
in Colorado and is clamoring for a special tax on the state, and for
equal train service in all states. Now that the worth of Rearden Metal
has been proven and demand for it is has sky-rocketed, the government
begins regulating how much he can sell, and to whom. The only bright
spot in the increasingly grim situation is that Dagny and Rearden find a
motor in an abandoned factory, a motor that appears to have been a
technological breakthrough. But what is it doing in a junk heap? And
what happened to the genius who invented it?
As Dagny tries to solve that mystery by searching for the inventor,
she is increasingly convinced that the disappearances of so many
productive people must be some kind of organized plot. Eventually Dagny
discovers…
… But wait. Atlas is a mystery novel. If you have
not read it but would like to, I don’t want to spoil the suspense and
pleasure of how these mysteries are solved. So be warned: spoilers
ahead! I’ll waive the normal standards of courtesy if you want to read
the papers, or put in your MP3 headphones, for the next few sentences….
Eventually Dagny discovers that indeed there is such a plot. Led by
the man who invented the motor, the best producers are engaged in a
strike: to withdraw their talent, work, and ability to create wealth
from a society that dishonors their work even as it expropriates what
they have produced. And they have set a condition for their return: The
recognition of their right to produce and trade freely, without state
interference. In effect, they are demanding a capitalist revolution.
Their leader, John Galt, has issued the call: Capitalists of the world,
unite! You have nothing to lose but your chains.
The moral philosophy embodied in the strike can be broken down into three broad themes. Atlas
Shrugged actually conveys a multitude of ideas that are dramatized by
the events and explained in a long speech—a radio address—in which Galt
tells the world what the strike has been about. But these three are the
deepest, most essential ones, the ones that really make the novel an
intellectual revolution as well as an exciting story. If you get these,
you get the book.
- 1. The glory of production
- 2. The morality of self-interest
- 3.The justice of trade
1. The glory of production
At the beginning of Atlas Shrugged , Eddie Willers recalls a childhood conversation with Dagny Taggart.
- “You ought to do something great...I mean, the two of us together.”
“What?” she asked. He said, “I don’t know. That’s what we ought to find
out. Not just what you said. Not just business and earning a living.
Things like winning battles, or saving people out of fires, or climbing
mountains.... The minister said last Sunday that we must always reach
for the best within us. What do you suppose is the best within us?”
By the end of the novel, Eddie knows the answer to that question, and so do we. Atlas Shrugged is
a novel about producers, specifically business producers, and it
celebrates them as heroes. Rand’s first theme is that production is
good. It is good not only because the things we produce support our
lives, and provide comfort and security; it is good because the activity
of production is an activity of creative achievement, adding value to
our world through the exercise of intelligence and effort. Rand sees
production in moral as well as economic terms, as an expression of the
best within us.
Hank Rearden is the character who provides the full template for the virtues of the producers. He is truly the Atlas of the novel’s title, the giant who supports the world by creating wealth.
He came from utter poverty. He began working in the Minnesota iron
ore mines at age 14. He worked, learned, and saved, until he bought the
mines, then an abandoned steel plant, and then coal mines, from which he
built the most successful steel company in the business. And then he
spent 10 years of research and experiment to invent a new metal alloy
much better than steel.
His character as a producer is shown in countless ways throughout the novel. Rearden is …
a) A man of purpose and vision, with the self-generated will to
pursue the vision in reality. When the first heat of Rearden Metal is
poured, he thinks back to what kept him going through the exhausting
process of trial and error.
- the one thought held immovably across a span of ten years, under
everything he did and everything he saw, the thought held in his mind
when he looked at the buildings of a city, at the track of a railroad,
at the light in the windows of a distant farmhouse, at the knife in the
hands of a beautiful woman cutting a piece of fruit at a banquet, the
thought of a metal alloy that would do more than steel had ever done, a
metal that would be to steel what steel had been to iron.
b) Rearden is a man who takes responsibility for his decisions and
actions, not just in business but in every area of life. He was his own
harshest judge and task-master.
c) At the root of his character, infusing all his other traits, was
an absolute commitment to objectivity, to accepting facts as facts
without evasion or wishful thinking. He not only had a brilliant,
creative mind in the sense of intelligence and knowledge. He was
committed to using his mind to the fullest, to understanding the world
as it is, to finding truth—and speaking it honestly. In other words, he
not only had a highly developed capacity for reason, he possessed the
moral virtue of rationality.
d) Finally, Rearden was a man of pride, in himself and his
accomplishments. In one of the first efforts of the looters to
expropriate Rearden Metal, the State Science Institute attempts to buy
the rights to Rearden Metal and take it off the market. Rearden refuses.
When a Dr. Potter from the Institute asks why he wants to make his
gains over years, squeezing out a profit margin penny by penny, rather
than accept a government check now, Rearden says “Because it’s mine. Do
you understand the word?” In the final lines of the scene, Potter again
asks Rearden why he is refusing. “…it’s because Rearden Metal is good.” 174
One of the things that Rand conveys about production—over and over
again, in many different forms—is that the source of material
achievements and wealth lies in the spirit of the producers. Early in
the novel, we hear Dagny reflecting:
- Motive power—thought Dagny, looking up at the Taggart Building in
the twilight—was its first need; motive power, to keep that building
standing; movement, to keep it immovable. It did not rest on piles
driven into granite; it rested on engines that rolled across a
continent. (67)
And what do those engines rest on? Riding in the locomotive on the
first run of the John Galt Line, Dagny walks into the engine room:
- They are alive, she thought, because they are the physical shape of
the action of a living power—of the mind that had been able to grasp the
whole of this complexity, to set its purpose, to give it form.
They are alive, she thought, but their soul operates them by remote control. Their soul is in every man who has the capacity to equal this achievement. Should the soul vanish from the earth, the motors would stop, because that is the power which keeps them going—… the power of a living mind—the power of thought and choice and purpose." (234-235)
Rand is of course speaking metaphorically here, but the metaphor is
a powerful one that resonates throughout the novel, and stands for a
truth that is not a metaphor: Material production has a spiritual core.
Conversely, when the spirit is gone, machines, buildings, roads—all
the products of industrial production—reduce to inert matter. And,
quickly enough, they rust, decay, break down, fall apart, and revert to
natural elements. In Aristotle’s sense of soul as the animating
principle of a living thing, human intelligence is the soul of the
machine. In portraying a society in decline, Atlas has many
scenes that illustrate the point. For example, when Dagny and Rearden
find the abandoned factory, the countryside they pass through is in deep
industrial decline. People are in fact living in pre-industrial
conditions: no electricity, few paved roads, no travel to next town,
plowing fields by hand. The inhabitants are using the relics and debris
of industry for the accidental purposes permitted by their physical
shapes: telegraph wire to hang laundry, engine cylinders as flower pots,
etc. This is the image of what happens when the mental/spiritual source
of industry—the motive power—is gone.
In dramatizing the spiritual core of production, Rand challenged
the ancient prejudice that material production is a mundane, mechanical,
purely materialistic affair. Some of the world’s major religions teach
that there is a dichotomy within human nature between a higher and a
lower self; and a built-in conflict between desires for materialistic,
worldly good such as wealth and physical pleasure, and aspirations for
things of the spirit—knowledge, virtue, love, art, and the like. Among
the Greek philosophers, Plato held to that view. And even Aristotle, who
had a more worldly outlook and a more integrated, organic view of human
nature, still held that man’s highest and noblest activity is the
exercise of reason detached from the use of reason to create things in
the world.
Since the Industrial Revolution and the birth of capitalism two
centuries ago, the power of reason to improve human life through
production has become astoundingly obvious. Yet the attitude persists
even to our day. Matthew Arnold, an English writer and educator in the
19th century, expressed the attitude this way: "Which is more
admirable, the England that produced coal and railroads, or the England
that produced Shakespeare and Jonson?" [Culture and Anarchy].
Arnold intended this as a rhetorical question: all right-thinking
people would say Shakespeare and Jonson represent a more admirable
achievement than the producers of coal and railroads. Rand emphatically
rejects this invidious comparison as a false dichotomy. Both kinds of
activity, artistic production and material producers, are forms of the
human exercise of intelligence and imagination. They both take courage,
integrity, and discipline. And they both add value to our world.
Now I have been referring to material production as the creation of
wealth. I want to clarify that Rand is not primarily concerned with
wealth in the sense of money, cash on hand or in the bank. Rand
understood her economics. Money is a measure and store of value, but the
value lies in the real goods and services that have been produced.
Money is also a medium of exchange, but only among those with something
to trade. Money has no meaning or value if it is detached from
underlying values, the real goods and services and from the creative
activities that produce them. This is what Rand means when she speaks of
creating wealth, and monetary wealth that is earned through production
is something to be proud of. But she is not concerned with the size of a
person’s bank account per se. James Taggart was a very rich man, but he
acquired that money through illicit, nonproductive, political
manipulation—and it does him no good when his policies have destroyed
the economy.
The first key to Rand’s defense of capitalism, then, is that
productive achievement is the essence of the human ideal, of human
beings as they can be and ought to be. She is not making the economic
point that capitalism excels in enabling the production of material
wealth, although that is important. She is making the ethical point
that capitalism protects and rewards those human and heroic qualities
that make creation of any type possible. It protects and rewards the
best within us.
2. The morality of self-interest
In the market system of capitalism, individuals pursue their
self-interest. That is the basis of economic theory, but it has always
posed a moral problem for defenders of capitalism because of the moral
tradition of altruism.
Virtually every code of morality in history has said that helping
others is a core principle of ethics, that self-sacrifice is the noblest
thing a person can do, that we should all try to put service above
self. If you start from that moral premise, it affects how you see the
economic activities driven by self-interest: making a living, buying a
house, investing in stocks, starting a company, and the like. These will
seem at best amoral, but easily crossing the line into greed and
avarice. Even if the overall results are beneficial, as Adam Smith
showed, that fact does not change how people tend to see the individual
activities. As one of Smith’s predecessors, Bernard Mandeville, put it,
there’s a paradox in the fact that “private vice produces public
benefits.” So capitalism has widely been regarded as being conceived in
sin. As a result, advocates of the free market tend to focus on the
economic efficiency of the market, and the general benefits to society.
At the same time, the critics of capitalism have always attacked it as founded on selfishness. Long before he wrote Das Kapital,
Karl Marx was writing essays that denounced capitalism as immoral, and
not just capitalists but the entire classical liberal philosophy of
individual rights.
- None of the supposed rights of man, therefore, go beyond the
egoistic man, man as he is, as a member of civil society; that is, an
individual separated from the community, withdrawn into himself, wholly
preoccupied with his private interest and acting in accordance with his
private caprice." [From "The Jewish Question."]
Later in the 19th century, Beatrice Webb, a prominent
member of the Fabian socialists, who pushed England to embrace the
welfare state, described socialism as an attempt "to transfer the
'impulse of self-subordinating service' from God to man." [My Apprenticeship,
158] It is undoubtedly this “impulse” that explains why socialism was
such a popular cause. What galvanized people and made them feel
socialism was an idealistic cause was not Marx’s goofy economic
theories. It was the idea that socialism is the moral ideal because it is founded on sharing, brotherhood, giving to each on the basis of need.
Today, the same altruist moral premises lie behind the frequent
attacks on business and the profit motive as greedy. And also the in the
tendency of highly successful businesses and businessmen to feel that
they must engage in philanthropy to justify the wealth they have
acquired.
Rand’s defense of self-interest and her criticism of the altruist morality are the most radical features of Atlas,
illustrated in many scenes. At a crucial point in the novel, for
example, Rearden is on trial for violating an arbitrary economic
regulation. Instead of apologizing for his pursuit of profit or seeking
mercy on the basis of philanthropy, he says, “I work for nothing but my
own profit—which I make by selling a product they need to men who are
willing and able to buy it. I do not produce it for their benefit at the
expense of mine, and they do not buy it for my benefit at the expense
of theirs; I do not sacrifice my interests to them nor do they sacrifice
theirs to me; we deal as equals by mutual consent to mutual
advantage—and I am proud of every penny that I have earned in this
manner. . . .”
Rand held that every person is an autonomous individual, with the
moral right to pursue his own happiness. She admired those who embrace
the wonderful fact of their own existence and live their lives to the
fullest, without guilt or apology. As she put it in the title of a later
work, she believed in “the virtue of selfishness.” But her conception
of self-interest and egoism is radically different from the conventional
picture of selfishness. It is not the kind of grasping, exploitative,
attempt to satisfy urges of the moment, or seeking money, sex, and power
at any cost. The villain businessmen in Atlas are the ones who
fit that picture. Her heroes define their self-interest by achievement,
rationality, pride, and justice. In that respect, the moral philosophy
of Atlas could just as well be described as the selfishness of virtue.
Rand took seriously the literal meaning of altruism. "The basic
principle of altruism is that man has no right to exist for his own
sake, that service to others is the only justification of his existence,
and that self-sacrifice is his highest moral duty, virtue, and value."
["Faith and Force"][1]
And she shows throughout the novel that sacrifice is not a moral
but a highly destructive injunction. Among many other points, sacrifice
as a moral imperative is the chief philosophical basis for collectivism,
always invoked by the power-seekers to rationalize expropriation. And
that indeed is what the strike of the producers is all about. They
refuse the role of sacrificial victims. They refuse to be treated as
means to the ends of others.
At the same time, the novel draws a sharp distinction between
altruism and benevolence. By contrast with altruism, the spirit of
benevolence leads one to help others as a choice, not a duty. It can
involve giving to others in response to a temporary crisis that you can
help them through, or investing in someone’s potential. But it does not
mean writing a blank check on one’s resources to sacrifice for the
endless needs of other people at large. And such benevolence does not
take precedence over the virtues involved in productive achievement. It
is a secondary element in morality.
There are many scenes of genuine benevolence in Atlas. I
want to mention one in particular, because it illustrates both
benevolence and altruism. Dagny is working in her private rail car on a
Taggart train when she sees the conductor about to throw a bum off the
train. Something about him makes Dagny think he’s a good man down on his
luck; she stops the conductor and ends up having a long conversation
with him. Extending herself in that way is an example of Dagny’s
benevolent spirit. The bum tells her about a factory where he used to
work, the very factory in which Dagny and Rearden had found the motor.
Here’s where we get to the contrast with altruism: When the founder of
the company died, his three children took over and turned the place into
a workers’ cooperative to be run on the altruist principle “from each
according to his ability….” The account of what happened is a brilliant
analysis of what that Marxist slogan means in practice.
- In a collective enterprise, you cannot simply let each individual decide what his ability and needs are; that must be decided collectively. So everyone competes to exaggerate his needs and minimize his ability.
- Decent people in such a system felt guilty about consuming too much. But those who are irresponsible, who are wasteful or profligate in spending their income and then can’t provide for their needs, get taken care of anyway; the group provides at least the minimum.
- People are rewarded for doing a poor job, punished for doing a good one. If you do a poor job there is no penalty; you still get your needs taken care of. If you do a good job, there is no extra reward; on the contrary, you raise expectations and get more work assigned to you.
- Because of these conflicts, the system bred hatred among people, as they snooped and meddled in each other's lives to see who was slacking off work or spending money on indulgences.
- It was impossible to allocate all work and income by democratic vote. So the power to make decisions flowed into the hands of one person acting as economic czar over everyone’s life.
- The best people left the company, refusing to work under such conditions; the quality of its product declined and customers went elsewhere.
This is what the principle of altruism comes to, finally. It is not
kindness; it is not benevolence; it is not brotherly love and
solidarity. The forced dependence of everyone on everyone else means a
war of all against all, in which power rules, and personal freedom,
responsibility, pride, and good will are extinguished.
3. The justice of trade
I will turn now to the third major theme in Atlas Shrugged : the justice of trade.
In all of its many forms, trade is a voluntary interaction among people to mutual benefit.
Both of those features are essential: Whether I am buying milk in the
grocery store, hiring an employee, forming a corporation with a group of
other people, buying a house, whatever, a trade is voluntary. It’s
something I choose to do and something that can happen only if the other
party or parties also choose. And the reason we all choose it to engage
in trade, of course, is that each of us expects to gain. We value what
we’re getting more than what we are giving in exchange, whether it’s
money, time, or anything else.
As a story about business, Atlas Shrugged highlights trade
as a major type of human activity. But Rand also extends the concept
beyond the realm of economic exchange, of buying and selling goods and
services. Indeed, the story shows how trade in a broader sense applies
to all human interactions. It applies, for example, to the exchange of
ideas and information, to the marketplace of ideas, as we often say. In
the realm of ideas and information, there may not be any literal
transfer of possession. When I tell you something I know, I don’t lose
the knowledge I gave you. But it is still a voluntary interaction from
which we both gain. The concept of trade even applies to personal
relationships, where we give each other and receive emotional benefits.
As Rand put the point in a later essay,
- A trader is a man who earns what he gets and does not give or take
the undeserved. He does not treat men as masters or slaves, but as
independent equals. He deals with men by means of a free, voluntary,
unforced, uncoerced exchange—an exchange which benefits both parties by
their own independent judgment…..
- In spiritual issues, a trader is a man who does not seek to be loved
for his weaknesses or flaws, only for his virtues, and who does not
grant his love to the weaknesses or the flaws of others, only to their
virtues. [ The Virtue of Selfishness ]
Rand’s principle is that trade is the proper, ethical way for
people to relate. It is the principle of justice. Because it is
voluntary, trade respects each individual’s autonomy and freedom to act
on his judgment. Forcing people to interact against their will is as
hateful in the economic realm as it would be in the realm of friendship
and love. The are many examples in Atlas of the government
using economic coercion against the producers, regulating what they can
do, depriving them of their property and of everything they had built in
the expectation of being able to use it, tearing away their freedom.
Rearden in particular is saddled with edicts that wreck the carefully
constructed production system that enabled him to make the best steel at
the best price. These economic controls are of a piece with what
totalitarian states do to artists and intellectuals by suppressing their
creativity.
So the first thing that makes trade the principle of justice is
that it’s voluntary. The second essential feature of trade is that both
parties gain. Because the benefit is mutual, individuals do not
sacrifice themselves or demand sacrifices from others. Trade is just
because it treats others as autonomous equals and recognizes that the
values they have to offer are products of their autonomous minds. The
business heroes in Atlas are fierce competitors, hard
bargainers, demanding bosses. It’s obvious how those attitudes reflect
their pursuit of their interests. But Rand also shows how the attitudes
express a deep respect for the people they are dealing with as competent
to pursue their own goals and make their own decisions, without any
need for pity or charity.
In speaking of equality in connection with trade, I am referring to
the basic equality of people as persons, as independent, autonomous
agents. I am referring to the equal dignity they deserve—or can earn—as
moral beings regardless of their ability or place in life. But of course
people are not equal in ability, circumstances, success, etc. And as a
writer in the Romantic tradition, Rand made her heroes people of
exceptional, larger-than-life talents and achievements. In this respect,
there’s a very important addition she makes to the principle that trade
involves mutual benefit. Marx held that capitalists are exploiters
because their profits are taken from revenue that would otherwise go to
the workers. Many people who do not go that far are nevertheless
suspicious about inequalities that occur in a free market, or feel that
trade is fair only when the parties are more or less equal in bargaining
position.
Rand disagrees. A key point that is explained and dramatized in Atlas is
what she calls “the pyramid of ability.” When wealth is acquired by
creative achievement in a free society, those at the top of the scale in
wealth provide much more value to others than they receive back; it’s
the people at the bottom of the scale who receive the most as return on
their efforts, because their efforts are leveraged by the technology,
investments, risk-taking, and management skills that went into creating
the jobs they hold.
As John Galt explains,
- The man at the top of the intellectual pyramid contributes the most
to all those below him, but gets nothing except his material payment,
receiving no intellectual bonus from others to add to the value of his
time. The man at the bottom who, left to himself, would starve in his
hopeless ineptitude, contributes nothing to those above him, but
receives the bonus of all of their brains. Such is the nature of the
'competition' between the strong and the weak of the intellect. Such is
the pattern of 'exploitation' for which you have damned the strong.
Atlas Shrugged , 988-989]
The antithesis of trade, and the only alternative as a way to interact with people, is power.
Power is the effort to get something by bringing another’s mind and
effort under one’s control, regardless of that person’s choice or
benefit. Power is inherently coercive, not voluntary. It is based on the
threatening the person with loss instead of offering him some gain. It
is therefore a negative sum relationship, rather than positive sum. And
where trade is a relationship between people as equals, power is a
relationship of domination.
Every society has some mix of trade and power as operative principles of interaction. One of the things that makes Atlas a
very long book is Rand’s ambition to show what happens, across an
entire economy—an entire society, really—as freedom to trade is replaced
by the exercise of power, up to the point of collapse from a purely
power-based system. The result, in my view, is a tour de force.
It could serve as a textbook in the economics of a free market and of
government intervention. Indeed, I know economists who assign the book
in intro courses for that very reason.
In the course of the narrative, we see how government actions
produce unintended consequences. Price controls in one industry give
rise to shortages that cascade through other industries. Regulations on
who can buy Rearden Metal give rise to black markets. By the end,
government has taken total control, with appointed bureaucrats making
all economic decisions. With the complete abandonment of markets, we see
that no rational allocation of resources is possible. In one amazing
scene, Taggart freight trains are sent to Louisiana to serve some
bureaucrat’s pet project, so they are not available to ship a record
grain harvest in Minnesota, and the wheat rots by the tracks.
Along with these economic effects, Atlas dramatizes the
political ones. As power grows by degree, it changes its nature. It
becomes increasingly arbitrary: laws are replaced by edicts, the rule of
law by the whim of those in power. The pursuit of power becomes
increasingly overt; the justifying fictions of serving the public
interest become increasingly desperate, dishonest, and cynical. Success
in business increasingly goes to political entrepreneurs—businessmen who
seek wealth through political connections and manipulation—rather than
real entrepreneurs who gain wealth through production. People flee from
positions of responsibility in reaction to a social environment that
penalizes both success and failure in unpredictable ways. To shore up
its fragile, unworkable economic planning, the government becomes
increasingly desperate to boost public morale by censoring critics and
imposing harsh penalties for “economic crimes.”
This entire story about the decline of the economy, the growth of
power, and the disastrous results is a brilliant time-lapse portrayal of
what happened in Soviet Russia over the course of 70 years. And many of
the individual episodes read as if they were taken from yesterday’s
headlines. But despite the realism of her narrative, Rand’s goal in Atlas
is not primarily to make an economic or political point. Her concern is
ethical: to dramatize the principle of trade as the essence of justice
among people.
Conclusion
In telling her story about the strike of the producers and the
capitalist revolution they bring about, Rand was also introducing a
revolutionary moral perspective. The three core elements of that
perspective, to summarize, are
- The glory of production, the creative nature of all productive achievement, including the creation of wealth, as opposed to the view of business as materialistic.
- The morality of self-interest, of pursuing one’s life and happiness—including the pursuit of profit, wealth, economic gain—as opposed to the morality of altruism.
- The justice of trade as the proper relation among people, in all realms of life, as opposed to power and sacrifice.
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