The Self-Destruction of the 1 Percent — Die Journalistin Chrystia Freeland schlägt den Bogen von den alten Veneziern zu den Vereinigten Staaten. Deren Gemeinsamkeit: Die Elite will sich von den anderen abgrenzen – und bringt sich so in Gefahr sich selbst zu zerstören. In Venedig sicherte sich der Adel in der sogenannten „Serrata“ die Macht:
Venice’s elites were the chief beneficiaries. Like all open economies, theirs was turbulent. Today, we think of social mobility as a good thing. But if you are on top, mobility also means competition.
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The story of Venice’s rise and fall is told by the scholars Daron Acemoglu and James A. Robinson, in their book “Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty,” as an illustration of their thesis that what separates successful states from failed ones is whether their governing institutions are inclusive or extractive. Extractive states are controlled by ruling elites whose objective is to extract as much wealth as they can from the rest of society. Inclusive states give everyone access to economic opportunity; often, greater inclusiveness creates more prosperity, which creates an incentive for ever greater inclusiveness.
Bottom Line: Gesellschaften können also dann besser überleben, wenn sie möglichst viele Menschen an der Wirtschaft teilhaben lassen.
Noch ein sehr bezeichnendes Zitat aus dem Text (über das ich auf neunetz überhaupt erst auf den Artikel aufmerksam wurde):
Businessmen like to style themselves as the defenders of the free market economy, but as Luigi Zingales, an economist at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, argued, “Most lobbying is pro-business, in the sense that it promotes the interests of existing businesses, not pro-market in the sense of fostering truly free and open competition.”