Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal

Justice demands that small businessmen be reduced to corporate employees

According to Ayn Rand: “Every ugly, brutal aspect of injustice toward racial or religious minorities is being practiced toward businessmen” (41). Even if there is some validity in the claim that big business is sometimes treated unfairly, this is childish hyperbole. America has not yet had a policy of genocide against big business so Christians can steal their property. The government has not yet issued a decree that all businessmen must vacate their homes and move away to reservations in the desert. They are not lynched, nor beaten, their children are not sold away from them, and their daughters are not required to submit to their owners’ lechery. They are never shot nor arrested for striking for decent wages and working conditions. All that is required of them is that they pay income tax on their wildly excessive wealth that they do not need, and can only with the wildest and most narcissistic stretch of the imagination be said to have earned or to deserve. This is not remotely like slavery.

On the other hand, Rand and Alan Greenspan describe the anti-trust system in which the laws are confusing, in which merely by defending themselves successful businessmen put themselves in even greater danger, and in which companies are “being condemned for being too successful, too efficient, and too good at competition” (Greenspan, p.72). I know too little about the anti-trust laws, or the specific cases Rand and Greenspan describe, to know the other side of the story, but it sounds like a legitimate complaint. On the other other hand, in ATLAS SHRUGGED, the companies driven out of business by more successful companies are always caricatures of incompetence. In the real world, many competent businesses are driven out of business by underhanded practices, and this was part of the motivation for developing anti-trust laws. Admittedly, in the real world (as opposed to Rand‘s disingenuous fantasy world) larger companies will always be able to produce and sell commodities less expensively than smaller companies, however competent the smaller company may be, and drive them out of business by legal -- though hardly moral -- means. Maybe the big companies became big by virtue of greater efficiency and a better product, or just as likely, maybe an already gigantic company pumped a lot of money into a new enterprise. As Nathaniel Branden says, “a chain store could give [the neighborhood] better service at lower prices and thereby let them save money . . . no one has a vested right to a position if others can do the job better than he can” (P. 78). So small neighborhood stores, restaurants, and farms must sell out to corporations. These small businessmen whine about unfairness, but that’s what capitalism is all about. It makes no sense to be in favor of laisser-faire capitalism, yet opposed to successful corporations. “When people denounce the free market as ‘cruel,’ the fact that they are decrying is that the market is ruled by a single moral principle: justice” (p.78). These small businessmen and farmers can now get jobs with the corporations, at the lowest wages the corporation can get away with paying (as determined by the ‘free’ market); and more and more of the nation’s wealth will be concentrated into the hands of fewer and fewer people. However, it is not the nation‘s wealth; it is their wealth.

Laisser-faire capitalism leads inevitably to industrial feudalism

Rand and her cronies are typically disingenuousness on this topic. If we are to believe them, there are two sets of capitalists: those who operate under laisser-faire rules, and those who use their pull to get handouts from the government -- “wealthfare,” as we call it. Rand complains: “A system of pure, unregulated laissez-faire capitalism has never yet existed anywhere” (p. 45). Marxists, Christians, and Moslems can and do make the same complaint, with equal truth and justification. This is because people cannot be depended upon to behave according to whatever your favorite ideology happens to be. Wealthy people are always going to have pull with the government, and can be counted upon to use it, unfairly, and against whatever the “rules” are supposed to be. Unregulated capitalism is always going to be corrupt. That is simply self-evident. Alan Greenspan finally acknowledged that which those of us who know very little about economics had always known. Rand asks, and answers herself: “What is economic power? It is the power to produce and to trade what one has produced” (p. 44). As if that was all that there was to it. But economic power is also, obviously, the power to buy and control and essentially be the government. The one thing that all societies have had in common, throughout the entirety of mankind’s history, is that they have been governed by the wealthy. This was even -- one might even say especially -- true of the so-called “socialist” governments of China and the Soviet Union. America’s Founding Fathers, or at least some of them, wrote the Constitution establishing democracy in an attempt to prevent one segment of society from having undue power. It has never worked perfectly, and in the past thirty years or so, accelerated by Reaganomics, it has all but collapsed. “The businessman’s tool is values; the bureaucrat’s tool is fear” (p. 45). But the businessmen either are the bureaucrats, or they have bought them. The justice of unregulated capitalism leads to giant corporations, leads to greater and greater stratification of society, which leads to a system of industrial feudalism. Presumably, all Americans are acquainted with President Eisenhower’s warning of the coming -- now already well-enthroned -- power of the military-industrial complex. Jack London, in THE IRON HEEL, quotes Abraham Lincoln regarding oligarchic power: “I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country. . . . corporations have been enthroned and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed.” —U.S. President Abraham Lincoln, Nov. 21, 1864 (letter to Col. William F. Elkins) (Ref: The Lincoln Encyclopedia: The Spoken and Written Words of A. Lincoln). So far, in nothing that I have read by Ayn Rand, does she ever use the word democracy. The “freedom” Ayn Rand favors is that which permit’s frees the super rich to form giant corporations so that America will have government by oligarchy.

Since, as Rand acknowledges, laisser-faire capitalism has never yet existed, it is impossible to know whether it would actually work as conjectured. Expecting the ‘invisible’ hand of the market to make everything work out right, if employers, employees, and customers behave according to their own selfish interests, is not intrinsically convincing. This is analogous to expecting justice to prevail in a trial in which prosecutors and defense attorneys present all of the skewed “facts” favorable to win their case, completely irrespective of the truth of guilt or innocence, and even though both sides know but ignore this truth in the interest of winning their case. Justice is likely to be determined by whoever can buy the better lawyer. As Supreme Court Justice Antonia Scalia (in the video Truth on Trial, from Ethics in America) exclaims: “If you don’t hire a good lawyer, it’s your fault.” The most successful lawyers are not successful because they are always on the side of justice, but because they are skillful in manipulating juries to get verdicts favorable to those clients wealthy enough to buy justice. In the real world, it is not clear that the best products always win -- the corporation able to pay for expensive advertising, or sell relatively inexpensive but shoddy products to people who do not earn enough to pay for better -- will be the winner; nor do employees work voluntarily -- seriously, what choice do they have? Nor -- especially not -- is it true that having the vast bulk of the nation’s wealth controlled by a small percentage of the society is synonymous with a non-statist society. Democracy is the hallmark of a non-statist society -- not laisser-faire capitalism. Democracy and the extreme economic stratification to which unregulated capitalism inevitably leads cannot coexist.

This riveting compilation of 26 essays includes contributions by Alan Greenspan, Nathaniel Branden and Robert Hessen. It is primarily a treatise on the moral aspects of capitalism. The themes revolve around human nature and mankind's relationship to existence. Capitalism is advocated because it is the only system compatible with the life of a rational being.

Rand claims that the classical defenders and modern apologists of capitalism are by default responsible for undermining it. In her view, they are unwilling or unable to fight the battle on moral-philosophical grounds.

The essays provide a plethora of gripping insights and novel angles. Rand detests the idea of using altruism to defend capitalism. She proposes rationality instead, with a ruling principle of justice.

I do not necessarily agree with her on this but I enjoy Rand's scathing criticism of conservatism's perceived fallacies. Her vitriolic dissection of the 3 conservative strains is highly amusing! She identifies and attacks the Religious and the Traditionalists but really unleashes the sharp edge of her scorn on those who defend capitalism from the argument of mankind's depravity.

In the essay Requiem For Man, she savages the encyclical Populorum Progressio by Pope Paul VI, in which she also rips apart the reactions to it by publications like the New York Times, Wall Street Journal and Fortune magazine.

The book consists of two parts. The first is Theory And History, which includes essays on inter alia war, the persecution of big business, antitrust, gold and economic freedom, property status of the airwaves, and patents and copyrights.

Part two: Current State, includes essays on the anatomy of compromise, the art of smearing, rule by consensus as a form of fascism, and the student rebellion. The final two essays: Man's Rights and The Nature Of Government, appear in the appendix.

Whatever the flaws in Rand's Objectivist philosophy, this book remains a brilliant and unique defence of freedom and capitalism. Moreover, history has proved Rand a prescient thinker who was correct in many of her analyses.

Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal ranks among the very best of her non-fiction works. It is highly engaging, thought-provoking and often quite amusing. The book concludes with an index and a bibliography listing titles by Henry Hazlitt, Isabel Paterson and Ludwig von Mises, amongst others.

Ayn Rand offers a sound moral defense of the laissez-faire capitalism, but with moral reasoning rather than theoretical or statistical reasoning. Rand makes her case that the spontaneous natural economic order of free-markets is the only social system conducive to individual liberty and the natural rights. She shreds economic myths and fallacies with her sharp wit and reason. Rand also offers a scathing, yet logical critique of an interventionist state in the economy. Rand pokes reason in the face of her collectivist critics. Collectivist pursuit of economic and social equality has left hundreds of millions dead at hands of totalitarians in the past century. It's no wonder they loathe her every word. Some of her ideas stemming from her concepts of the "virtue of selfishness" and "rationale selfishness" are thought-provoking rebuttals to radical egalitarianism, but on the same token, her critique of "altruism" is rather shallow. The essays by younger Alan Greenspan in the 1960's alone are worth the price of admission. He offered a defense of sound money... yes a pure gold standard and other essays on anti-trust and consumer protectionism. Yet today, he is Fed Chief and head of the central bank, a statist institution which personifies an interventionist socialist state. Has he grown naïve about economics with age? Or has he just sold out for power? You be the judge! Beyond this book, I cannot tolerate much if any of Rand's objectivist philosophy, particularly the atheism, materialism and relativism, which isn't overt in this book. Rand's philosophy holds to a materialism on par with Marx and in her zeal against collectivism, she espouses an individualism larger than life. (I guess I give it 3.5/5.0.)

This book contains an excellent collection of essays on the political branch of Ayn Rand's philosophy of Objectivism and is appropriate for anyone seeking to obtain a deeper understanding of her political philosophy beyond reading her novels. A few of my favorite essays contained within include:

* What is Capitalism? -- Ayn Rand's delineation of Capitalism as a political system where individuals live according to the Trader Principle and have a minimal, but central government to prevent the initiation of physical force and fraud.

* Antitrust -- Alan Greenspan's excellent essay that attacks Antitrust legislation as subjective, harmful and immoral.

* Gold and Economic Freedom -- Alan Greenspan's essay on the need for objective currency. In particular, he suggests a return to a 100% gold standard.

* Patents and Copyrights -- Ayn Rand's views on the necessity and morality of intellectual property rights.

* Theory and Practice -- Ayn Rand's views on the invalidity of the "Mind-Body Dichotomy", which is also known as the "Theory-Practice Dichotomy" or the "Thought-Action Dichotomy".

* The Wreckage of the Consensus -- Ayn Rand's views on the debacle that was the war in Vietnam. In my opinion, reading this essay really suggests how she would view the current war in Iraq.

* Man's Rights -- in this essay, Ayn Rand discusses what individual rights are and where they come from. Specifically, she argues that rights come from the nature of man (not from divine origin, society or law) and what they mean in practice.

* The Nature of Government -- this essay contains Ayn Rand's view on government's as an agency of force, how the only proper purpose for a government is to safeguard the rights of men, how the only legitimate functions of government are those necessary to preserve individual rights (i.e., police force, army and a court system) and the necessity for a strong, central government to serve as a final arbiter on the use of retaliatory force. This last point is in stark contrast to various anarcho-capitalists such as David Friedman and Murray Rothbard.

In a well organised sequence of essays Ayn Rand and contributors shake the misconceptions that still prevail about what capitalism is and what it does. Simply put it means the removal of force from human relations (whether by mugger or government) so that people deal with one another based upon reason and free association. Sound good? It is, unless you want control over other people, or access to things they make!
Being free to think and act (not forcing others) means owning the produce of that thinking and acting, ie property. Without the right to the product of your thinking and acting why think and act? What happens inder those conditions is well demonstrated by the impoverished communist nations like Cuba.
Rand analyses each topic with the same insight and logic, debunking myths and exposing fraudulent ideologies - its a fascinating journey, often challenging.
Definately a must have for anyone interested in liberty, in politics and in how some nations became rich, whilst others did not.

In my view, Ayn Rand's popularity during her heyday had much less to do with the quality of her writing or her thinking than the fact that the demand for writing in support of capitalism and individual liberty was much greater than the supply. She was born in Russia and was 12 when Lenin became the Soviet dictator and her father lost her pharmacy. When she finally arrived in 1926, she stayed and got some work in Hollywood as an extra and a script reader. She wrote some scripts and published her famous novella "Anthem" in 1938. By mid century she published the best selling books "The Fountainhead" (1943), which became a movie with Gary Cooper and Patricia Neal in 1949, and "Atlas Shrugged" (1957). She attracted a great deal of attention from the public and gathered some talented disciples.

This book is a collection of essays by Rand as well a few of her more compelling disciples such as Alan Greenspan (yes, that Alan Greenspan), Nathaniel Branden, and Robert Hessen. The focus of this book is on the morality of Capitalism and, in my view is a mixed bag. Of course, I think that of all of Rand's writing. She is a compelling polemicist when attacking collectivism and on the righteousness of economic freedom and political liberty. When she extends her thinking to matters such as religion, altruism, copyrights, and patents things get much weaker. In other words, she is compelling the first few steps in arguing for capitalism, but when trying to use her ideas to create a society she becomes to narrow in her views. Her "objectivism" and focus on self becomes a hammer she uses to hit everything else as if it were a nail.

Rand is still influential and controversies still surround her life and thought. For many people, she is a phase they go through when first coming to understanding their rights as individuals and free economic beings. However, few stay with her thinking for a long period of time. Some do, but most do not. I don't think you can recognize the Alan Greenspan in these pages with the policies he espoused as Chairman of the Fed (regardless of how you regard his tenure).

If you are interested in Rand's political writing, this is a decent read, but I advise you to bring more than a pinch of salt as you read it. While some of her writing is powerful and persuasive, make sure you consider its implications before you jump on her bandwagon.

Personally, I much prefer the conservatism of William F. Buckley Jr., Russell Kirk, and Whittaker Chambers, to name just a Conservatives who did battle with her during her period of greatest fame. Do NOT let anyone try to hang her around your neck as a foundational conservative thinker. She is not. She considered herself her own school (and her claims to being the greatest philosopher of all time have only become more laughable as the decades pass) and is not part of the conservative mainstream in American political thought. Reagan came out of Kirk and Buckley much more than out of Rand.

Reviewed by Craig Matteson, Ann Arbor, MI

"Is man a sovereign individual who owns his person, his mind,his life,his work and its products- or is he the property of the tribe(the state,the society,the collective) that may dispose of him in any way it pleases,that may dictate his convictions,prescribe the course of his life,control his work and expropriate his products?Does man have the Right to exist for his own sake-or is he born in bondage, as an indentured servant who must keep buying his life by serving the tribe but can never acquire it free and clear?"

These are beautiful words that relate with me and my thinking and It is RATIONAL,the book is for rational People, A Must for Conservatives and Political Junkies. Capitalism -True Capitalism *No State Involved*- works, but as Ayn Rand puts it in her book so elegantly It's never been given the chance by a people and a media with The "Mob/Collective"*my choice of words here* mentality.

If it has a downfall for me it is the Final Chapter in Response to The Then Pope and Comparing Catholicism with Communism just because of the ENCYCLICAL OF POPE PAUL VI ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF PEOPLES. MARCH 26, 1967,she then goes on to rant about how Barbaric the Church is and That St Augustine was Against people being their own and that St Thomas Aquinas was the only one she admires in some words.Sadly As A Catholic it bothered me(Not because it's true) and the fact that she was an Amoral or Immoral Atheist does not help her arguments in the last chapter.
Despite this setback the book is an excellent defense and seething rebuttal to common myths and outright lies about Capitalism.

Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal is one of the most fascinating publications I have ever read. In it, Rand affirmed a strong belief in self-improvement through rational thinking and to place a higher priority on reasoning ability as opposed to having oneself guided by mere whims or emotions that have no foundational bases supporting them.

It is quite noble how Rand tried to enforce the theme that for one to live life fully, every action must have a guided reason as much as possible. Living according to the dictates of others or being a mere reactionary to what happens on a day-to-day basis reduces one to a form that is less than an accomplished human being with defined clarity and purpose.

From various angles, Rand attacked the philosophies and institutions, both secular and religious, that have espoused doctrines that are, in nature, altruistic. Frequently, she would cite that for a people to be free, the rights of the individual must be of primary importance, not those of the group or collective that the concerned person happens to belong to.

From having read this book, as well as Rand's The Virtue of Selfishness, I can understand how one could be wary of those who might give speeches, formal or informal, whose main idea or motive (whether it has the best of intentions) centralizes the concept of where one is to be a part of "something that is bigger than myself". Rand intermittently argued from a personal, yet universal, perspective that for a philosophy to guide man's existence and to strengthen a nation, as a whole, it must keep the right of the individual intact and that any idea that subordinates the individual to a group is dangerous, locally and encyclically.

Throughout, Rand stated that from the slightest suppression of individual rights has spawned problems hampering the ability of a society to function. Among the stated are political pull, mob rule, anarchy, political tyrrany, all of which essentially leave no room for anyone to act or communicate in a free manner.

Perhaps, most importantly, Rand hypothesized how self-destructive it would be to forgo any attempt to establish an unwavering, meaningful philosophy, especially in cases where reason and emotion are mutually exclusive. Anything less would be compromise, leaving the individual somewhat unhappy, at best, or under the influence of physical and psychological abuse, at worst. A thorough analysis of this work of Rand might make one ponder the role that politics and religion should have in his/her life.

Overall, this is a book that will make you think. At the introduction, Rand stated that in order to know better the philosophical foundations of Objectivist Ethics in Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, one should read The Virtue of Selfishness first, which I agree. If anyone wonders what could possibly follow up to Capitalism, I would recommend Return of the Primitive, which takes on not only altruism but also pinpoints on the causes, effects and patterns of nihilism, which Rand complained was being touted through the contemporary philosophy classes that introduced students to the ideas created and inspired by the writings of Immanuel Kant.

In terms of how one might be positively influenced by this book, I would say that reason, as Rand described it, can be a most powerful tool in creating a win-win situation for everyone who achieves, not just self. One word of warning: Rand, through her words, even two decades after her demise, can leave an indelible mark upon minds that can still be molded. I would recommend that you should take the power of reason and of logical thinking seriously, but do not let it get confused with what could lead to taking yourself too seriously.

For nascent Objectivists or libertarians, this work is undoubtedly the best single introduction to what's really important about capitalism. Not only does Rand et al dispell widely held myths and misconceptions about the workings of the free-market in theory and throughout history, but they also present a relentless moral case for freedom. There is no garbage about "the common good," or "the greatest benefit to the greatest number," but rather, a consistent appeal to the right of each human being to his life, liberty, and property. Moreover, not only is the case made from the simple standpoint of natural rights, but also from the more controversial framework of ethicial egoism, or, to put it more clearly, rational selfishness. Nevertheless, some of Rand's ideas concerning the actual framework of a free society are a bit off the mark, such as her scheme for financing government through a lottery or her aversion to violent civil resistance. Regardless of this, the work is solid, and I give it my highest recommendation.

This riveting compilation of 26 essays includes contributions by Alan Greenspan, Nathaniel Branden and Robert Hessen. It is primarily a treatise on the moral aspects of capitalism. The themes revolve around human nature and mankind's relationship to existence. Capitalism is advocated because it is the only system compatible with the life of a rational being.

Rand claims that the classical defenders and modern apologists of capitalism are by default responsible for undermining it. In her view, they are unwilling or unable to fight the battle on moral-philosophical grounds.

The essays provide a plethora of gripping insights and novel angles. Rand detests the idea of using altruism to defend capitalism. She proposes rationality instead, with a ruling principle of justice.

I do not necessarily agree with her on this but I enjoy Rand's scathing criticism of conservatism's perceived fallacies. Her vitriolic dissection of the 3 conservative strains is highly amusing! She identifies and attacks the Religious and the Traditionalists but really unleashes the sharp edge of her scorn on those who defend capitalism from the argument of mankind's depravity.

In the essay Requiem For Man, she savages the encyclical Populorum Progressio by Pope Paul VI, in which she also rips apart the reactions to it by publications like the New York Times, Wall Street Journal and Fortune magazine.

The book consists of two parts. The first is Theory And History, which includes essays on inter alia war, the persecution of big business, antitrust, gold and economic freedom, property status of the airwaves, and patents and copyrights.

Part two: Current State, includes essays on the anatomy of compromise, the art of smearing, rule by consensus as a form of fascism, and the student rebellion. The final two essays: Man's Rights and The Nature Of Government, appear in the appendix.

Whatever the flaws in Rand's Objectivist philosophy, this book remains a brilliant and unique defence of freedom and capitalism. Moreover, history has proved Rand a prescient thinker who was correct in many of her analyses.

Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal ranks among the very best of her non-fiction works. It is highly engaging, thought-provoking and often quite amusing. The book concludes with an index and a bibliography listing titles by Henry Hazlitt, Isabel Paterson and Ludwig von Mises, amongst others.

While it's hardly arguable that capitalism is an economic system capable of generating immense wealth, not many people have tried defending capitalism from a moral viewpoint. That is exactly why they have not succeeded in showing that capitalism actually is the only system that protects the rights of man as well as allowing him to rise as high as he wishes and his abilities allow him.
And then there is "Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal" - a collection of essays on many different subjects, all defending capitalism not only because it's a wealth-generating system, but first and foremost because it is moral. There are even a few essays written by Alan Greenspan before he - seemingly - rejected his ideals and became head of the Federal Reserve.
A great book, and a constant source of inspiration.

Along with "Economics in One Lesson" by Henry Hazlitt, this is the best introduction I know to the topic of Capitalism and economics. With all the baloney out there, this book will give you the essential moral perspective and help guide you in fighting the anti-Capitalism fallacies we are all bombarded with on a daily basis, in America and around the world. The Appendix with "Man's Rights" is essential reading for everyone. Ayn Rand clarifies the basis for rights and why only the system of laissez faire Capitalism respects the rights of the individual, by taking the initiation of force out of human relationships. I have only read portions of George Reisman's lengthier book "Capitalism: A Treatise on Economics" which was influenced by Ayn Rand's thinking, but what I read added further insight and solid evidence of the rightness of Capitalism for human life.

When Ayn Rand wrote this book Capitalism was completely out of "fashion" because people had yet to discover what capitalism is. Today, capitalism is in "fashion"--yet, unfortunately people still don't fully grasp what it is, what it stands for, and what it requires to exist. Quoting Miss Rand:
"No politico-economic system in history has ever proved its value so eloquently or has benefited mankind so greatly as capitalism -- and none has ever been attacked so savagely, viciously, and blindly. The flood of misinformation, misrepresentation, distortion, and outright falsehood about capitalism is such that the young people of today have no idea (and virtually no way of discovering any idea) of its actual nature.
"...[I]t is capitalism's alleged champions who are responsible for the fact that capitalism is being destroyed without a hearing, without a trial, without any public knowledge of its principles, its nature, its history, or its moral meaning. It is being destroyed in the manner of a nightmare lynching -- as if a blind, despair-crazed mob were burning a straw man, not knowing that the grotesquely deformed bundle of straw is hiding the living body of the ideal.
"The method of capitalism's destruction rests on never letting the world discover what it is being destroyed -- on never allowing it to be identified within the hearing of the young.
"The purpose of this book is to identify it. [It] is addressed to the young -- in years or in spirit -- who are not afraid to know and are not ready to give up."
"What they have to discover, what all the efforts of capitalism's enemies are frantically aimed at hiding, is the fact that capitalism is not merely the "practical", but the only moral system in history."
Wow! Can this woman write or what!

This book presents a rigourous defense of capitalism from a rights based perspective, and I strongly recommend it to anyone who is interested in a non-utilitarian, pro-capitialist perspective.
Captialism The Unknown Ideal dispells many of the myths of its opponants, making it both a good book for those who wish to brush up on free market arguments. Of particular interest is Greenspan's essay on Antitrust, given the current government witchhunt against Microsoft. Alienation by Branden is a refutes the aformentioned Marxian concept, while the Man's Rights Apendix lays a good foundation for Rand's rights theory. Overall, most of these essays are worthwile.
Of course, as an anarchist, I take issue with a few of the ideas presented in Capitalism, especially the Nature of Government essay which totally misses the mark on anarchism and makes a weak argument against polycentric law.
Nevertheless, I wholeheartidly recommend the book, radical capitalism at its (almost) finest!

Rand is easily my favorite 20th century thinker. However, as time has passed, I've grown slowly disattached from her theories, called Objectivism. Re-reading her works, such as Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, has the effect of focusing one's thinking, removing some of the unnecessary complications that have piled up since one last picked up one of Rand's books.
This is not to say everything in Capitalism: the Unknown Ideal is true, or that it is even well said. Rand was a good non-fiction writer, but by no means the best essayist of the twentieth century. If you're looking for non-fiction rhetorical style, look elsewhere. She writes clearly, and the writers strongly, cutting out most of the graft and unnecessary details, with the benefit of presenting a philosophy with simple principles, easily understood by the most casual reader. Still, the brilliance of Rand best shines through in her fiction. Read The Fountainhead or Atlas Shrugged to get a sense of why people, instead of simply respecting her, are devoted to her.
If you're new to Rand, I recommend reading her non-fiction first, and to read Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal first among the non-fiction. If you like it or dislike it, you'll be ready to move on to Rand's fiction with a better ability to question the themes she argues in her works.

Every page of this book is interesting. Although it was written 50 yrs ago, it reads as though it was written in 2010. It gives evidence and opinions regarding fascism, communism, marxism, vs capitalism; what has taken place, how it happened, and what will happen if we aren't very careful, and awake. It covers so much ground that it is difficult to list topics, but here goes; "There is no direction , no goal, no compass, no vision of the future, no intellectual element of leadership. Are there any 'emotional' elements dominating today's culture? Yes. One. "Fear"...... In a mixed economy, every government action is a direct threat to some men and an indirect threat to all. Every government interference in the economy consists of giving an unearned benefit, extorted by force, to some men at the expense of others. By what criterion of justice is a consensus-governnment to be guided? By the size of the victim's gang." ......Britains' Socialized Medicine; the price that does not show up on the cost sheets of socialized medicine is the 'brain drain', the nations scientists left Britain due to the administrative jungle and the low pay and the controlling hand of the Treasury
in all university grants.

"Businessmen - who provide us with the means of livelihood, with jobs, with labor-saving devices, with modern comforts, with an ever-rising standard of living - are the men most immediately and urgently needed by society. They are the first victims, the hated, smeared, denounced, exploited scapegoats..... Doctors come next. It is precisely because their services are so crucially important and so desperately needed that the doctors are now the targets of the altruists' attack, on a world-wide scale.............. penalizing success, of sacrificing productive genius to the demands of envious mediocrity.

A mixed economy is a mixture of freedom and controls - with no principles, rules, or theories to define either. Since the introduction of controls necessitates and leads to further controls, it is an unstable, explosive mixture which, ultimately, has to repeal the controls or collapse into dictatorship. A mixed economy has no principles to define its policies, its goals, its laws - no principles to limit the power of its government. The ONLY principle of a mixed economy - which, necessarily, has to remain unnamed and unacknowledged - is that no one's interests are safe, everyone's interests are on a public auction block, and anything goes for anyone who can get away with it..... a mixed economy is rule by pressure groups. The only enemy is integrity.

"Liberals" deride any political concern with such large-scale matters as an entire society or an economy as a whole; they concern themselves with single, concrete-bound, range-of-the-moment projects and demands, without regard to cost, context, or consequences. "Pragmatic" - not "idealistic" - is their favorite adjective when they are called upon to justiy their 'stance' as they call it, not 'stand'. They are militantly opposed to political philosophy; they denounce political concepts as 'tags', 'labels', "myths", 'illusions' - and resist any attempt to 'label' i.e., to IDENTIFY - their own views. They are anti-intellectual. The only remnant of their former 'idealism' is a tired, cynical, ritualistic quoting of shopworn "humanitarian" slogans , when the occasion demands it."

"The destruction of freedom is their common goal, after which they hope to fight one another for power"....... "And thus a country which does abhor fascism is moving by imperceptible degrees - through ignorance, confusion, evasion , moral cowardice, and intellectual default - not toward socialism or any mawkish altruistic ideal, but toward a plain, brutal, predatory, power-grubbing, de facto fascism." "At present, we are a disintegrating, unsound, precariously unstable mixed economy - a random, mongrel mixture of socialistic schemes, communistic influences, fascist controls, and shrinking remnants of capitalism still paying the costs of it all - the total of it rolling in the direction of a fascist state."

"No matter what the verbal camouflage, such is the actual meaning of any variant of 'TRANSORMED', or 'modified' or modernized, or 'humanized' capitalism. In all such doctrines, the "humanization" consists of turning some members of society ( the most productive ones) into beasts of burden."......"the 'rich-by-force, the rich-by-political-privilege, the type who has no chance under capitalism, but who is always there to cash in on every collectivist 'noble experiment.' It is the creators of wealth who are destroyed under this system."............... "Anti-ideology consists of the attempts to shrink men's minds down to the range of the immediate moment, without regard to past or future, without context or memory - above all, without memory, so that contradictions cannot be detected, and errors or disasters can be blamed on the victims."

"A political ideology is a set of principles aimed at establishing or maintaining a certain social system; it is a program of long-range action, with the principles serving to unify and integrate particular steps into a consistent course. It is only by means of principles that men can project the future and choose their actions accordingly."

"You would be surprised how quickly the ideologists of collectivism retreat when they encounter a confident, intellectual adversary. Their case rests on appealing to human confusion, ignorance, dishonesty, cowardice, despair. Take the side they dare not approach; appeal to human intelligence."

The importance of this book stems almost entirely from its status as the first polemical defense of a "pure" form of laissez-faire since Spencer's "Man Versus the State." Advocates of this singular ideology are nearly universal in its praise, and some of the essays in the book (particularly Rand's "Roots of War") are regarded by laissez-faire enthusiasts as timeless classics. Those who are not sympathetic with laissez-faire will have an entirely different opinion of the book's worth, but that's always the case with partisan political tracts: they appeal only to those who already agree with the views propagated therein. If you agree with Rand's political ideals, this book will seem like manna from heaven. If you don't, you will regard it as jejune rubbish. That is the trouble with ideological political writing: it nearly always amounts to little more than preaching to the choir.
As a propagandist, Rand had at least one thing going for her that separated her from pack: she had a "vision" of things, an ability to see political and social phenomenon in a larger than life frame of reference and to describe and project that vision in incisive and compelling terms. And while there is much in this vision that deserves scientific criticism, one aspect of it really ought to be better appreciated. I have in mind Rand's contention that it is a creative minority that is decisive to the success of the free market, rather than the "consumer sovereignty" preached by the Austrians. Mark Skousen has challenged Rand's vision of capitalism from the Austrian point of view. But Rand's vision, at least on this issue, comes closer to the facts.
It is regrettable that Rand chose to integrate this largely correct vision with an over-romanticized view of business. Her contention that everything "bad" ever associated with capitalism is either not really bad or is caused by government interference in the market is simply not supported by the historical evidence, if for no other reason that business and politics have always been inextricably connected and that it is a veritable law of society for it to be this way.

If you want an economic analysis of Capitalism in the concrete, and why it is the best means of nuturing production and prosperity this book isn't for you. I will refer you to von Mises and others of the Austrian School for that. What is in Rand's work is a study of the morality, philosophy, and justification for Capitalism. This work even includes 3 essays by Alan Greenspan, apparantly before he became a parasitic bureacrat for the ill-concieved Fed (morally and economically). The book is split between Defining and chronicling Capitalism's roots and meaning, and between observations of the perversion and destruction of Capitalism circa mid '60's. If you like Rand You will like this. If you like Capitalism but want moral justification for it you need this. If you don't like either don't waste your money and don't post mock reviews.

Ayn Rand has a refreshingly frank, "tell it like it is" style of writing. I can understand that it may seem a little "preachy" to some, but you cannot deny the logic and intelligence of her ideas. All it requires is for people to think long and hard about it. An example of the logic: If you leave people to do whatever they want to do, whether it is working to make a profit or helping others, or both, they will do it better through personal choice than through coercion. You can see it in microcosm with the way individuals intereact with each other - whether it be trade or any other type of interaction. If it ever appears otherwise, that means there are other factors involved. Economics and politics have been popularly portrayed as much more complex than they really are, to confuse people and to keep people ignorant. I recommend this book to anyone, for expressing the simplicity of these areas of knowledge.

For anyone interested in an economic case for capitalism, this is not the right book - Rand was a philosopher, not an economist (in spite of her sound understanding of economic theorems.) However, for anyone interested in a moral defence of the system and an understanding of its intellectual history and opponents, this is a vital piece of work. Rand includes essays on voluminous topics, such as the gold standard, distortions of what actually happened during the Industrial Revolution, the proper role of government (I disagree with her on this), and so on. It is essential to understand that Rand was not a corporate shill, nor did she approve of the status quo - to the contrary, she strongly opposed the notion of corporate welfare and the like, and believed in a free market economy. Unfortunately, her adulation of big business gave ample ammunition to her critics. She replicates her essay on the rights of individuals toward the end of the book, which is in itself an excellent read. Taken in conjunction with The Virtue of Selfishness, this work will spur the youthful mind into further inquiry on the philosophical origins and defences of laissez-faire.

The first thing you should know before buying this book is that it is a book of philosophy, not an economic treatise. In a nutshell, Rand defends Capitalism as the most moral system because it is the only one that fully respects property rights. Without property rights, no other rights are possible, and most of our economic and social problems stem from violations of individual and property rights.
Most of the criticisms of this book overlook the fundamental theme. It is very possible you may not care for the way Rand presents her arguments, or dislike certain terms she uses. But if you don't like the salesman's presentation, don't blame the merchandise.
Rand's views were highly influenced by the Austrian School of thought in economics, so if it is an economic treatise you're looking for, I suggest you start with the writings of Ludwig Von Mises, F.A. Hayek, or Murray Rothbard.

Hakuna Matata = There are no problems (Simba in The Lion King).
Excellent - Merchandise arrived as described, excellent condition, prompt and well packaged, great quality, value and dependable service - I'm a happy camper: Thanks, and may the Force be with you!

Capitalism, which is not to be confused with the 'mixed-economy' that has existed in this country, is the only MORAL system of politics/economics. If you want to understand the philosophical basis for Capitalism, and why it is the ONLY moral system compatible with man's life as man, then I highly recommend buying a copy of: Capitalism - The Unknown Ideal by Ayn Rand. If we are to defeat the enemies of freedom it is crucial to understand the flaws in their policies and be able to explain the reasons to those who may be searching for the truth but require a logical and well reasoned explanation. Those with power lust who would rule the world know that it is the concept of Capitalism that must be destroyed. Observe the current government takeover of multiple industries combined with the denunciation of Capitalism. This book should be required reading in high school.

I first read Rand's "The Virtue of Selfishness" in a political philosophy class in college. The book made an impression on me unlike any other book I had read before and a few years after I graduated I decided to reread it. I then read "Philosophy, who needs it" and "Capitalism, the unknown ideal." This set of books is an absolute must read for any thinking person. Be warned, however; if socialism or religion is so deeply ingrained in your mind that nothing can wash it away, you most likely will find yourself giving the book a one star, like many of the reviewers did on this site. If you live in the USA, read these books (especially "Capitalism, the unknown ideal") to find out why you live in the only country ever founded on moral principles. If you live in a socialist (or worst, a Communist) country, read the books to get a better insight of your own government. Finally, as an European who grew up in Europe and came to the USA in his teenage years, I must say that, although I have always sensed and known the huge difference between the European and American mentality, it's Rand who describes it so very eloquently in the last chapter of "Philosophy, who needs it".

Essays on the value of Capitalism in a free society where men think and opine without fear of retribution from despots and, ideally, are shielded from them by a non-central and defensive infrastructure strong enough to do so.

It is often incorrectly attributed to Rand, by her critics, that her unfettered, uncompromising belief of "autonomous man", as central to fulfillment in the individual life, is undermined by the defense of Capitalism when so many clear examples of corrupt, destructive behavior exist within that system. Whereas those same critics would argue this or that particular collective ideology is superior, what they do not acknowledge is that type of behavior DOES NOT represent Capitalism but the unethical and amoral actions of the individual(s). So, these critics are either ignorant of Rand's ideas or deliberately deceptive in their critique of her beliefs. I have yet to read or know of any advocacy from Ayn Rand's Objective epistimology which encourages or condones a purpose-driven life devoid of conscience from considering the simple difference between right and wrong...including the Capitalist system. Ideally, were ALL men to consider and execute the simple difference between right and wrong in their lives; Capitalism truly defines the ONLY financial system free men can live by as it enriches the creative and resourceful individual while beneficial to the "productive members" in the same free society. Here, the purpose of profit is easily understood. It rewards the unnatural practice of sacrifice by daring the individual with the lure of genuine success.

Likewise....the dregs within a capitalistic society are neither provided or offered anything beyond their willingness to participate in a positive manner. As it should be. Those who "associate" or "equate" profit with greed in their indictment against Capitalism do so understanding they are wrong in their agenda driven analysis or are intellectually inept.

There are some of Rand's epistimological teachings I am unable to absorb or, perhaps, just don't understand. I am no scholar yet believe with some writing a personal bias for certain things does exist outside of her Objectivist philosophy which inflects from the meaningful, enriched direction she sought for her fellow human being. Might I add a direction well-documented, supported and hopefully, timeless. That being said I support her belief in freedom from tyranny and a corrupt oligarchy to the benefit of mankind through positive egoism, ethical conduct, and purpose-driven life all individuals are capable of having and deserve the opportunity to realize.

Perhaps one of the most powerful defenses of capitalism yet written, this book explodes most criticism of it. In a series of well-written essays (including some by now-Fed chairman Alan Greenspan) it is demonstrated that almost all of capitalism's flaws are actually the result of statist manipulations. My primary reason for rating it only as an "8" is that some of the cultural references have become a bit obscure over the past thirty years. I would strongly recommend this book to anyone.

An excellent collection for anyone interested in the moral underpinnings of free-market capitalism.
As a quick side note to the editoral, you said it yourself "...the antitrust laws forced railroad barons to use illegal payoffs to forge ahead with expansion..." and therefore, we see the AT laws are indeed to blame... Something about Force and Mind; Morality ending and the Gun beginning...
I found this to be one of the more easily available non-fiction works from Rand, and the contributing writers are well known indeed. I find the topic of Mr. Greenspan's piece curious considering his current position and policy, but I suppose we are all allowed to change with age.
Why only Four Stars? While providing some very distinct insights into objectivist philosophy, Rand's more notable works (Fountainhead, Atlas, Anthem, etc.) paint the incredible picture of Objectivism in Action. In 'Capitalism' we find the true possiblities of an unadulterated free-market economy spelled out in none too technical text. Given an un-addled mind, and an active imagination, one can think these ideas through to fruition. But, through the fictional works, we can see the 'final product' of an objectivist outlook, and what it means to the future of mankind.
Too often do we find examples of moral philosophy rotting between two covers, never to see the 'real' world. It is my fear that this is what has happened in this work. Too many have picked it up, read it, and said "To what end?" without proper answer. Some might say that most who read it would be lacking in the ability to see the application of these ideas. Perhaps it is that in today's world of fad morality, the impact can better be had through the use of the readers imagination and mind; Allowing them to convince themselves of the grand possibilities of the human spirit, by seeing it enacted within a fictional work.

The essays in this book differ from those in many of Rand's other works because of its accessibility. Although many Objectivists will tell you to start elsewhere, I find that this book has many great arguments for capitalism that the lay man will understand, so START HERE FOR AYN RAND'S NON-FICTION.

Another remarkable feature of the book is its historical perspective. I was hesitant, at first, to get this book because the articles are written from the late forties to late sixties, however, the timeless quality of the articles really shine through. They are so well put together that they stand the test of time. Contributing author Alan Greenspan was the longest sitting chairman of the Fed, so that alone is enough to understand the importance that this book has for current and past economic policy in the United States.

Unlike many other essay collections, this book has a great progression of essays. You can read this book from start to finish, always adding onto the ground established by "What is Capitalism" until the entire picture opens up before you.

These collection of essays are what the libertarian view of Capitalism should be and after you're done reading them, you should be well prepared to defend the importance of freedom. So many topics discussed from war, monopolies,gold and unions this book really does cover most of the topics that affect us Americans. What's interesting is the book is not new and reads as if it's quite dated but the truth is the truth no matter how old it gets. I love reading Rand's thoughts and this book, being nonfiction, is right down my alley.

After taking an Intro to Business class in college and having learned only about communism and socialism and that capitalism was the root to all evil, I started to question a lot of things. If the US is founded on capitalism, does that mean that the US is the root of all evil? Of course the answer is no!
If you're interested in learning some of the facts about what capitalism is and should be, this is the book you want to pick up. This book should be required reading in college business, law, and all government classes. Ayn Rand covers all aspects of capitalism in a very organized, logical way. This book is very easy to understand and is clearly and concisely written. It is a must have if you want to pick up anything about capitalism.

Have you ever felt that there is something wrong with the world, but haven't been able to put your finger on exactly what it is? This book will do it for you. Ayn Rand, along with some interesting additions by Nathaniel Branden and Alan Greenspan, shows you how deep the rabbit hole really goes. This book is a collection of articles addressing the application of capitalism as a political system, or rather the lack of it, and consequently the inevitable demise of humanity due to the implementation of collectivist, anti-capitalist policies. By exploring different parts of society and the application of collectivist policies that govern us, Ayn Rand basically explains why collectivism (i.e. socialism) is the root to all evil.
If you are looking for a book about Ayn Rand's ideas and philosophy of life, and are reluctant to engage in her lengthy, fictional novels like Atlas Shrugged or The Fountainhead this is definitely the book for you.

Ayn Rand was unique among Capitalism's defenders. Instead of defending Capitalism on economic grounds (its ability to increase the standard of living of the masses, for example) she defended it on moral grounds. Man is a rational animal who is rightly concerned with his self-interest. Capitalism is the system of government necessitated by the nature of man.
CAPITALISM: THE UNKNOWN IDEAL is a collection of essays mostly by Rand (but with some by Alan Greenspan, Nathaniel Branden & Robert Hessen) which were originally published in the 1960's. Rand's essays share the virtues and shortcomings of most of her work. The writing is clear and exciting, but some of the argumentation is overblown. Her standard approach is to take a doctrine that she doesn't believe in (religion, for example), caricature it, and then draw all sorts of inferences about what a person must believe to hold such a doctrine. So her recreation of what Christianity or Conservatism is has little to with what most of its advocates believe.
Although Rand's philosophy and her defense of Capitalism is problematic, there is a good deal of interesting social commentary in this book. I particularly like "Extremism, or the Art of Smearing."Another excellent is essay is "The New Fascism: Rule by Consensus." There is also a lot of dubious reasoning, which stems from the fact that Rand wasn't particularly well read in the areas she felt obliged to pontificate on. For example, she says that the era of peace from 1815 to 1914 was the result of Capitalism. A.J.P. Taylor (a socialist and not a religious believer from what I can tell), stated that it was the fruit of Christianity. She says that the founding fathers of the US wanted to create a totally new system of government, but the Declaration of Independence indicate that they sought conserve the existing system from English encroachments. Or, she states that businessman are the "persecuted minority" when in fact they benefit more than anyone from subsidies and various protectionist legislation.
For defenses of Capitalism based on different approaches, the interested reader should consult the works of Murray Rothbard and Ludwig von Mises.

This is a great followup read to Atlas Shrugged! Atlas should impart a great knowledge of Rand's philosophy of life first, and the superb essays in this book should cover a lot of the more practical issues associated with free market capitalism. Its a good one-two punch to gain a greater understanding of politics and philosophy. I highly recommend this book.

'Capitalism', properly understood, is simply what results when people observe the Ten Utterances.
The classical-liberal 'rights to life and property' are simply another way of describing the Torah's prohibitions on murder and theft: your 'right to property' is simply my obligation to refrain from thievery (in *all* its myriad forms!). The goals of both social harmony and 'economic efficiency' are promoted, not by socialists' attempts to redesign human society in conformity with their own corrupt visions, but by observance of the Divine precepts of *justice* - of which prosperity is a beneficent side effect.
Unfortunately, Ayn Rand, in her deeply ambiguous relationship with Judaism, saw fit to retain only half the truth - and without G-d at that! She did not regard religion ('mysticism') as the proper foundation for an ethical society - and she therefore replaced the revelation of Sinai with her own secular perversion thereof.
But as many 'modern' people are discovering, there is no justice apart from a religious foundation, because on any other foundation there is no reason to think justice is important. If you, my fellow human being, are not made in the image of G-d but are merely an assemblage of molecules thrown together by the happenstance of purely material 'evolution', then why should I respect your so-called 'rights'?
And so it becomes clear that the latter six of the Ten Utterances depend firmly on the first four. The proper basis of 'capitalism' is in the rejection of idolatry - and 'Objectivism', being a form of idolatry itself, will not help with that task.
'Capitalism' and Divine revelation stand or fall together. A world without G-d was the vision of Marx and Lenin, not of the great classical liberals.

For those who have not given Atlas Shrugged a shot, perhaps intimidated by its girth, Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal seems to summarize its best points. While I don't consider myself a true objectivist--I am one of the mixed up individuals who CAN advocate 100% lasse-faire free market policy and yet entertain the idea of a realm "beyond the grave"--Capitalism spends its time advocating (mostly) the areas where objective concepts can work. Ayn demonstrates the roots of war, persecution of big business, child labor, copyrights, leftist student rebellion, and "extremism". Also, ironic commentary by the market "bubble popper" himself, Alan Greenspan, show how much a man can change in 30 years, as he blasts antitrust laws and the abolition of the gold standard. All in all, this collection of ideas will really make one realize exactly why Tom Daschle can persuade 1/2 the American public that the rich are getting more tax returns than they deserve in thirty seconds (Lexus and Muffler). Logic and reason cannot win without the facts--our society doesn't have time for the facts. The Keyensian socialism that is running rampant in government economics and university economic departments MUST be aware that their policies are simply illogical "band-aid on broken leg" policy--it is an ideological philosophy that is shared among them. All in poverty is better than wealth discrepency. One quote shown throughout this our history (and this book) is simply "At the cost of WHOM?". Keep that in mind when watching both our lefties and righties and their great new programs offerred (clips for 30 seconds) on your local news.

Ayn Rand's *Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal* is a rare disccussion of the rudiments of capitalism, how it works, what its benefits are, why it is the only moral system. It is the only book I know of that demonstrates the virtues of capitalism and discusses the roots of such virtues: that wealth is the result of producitivity and that productivity is the result of correctly identifying reality by means of a consitent use of reason. The book also refutes the many attacks on capitalism and the many mistaken evaluations of it. Highly recommended.

Sincerely,

Sylvia Bokor

Although this book was written many years ago, it rings true for today's issues. The book is made up of multiple (25 or so) mini essays, each about 5-10 pages long.

The book has a clear and logical philosophy that is consistent. Its' basic premise is that pure capitalism is the first and only moral system for man. This is because capitalism equals freedom which frees a man from coercive oppression, and that man can only create wealth and new ideas when free to use his mind. The book states that the US briefly came close to pure capitalism in the 1700 and 1800s, but is now heading to fascism, as the state leaves property in private ownership, but the state controls output and use of the private property.

This book is the best I've read in several years, because it helped me unify my outlook on several fronts (political, economic, legal, social, etc) into one grand, consistent theory. I think this book will appeal to liberals and conservatives alike. Both are damned in this book by Rand, but I think the left, right, and center will recognize parts of Rand's philosophy that are dear to them too.

Read it for yourself to see, the book is cheap.

The argument of many reviews below -- that many of Rand's supporters accept all of her ideas like cults accept kool-aid -- is well taken. I have noticed that this is often the case. However, two points of note: (1) The fact that some individuals buy capitalism hook-line-and-sinker wihtout understanding it or giving fair thought to its objections is not, in itself, an argument against a free-market. (2) the same could also be said of those who -- knowingly or unknowingly -- advocate the welfare state.

Although this book is not to be seen as the end-all in the capitalism-socialism debate, it does give sharp points to anyone wishing to defend capitalism. While incorporating some of the arguments presented here, I have soundly demonstrated short-comings in the political position of many of my sparring partners. Many of my opponents -- and Rand discusses this point in detail -- are totally unprepared for a confident, calm, and intelligent thinker prepared to debate laisssez-faire capitalism. Often, when a socialist's first wave of arguments are answered, there follows is a hasty retreat into moral relativism, the impotence of reason, and all other sorts of curious, slippery positions. The debate between capitalism and socialism is no where near as one-sided as many socialists wish to think.

The essays by Alan Greenspan present the reader with a glimpse into the motivation of the current Fed Chief. Rand's essays are a modern defence of capitalism. The collection shows how most of the problems with capitalism orginate from government interference with the free market. This is a must read for anyone with an interest in economics.

These are shortish essays. You can read one per night as bedtime reading and then dream happily about a society freed from the redistribution of wealth, centralised control or a planned economy. It is full of clear reason. Rand calls her method "objectivism" and strives to keep prejudice and hope, wishes and desires, higher ideals and fantasies far, far from her philosophy. Talk to any socialist and nothing but dogmatic, demagogic, trumped up, scare mongering claptrap comes out. This book relies on logic to break every possible socialist argument into fragments. A socialist cannot take it for a second as when faced with logic, their argument falls to bits. Rand is wonderfully free of the demagogic mind control that we have gotten used to in our intellectuals. She cuts to the bone. She gets to the point. She hits the nail on the head... Never beats around the bush. Sometimes the truth hurts. Maybe some things in this book will hurt you. THIS is the pain of learning... BIRTH PANGS as Nietzsche would say. A new and better you can emerge with reason on your side. Read this and you grow as a person.

It is sometimes difficult in public to be objective about the ideas of Rand, for the reason that the hatred of her detractors and the devotion of her followers borders on the hysterical. It is best to contemplate her philosophy in private, and then communicate to those who perhaps are still open enough to consider sometimes very radical ideas. Rand's thinking on ethics is brilliant, and the best in the history of philosophy, but this book, summarizing her thoughts on the political ramifications of her ethics, is very flawed, and there are some very outlandish claims that are made if one views them from a scientific perspective.
Economics is a difficult subject, and some might say not a science. But the financial interactions of humans can be studied scientifically, given the patience and the mathematical tools. Rand, and the other contributors of this book, do not do this anywhere in the articles. They are at best a loose, qualitative description of capitalist economics, and as such are not useful to those who really want to understand the dynamics of the capitalist economy. Rand calls capitalism "an unknown ideal" and laments the state of society (at that time), in that its not fairly represented in education or the popular media. The evidence she gives however is purely anecdotal, and she makes no attempt to cite empirical or historical studies. It is one thing to argue for the ethical foundations of capitalism, which she does so with incredible originality and skill. It is quite another to describe the inner workings of the economy and to prove causal connections between historical economic events.
For example, Rand states in the first article 'What is Capitalism" that depressions and mass unemployment are not caused by the free market but by government interference into the economy. What evidence of this is there? Rand does not cite any empirical or historical data for this assertion, and even lacking such data, does not attempt even to construct a quantitative model that would lend some plausibility to her argument. In economic studies, mathematical modeling sometimes serves to shed light on a particular phenomenon when empirical data is lacking. Such a model can then be altered as the data is collected. Attempting to find the causes of depressions is a nontrivial affair, and something that economists and mathematicians have wrestled with for decades (if not centuries). Rand is very cavalier in her assertion here, and again, makes no attempt to prove it using a calm, rational, and scientific framework.
In another article, written by her former collaborator, Nathaniel Brandon, and entitled 'Common Fallacies about Capitalism", he argues that free markets make monopolies impossible. His arguments utilize a sort of 'principal of arbitrage' (my words here), in that he argues that a monopoly that attempts to set prices will result in a competitor entering the field to take advantage of the high profits, thus closing the artificially high prices set by the monopoly. This is certainly plausible, but the time scales involved for the competitor may be too long to take advantage of the profitability. Getting into a highly technological business, such as chip manufacturing or drug discovery, may be too difficult and time-consuming for a competitor. And, Brandon still needs to justify his assertions with either an economic model or with an empirical study. He does not cite any historical evidence to support his claim.
Capitalism as discussed in this book may not currently exist by the standards and definitions held by the authors of this book, and indeed one might believe that it has received an unfair and distorted hearing in academia and other circles. But human ingenuity has exploded in the last two decades, and shows no sign of abatement, despite the actions of the government and the existing tax structure. Perhaps maybe it is time to stop fixating on government inefficiencies and ineptitudes and continue to innovate. A society smart enough to invent and use genetic engineering, to create thinking machines, and to travel in space, will perhaps find dealing with the government mundane and rather trivial in the whole scheme of things, and perhaps not want to waste intellectual energy on tirades against government bureaucracies.
One can only speculate what Rand would think of the dizzying pace of technological development in the 21st century, but I think it would be fair to say, judging by the utterances of the characters of her novels, she would forget her moral outrage, and would find life in the 21st century exhilirating...

Being a collection of essays written in the 1960s by Objectivist, novelist and non-academic philosopher Ayn Rand and certain of her like-minded associates (including Alan Greenspan, prior to his arrival at the Fed), this book reads in part as a reasoned exposition of the moral and philosophical foundations of an ideal capitalist society based on individual rights and freedom, and in part as an emotionally charged, pejorative criticism of modern society for being misguided, amoral and a-philosophical.
Ever wonder what's behind the truly remarkable economic success of the U.S. over the past two centuries? Ms. Rand explains that the U.S. began as the "first moral society in history," uniquely founded on a Constitution that explicitly places limitations on government while guaranteeing the rights of private individuals. According to her thinking, inherent in man's nature (metaphysics) is his faculty of reasoning (epistemology). Only through having the freedom (politics) to reason, judge, choose and act can man exercise his individual rights (ethics), including his economic rights to acquire property and trade it freely with others. The purpose of government (police, armed services and court system) in laissez faire capitalism is reduced to that of protector of individual rights.
As the authors' analysis goes, it is no surprise that the individual rights and freedom on which capitalism is based vaulted the U.S. economy ahead of all others in the world during the 19th and 20th centuries. However, as advocates of pure laissez faire capitalism instead of today's mixed economy (i.e., laissez faire capitalism mixed with government controls), the authors find themselves at odds with virtually everyone else--liberals, conservatives, altruists, collectivists, academic philosophers, pragmatists, logical positivists, the press, Berkeley activists, the Federal Reserve (note the irony of Greenspan as longstanding Fed Chairman), and the Pope. The authors even chide the business community for compromising capitalism by supporting antitrust legislation, the Sherman Act, in 1890.
The authors' ideal society is an as-yet-unrealized world with no antitrust laws, no government intervention in the capital markets, neither tariffs nor subsidies, no compulsory education for children, no minimum wage laws, no inheritance tax, privatization of communication airwaves, no building codes, no FDA, no SEC, etc. Could such a world with moral law placed above society ("No society is better than its philosophical foundation") reasonably lead, as the authors insist, to a higher standard of living, more prosperity and more fulfilling lives for all of us? If so, they've got quite a tantalizing proposition, at least in theory. . . .

This book is a wonderful collection of 26 articles written by Ayn Rand (20 articles total), Nathaniel Branden (2), Alan Greenspan (3) and Robert Hessen (1). The 26 count includes the two articles in the appendix by Ayn Rand: "MAN'S RIGHTS" and "THE NATURE OF GOVERNMENT". I do have one criticism of this book but I will save it until the end here. All 26 articles relate in one way or another to the theme that 100% Laissez-faire Capitalism is the best Political-Economic system for mankind and that this fact is unknown to most people in the World --including most people in the United States. The first 13 articles deal with the THEORY AND HISTORY of Capitalism along with the opening article being true to form Ayn Rand: she defines her terms right away. Here she does it by positing and then answering the question: "WHAT IS CAPITALISM?". The next 12 articles deal with and destroy so many myths about capitalism that it is probably safe to say that anyone who reads this book will find at least 12 of their own myths about capitalism somewhere within the book. The next 11 articles (#14 through #24) deal with the CURRENT STATE of the United States in the mid 1960's and it is amazing how pertinent and informative these articles still are today. For example, for pertinence see article #20, "THE NEW FASCISM: RULE BY CONSENSUS", and for the informative see and discover the correct definition of 'freedom' on the first page of the article titled "CONSERVATISM: AN OBITUARY". There is simply too much good in this book to cover it all in one short review. It is a must read for anyone who is serious about politics and economics. Even if you disagree you will be compelled to think about your own position and attempt to solidify your thoughts about it after reading this book. The two ending (APPENDIX) articles speak for themselves and either alone is worth the price of the book. All the articles in the book were written and copyrighted in the 1960's and the book itself as collection of these articles was first published in 1967. Back then, and this is my only criticism, back then Capitalism WAS an Unknown Ideal, but today thanks to Ayn Rand and others, including the contributors to this book, Capitalism is now the KNOWN ideal, consequently the books title is not quite as accurate as it was when first published.

To Mark Pumphrey, who wrote the editorial review: You should read the book rather than listen to the cassette version; this would be a good way for you to polish your reprehensible grammar and punctuation skills. And the Shakespere reference goes "thou doth protest too much," not "protesteth too much." Have you been listening to audio versions of the Bard as well? Ayn Rand's ideas are certainly not out of date; look at California. Mr. Good Government and the greenie weenies prevented power companies from building new plants. And gee, look what happened--blackouts! And Gray "that 70s show" Davis has hired a bunch of spin doctors to demonize the entire energy industry. Oh no, we could all learn quite a bit from Ms. Rand.

Ayn Rand's political and economic philosophies are not much different than the libertarian's platform. Although at times Rand seems to be repitive, she is still able to convey the importance of a free market economy, and the dangers of government interference. The book is definitely worth a read for those who adhere to a mixed or socialist economy philosophy. However, as a graduate of economics, I must complain about the utter lack of empiricism in the book and some misinterpretations of the Sherman Antitrust laws.

This book provides the reader with the intellectual background to understand the basis of America's principles of liberty and economics. It also gives insight into what has insidiously crept into the America envisioned by our forefathers, which has implications on the problems America is faced with today. This is the kind of book that should be mandatory in high school and college. This book will reinforce what it is to be American and why we should take pride in the American culture and heritage.

yes 2008 caused by clinton fannie freddy n barney not wall st

yes mass produced housing can be a reality

yes we can forget oil and go atomic, hek we made 104 atomic stations in 70s yes we can do better and shoot waste into sun

yes the democrats are wrong about everything

yes madcow n stewert are morons

yes unions had no hand in high living standard

yes the robber barons never existed only men of ability

yes philosophy is the answer

fun fun read

will nuke all the green crony ideas in your head

you will come to see how str8 marraige should end

prositution should be legal

and unregulated free market make poor rich quickly

Ayn Rand's political and economic philosophies are not much different than the libertarian's platform. Although at times Rand seems to be repitive, she is still able to convey the importance of a free market economy, and the dangers of government interference. The book is definitely worth a read for those who adhere to a mixed or socialist economy philosophy. However, as a graduate of economics, I must complain about the utter lack of empiricism in the book and some misinterpretations of the Sherman Antitrust laws.

This book provides the reader with the intellectual background to understand the basis of America's principles of liberty and economics. It also gives insight into what has insidiously crept into the America envisioned by our forefathers, which has implications on the problems America is faced with today. This is the kind of book that should be mandatory in high school and college. This book will reinforce what it is to be American and why we should take pride in the American culture and heritage.

yes 2008 caused by clinton fannie freddy n barney not wall st

yes mass produced housing can be a reality

yes we can forget oil and go atomic, hek we made 104 atomic stations in 70s yes we can do better and shoot waste into sun

yes the democrats are wrong about everything

yes madcow n stewert are morons

yes unions had no hand in high living standard

yes the robber barons never existed only men of ability

yes philosophy is the answer

fun fun read

will nuke all the green crony ideas in your head

you will come to see how str8 marraige should end

prositution should be legal

and unregulated free market make poor rich quickly

What in the world is 'capatilism'? And on what grounds are we to trust a favourable review written by someone who misspells this crucial word every time it appears?
If one wishes to learn about capitalism, this is not the book to read. The positive reviews suggest to my own mind that the reviewers have simply not read any other pro-capitalism works.
That hypothesis would at least explain the constant misspelling of the very word itself.

I read about this book in Beitler's "Rational Individualism"Rational Individualism: A Moral Argument for Limited Government & Capitalism. Alan Greenspan was a contributor to this great book. Ayn Rand and Nathaniel Branden obviously believed in what they were writing. Did Greenspan just not get it? Greenspan violated everything in ths book.

The most fundamental presentation on Capitalism I have ever read . . . and I have read a lot of them. It makes understandable why the "traditional." economic defense of Capitalism is not convincing.

The more things change the more they stay the same, or so the saying goes. We think that today is a time of significant change and we are forging a new and better future. This insightful collection of essays from 1963 discusses many of the topics that are on the front burner today. It clearly shows where the change promised is heading...and why we do not want to go there.

Ayn Rand gives a powerful, well researched, concise, articulate, and compelling review of the far reaching favorable impact that capitalism has on society's progress. The absolute of "the right to private property" is the foundation upon which it stands. When anything, typically power grabbing "altruists" infringe on this right, the world begins to bleed - figuratively and literally.
This book gives a message which is absolutely imperative for our times.

Ayn Rand offers an excellent philosophical defense of capitalism. Her arguments deal not with the trivial myopic analysis of trivial economic data but with timeless abstractions that span human history. Whether one agrees with Rand or not, her essays ranging from morality to a fascinating discussion of the causes of wars and depressions are sure to be provacative and make one question one's previous assumptions.

This book contains essays in defence of capitalism from a variety of writers, not only from Ayn Rand herself.
This book was one of the first books I read in the field of philosophy, and especially in the field of political philosophy. I do admit that the arguments in the book may sound extremely convincing at a first glance, and they made me a confessing objectivist for approximately one year.
That is, however, the most dangerous aspect of a book like this one. After I gained an interest in philosophy, much thanks to Ayn Rand, I started reading books by other philosophers and the more I read the more I realized the total emptiness and nonsense-character of Ayn Rand's philosophy. Her ethics, for example, say absolutely nothing except that you ought to behave in any manner you like, as long as you do not harm (by physical force) anyone's right to life and property. In other words, two completely contradicting actions in a given situation (for example saving the life of a drowning child contra not saving his/hers life) may both be argued for and defended with help of Ayn Rand's ethics.
I do not intend to go into more depth in my critique here (I know the above argument regarding saving a child may be subject to a discussion since it is not waterproof in the form as it is presented above). The worst aspect of Ayn Rands philosophy is not her ethics however, but the most harmful aspect is the DOGMATISM it represents, and it's irrational faith in absolute truth.
For readers interested in political philosophy, this book is definitely worth reading, but not because its greatness, but rather as a warning against fanaticism and dogmatism which are aspects intrinsically interwoven in Rand's philosophy. For those of you who believe in liberalism and the freedom of man I would recommend the books by Karl Popper and Friedrich Hayek, two philosophers who differs significantly from Rands semi-intellectual dogmatism and who provides a much better defence of the free and open society.

Ayn Rand's "Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal" is an inspiring case against the plague of misinformed criticisms made by the "New Left". Rand provides essays which are both convincing and to the point.
The essays provided by Nathaniel Brandon make the book even more solid in presenting the moral case for Capitalism.
5 stars - need I say more?

The "Library Journal" review really captures this book's defects. Let me state from the outset that I believe capitalism is the best of all economic systems, but that doesn't mean I close my eyes to its deficiencies, of which there are plenty. Rand merely totes the capitalist party line without any critical eye to some of its inherent problems. Even master-capitalists Ludwig von Mises and Friederich von Hayek are not blinded by their fondness for capitalism the way that Rand is. Capitalism, and its concomitant minimal governmental intrusion, are to be commended, but in the way that critically evaluates both its virtues and vices, and Worldcom is just the most recent case of its vices. At least Ludwig von Mises and Friederich von Hayek recognize its vices, and, while acknowledging them, still demonstrate why capitalism is the superior system -- giving copious reasons and examples of why this is true. They also detail the vices of its antagonist, socialism, in a way that seems to elude Rand. Read these other important writers for a thorough examination of capitalism, not Rand's dogmatist's appeal based on hyper-rationality.

In this collection of essays, Rand shows why capitalism is under attack. Philosophically, the majority of people do not understand capitalism and think it is intrinsically bound with such uncomfortable notions as "selfishness." Far from being a cruel ideology that somehow, imperceptibly, oppresses people with material prosperity, capitalism is the doorway away from tyranny, economic enslavement, and political oppression. I highly recommend this read to anyone with an open mind and of a philosophical bent.

For the longest time I was against Capitalism. I had it all wrong. This book opened my eyes. I thought it was based on greed, but now I know it is based on competition. Now I see that this is what our forefathers were going for, and now I can understand why. But our Capitalist country has been taken away from us, bit by bit, starting with Roosevelt's New Deal. We voted for all the wrong things, and our representatives never stopped to explain to us that we were wrong. They liked the power. Now we have given them the power to be fascists. I just wish Ayn had written a book to teach us how to take back the mess we've made for ourselves. Sigh.

...but this book does a terrible job of expressing it.
This compilation of essays, including contributions by young (read: pre-Fed) Alan Greenspan, supposedly extols the virtues of capitalism. Unfortunately, this ain't what Capitalism is about.
I am a very strong believer that democracy, coupled with capitalism and a free market economy, is the most stable platform yet devised for economic growth and equitable distribution of wealth. Francis Fukiyama's well known book The End of History and the Last Man is repetitive and verbose, but it does a good job of developing this idea. Capitalism works.
Unfortunately, in this book Rand takes positive, solid concepts like free markets and trade and takes them to a lunatic fringe extreme that turns them into nutty anti-government caricatures.
The most disturbing, perhaps, are the essays written forty years ago by Alan Greenspan, who is now chairman of the Federal Reserve' arguably the most powerful man in the United States of America. In an article entitled 'The Assault on Integrity' he argues (correctly) that reputation is an important competitive advantage for corporations, and that they will act responsibly in order to protect this competitive advantage. He then takes this simple concept and extends it to the unsupportable conclusion that regulation by government entities in *any* fashion is unnecessary.
Oh what a difference a few decades makes; as the chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve Greenspan has now grown up to be the most powerful regulator in the world. We also know, of course, that the views which he espoused in the Integrity essay are pure nonsense. Left to their own devices for-profit corporations will often choose short term gains even if by doing so they take the risk of damaging their long term reputation. Corporate management reports to the shareholder, and the shareholder is focused on quarter-to-quarter performance. If a drug company can release a new product, or an oil giant can initiate a new project, they'll do so if they think it will boost the stock price. If the product turns out to be faulty, or an oil spill results ' well they'll cross that bridge when they come to it.
The situation becomes even more problematic when you consider the fact that the shareholders - the true owners of any corporation - don't actually run the business. Day to day operations are entrusted to a cadre of professional managers. Greenspan's thesis states that any entity will do "the right thing" because of a natural desire to maintain their reputation, but this theory obviously falls apart when the owners aren't truly calling the shots. Obviously Ken Lay (Enron) and Dennis Kozlowski (Tyco) weren't worried too much about running their respective companies' reputations into the ground; they were too busy enriching themselves at society's expense. Even Jack Welch, GE's highly regarded CEO and Wall Street's icon of managerial responsibility, has suffered some unflattering attention as of late. Yes, society needs to establish some rules, and make these guys follow them.
Okay, okay: hindsight is 20/20 and yes it is easy to debunk old theories as wrong based on new information. Greenspan did not have a crystal ball forty years ago, and to his credit he's changed his tune. Indeed we could all stand to learn a thing or two from Alan; old theories need to be reevaluated, and when events prove them wrong they need to be discarded.
Capitalism and free trade are both concepts that are positive for society. Unfortunately, this book is awful - full of outdated and incorrect ideas. If you want a book which gives a rational treatment of the many virtues of capitalism, Rand is an author to avoid. I can only hope that if/when Greenspan looks back at these essays that he contributed back in the early sixties that he gets a shudder of embarrassment. Ayn Rand has a fiercely loyal following and I know that this review won't make me any new friends, but capitalism and free markets are good concepts that get a bad treatment in this book. Bad economics. Bad science. Bad philosophy. Rand's devout might enjoy it, but readers simply looking for a balanced treatment of capitalism will want to skip this one.

This book is a great defense of Capitalism and an excellent introduction to what exactly Capitalism is and is not. Our current system of Corporatism/Fascism more closely resembles Socialism than Capitalism, and Rand makes it perfectly clear throughout this book. This is a must-read for anyone looking to equip themselves with the logic and ideas required to dismantle any altruistic argument on politics and economics.