Miks ja kuidas on vabaturumajanduslik kapitalism lääne ühiskonna üldise moraaliga vastuolus?
Date
2017
Authors
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Volume Title
Publisher
Tartu Ülikool
Abstract
In this work i am researching how free market capitalism and its main motivators and
principals are in contradiction with western morals. The main principals of free market
capitalism are making profits and avoiding losses, minimal government interference in the free market, constant economic growth as indicated by a countries GDP. What i mean by western morals is how the majority of people living in the western world and in the western culture think is right or wrong to do, or act. For example we might feel that it is unethical that a company spills toxins in a river that a lot of people drink from. I start off by looking at how and where do companies and people operating within the free market capitalistic system, according to its principals and motivators, ignore ethical problems. For example it would be more ethical to divide pharmaceutical drugs to people who need them with a low cost, even if it means less profit, or losses for the company. What we see in the United States today however, is that companies deliberately keep the drug prices high so they make a profit instead of a loss. Next i look at how economic thinking and the market mentality can influence our moral norms and values. I take examples mostly from our day to day lives where people are starting to apply the market mentality more and more. Infact the reason free market capitalism has started to conflict with morals, is because it has oozed into fields, that once did not operate according to the market mentality. The field of economics has never claimed, that it encompasses morals in its research and in market operations. But since the market mentality has oozed into fields in which there are inevitably moral problems and considerations, then in my opinion it should start paying attention to morals.
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Keywords
kapitalism, moraal, ravimitööstus, elukindlustus