Jack: Where Does Wealth Come From?

The following is written by Jack Chism in his first response to the video and blog I shared with him and with you readers previously.

Hi Greg:

I just got back from a trip and looked at your blog.  Much, much, much to respond to, both in that and in the film.  

First, I like your blog much better than the film.  The film is a wonderful work of graphic communication, and very persuasive if you accept its presuppositions.  I'm surprised that its author could process his argument so well without examining its foundations better than he seems to.

As for your blog, I'm interested in the conflicted spirit you seem to bring to it.  You want to look at both sides of an argument by doing kind of a Thomian analysis; but to do that you need to list the very best arguments before challenging them.  Otherwise you fall into the trap of making "paper tiger" arguments, as I fear you have here.  The two objections you answer are by no means the strongest arguments for the position you want to challenge.

I think that to come at it correctly, you have to get a clear idea of where wealth comes from.  This will help with questions of justice about who is entitled to possess and use wealth. Also it will help with questions about best results.  Actually, I'd like to read something from you in answer to that question:  Where do you believe wealth comes from?  It would give us a good basis, I think, for further discussion.

Also let me voice a concern about what you wrote comparing India's poor with ours.  To make such an argument, you'd need to quote some objective studies, telling how you measure happiness of one vs another group of poor people.  But also beware of the similarity of that argument to a pre-Civil War justification of the position of slave families:  "Those pickaninny kids are happier than we are on a winter night, all packed together in bed in their little cabin. And they sing and dance all day!"

It's a fact that studies have shown that in most societies, at most levels, there's little correlation between happiness and income level. (except for those living below absolute survival level--say $500 a year per person)  Should be obvious to us: if income correlated to happiness, then the richest would have little divorce, alcoholism, mental illness, etc.  But if that's so, then why do some feel a duty to redistribute income by force?

We can get clearer answers to that after we find a good answer to the question I gave above:  Where does wealth come from?  (Also what is it?) In addition, we might ask What is happiness?  And where does it come from--what precedes and produces it?

Ready to go?

Jack