Makers and Takers (Un libro que hay que leer)

Chapter 1
WHAT HATH GOVERNMENT WROUGHT?
An essential fact that stands out
in all history is that the real sources of
well being are scientific and economic,
not political and social.
--Carl Snyder in Capitalism the Creator

Think for a moment about our standard of living, about all the things that make our lives so comfortable and enjoyable, telephones, television, automobiles. Think about all the things which have enhanced human existence from the wheel to the airplane, the printing press to polaroid photography, the microscope to penicillin. Consider the electric light, the flush toilet, nylon, gasoline, rubber, the sewing machine, the refrigerator, and the safety pin. How many, of these were the result of government anywhere in the world?

None. All these and many more were created by a process having nothing to do with political power or methods.

What is this mysterious creative process, and why has there been such a strong tendency to look instead to political action for human advancement? Why has it been so popular to believe that it is progressive to place under political control the production of material goods which governments everywhere have been incapable of creating in the first place? Was it a politician who invented the automobile, the telephone or the electric light? Did government give us Kentucky Fried Chicken or television--or has government merely interfered with such things, as, for example, when the Federal Communications Commission for years delayed licensing television in order to protect the public's investment in radio?

All progress in our standard of living has been due to man's ability to control the materials in the world around him, to grow food, to make tools, to manufacture luxuries. Political action, on the other hand, aims to control people. When the control of materials has brought us where we are, why has there been such willingness to believe the control of people will take us where we want to go? The societies where men have been most controlled have been those in which it has been least desirable to live, societies without freedom.
Every step of progress throughout the centuries has always broadened man's horizons and extended the scope of his actions. Every....