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Self-interest 'wrongly understood'
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The gospel of prosperity vs. civil religion |
 Dear *|MERGE3|* *|MERGE2|*: The ongoing worldwide financial crisis has called into question a core basis of America’s economic system: Belief that the unfettered pursuit of one’s self-interest will lead to the betterment of all. Instead, wealth has become increasingly concentrated in the hands of the wealthy few, while wages for the rest are stagnant or in decline. “Those of us who have looked to the self-interest of lending institutions to protect shareholder’s equity – myself especially – are in a state of shocked disbelief,” Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan told the Congressional Committee of Government Oversight and Reform. 
Adam Smith, the “founding father” of America’s economic system, had no illusions about the drawbacks of self-interest. Even self-interested economic behavior that confers benefits to the greater society does so only incidentally – “without intending it, without knowing it,” Smith wrote in his treatise, The Theory of the Moral Sentiments. Read the rest of this article on SageLaw. *|MERGE8|* Read about the author here. |
