Opus 2011-289, Headlines: RIP Steve Jobs

My wife tells me that Steve Jobs has died.  This should come as no surprise.  He has looked close to the grave for some time.  There are many different attitudes towards who he was and the kind of personality he demonstrated but few will deny that he left his imprint on our world.

My contribution is this:  Steve Jobs was a modern day Robber Baron. 

I say that in praise, not condemnation.  Keep in mind that most of what you think you know about the so-called “Robber Barons” has been proclaimed by people who are far to the left of normal.  They tend to be socialists who think that profits are evil.

Were these industrial age entrepreneurs perfect?  Of course not.  Stupid question.  They were men who worked hard and earned a lot of money.  Beyond that they have little in common.  That is enough to condemn them in modern thinking. 

How would we define this group without being PC.  A robber baron is someone who gave a few thousand people reasons to complain, justified or not, and improved the lives of millions.  Take Standard Oil and Rockefeller.  Some gripe and complain and call him evil.  They claim that he made his money by illegal maneuvers and attempts to have a monopoly on the market.  Of course the same people would praise Barak Obama for identical behavior with the health care of the nation, but that is for another day. 

There is a book you might want to read.  It is called The Myth of the Robber Barons by Burton W. Folsom.  He does a lot of honest research on real facts.  He points out that Rockefeller was not even close to a monopoly when they started passing laws to try and shut him down.  He did not force other men out of business by unfair practices.  What he did what buy them out because they were so wasteful and inefficient.  One of the points made is that Rockefeller actually helped clean up the environment.  The people he bought out were taking a small part of the oil that came out of the ground and dumping the rest.  This would obviously cause problems.  Rockefeller found ways to use the “waste” and turn it into useful products.  Thus he did not dump, he sold.  This obviously helped his bottom line as well as the environment. 

His contributions changed the lives of the country for the better.  Folsom points out the effects Rockefeller had on education and leisure.  Before he started cutting costs people had kerosene lamps but the cost of fuel was so high that they could not afford to use them.  His efficient business practices reduced the cost of kerosene so much that even poor people could afford to stay up reading after dark.  It improved family life and gave more options.

He makes the same case for Carnegie, Vanderbilt and others. 

Steven Jobs was a modern day Robber Baron.  I think that is a good thing.  I think that the so-called Robber Barons were a blessing because the benefits they produced made for a freer society.  You are free to disagree but if you do you might want to move back to a cultural level that does not benefit from their contributions.

Just kidding.  It’s the liberals that want to force you to conformity.  Stick around.  Maybe you will learn.  Maybe I will.

homo unius libri