Năm 1776…

ko phải vì lòng thương của anh bán thịt mà ta có thịt lon ăn, mà vì lợi ích của anh ta mà thôi...

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… was quite a year. In this essay for the Independent Institute I applaud the words of Thomas Jefferson and of Adam Smith. A slice:

It’s often said that America’s founders had “faith” (niềm tin) in freedom (tự do). But because of Smith’s work, a better term is confidence (sự tin tưởng) in freedom. Smith explained how private property rights (quyền sở hữu tư nhân), freedom of contract (tự do ký kết hợp đồng), economic competition (cạnh tranh kinh tế), and market prices (giá cả thị trường) peacefully (một cách yên bình) direct each individual (cá nhân) who is pursuing his own goals (theo đuổi mục đích tự thân) to achieve those goals only by helping countless other individuals to achieve their goals. The result is a beautiful process of mutual assistance (hỗ trợ lẫn nhau).

In one of Smith’s most quoted passages, he observed that “It is not from the benevolence (sự tốt bụng, lòng thương người) of the butcher (người bán thịt, tên đồ tể), the brewer (làm rượu), or the baker (làm bánh), that we can expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest.” Businesses in free markets (thị trường tự do) prosper (phát triển, thịnh vượng) only by satisfying (thỏa mãn) consumers (khách hàng) – and the more that businesses satisfy consumers, the more those businesses, their workers, and their customers will prosper.

And while Smith was a realist (người thực tế) who knew that markets always work imperfectly (không hoàn hảo), he argued that in most cases government intervention (can thiệp của chính phủ) makes matters worse (khiến mọi việc tồi tệ hơn). Even if politicians (chính trị gia) were miraculously (một cách thần kỳ) to become immune (miễn nhiễm) to pressure (áp lực) from special-interest groups (nhóm lợi ích), their knowledge of how best to use scarce resources (nguồn lực khan hiếm) is far too scant (quá ít ỏi) to enable them, or the bureaucrats whom they employ, to improve upon market outcomes.

In 2020, alas, this deep wisdom from 1776 is largely lost. Politicians and pundits today, from left to right, see ordinary men and women as hapless victims of forces beyond their control. These pathetic creatures, it is assumed, need not protection of their rights but, instead, provision of their sustenance (phương tiện sinh sống; (từ hiếm,nghĩa hiếm) sự nuôi dưỡng).

Bài trước: Công nhân kiệt sức vì Cách mạng Công nghiệp