"Rescuing Capitalism"

I started writing my book in the spring of 2023. I wrote about Lina Kahn at the Federal Trade Commission. Joe Biden walked a picket line and became the first U.S. president to declare supply-side economics a failure. It appeared that government would regain it regulatory muscle and balance the excess of capitalism as it always had before 1981.

But I still believed that only business had the agility, scale, resources and motivation to reverse the horrific crises confronting us. Corporations had so successfully damaged our trust in government that I didn’t see a quick recovery.

But holy smokes! The last 6 months have proven that a) the government is corrupt and ineffectual and, b) business can act in the common good. The balance between public and private interests has been stood on its head. The federal government is now the promoter and guardian of private greed and corporate America, driven by self interest, is offering resistance. Here are some examples:

Renewable energy: Trump is working to promote fossil fuels while the business world continues the rapid development of solar, wind and battery technology.

Transportation: Trump is removing federal subsidies for EV’s but the global auto industry is committed to replacing the internal combustion engine.

Labor: Trump subscribes to the Jack Welch theory that labor is a cost that needs to be continually managed down. But the world’s corporations have long known the command-and-control management is a failure and that people are a company’s number one asset. (see note below)

Environment: Trump pulls out of the Paris Agreement. Exxon Mobile CEO Darren Woods disagrees, arguing for our continued involvement in global efforts to combat climate change.

Stability: Chaos is a strategy underlying the implementation of Project 2025. Business abhors chaos and warns that operating outcomes will suffer.

We are suffering a 44-year self-inflicted wound…the supply-side economic experiment. The “givens” of that experiment are three: government is bad, consumption is good and constant growth is possible. They are myths.

Bringing this failed experiment to an end requires that we stop believing such nonsense.

I do not have idealistic notions that capitalism will come to our rescue nor do I have any fantasies about an out-sized role for Vermont’s in the rescue. But I know that businesses can be agents for positive change because I worked with them for 50 years. And to prove it I tell the stories of dozens of Vermont companies that are innovating solutions to our environmental and social crises while operating profitably.

note: In 2004, Jack Welch was CEO of GE Capital which owned NBC. That is the year that NBC began airing “The Apprentice.”