Creative Class

Were you – like me – ever amazed at how so many people could afford bigger and bigger homes, New England beach houses and Florida condos, expensive cars? The answer, according to a terrific article by Ben Funnell in the Financial Times, is simple: cheap, available credit.

Debt, he says, is “capitalism’s dirty little secret.” Cheap mortgages, cheap car leases, and the use of home as veritable ATM’s created fictitious living standards for the middle class and the bulk of the population at a time of low productivity and paltry growth in incomes, and where the bulk of the gains in wealth were scooped up by the top fraction of households.

In a recent issue of the American Interest related to The Ends of Growth, we argue that, “Our focus on economic growth is misplaced and our leaders’ conception of the U.S. economy is misplaced. No wonder were in such a mess.” Defining Prosperity suggests that both republicans and democrats have an outdated understanding of our political system. The republicans have an absence of principle and the democrats have an obsolescence of purpose.

The next America needs to have an understanding of what America is. Economic growth, or its absence, is merely an indicator on the dashboard of our ongoing national journey. The engine that propels American capitalism forward is entrepreneurship; the fuel is opportunity; the work of foundations recycles the energy of society, making progress and widespread prosperity sustainable.

This century – the global century – will rest on sustainable development in global cities driven by entrepreneurs and fueled by venture capital. However, what will make this happen is the reconstitution of wealth on a global scale the likes of which has never been seen.

Wealthy individuals from around the world will have to learn from the American model that entrepreneurship leads to wealth, wealth needs to be given back to create opportunity for the next generation. The entrepreneurship-philanthropy-opportunity cycle is the inner dynamic of American capitalism and the source of its prosperity. The strengthening of it in the global economy is our most important job today.

… one victim will be entrepreneurship.

I monitor the financial blogs quite a bit and over the last two weeks an amazing transformation has occurred. Initially, many were calling the current wave of government takeovers “socialism.” Now, with the most recent Bush-Dodd-Frank plan to give enormous amounts of U.S. government money to global financial institutions, few believe this has nothing to do with “socialism.” What a canard. This is simply the final act in a long bout of “crony capitalism.”

Socialism is about government ownership of parts of the economy in an effort to transfer some of the gains to the less fortunate in society. For anyone to believe that the last two decades of financial deregulation and the current giveaways of government monies have anything to do with socialism is simply ridiculous. This is about some sort of booty capitalism where theft was legitimated. When the State abdicates its role as an enforcer of rules of the game, things quickly get out of control and outright fraud becomes the rule.

The New Deal was not socialism, though many accused it of being that. It had many components, but one of them was the enforcement of transparency and rules upon the stock market. It was this that made U.S. markets the envy of the world. These have now collapsed as few trust the financial results being reported by U.S. firms or even a day’s trading results, as investment banks are clearly investing in their own stocks for day trading profits. The SEC and the Fed have openly told firms they do not need to report their results truthfully. This is extremely dangerous throwing the major principles necessary for operating markets overboard at the first whiff of a crisis is extreme and dangerous short-termism. Regaining public trust will take a very long time.

How does all of this affect entrepreneurship and creativity? The U.S. entrepreneurial model was to start a firm, build it, and then use public stock markets to raise capital to build the firm further. In the last decade, many of the advocates for entrepreneurship came to think of public markets simply as exits from which the promoters got rich. This type of thinking is a fundamental misunderstanding of the role of stock markets. The initial public offering is meant to raise more capital so that a firm can grow. The EXIT is only a by-product of the raising of capital for further growth.

This mistaking of a private goal for the public good led to the offering of ridiculous firms in the dot.com bubble, which made billions for unscrupulous “entrepreneurs,” venture capitalists, and investment bankers. It also destroyed the public markets. Unfortunately, this most recent meltdown, which is only in its first stages, will be catastrophic for small firms wanting to raise capital.

For Schumpeter’s gales of creative destruction to work, one needs the transparency that can only come from stern and fair regulation. Otherwise, the creativity that creates new value cannot be expressed because of a generalized lack of trust.

I know I have combined two thoughts in this post. We need to sharpen up our vocabulary so that we can discuss the issues clearly and thoughtfully.

What do you think will be the effect of this collapse on entrepreneurship?