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Ayn Rand on Corporations
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Business, not labor, initiated federal economic intervention
Organized labor has been much more sensitive to the danger of government power and much more aware of ideological issues. Its spokesmen have fought the government in proper, morally confident terms whenever they saw a threat to their rights.
Labor's concern was aroused only in defense of its rights; still, whoever defends his own rights defends the rights of all. But labor was pursuing a contradictory policy, which could not be maintained for long. In many issues--notably in its support of
welfare-state legislation--labor violated the rights of others and fertilized the growth of the government's power. And, today, labor is in line to become the next major victim of advancing statism.It was business, not labor, that initiated the
policy of government intervention in the economy (as long ago as the nineteenth century)--and business was the first victim. Labor adopted the same policy and will meet the same fate. He who lives by a legalized sword, will perish by a legalized sword.
Source: The Ayn Rand Letter, I/3/2, by Ayn Rand
, Jan 1, 1979
Greed, if rational, is good
And when men live by trade--with reason, not force, as their final arbiter--it is the best product that wins, the best performance, the man of best judgment and highest ability--
and the degree of a man's productiveness is the degree of his reward. This is the code of existence whose tool and symbol is money.
Source: Atlas Shrugged, by Ayn Rand, p.388
, Jan 1, 1957
Page last updated: Apr 30, 2021