The first book of [Vilfredo Federico Damaso] Pareto's (1848-1923) in which the new pessimistic stance becomes dominant is his Les Systemes Socialistes (2 vols, 1901-2). But his newly detached stance did not at all mean that he had abandoned his libertarian ideals or his method of social analysis. Indeed, Finer writes of Pareto that Molinari was 'a man whom [he] admired till his dying day'. Thus Pareto writes bitterly of how in society, robbery through government is far easier, and hence more attractive, than hard work for the acquisition of wealth. As Pareto mordantly wrote, in a passage that anticipated such twentieth century libertarian theorists as Franz Oppenheimer and Albert Jay Nock:
Social movements usually follow the line of least resistance. While the direct production of economic goods is often very hard, taking possession of those goods produced by others is very easy. This facility has greatly increased from the moment when deprivation became possible through the law and not contrary to it. [Italics Pareto's.] To save, a man must have certain control over himself. Tilling a field to produce grain is hard work. Waiting in the corner of a wood to rob a passer-by is dangerous. On the other hand, going to vote is much easier and if it means that all those who are unadaptable, incapable and idle will be able to obtain board and lodging by it, they will hurry to do so.
Pareto unfortunately championed a positivist methodology in keeping with his reliance on the model of physics and mechanics. But this was more than offset by his supplying us a deathless anecdote in a brilliant defence of natural economic law as against the 'anti-economists' of the German historical school. It is an anecdote that Ludwig von Mises liked to relate in his seminar:
Once, during a speech which he was making at a statistical congress in Bern, Pareto spoke of 'natural economic laws,' whereupon [Gustav] Schmoller, who was present, said that there was no such thing. Pareto said nothing, but smiled and bowed. Afterward he asked Schmoller, through one of his neighbors, whether he was well acquainted with Bern. When Schmoller said yes, Pareto asked him again whether he knew of an inn where one could eat for nothing. The elegant Schmoller is supposed to have looked half pityingly and half disdainfully at the modestly dressed Pareto - although he was known to be well off - and to have answered that there were plenty of cheap restaurants, but that one had to pay something everywhere. At which Pareto said: 'So there are natural laws of political economy!'
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