Crony Chronicles

I’ve just discovered  Crony Chronicles – the cronyism resource,

In an economically free society, the role of business is to create value for society by producing products and services that their customers consider beneficial. If they do this while using resources wisely, they make a profit, and societal wellbeing is enhanced.

Cronyism diverts resources away from the wants and needs of consumers and toward political purposes. Cronyism occurs when an individual or organization colludes with government officials to create unfair legislation and/or regulations which give them forced benefits they could not have otherwise obtained voluntarily. Those benefits come at the expense of consumers, taxpayers, and everyone working hard to compete in the marketplace.

I made this related speech in Parliament a while back. For example,

It strikes me that the third way seems to have turned private enterprise into a vampire squid to be suckered on to the faces of people on normal and low incomes.

So why does crony capitalism happen? Misplaced faith in state power to solve our problems is the answer. I’ll recommend several related slim books in the next few posts. In the meantime, one of their videos: