Makers and Takers
By Max Borders

There are economic means and political means. One is generative and the other is destructive.

GDP is a lousy way to measure growth. If a government subsidizes the construction of a very expensive pyramid—or a bridge to nowhere or EV cars—that goes into the calculation. It makes no sense to take resources out of one pocket and put them into another that yields comparatively less value. It makes no sense unless you’re a direct beneficiary, an outstretched palm, or willing to sell your support to the highest bidder. A nation declines when politicians tilt the advantage from transactions to mere transfers. Western governments are spending money on boondoggles to create an illusion.

In the early 1900s, the German sociologist Franz Oppenheimer introduced an underappreciated distinction. Oppenheimer described two approaches to acquiring wealth: the “economic means” and the “political means.”

I call those who take these approaches, respectively, Makers and Takers. (Or Traders and Raiders, if you like.)

Through economic means, you generate value through your labor or exchange your labor's fruits for another's. The political means is more or less the forced appropriation of the fruits of someone's work. Stealing, raiding, or committing fraud are obvious ways to take the fruits of another's labor. But there are subtler acts, such as externalizing costs, which means foisting them on others without their consent.

***