In his extraordinarily valuable 1998 book The Wealth and Poverty of Nations, Harvard economic historian David Landes notes the following (on page 154):
Indian cottons transformed the dress of Europe and its overseas offshoots. Lighter and cheaper than woolens, more decorative (by dyeing or printing), easier to clean and change, cotton was made for a new wide world. Even in cold climes, the suitability of cotton for underwear transformed the standards of cleanliness, comfort, and health. In the American plantations, it answered perfectly; as some Jamaica traders put it (1704): “… the said island being situated in a hot climate, much of the clothing of the inhabitants is stained callicoes, which being light and cheap and capable of often washing contributes very much to the keeping them clean and in health.”
Factory-woven cotton underwear….
… a major pollution fighter made possible by capitalism.
Share
{ 24 comments }
Small world. I just read that book yesterday at the library while waiting for my wife to get a few things done using the public wi-fi (can’t really take a snapshot of that). Great book. I had to cruise through it pretty quickly to finish the whole thing though.
I think I spent six months on it.
These “Cleaned by Capitalism” posts are nice, and I agree with their implicit claim that the vast majority of innovations we benefit from in our day-to-day life would not exist were it not for the individual drive to improve one’s position (by inventing stuff people need and trading them for it).
However, it seems a non sequitur. It should be “cleaned by innovation”, and the argument about why capitalism facilitates the greatest innovation is a second stage to the argument. After all, wasn’t it Marx who claimed a new socialist man could emerge to create all these items through some selfless drive to better man-kind?
He could if he had access to capital.
Why make it in two stages when one suffices?
I think Marx claimed a lot of things that turned out to not be true, and were devastating to humanity.
I think if I was looking to quote someone I’d look a little harder to find someone who had a grasp on reality.
You mean like: “the state will wither away.”?
At least he thought it would be a good idea for the state to whither away.
Or, he thought it was a good idea to say so.
I concede that it was a bad choice of people to quote. I meant not to support anything Marx may have said or believed… but I wanted to draw attention to the logic of the “cleaned by capitalism” pieces. It is innovation that is responsible for these advanced. We all here seem to agree that innovation is best fostered by capitalism… but one cannot infer from cotton underwear’s invention that it was invented due to capitalism (and some of the reply’s here seem to think I *don’t* think this is the case…. but I do… it is just that better/clearer examples as a direct consequence of capitalism must exist out there).
Economics is great. Under what other discipline could one post pictures of underwear and declare them to be a great advance?
Human Sexuality
Hmm. True. Game set and match, sir.
Got to admit… I find this really stupid. Capitalism has brought great advances in pollution reduction. But it really seems like you’re trying to say pollution is not a problem. Just because things are better than they were 100 years ago doesn’t mean that externalities are not worth our attention.
“Just because things are better than they were 100 years ago doesn’t mean that externalities are not worth our attention.”
Nobody needs to attend to them via public policy means. Free markets themselves have made improvements to human cleanliness and environments without any political agreement that “attention” be paid.
Okay, I see a cotton undershirt, and pair of cotton skivies, but what is that thing above them?
It looks like a sock to me, but it might well be some sort of prophylactic against cold. An ankle warmer perhaps? Wristbands?
I must wonder whose garments those are. If they do indeed belong to the esteemed Dr. Boudreaux, I feel I may have learned more about my department chair than I really wanted to know.
I dunno, Don. You’re talking like capitalism is a Dealer Installed Option for running your economy. This it ain’t. Even Marx, that parasite on women, knew this, and borrowed its true nature for his inevitability of communist revolution argument.
Basically, “capitalism” is just a short way of saying “human nature as it relates to economics.” Put people together, and the inevitable luck of the draw means A will have more gizmos and talent at making framistans than he needs personally. He will therefore inevitably, unless otherwise constrained, trade gizmos and his time making framistans with B, who has a deficit of both, but an excess of whole grains and liquor. Buyer and seller seek to maximize their personal utility, have an interest (if they have any brains) in accumulating capital for improving the efficiency of their labor, and away we go.
I think you’d be better off pointing out that capitalists is what we are by our nature and natural logic. Any other system has to BEGIN by suppressing our very nature and replacing it with something else. That’s as stupid as — and very comparable to — deciding to replace the car with some other vehicle, but refusing to use wheels (because they roll over small animals sometimes, you know).
I love this book!
Strange. Don seems to use the word ‘pollution’ when most people would use the word ‘disease’. Perhaps he prefers this kind of ‘pollution’ because it’s the one free markets clean up. When comes to pollution of air and rivers no clean up is required because it’s the ‘commons’ and because no one owns the ‘commons’ there’s no obligation to treat it nice.
Brace yourself for a deluge of confusion between “I think markets are great but they require certain preconditions to be efficient” and “hi, my name is Gil and I hate markets”
Huh?
Any mention of why the market can’t handle pollution usually causes great consternation on here, and hand-wringing about being anti-market. You seem to have avoided that, though.
I have no problem with cotton as a plant or a fabric, but I do find it remarkable to see its praises sung with absolutely no mention of those who were enslaved to produce it. Didn’t their capitalistic aspirations count for anything? The problem with free market absolutism is that it takes the conditions essential to its existence and produced by non-market means for granted.
I agree. All hail the workers of this country. Whenever we speak of the grandeur of public buildings, roads, bridges, car companies, banks etc.. we must always remember those who are enslaved to produce it.
The problem with free market skepticism is that it takes the conditions essential to governments existence and produced by non-government means for granted.