John Mackey, the CEO and co-founder of Whole Foods, claims capitalism is the ‘greatest thing humanity’s ever done’.
- Mackey argued that socialism does not work and that it is “trickle-up poverty”.
- The CEO and co-founder is worth an estimated $75 million.
- He blames colleges and progressives for fuelling negative views of capitalism.
Speaking to the American Enterprise Institute last week, John Mackey shared his views on capitalism and socialism.
John Mackey is the CEO and co-founder of Whole Foods and according to Fox Business, he is worth an estimated $75 million. Last week, Mackey spoke to the American Enterprise Institute and discussed his beliefs regarding business, capitalism, and socialism. Speaking of business culture, Mackey said:
It needs to evolve. Otherwise, the socialists are going to take over — that’s how I see it, and that’s the path of poverty. They talk about trickle-down wealth, but socialism is trickle-up poverty. It just impoverishes everything. That’s my fear, that the Marxists and socialists, the academic community is generally hostile to business. It always has been. This is not new.
In addition to this, Mackey blamed colleges for fuelling negative views of capitalism.
That’s why we’re seeing this move toward socialism — because capitalism they see as inherently corrupt. That is wrong. Capitalism is the greatest thing humanity’s ever done. We’ve told a bad narrative, and we’ve let the enemies of business and the enemies of capitalism put out a narrative about us that’s wrong. It’s inaccurate and doing tremendous damage to the minds of young people.
Moreover, Mackey argued that socialism has always failed.
Socialism has been tried 42 times in the last 100 years, and 42 failures, it doesn’t work, it’s the wrong way. We have to keep capitalism, I would argue, we need conscious capitalism. […] We have to recognize that some of the progressive insights are important and they shouldn’t go away, but we can’t throw out capitalism and replace it with socialism. That will be a disaster.
John Mackey’s full interview with the American Enterprise Institute can be seen below:
