For long, economists have been blindly following Darwin's theory of "Survival of the fittest" as the maxim for the functioning of the capitalist economy. The problem is, however, they forget that the whole purpose of functioning of an economy is to move towards a more civilized form of existence. Civilization has seen man moving out of the jungle and reach where he is today. Sadly, however, he has not yet been able to discard the rules of existence that he used to follow in the jungles.
Capitalism from the very beginning has been based on the principle of individualism and survival of the fittest. When Adam Smith had talked about man being rational and therefore trying to maximize his returns if left free in the market... he had also referred to the same principle. The rules of the capitalist market have always wanted us to compete with others and maximize our benefits (read as profits). Critics point out the fact that when left free in a market an individual's return is not only a function of his competence and efforts (in terms of the number of hours he puts in) but also a function of his past accumulated wealth (on which he might have had no contribution). Based on the same argument some economists in India don't want MNCs to enter India as the survival of Indian companies is not only dependant on the quality of the products they produce but also on how strong is the competitor. Thums Up is not only an example of a quality product but also an example of brand building. Perhaps it was India's best ever example of an original brand name around which an identifiable brand personality had been built. The ad campaigns used to be most creative wherein the name Thums Up would coincide with the image that comes into mind; An image of a free, excited, adventurous young man which was nicely reflected in the caption "Taste The Thunder". All this came to nothing when a giant like Coca Cola entered the market. Thums Up got sold off. One of the best Indian brand names today sells under the aegis of Coca Cola. This proves the point that the capitalist economy is based on the concept of survival of the fittest. In a jungle, fittest refers to the strongest or the one who can best adjust to the existing environment; In an economy, fittest would refer to the richest. Therefore we see that the market economy has always helped the rich to grow richer at the cost of the others. This statement is authenticated by the fact that in USA the top 5% and top 20% of the economy who used to earn 15.5% and 41.1% of the total national income in 1973 were earning 17.9% and 44% of the total national income in 1989 respectively. The income earned by the lowest 20% of USA fell down from 5.5% to 4.6% during the same period while those of the lowest 4/5th of the economy fell down from 11.9% to 10.6%. The same applies to most of the other countries following the free market system.
Originally Posted By http://www.arindamchaudhuri.com/survival-of-the-weakest.html
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