Is Greed Good?

The notion that "Greed is Good" dates back to Adam Smith's time when he described an economic system is based on self-interest in his book "The Wealth of Nations."

Today's mainstream try to portray that capitalism is based on empathy not on Greed which in cases makes sense (here). They try to explain that the Capitalist understand the market and the needs of costumer and have to do that in order to be success. And whoever puts their self-interest first in place of customers' need will no longer be able to be in a market in a long run.

In his book, The Future of Capitalism, the British economist Paul Collier makes a number of suggestions for reforming capitalism. He criticizes the “moral deficit” of “modern capitalism.” He also claims that the maxim of modern capitalism is “greed is good,” Gordon Gecko’s famous line from the film Wall Street, and that the system therefore urgently needs an ethical course correction. 

This notion of putting customers' needs first is true, but the core ideology or the core purpose is still to be dominant in the market. The focus is on customers' need in anyway possible and greed is always in their way. Its not only the nature of the Capitalism; but it is, in fact, the nature of human being.

For Marx, however, greed is an "abstract hedonism". It's worth quoting this idea from "Grundrisse":

"Greed as such, as a particular form of drive, i.e., as distinct from a craving for a particular form of wealth, e.g. for clothes, weapons, jewels, women, wine is possible only when general wealth.... has become individualized in a particular thing... money. Money is therefore not only the object but the fountainhead of greed. The mania of possession is possible without money; but greed itself is the product of particular social development, not natural, as opposed to historical... Hedonism in its genral form and miserliness are two particular form of monetary greed. Hedonism is the abstract presupposed an object which possesses all pleasures in potentiality. Asbtract hedonism realizes that function of money in which it is the material representation of wealth... In order to maintain it as such, it must sacrifice all relationship to the objects of particular needs, must abstain, in order to satisfy the need of greed for money as such.. (Marx 1973)

Today's capitalism might have shifted but greed in still in the core. It might not be revealed in their product or services but it exists within. The modern world runs under capitalism and it is worth having capitalistic view on this to survive in the modern world. Its is worth noting and knowing the driving force of capitalism.