The lesson is that defenders of free enterprise have to put less weight on happiness. Sure, happiness is one good thing. But so is achievement - doing something productive with your life. And on this score, free enterprise looks a lot better than welfare states that subsidize people who skate through life without even trying to make something of themselves.
Once you take achievement seriously, moreover, you start to see that redistribution is immoral in and of itself. When someone achieves something - whether writing an article or building a business - they deserve to keep the product. It matters little whether keeping the product makes the achiever happy. The point is that achiever earned what he has, and other people - including government - ought to respect his rights. From here, you're close to the truism that taxation is theft - and the moral case for free enterprise looks solid indeed.
That’s from Professor Bryan Caplan at the Econolog.
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