Who creates wealth?
In 2004, a reserve first baseman for the Boston Red Sox sullied the sweet moment of the team’s first World Series victory in 85 years, when he claimed ownership of the ball he used to make the last out. It was a sad commentary on a grabby age; and it raised a couple of crucial questions: Who exactly created the monetary value of that ball (which could fetch millions), and why should the person who just happened to be holding it at the end of the game be entitled to all its value? These questions are highly inconvenient to the reigning economic thinking. Yet they need to be asked. The value of a business, resource, historic baseball or whatever does not reside solely in the thing. Nor does it arise from the efforts of an entrepreneur alone. Value is, rather, a co-production between an individual, society and nature; and the latter two often play the larger part. Land values, for example, are almost entirely a social product. That’s why two acres near an urban freeway exchange or subway
