A most persistent myth that enjoys widespread belief in modern times is the fable about wealth being the result of brainpower—the brainpower of those who possess wealth. “It takes brains to make money,” we are told again and again. If we point to that considerable percentage of the super-capitalist class—a, majority, in fact—whose wealth is inherited, there is the immediate response: “Well, so their fathers or grandfathers had the brains. And they have to know how to handle the fortunes, too, or they can lose them."
Well, it isn't easy to argue with that because it does take a certain type of brains to found and maintain a financial empire. A reading of American history makes this apparent. The Morgans, the Mellons, the Rockefellers, the Carnegies and Fricks, the Fords, the DuPonts and the rest of the super-rich Americans did have the sort of brains one finds in the Jungle among predatory animals. They were pitiless as they clawed their way to success, with little mercy for the workers and their families whom they used (“employed,” is the word in general usage) to produce their wealth and just as little compassion for one another in their mad competition to sell one another short.
But we must admit the analogy is not altogether fitting. The predatory lower animals, we understand, do not usually devour their own particular species, nor do they seek to store up endless caches of dead carcasses. On the other hand, the two-legged predator has had, and still maintains, institutions that surround his depredations with the aura of respectability, even holiness. He has his charitable foundations and his churches, upon which he bestows vast sums and which reciprocate by saving him on his taxes, keeping his name before the public, and generally singing his praises. They function as pillars of his empire.
Well, we are often told, that might be true of some of the capitalists but it doesn’t fit the majority, it doesn’t affect the proposition that it still takes talent to make money. And of course brains and abilities are invaluable assets. But the industries and institutions of capitalism today are not generally operated by members of the capitalist class. Rare, indeed, is it to find a capitalist in modern times who even knows where his industries are, leave alone have anything to do with operating them. Can one imagine a Rockefeller or a J. Paul Getty concerning himself with the actual details of running his far-flung financial and industrial institutions? They are no doubt busy most of the time with their travels, their political manipulations and their society events. They may conceivably consult, from time to time, with some of their executives. But even allowing for acumen in their own right they would have to be supermen, indeed, to have the time and talents needed to operate the industries of these times. And that is precisely why they endow the prestigious business schools throughout the nation. They pay to train, and then hire the required brains. As a class, the capitalists of our times are completely superfluous and parasitic. They could all be transported to the moon, never to return, without noticeable effect to the total economy, not even to their stock exchanges for they, too, are operated from top to bottom by hirelings.
What does it take to make money today? Brains and talent, certainly, but not one's own brains and talents. One needs capital. How does one get capital? In various ways: by inheriting it, by luck at the racetrack or lottery, by robbery (but don’t get caught!). Far better to pick the right parents. We wouldn't necessarily agree with the great French novelist Balzac who argued that behind every fortune is a crime. But we do agree with Marx who exposed primitive accumulation as forcible, brutal, even murderous expropriation of the majority and the creation of a propertyless working class. But the secret to riches in modern times is: by hook or by crook, hire the brains to make it for you.
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