Why Intervention Matters

Why should we fear government intervention?

Perhaps the most pertinent example that demonstrates how rapidly instituted government intervention can lead to full-scale socialism is the record of National Socialist Germany.

January 30, 1933 Adolf Hitler was appointed to the position of German Chancellor. Hitler’s meteoric rise to power can be contributed to multiple factors. Although an inexperienced politician, Hitler’s charismatic rhetorical skills catapulted him into the public limelight.

A member of the National Socialist Party, Hitler endorsed and promoted the party’s radical reforms of collectivism, elimination of individualism, and state ownership of the means of production in the fields of banking, manufacturing, healthcare, and education. To achieve these goals, the National Socialist Party sought accretion of industry using their interventionist measures in the name of protectionism. The National Socialist Party opposed free trade and sought to reach a state of autarky (self-sufficiency). The last objective on the National Socialist Party’s list was job creation and that objective was not addressed for the first 18 months Hitler was in power.

Under the National Socialist Party and Hitler, Germany was on the road to Hindenburg or German Socialism, which had all the appearances of private ownership of the means of production and the appearances of the market functioning effectively. However, there was no longer entrepreneurship but shop keepers and managers who obeyed government orders unconditionally in the matters of production management. The centralized government instructed these managers on what and how to produce goods and services, what to pay their employees, who they could hire, what was to be automatically deducted from pay checks, and what hours the employees were to work.

Immediately upon taking office, Hitler established control over all unions by abolishing all unions but one: the Labour Front (DAF) which reported directly to Hitler’s office. There was no vote on whether there would be a union or not.

Hitler’s political campaigns were funded by Benito Mussolini and Henry A. Ford leaving Hitler free to concentrate on his rhetoric and not the financing of campaigning. Although he campaigned about the economic woes of Germany, Hitler quickly dropped economic issues once in office. Instead, Hitler’s attacks and rhetoric turned into a War on Prosperity blaming the Jews for the bad economy. Why the Jews? These were the people who had prospered, who had used their business acumen to succeed. The reality was Hitler neither understood nor did he have any interest in economics. (Bullock, A., 1962, p. 152) Thus, Hitler began the culture of class envy and hatred.

First, Hitler began confiscating property and wealth from his War on Prosperity targets, and he practiced the Marxist philosophy of Redistributing the Wealth by giving the confiscated property to those who were less prosperous. Second, Hitler established the SS who instituted social welfare policies including nationalized healthcare. The National Socialist Party decided whose lives were worthy or unworthy of living, and it was the scientists who made these decisions for the government. Third, professional women were stripped of their jobs, and women were paid to stay at home. Fourth, all wages were decided by the government. Fifth, young people were more or less forced to join the Voluntary Labour Service and the Voluntary Youth Service.

Under Hitler’s National Socialist Party, one intervention by the government led to another intervention. It was a “slither down” economy as all businesses were eventually under government control. “Businesses who were reluctant to follow the New Order had to be forced into line.”

Should we be concerned with government intervention?