Matthew Lau: Schools should stop teaching lies about capitalism

financialpost.com:

“Our capitalist system,” I have just learned, “is one of the main reasons our planet is getting stripped away and destroyed.” That is according to the Toronto District School Board, which made the claim in the November edition of its EcoSchools newsletter to promote something called “Buy Nothing Day” on November 29. The TDSB says that by buying nothing for a day people can protest consumerism and help the environment. The reality, of course, is just the opposite: capitalism and buying things are nothing to protest. Nor are they responsible for “our planet getting stripped away and destroyed.”

From 1900 to 2021, world average life expectancy rose from 32 years to 71 years — an astonishing increase that was not the result of people buying nothing and consuming nothing. Quite the opposite: it was the result of the widespread advances in technology, medicine and overall economic productivity driven by capitalism that enabled people to increase their consumption.

One reason people live longer and better lives than they used to is that modern economies and technologies protect against environmental disasters. The global death rate related to climate and weather catastrophes is today less than one per cent what it was a century ago.

That capitalism is responsible for planetary destruction and other environmental harm is also nonsense. In addition to longer and better lives, capitalism has delivered a high degree of environmental cleanliness. Mass production of the automobile cleaned cities by ridding streets of horses and disease-attracting horse manure. Vacuum cleaners, dishwashers, air fresheners, washers and driers, ventilation systems, disinfecting wipes — the virtually unlimited products that make our immediate