My favorite president William Howard Taft once said, “Socialism proposes no adequate substitute of the motive of enlightened selfishness that today is at the basis of all human labor and effort, enterprise and new activity.” In not so many words, selfishness runs our world.

A friend of mine gave me the topic for this week’s column. He gave me an argument I could not resist. He argued that “even in selfless acts, humans are still full of personal gain because they gain a satisfaction of knowing they did something good.” This argument was made in support of our capitalist economy, but also proves a point many people choose to avoid: Selfishness is what motivates us all.

Looking at his statement, I would have to agree that capitalism is the only true economic system that requires people to reap their own rewards. I mentioned this in an earlier column this month. His points of argument were intriguing though.

He shared with me an example concerning primitive tribes and their motivation for survival. He argued they stayed alive because it’s human instinct to want to live. While some may think that tribes act to protect the whole, the act of protecting the whole actually is a survival technique that promotes the survival of the individual. They act to protect the whole because they know there’s safety in numbers. “It’s human nature,” my friend said. “You can’t change it.”

Selfishness is natural. It’s a part of being human. It is what makes the world we know and, for the most part, enjoy living in. So why try and change something that’s been around for the ages? Capitalism is not broken. It may not be perfect, but it is not so far gone that we need a new system.

Numerous anti-capitalists believe capitalism is destroying the planet. Creating an unlimited amount of new needs and wants every day is making for a lot of excess waste. That makes sense, but no one is saying we need a new phone every year; we could still be using the bricks from the past. We do not need iPods; I am sure we can still find the original Walkmans in some thrift shop, but those new phones and iPods also put food on the table for those living in the manufacturing sectors.

Other kindhearted souls believe the poverty levels of America are unacceptable. I agree with this statement. Poverty should not exist in America, but people need to learn to help themselves. It is time people start figuring out what they need and learning how to get it. The poverty line that exists in America is equivalent to the “1 percent” in other parts of the world — and we should not forget it. Those at the very lowest economic levels in America are still much better off than even the middle-class citizens in third-world countries.

The pro-capitalist movement woven into American society thrives off the basis of greed. It thrives off the natural human instincts that consume us all. This is not always a bad thing and it works well to our advantage. It cannot be altered; even the few people who give up all their worldly possessions cannot make basic human survival succumb to an alternate system. Relying on a governmental system to ensure survival will not work. People know themselves and they know what is best for them, and trying to convince them otherwise is not going to work well in the end.

People have never liked to feel controlled. Every situation where someone has thought he or she knew what was best for the masses has always left a large portion of said masses disgruntled and, in several cases, has led to uprisings.

Capitalism may not be everyone’s idea of perfect, but it has been working pretty well so far. As Taft said, “We are all imperfect.”