Assigned Entry #4 Main Influence

When I lived in Iraq for 12 years, I did not hear the word capitalism. In Iraq, the government used to control all the companies that worked in the country. So I didn't know the meaning of capitalism, until I traveled to Egypt in 2005.

 In Egypt, I noticed that the people in the government are the same ones who own the major companies. The best Example is Ahmed Ezz who was an Egyptian businessman and one-time politician, the former owner of Ezz Steel and the former chairman of Egypt's national assembly's budget committee. Also a former senior member of the ruling National Democratic Party of Egypt and has been described as "a confidant of the president’s son Gamal Mubarak, and two other former ministers. In his positions in the government, Ezz used his authorities to lower taxes for his business and buy cheap raw material for his factories. Also he used his connections in the government to eliminate any major competition in the market. Plus many more examples like Ezz, even the president Mubarak himself used his powers to make profit for himself. That was one of the reason people revolted against Mubarak and his government. 

  When I watched the movie Capitalism: Love Story, I realized that Capitalism here is the same in Egypt. The only difference is that here the competition is bigger, and poverty is much less than Egypt. While I was watching the movie, I kept comparing situations that happened in the movie to similar ones in Egypt, and wondered will there be a time that people revolt against the government someday like in Egypt? It is possible, and some people are already revolting, asking for their rights and better work conditions. Some people already noticed what Capitalism has been doing to the country, and they started educating people about the problems of Capitalism. The Government should control the private companies not the other way around.

In the 21^st century, Money became everyone’s ambitious and lifelong goal. Everything around us became labeled with price. If you don’t make enough money, then you are not living. Nowadays, people are running in circles, they work for minimum wages to buy food and pay the rent so they can go work at the next day. What kind of life is that? It is not a life. People in Europe work to live, and in the U.S they live to work.