Calling for less destruction and more creation

Washington

WE are not getting our money's worth from "creative destruction". For history buffs, the phrase will be familiar. Coined by Joseph Schumpeter (1883-1950) - one of the 20th century's towering economists - it defines a central characteristic of capitalism. Capitalism expands material wellbeing by replacing existing technologies, products and business methods with superior substitutes. Though this initially disrupts established industries and communities, it is the main engine of economic progress.

Here is Mr Schumpeter in his Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy (1942): "Capitalism . . . incessantly revolutionises the economic structure from within, incessantly destroying the old one, incessantly creating a new one. This process of Creative Destruction is the essential fact about capitalism."