Response to Berry's "Faustian Economics"

Yes, it is true that we are exhausting our natural resources. This is irreversible and we do need to find other sources of energy. We also need to figure out a way to re-stabilize our economy. These problems may be the result of greed and wastefulness, but so is our society as a whole. This is how we have become successful. Our greed and our desire for limitlessness as a society is what made us what we are today. Capitalism, as it exists in America today, may leave a group of people marginalized, but it also provides for the luxuries that we enjoy here that don't exist anywhere else. Even the poorest American citizens have advantages that others could never dream of outside of this country. Our desire to have the most and be the best has made us the most powerful nation on the planet. Twelve million immigrants arrived on the shores of Ellis Island during the 19th century to pursue their own dreams of limitless growth and success. Because of these ideals we have become the wealthy and powerful nation that we are. While it is nice to think that everyone should band together to make the world a better place, that is not how the world works. Berry's use of literary allusion further demonstrates how unrealistic it is to expect people to accept their limitations. Faust had the right idea. Without people who are willing to risk it all to have everything, we would be nowhere.

We don't live in a collectivist society, our society promotes individualism and our right to do as we please. We are given the opportunity to go to school and pursue the career of our choice. Our country has been advanced by those who strove to make the best of themselves and surpass the expectations and perceived limits of others. Because of these people, all of them greedy and unwilling to recognize their own limits, we have made amazing advances in science and technology. When "germ theory" was first proposed it was considered impossible. How can something we can't see be making people sick. Putting limitations on people means that you yourself has limits. Our history is one of mainly wealthy, white, males and their exploits that made America what it is today. We have access to education, food, clean water, and feel safe that we will not be invaded by another nation. Our capitalist economy and sense of limitless has made us this way and we shouldn't allow Berry to make us question these values. 

We may all be selling our souls to the devil by pursuing our own desires to be limitless in knowledge, wealth and power, but it's because of this that I can enjoy the luxuries that I have. The fact that Berry himself has taking the time to write this article in the first place is nothing less than indulgent. For thousands of years mankind has strived to get to the point that people can pursue their interests as they please. If Berry were somewhere else, he wouldn't have the time or opportunity to write because he would have to worry about his day to day survival. Just as Berry thinks that our greed is a problem, people consider obesity a problem. These things are luxuries. It is a privilege that we have the choice to eat ourselves to death. Every society in history has strived to obtain a large food supply and now we are complaining. If Berry wants to go save the rain forests than he can go ahead and do that. He should just know that he can only afford to waste his time there because of the opportunities provided to us by the greedy, wasteful people of the United States who make it possible for all of us to do what we want with our lives and enjoy such a privileged existence.