To what extent do you agree that capitalism will not only survive but it will develop

Its capita income is 20% higher than in European countries. Switzerland is the 5th biggest foreign investor in Russia (after Germany, Great Britain, the Netherlands and Italy). The whole amount of Swiss investments to the Russian economy is $770 mln, that is 2.2% of the whole amount of foreign investments. Russian businessmen actively work with Swiss banks and trade companies. Nowadays, business contacts between Russia and Switzerland are turning to brand new level of their development.However, many developing countries have huge debts with Western commercial banks on which they are unable to pay the interest, or repay the debt. Thus they need to renew the loans, to reschedule repayments, or to borrow further money (from the IMF), often just to pay the interest on existing loans. To help countries with unmanageable balance-of-payments problems, the Bretton Woods conference created the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Under these circumstances, the IMF imposes severe liabilities, usually including the obligation to export as much as possible. The IMF extends short-term credit to nations unable to meet their debts through conventional means (by increasing exports, taking out long-term loans, using reserves). The IMF, to which the USA contributed 25 % of an initial $ 8,800 million in capital, often requires chronic debtor nations to undertake economic reforms as a condition for receiving its short-term assistance.Furthermore, speaking about the advantages of the capitalist (market) way of life, we can’t resist the opportunity to mention the USA where the market idea does survive and prosper day after day. Nowadays, the Americans watch a lot of TV – there are hundreds of channels on 24 hours a day. By the 1960s filmed television programs had become an important American export. Other countries found it cheaper to buy American television production than to make their own. Soon such exported programs were being watched by viewers all over the world. Most TV shows were concerned with entertainment. The global appeal of big entertainment events is gained by “reality shows”, which combine the drama of life performance with interactive participation. One of such shows is “American Idol” – the US version of the huge British TV hit, “Pop Idol”.However, the vast majority of people want governments to do more than just set up the institutions necessary for markets to function. They want governments to stop the production and sale of things that the market economy may not provide a lot of, like housing for poor. They often also want to tax well-off citizens to pay for government programs for the poor [1,56].Many government programs are so commonplace that you don’t even think of them as being government interventions. For instance, free public schools warning labels on medicine bottles, sin taxes on alcohol and tobacco are all government interventions in the economy.The government interventions needed to implement such programs are, in many cases, not efficient. But many people would argue that there’s quite a bit more to life than efficiency and that the inefficiencies caused by many government interventions are well worth the benefits that they produce. For such people, the government interventions in question increase overall happiness despite the fact that they are inefficient.Furthermore, much of trade is not free. While governments across the globe have lifted numerous barriers to international trade, significant protections remain. In some cases, these mechanisms promote environmental protection, public health or stable jobs. (However, in many cases they are designed not to promote broad social goals but rather to further the narrow interests of the politically powerful).Capitalism in the 20th century changed substantially from its 19th-century origins, but remained in place and by the end of the century was established as the world's most prevalent economic model, after the collapse of the USSR.Several major challenges to capitalism appeared in the early part of the 20th century. The Russian revolution in 1917 established the first communist state in the world; a decade later, the Great Depression triggered increasing criticism of the existing capitalist system. One response to this crisis was a turn to fascism, an ideology which advocated state-influenced capitalism; other responses are, a rejection of capitalism altogether in favor of communist or socialist ideologies.In the years after World War II, capitalism was moderated and regulated in several ways. Keynesian economics became a widely accepted method of government regulation; meanwhile, countries such as the United Kingdom experimented with mixed economies in which the state owned and operated certain major industries.Other aspects of 21th-century capitalism include the rise of financial markets, quantitative analysis of market trends, and the increasing globalization of production and consumption.To sum up, because pure market economies don’t deliver everything that many people want, most societies have opted for at least some – and in some cases, quite a lot of – government intervention in the economy, the result is that most economies today are mixed economies, with some aspects of direct command and control of economic activity mixed in with a mostly market economy that uses a price system to allocate resources.BibliographyBrenner, Robert, 1977, "The Origins of Capitalist Development: a Critique of Neo-Smithian Marxism," in New Left Review 104: 36-37, 46 Dobb, Maurice 1947 Studies in the Development of Capitalism. New York: International Publishers Co., Inc. 42-46, 48 ff. Marx, Karl [1867] 1976 Capital: A Critique of Political Economy Volume One trans. Ben Fowkes. Harmondsworth and London: Penguin Books and New Left Review. 874Stark, Rodney. Victory of Reason, (Random House New York, 2005) Ferguson, Niall. The Ascent of Money, (Pengiun,2008)Skinner, Quentin, The Foundations of Modern Political Thought, vol I: The Renaissance; vol II: The Age of Reformation. CambridgeUniversityPress, 1978)