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TechnoratiEvery year, the Heritage Foundation, in conjunction with the Wall Street Journal, dutifully churns out its annual Index of Economic Freedom, a ratings guide to countries' relative corporate hospitality.
The book-length report makes a quite modest global media splash every year. A Lexis search shows the 2008 report, issued last week, garnered (mostly quite short) stories in New Zealand, Australia, China, Russia, Thailand, Bahrain, the United Kingdom, India, Ireland, the Philippines, Poland, Singapore, Ukraine, Taiwan, Korea, the United States, Zimbabwe, and various wire services. If past years are any guide, over the course 2008, the report will likely be referenced several times in the Wall Street Journal editorial pages, and in various other publications. Not bad, but not earth-shattering.
The Index of Economic Freedom is significantly more important than this news coverage suggests, however.
For the last several years, the report has been subtitled "The Link Between Economic Opportunity and Prosperity," and a central thesis of the report is that removing controls on corporations will create economic wealth. When apples are compared to apples -- that is, when countries of similar economic development are compared -- this claim is revealed to be nonsensical, as various studies from the Center for Economic and Policy Research and many others have shown.
But more important than the asserted connection between removing corporate restraints and prosperity is the report's definitional maneuver. It claims "economic freedom" -- and all of the justifiably positive connotations with freedom -- as part of the corporate agenda. It equates "economic freedom" with corporate superiority to popular control.
The Index of Economic Freedom is not the only tool to spread this propaganda, but it is among the most influential. The idea has seeped deep into the culture.
The Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), which was supposed to be the major Bush administration anti-global poverty innovation (but has in fact failed to distribute more than a tiny fraction of funds allocated to it) by statute selects recipient countries in large part based on measures of their "economic freedom." The MCC actually relies on the Heritage Foundation's Index of Economic Freedom for determining a component (countries' trade openness) of the MCC's economic freedom rating.
Members of Congress have introduced dozens of bills and resolutions referencing "economic freedom" over the last decade. One small example: Senator Barack Obama, along with Senators Chuck Hagel, R-Nebraska, and Maria Cantwell, D-Washington, in 2007 introduced the Global Poverty Act of 2007. (A version in the House of Representatives, introduced by Adam Smith, D-Washington, has 84 co-sponsors.) The bill would require the President to develop a strategy to meet the Millennium Development Goal of reducing the number of people in the world living in extreme poverty by one half. Although the bill is mainly aspirational -- operationally, it doesn't require anything than development of a strategy -- it embraces a noble goal, and the world would be a better place if the legislation became law. But it is noteworthy that a "finding" of the bill is that "Economic growth and poverty reduction are more successful in countries that invest in the people, rule justly, and promote economic freedom."
The Global Poverty Act does not specify what "economic freedom" means, and the sponsors of the bill would almost certainly disagree with some of the detailed definition supplied by the Heritage Foundation. But they have, at least in passing, adopted the framework.
Just what exactly does the Heritage Foundation mean when it says "economic freedom?" The Index of Economic Freedoms contains a preposterously precise formula for measuring and comparing so-called economic freedoms, based on the following 10 factors: business freedom, trade freedom, fiscal freedom, government size, monetary freedom, investment freedom, financial freedom, property rights, freedom from corruption and labor freedom.
OK, that's not much of an answer to the question. What do these grand phrases mean when Heritage translates them into concrete terms?
Here are some examples:
* "Trade freedom" measures not just how low tariff rates are, but the extent to which a country maintains "non-tariff trade barriers," such as "safety and industrial standards regulations" and "advertising and media regulations." Heritage considers national restrictions on biotechnology products -- which apply equally to domestic and foreign genetically modified foods -- as trade restrictions.
* "Fiscal freedom" is simply code for how low tax rates are. This includes corporate tax rates -- which the Heritage formula weighs as heavily as taxes on individuals.
* Countries are awarded more points the smaller the size of the government relative to national economic output. The most points are awarded for a government with zero size!
* "Investment freedom" actually has almost nothing to do with the ability of people in a country to make investments. Heritage defines investment freedom as whether there are restrictions on foreign investment, including whether any industrial sectors are off limits for security reasons, and whether expropriation is permitted -- even with compensation paid to investors.
* "Financial freedom" means whether banks and high finance are unregulated. The United States is apparently penalized for the various modest Sarbanes-Oxley rules passed after the Enron and related debacles.
* Heritage contorts "labor freedom" to mean the ability of corporations to fire workers without restraint and the absence of any minimum wage rules (with countries penalized the higher their minimum wage relative to average value added per worker).
The successful effort by the Heritage Foundation and its allies to capture the term "economic freedom" is not just a propaganda coup, it is a heist.
Heritage and its collaborators have stolen and debased the grand and noble vision of Franklin Roosevelt. They explicitly state that they are carrying out a project initiated by Milton Friedman (author in 1961 of Capitalism and Freedom, among many other works) to define economic freedom in terms of individual economic actors' -- typically corporations, though they often prefer to glorify individual entrepreneurs -- ability to escape public control. This ideal is held out against Roosevelt's idea of a caring and sharing society, where the crucial economic freedom is freedom from want.
In his famous 1941 "Four Freedoms" speech, Roosevelt offered a vision of a world defined by four freedoms (freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom from want, and freedom from fear).
"Translated into world terms," Roosevelt proclaimed, freedom from want "means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants -- everywhere in the world."
His specific 1941 agenda, unfortunately, remains a suitable elaboration for the present day of this more appealing, democratic and humane concept of economic freedom.
"The basic things expected by our people of their political and economic systems are simple," Roosevelt declared.
"They are:
* Equality of opportunity for youth and for others.
* Jobs for those who can work.
* Security for those who need it.
* The ending of special privilege for the few.
* The preservation of civil liberties for all.
* The enjoyment of the fruits of scientific progress in a wider and constantly rising standard of living."
"These are the simple, the basic things that must never be lost sight of in the turmoil and unbelievable complexity of our modern world. The inner and abiding strength of our economic and political systems is dependent upon the degree to which they fulfill these expectations."
"Many subjects connected with our social economy call for immediate improvement. As examples:
* We should bring more citizens under the coverage of old-age pensions and unemployment insurance.
* We should widen the opportunities for adequate medical care.
* We should plan a better system by which persons deserving or needing gainful employment may obtain it."
Robert Weissman is editor of the Washington, D.C.-based Multinational Monitor, and director of Essential Action.
(c) Robert Weissman
21 Comments so far
Show Alli am reposting this comment also on the ANTARTICA MELTING article because i think it is also relevant considering the huge energy potential of it and its benefit of 100% sustanibility so here it is…
i have been reading the posts and am totally surprised i didn't come across anybody even mentioning one of the best most SUSTANABLE solutions that humankind can reach for from the forgotten toolshed of history. This is called HEMP. industrial hemp is the most viable alternative to any of this 'biofuel' debate that is currently going on. HEMP is a plant that thrives under so many varying conditions as to allow its use and commercialization without undue hardship on ever depleted resources. HEMP could be grown from Maine to Florida from California to Texas to Canada to India. If you get the chance look for a little video that the US DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE made during WWII. its called HEMP FOR VICTORY and the Government denied its making of the video until one was furnished by the great Jack Herer. The HEMP plant has thousands of uses, and to those that would say that biodiesel could be made from corn, yes this is true, but HEMP has more energy per acre than corn or many other 'short root' plant do. HEMPs roots penetrate deep into the surface of the soil making the plant very drought resistant. The melting of the caps will send massive amounts of saltwater to coastal plains, but in other parts of the world drought will be the name of the game. Essentially with the miracle plants growth parameters many harvests could be produced in one growing season, unlike corn or soy or others out there. the advantage you get in this case is that you can 'plow under' the first round into the ground and let sit early in the growing season. After two to three weeks in the soil the nutrients from this decaying matter is released into the topsoil making it increadably rich, THEREFORE NO NEED FOR HARMFUL AND DANGEROUS SYNTHETIC PESTICIDES OR HERBICIDES. promoting the NATURAL STATES OF DEFENCE OF ANY PLANT, hemp included, is the only viable way around using soil killing chemicals. (samples of topsoil taken from fields where caustic chemicals are used will prove that the soil itself is accually dead or dying ie no benefial and life giving microorganisms, the foundations of life) Hemp can reverse this process, INFACT hemp has been used around the areas affected by the CHERNOBLE nuclear disaster for the very purpose of naturally absorbing the radioactivness present in the soil (and this is just ONE EXAMPLE). I was doing some research the other night and discovered that the closest country to the US that has legal access to growing hemp (licensed and regulated obviously) is Canada. This plant should be the god given right of any human on earth to grow and utilize, whether for fiber, fuel, food, or medicine. Unfortunatly, toomany entrenched industries shake with fear whenever any meaningful change in the production and commercial utilization of the plant; because they would be out of business very quick like. Unfortunatly it might take an 'end of days' scenario for the power elites to relinquish their control over the plant and allow for its productive cultivation. the US economy would bounce right back from its 20 trillion dollar debt within two to three YEARS if it were legalized tomorrow. And i should probably mention this because the issue often is confused by the less informed, but marijuana as a drug is relativly mild compared to just about any modern day pharmacutical. It is important to note that HEMP and marijuana differ because HEMP mostly of the ruderalis family of cannabis ie very low thc content in relation to its mass. You could smoke a joint the size of a light pole made from hemp and still only end up with a mild headache. HEMP generally has a .1-2% thc content whereas its cannabis sativa cousin can produce the 'flowers' or 'buds' with upwards of 30% thc. so if anyone tells you that hemp is the same thing as the drug pot-just lying to you or has another agenda or most probably (and unfortunatly here) is totally ignorant of this critical and overlooked issue.
sorry if the script is rough around the edges, this could be called a 'rough draft' proposal.
"Just what exactly does the Heritage Foundation mean when it says "economic freedom?" - 10 factors: business freedom, trade freedom, fiscal freedom, government size, monetary freedom, investment freedom, financial freedom, property rights, freedom from corruption and labor freedom."
Can the Heritage Foundation tell us how we can possibly have "freedom from corruption" while all these other freedoms clearly create major conflicts of interest within the corporate business community and invite "freedom of fraud and abuse"? Have they not researched how the "repeal" of the Glass-Steagall Act created the sub-prime securitization fraud we are experiencing today?
The Heritage Foundation might not be doing their homework but we can certainly do it for them - and for ourselves.
http://www.financialsense.com/editorials/engdahl/2008/0123.html
The separation of Chuch and State, in most parts of the world, is considered key to providing some measure of Religious Freedom.
The separation of Business and State would be key to providing some measure of Economic Freedom.
Makes me want to re-quote Napoleon:
"When a government is dependent upon bankers for money, they and not the leaders of the government control the situation, since the hand that gives is above the hand that takes. Money has no motherland; financiers are without patriotism and without decency; their sole object is gain."
"New Zealand, Australia, China, Russia, Thailand, Bahrain, the United Kingdom, India, Ireland, the Philippines, Poland, Singapore, Ukraine, Taiwan, Korea, the United States, Zimbabwe,"
Is it just a coincidence or on purpose that the Index of Economic Freedoms did not mention France , Italy , Germany , Holland ... and the rest of the mermbers of the richest political entity in the world , European Union ?
With the optimim hybrid of socialism/capitalism seemingly working for the equitable benefit of workers and business , Europeans can justifiably snear at the irrelevant "fluff" issue by the Heritage Foundation.
There was a comment from an American-expatriot , French citizen in Michael Moore's movie , "Sicko": " We're drowning in taxes but that's OK ".
True or fictional , the statement encapsualates the feeling that a society can enjoy the best of socialism and capitalism syncronously.
What they mean by economic freedom is freedom for the elite to exploit the classes below them for self-gain, which really translates to freedom to spread even more misery around the globe. Ironically, they do not realize that their continuing race to the bottom will only serve to further destabilize the society in which they must live, which indicates plain stupidity on their part.
kivals: All categories are slushy at some point, but we can objectively pick a number. For instance "the top x% control y% of the wealth & natural resources". Furthermore, we can identify government actions -- whether here, in Stalinist Russia, Nazi Germany, ancient Rome, etc. which were designed to increase the power of that top x%, at the expense of the remainder. It is the politics of power of the few, at the expense of the many, and independent of what color hat they claim to wear. We can point these things out objectively.
With your now-dead left/right metaphor (that's all it ever was), we can't say Bush believes in small government or fiscal responsibility. Nor can we say that the Democrats actively oppose Bush, given their near-total lack of heat applied against him. Nor can we say that public/private are separate entities, worthy of separate analysis. Government has shown itself time and again to be synonymous with the private elite of its particular historical era, not separable from it.
Furthermore, we can note that today's "capitalists" rely on cheap communist labor. Yesteryear's capitalists relied on slave labor. Today's "communists" rely on capitalist spending patterns, debt encumbrance, etc.
Bottom line, the left/right thing is useful only as an abstract exerise in metaphorical sophistry. The reality is that they're either intertwined, co-dependent or historically inseparable from power politics.
Again, I can objectively divide a populace by rich and poor at an inflection point. For instance, those people who earn more than 50% of their wealth through their own labors, vs. those who earn more than 50% of their wealth through their investments (the labors of others). Or whatever -- these are objective measures. What objective metrics exist for left and right? Or for any other purely metaphorical language?
FVHorn, very well put. I like the Fair Market concept. The Free Market Mythos is utterly mad - it is used as license to try to win it all at the expense of anyone else. Hey, in a free market, the government is for sale! The elections are for sale! Justice is for sale! Money is for sale!
Heck, if I have enough money to blow the tops of mountains, and to buy off any courts or governments that might try to stop me, shouldn't I be allowed to in a free market?
But, anyway, the Free Market Ethos/Mythos/Pathos has certainly given rise to something that is anything but a free market. With the Secretary of Inflation (Helicopter Ben) lopping 3/4% off the rent the Fed charges on the currency it's printing, not becuase of free market forces, but to stop a panic on wall street, there is zero free market reality to the very currency that everything is priced in. So, yet another Orwellianated term - the free market. It's rigged, and it ain't rigged by or for the people.
For some reason, the real economic freedom we need to expand (which is rarely discussed in the "public" realm) is freedom from big business.
Another freedom we need to pursue -relative to government- is to get big business off our government's back.
Anyway, our day-to-day lives are influenced more by the private decisions and behaviors of big business planners than by government bureaucracies.
The American Economy is held up ONLY by the government, and thus is TOTALLY POLITICAL. Teh Bush Government is re-distributing wealth UPWARDS via corporate-welfare 'socialism'. So much for Economic Freedom! That the Coors Beer Heritage Foundation is recommending some abstract economic freedom and 'free' market, and about how that would be more 'efficient' is absurd. Slavery can be more 'efficient' too. And anarchy must be just plain wonderful. But of course, anarchy with the caveat that money and gold still hold their power. Not people. But the Golden Calf must stll be worshipped.
Without deficit spending by the US Government, the Bush tax cuts could not happen, not without discarding the safety nets of hundreds of millions of capitalist-economically 'worthless, inefficient' people and basically letting them die, and not without totally discarding the American military machine. And I dare the Coors Beer Heritage Foundation to say out loud that it wants these consequences!
If the government then cannot discard people like the 'efficient' corporations do (as well as corporations exercising the 'efficiency' of not having to pay royally up the yinyang for their own defense like the government does), and the government couldn't raise the debt ceiling, then the tax cuts for the RICH are a form of WELFARE PAYMENT to the rich that the government CANNOT afford, as are tax-free government bond interest payments. These payments are Surplus monies to the rich that wind up inflating prices in real estate and stocks, so the wealthy tend to get wealthier in our new Gilded Age, at the expense of the govenment, directly and indirectly.
The US Government now owes $12 Thousand Billion dollars, with another $56 Thousand Billion in accrued-deficits-forward. Tell me this doesn't prop up the ecomomy. Or would bring it ALL down with a US Government Bankruptcy. And the US is Rocketing downhill with a Billion dollars a day of new debt and another Hundred Billion dollars a month in international trade deficits. But the Coors Beer Heritage Foundation thinks these things are good, as they lead to a smashed-up, powerless, bought-off US government, and the money power and ownership is all transferred to TransNational Corporations and International Bankers.
Of course, BushWar spending and Homeland Security spending have goosed the economy, as well. And the housing bubble has made the whole economy appear wealthier for a time (thanks to the Greenspan Neo-Con-controlled Fed). This is due to the Mark-to-Market illusory and deceptive nature of home prices and the massive margin housing relies on. If the stock market were allowed margin like housing, you could see DOW 300,000 (this kind of margin in the 1920s led to the stock market margin-call crash of 1929 and the ensuing 'free market-working-allowed-to-happen shakeout' called the Great Depression). But would this be good? Would this be real? It would all be borrowed. Just like America today. And it couldn't be paid back. Just like America today.
The Coors Beer Heritage Foundation version of democracy seems to be, not one person-one vote, but rather, "for each dollar you own, one vote." I'm sorry, but the libertarian/ pure capitalist, or FEUDAL system was tried before, and failed way back in the Dark Ages, if you recall.
Why, if states could be 'efficient' and 'fire' their own citizens, and tell them to leave the premises (the state or country), then the states' deficits for helping these same people (or imprisoning them) would also disappear. This is what Mexico is kind of doing now.
And of course, with the new, efficient-model government, if you are defrauded, or poisoned by food or medicine, or injured by a product, or have a crackhouse or whorehouse move next door to you, or you are murdered, well tough. No 'Nanny' state will be there to help protect you. The victim will be responsible, just like the raped woman in Suadi Arabia. Such victims will be publicly whipped because they shouldn't have become victims -so have only themselves to blame. Just like the Neo-Cons are now saying it is the fault of those who listened to the boosters and realtors and mortgage bankers in the first place, and took out mortgages that will become unserviceable. So be sure to Shoot first, in a wild-west, completely untrustworthy, dog-eat-dog world.
I see examples of the Coors Beer heritage Foundation's ideal of 'Economic Freedom' around the world... take Somalia -with no government, take Mexico -with its many billionaires among crushing poverty. It seems a lot of people want to leave those capitalist paradises. Take the average American CEO. Is it 'efficient' to pay so much for a CEO? More than a brain surgeon or a general? Why? Just because Mr. CEO has the sociopathology and callousness to fire thousands of people for short-term gain because these living people were 'inefficient' and wouldn't work for the $1 an hour he was offering?
Let's face it, one guy's version of efficiency is another's example of gross waste. So where do you find efficiency when life itself is completely 'inefficient'!
Don't talk about efficiency, or the Absurdity of 'Economic' Freedom. Talk about fair trade and fair play and teamwork and community. And 'Free' Markets and Economics care not about any of these things.
The 'free market' and 'economic freedom' are also lies. Witness the 1500-page corporate-written 'free market' trade agreements we have seen in the past years. Packed with special interests and unfairness as only lobbyists and attorneys could deliver, at great cost. But supposedly about 'free' trade. What mendacious Lunacy. Read "The Shock Doctrine" by Naomi Klein, for a better analysis of free trade and free markets. The book makes one understand the anti-law, anti-government, anti-democratic, UberNational, Corporate/Fascist nature of Heritage Foundation's definitions in their made-up 'Index' of Neo-Con Dreams.
And please don't talk to me about the run-by-and-for bankers private Federal Reserve, that Nanny State Institution for the Capitalist Class, conjuring up money to give away (BUT ONLY TO BANKERS as the US is forced to borrow money, hat in hand, from elsewhere}, and lowering interest rates for the banks and corporations BY DECREE when the 'big boys' have screwed things up royally, in order to save their Neo-Con asses. So much for the so-called 'free' market!
Remember, a thumbnail version of capitalism is: buy low and screw that guy, and sell high and screw that guy, too. Some kind of morals and ethics, eh? Don't look for morals and ethics in raw unfettered capitalism. It has not put this country in a good place.
There may be a blend of small, individual capitalism and democratic socialism that is best... may be. See the Scandinavian countries for examples. But the 'Free' Market Mythos must be discarded. The 'Fair' Market is a better and more humane model. And the Coors Beer Heritage Foundation must be discarded too, along with their Lunatic Index celebrating the Neo-Con Dream of Total Stateless Corporate Criminality.
How can we regain economic freedom without first addressing our ecological needs?
Paul Bramscher,
I am not sure I understand your distinction between left-right and up-down, though I will say that I do not necessarily classify those who identify themselves as "liberals" as being on the left. I generally think of the left in terms of economics, and I agree that it appears unlikely that one would find a billionaire on the left on economic issues. As for Soros, that vile excuse for human excrement made his fortune by destabilizing currency markets in Asia, undoubtedly leading to the misfortune and suffering of millions of innocent people, and I would not ever claim to understand what games he is playing in the US political sphere. I cannot imagine how a progressive could or would accumulate billions of dollars, though I suppose one could inherit such sums.
The "freedom" rhetoric was enthralled in September 1942 to capitalism with a speech given by Lamott Dupont to the National Association of Manufacturers. Whereas "capitalism" was viewed as a failure in the shadow of the Great Depression, NAM gave it a new lease on life under the rubric "free enterprise," as Dupont called it in a position endorsed by the association:
"The way to view the issue is this: are there common denominators for winning the war and the peace? If there are, then, we should deal with both in 1943. What are they? We will win the war by reducing taxes on corporations, high income brackets, and increasing taxes on lower incomes, by removing unions from any power to tell industry how to produce, how to deal with their employees or anything else, by destroying any and all government agencies that stand in the way of free enterprise."
This repackaged capitalism that enfolded the corporatist (as the English had called it) policies of Mussolini and Hitler later gave rise to the term "free market" (since free enterprise was not doing very well at producing large numbers of enterprises) and now finally disintegrated into the large number of freedoms spelled out here: freedom of expansion, freedom of merger, freedom of exploitation, etc. The very notion of "freedom" is dying the death of a thousand cuts as has the word "liberal."
kivals:
It's not left and right. It's up vs. down.
Can you name a really hardcore person or corporation on the "left" which is fantastically wealthy? Sure, we can point to poor people on the far "right". But how many billionaire progressives? If you're thinking Soros, I'd have to say that he's got more than one sacred cow in the pasture.
As is true generally with the framing of the right, the Index of Economic Freedom apparently assumes that freedom is completely based on the extent of governmental limitations on individual economic actors (control by the government of economically elite individuals), and is unrelated to the limitations powerful individuals place on less powerful individuals (control by the economically elite of the non-elite, e.g. employer-employee). I would think that a nation that practices human slavery would rank quite high on that scale.
The left is that segment of the population that is concerned with the limitations placed by, and the bullying practiced by, the powerful players in the economy on the less powerful. And the left generally supports a strong government as the government appears to be the most qualified candidate to control such abuse, particularly if that government is to some extent an expression of the popular will. So the freedom of the majority (the non-powerful) should be positively correlated with the strength of the government, while the freedom of the minority of economic elites would be negatively correlated.
That's a good point bigjoe. Once your life depends on the economic mechanisms you participate in, you're trapped.
You're much less free when only the bottom 99.99% are held accountable for their crimes.
And much less free when you can be saddled with a share of an incomprehensibly large government debt.
Certainly, there's a long, long, long, long, long way to go in the right direction.
Reclaim it huh? When's the last time we *had* it? When we were all hunter gatherers?
I think the principles are good though.
Communist Healthcare is an essential ingredient to economic freedom. Self employed? Complications during pregnancy? Having to choose between keeping your house and keeping your life wouldn't seem like freedom to anyone who's tried it the other way.
The Heritage Foundation, and others, are little more than facades to dilute the source of authoritarian/corporate messages, and lend them some credibility by hiring a batch of academics to write up party-line reports.
Note how all of the "economic freedoms" here are framed from the global investor's or CEO's perspective. Here's economic freedom from the working-person's perspective:
* Ability to freely work and live in any country you want to. Cross borders without hassle, etc.
* Ability to claim residence in the Caymans, etc. to dodge income taxes.
* Ability to wage small-scale wars for things you want.
* Politicans that not only leave you alone, but actually help pave your way and provide cover.
etc...
When the people control the money, the people control the government. When the government controls the money, the government controls the people.
or, to quote Napoleon Bonaparte:
"When a government is dependent upon bankers for money, they and not the leaders of the government control the situation, since the hand that gives is above the hand that takes. Money has no motherland; financiers are without patriotism and without decency; their sole object is gain."
which sounds even worse, to me.
Why should we be surprised that The Heritage Foundation is ahead on "capturing" the term "economic freedom" and twisting it to mean goodies for corporations when other reasonable people hear it and think it's for people?
Did we not learn after the switch from "Gift and Estate Tax" to "death tax" that Republicans can spin big lies with small words?
Elect wall-to-wall Democrats to Washington and trump (aka, mute to irrelevance) the Heritage Foundation noise.
Paul Bramscher,
I am sure you are aware of the history of the left label -- from the seating arrangements in the French Legislative Assembly of 1791. And the "left" label came to be associated with the goals of the French Revolution, particularly regarding equality. And if the left stands for equality, the right stands for inequality, though in the USA with the rhetoric at its founding, the inequality is justified by utilitarian arguments.
And virtually everyone agrees that equality must extend to political equality on the surface (one person -- one vote, though the left holds this must mean real equality -- no campaign contributions), and on other issues different subgroups of the left hold different standards of equality.
So again, I am not sure how changing the age-old and understood dichotomy of left-right to top-down is all that helpful, though that would be wonderful if it works in getting the bamboozled in the US to take a fresh look.