EXCERPT:
"Curiously, the set of self-interested actions that are widely praised are those whose positive effects redound almost exclusively to each self-interested actor. If I exercise and eat right, the resulting health and beauty benefits are mine alone. My healthier heart, bulgier biceps, and more-slender body do nothing to improve my neighbor’s well-being. (In fact, my exercise and good diet might harm him, for they improve my chances of getting the pretty girl whom we’ve both been eyeing.)
In contrast, prominent among the self-interested actions that are popularly suspect are those whose fulfillment requires self-interested actors to provide benefits to others. Of course, the business firm that earns profits in the market yields benefits to its self-interested principals – but it does so only insofar as it yields benefits to others. And the greater the benefits provided to others, and the greater the number of others provided with these benefits, the greater are the benefits that the self-interested, profit-seeking business principals enjoy. That is, when someone selfishly jogs to improve his or her health, we applaud. When that same someone selfishly seeks financial profit by offering goods or services for sale to consumers, many of us are wary. (And even most of the other of us who aren’t wary don’t positively praise this variety of self-interested behavior. We merely tolerate it as necessary.)
Selfish behavior that is exclusively self-regarding is praised; selfish behavior that requires the selfish actor to consider and satisfy and please strangers is suspect."
