Gerry Harvey, the founder & CEO of Harvey Norman, is supporting government policy to adopt extortion in the form of taxes upon online commerce. What do we need to know about a businessman who lobbies government for tax increases. Well, there are a number of things we should know about him:
1. He lacks an education - in fact according to his profile on Wikipedia, he did not like university. What might we garner from that? I suggest that 'he is a man of action', not a man who would celebrate abstract concepts like justice. He is a practical man, who obviously courts favours from governments. Governments are 'practical' people as well, they love such sympathises because the government can argue that they have the support of business, just as the government did with the Resource Rent Tax.
2. He thinks life is about doing what you don't like - I guess we might garner from that that he thinks its great for people to suck it up and serve government. The 'good of the society' and all that. Classical liberal nonsense.
We must of course celebrate success in any person. But this is a man who has accumulated wealth and starved his mind of knowledge...except it seems that knowledge which makes money. I love capitalism...so much that I would prefer to keep extortion and coercion from it. But Harvey wants to invite government into the picture to protect his profits. Clearly this old fashion man is not keen to adopt online commerce, and is resentful now because his strategy has not worked. Just look at his website - no wonder he can't make money from online sales. Where is the product?
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