Minister of Employment and Labor, Kim Young-hoon, appeared on a YouTube broadcast on the 29th and stated, "When we talk about sharing excess profits, some claim we are communists. How can social dialogue lead to talk of communism?" He added, "This proposal is not about cutting open a goose's belly, but about creating a bigger goose, another goose," sparking controversy. [Photo=Yonhap News]

"It's not about cutting open a goose's belly, but about creating a bigger goose."

This is the explanation given by the Minister of Labor, who has donned a armband, on a YouTube broadcast, claiming that Samsung Electronics' 'excess profits' will be socially redistributed.

When the opposition party criticized this as "cutting open a goose's belly" in response to what is essentially an overt declaration of plunder, advocating for the state to forcibly open corporate coffers and distribute wealth, this is the miraculous alchemy presented as a retort.

One cannot help but ask with common sense and reason: how can you possibly create a 'bigger goose' by arbitrarily collecting the golden eggs laid by the goose outside the legal framework of taxation, and by forcibly taking away even the capital that the goose needs to eat for innovation, and distributing it to others? A goose deprived of its food will not grow larger. It will either slowly starve to death or flee to another country where its food is not taken away.

I have no intention of belittling the personal trajectory of the minister, who is a former laborer. Every occupation has its dignity, and the experience of working hard is worthy of respect. However, when one sits in a position that requires coordinating the complex rules of a nation's macroeconomy and capital markets, the story changes entirely.

On what basis and with what confidence is this person, who lacks any knowledge or experience comparable to an expert in the flow of global capital or a company's financial risks, spouting such arrogant nonsense?

A non-expert, who has never even properly digested the first chapter of an economics textbook, poses as an economist while opening the coffers of a globally leading company fighting for survival on the front lines of the market economy. It is the bizarre confidence of the ignorant, who do not even know the basic principles of the ecosystem that govern what a goose eats to grow.

The climax of this chilling farce is the part where the minister himself, with a seemingly wronged expression, states, "I find it difficult to understand how this is connected to communism." If he truly doesn't know, it's a fatal intellectual bankruptcy; if he pretends not to know, it's profound deception.

The reason we call this policy a communist idea is clear. It is the act of forcibly extracting a private company's legitimate after-tax profits by labeling them with an arbitrary and moral stigma of 'excess,' bypassing the legal 'tax system,' and using state power to do so. This is precisely the definition of the confiscation of private property advocated by Karl Marx.

The minister is gravely mistaken. Communism did not initially approach with swords and the smell of blood. It has always descended like an angel, cloaked in the sweetest and warmest words in the world: 'democracy,' 'social solidarity,' 'co-growth,' and 'reducing inequality.' What has been the result of being deceived by that sacred rhetoric of creating a world where everyone lives equally and peacefully?

History has already proven it through countless bloodsheds. Systems that suppressed human beings' most natural instincts of private ownership and profit-seeking through morality have invariably collapsed. There is not a single country left on earth enjoying prosperity through a communist economic model.

Even China, its former suzerain, had to be resuscitated with capitalism to avoid starvation. It is a black comedy to see those who try to tighten the leash on Korea's top companies by invoking the specter of that failed ideology, which the entire world has already discarded, get offended and ask, "Why should we be called communists?"

What is even more laughable are their flimsy excuses. To legally extort money from companies, they even resort to using the marketing slogan "Another Family" of the late Chairman Lee Kun-hee, whom they have so demonized and cursed. The sheer audacity of stealing the words of a deceased businessman to use as a shield, distorting a company's voluntary supply chain management strategy into a logic of state-led forced wealth confiscation, leaves one completely speechless.

There is no more dangerous weapon than mistaking one's shallow knowledge for conviction. This is precisely the level at which the Lee Jae-myung administration and the leftist cartel approach the economy and the market. When non-experts, who do not even know how a goose grows, wield the rusted sword of 'equality,' they will not make the goose grow larger, but will instead slit its belly on the spot, leading to a tragic demise.

The end of this 'tyranny of authority,' wrapped in sweet and pleasing words, is clear: an empty wasteland where even excess profits to be shared have disappeared, and a perfect hell where everyone is equally poor. The patience of capital will never be long in the face of these bizarre amateurs dancing with the sword of old ideologies, mocking the trust of the market.

◆ Writer Park Ju-hyun

Composer, music director, columnist, and essayist. Actively expresses opinions on political, current affairs, and social issues on Facebook, gaining widespread resonance. Published the essay collection 'Crossing the Stormy Sea.'