Effective economic demand requires not merely need but corresponding purchasing power. - Henry Hazlitt

The thing so great that “private capital could not have built it” has in fact been built by private capital — the capital that was expropriated in taxes

If we look at it now from the consumer’s point of view, we find that he can buy less with his money. Because he has to pay more for sweaters and other protected goods, he can buy less of everything else. The general purchasing power of his income has therefore been reduced.

For the amount of real capital at any moment (as distinguished from monetary tokens run off on a printing press) is limited. What is put into the hands of B cannot be put into the hands of A.