Letters | Hong Kong protests do not signal a crisis of capitalism

K.K. Tse’s “Hong Kong’s protests are just the tip of the iceberg: capitalism is in crisis across the globe” (September 13), is a classic misdiagnosis of the situation in Hong Kong. Capitalism is not in crisis, Hong Kong is. And the issue is not economic but political. It all began with the extradition bill and it continues to remain so.

Two of the most successful cities in world history are Hong Kong and Singapore. For proof, one only need look at the economic success of both of those places compared to the countries surrounding them. That success, including that of China, can be directly traced to the bedrock principles of free-market capitalism as stated by Nobel laureate Milton Friedman, whose views are often, and wilfully, misunderstood. When Professor Friedman said that profit maximisation should be the goal of corporate CEOs, he meant “long-term profits”, which translate into share-value maximisation.