"The Ghost in the Financial Machine"

In my perspective ethos involved in modern capitalist greed and the religious piety involved in the sense of "the Protestant ethic" are not exactly at odds as Arjun Appadurai states in "The Ghost in the Financial Machine." Appadurai points out that "we cannot see in [modern capitalists] much of the spirit of the ascetical Calvinist businessman....rather the typical "master" of the financial universe is not a dull or nerdy accountant but a gaudy, adventurous, reckless, amoral type, who embodies just the sort of avarice, adventurism, and charismatic self-motivation that Weber saw as the absolute enemy of systematic capitalist profit making." I would argue that you absolutely can.

In amassing wealth Ben Franklin was not only acting on the chance that his predetermined path was one of salvation but also that if salvation was in fact his path then he has a moral obligation to amass wealth to do god's work. In the case of a Bernie Madoff type character wealth is amassed for very different reasons but with the same narcissistic view of moral superiority. Contrast this with the example of the Native American potluck and you can see the same ethos present in the "high-status" players of society, the inability of others to reciprocate their gifts created a temporary sense of superiority based on a veil of honor and credit just as were the capitalist ventures of Ben Franklin and pre-convicted Bernie Madoff. 

I am having trouble explaining exactly what I am thinking but in summary I think that even though the Protestant ethic is one of morality the ethos (or means of convincing one of another's ethic) is the same for both the protestant capitalist and the modern capitalist.