Two things caught my eye in today’s Denver Post:
One, a front page headline about how area libraries are in financial bind, and how they are ignoring “millions of dollars in tantalizing revenue” by not going after past-due fines.
I have a free market solution: run the libraries like a credit card company. When someone has an overdue book, don’t just charge a small fine. Charge a large fine – $25-$50. When the big fines go unpaid, impose even more fines on the fines. Charge 29% interest. When politicians complain that you are abusing their constituents, bribe them. And then send out the dogs – the collection agencies. They will set up repayment schedules that will assure a nice revenue stream for the libraries. What started out as a pittance ends up as a very large financial obligation.
Let the moneychangers show you how to run a temple.
The other article was an op-ed by the mayors of Boulder, Golden, Superior, and a Boulder County Commissioner, “A better highway, not a new toll road.” Toll roads are the private market’s answer to the problem of paying for roads – those who use them pay for them. It makes sense until one realizes that the benefits of good infrastructure are so widespread that its various elements ought too be a public burden … taxes.
There is a lot of economic activity going on the the foothills of Denver/Golden/Boulder, and the area is served by a hodgepodge of linked arteries in various stages of development. A toll road through the area would naturally force drivers to seek alternative routes. So the people who are proposing the toll road want to lower speed limits on alternative routes to ‘encourage’ drivers to use their toll road. In addition, they figure that many people will move over to Highway 93, an alternative route, increasing road wear and congestion there. They offer no remedy for that problem.
That’s private market logic in a nutshell: Force people to use your product and pay your freight, and refuse to pay for externalities.
Which reminds me of another adventure in free markets – there is a toll road between Denver and Denver International Airport, a very nice road and usually uncrowded because there is a non-toll alternative. In order to speed things up a bit, the managers of the road went to electronic enforcement of the tolls. They take your picture at various points, and send you a bill. It is a great idea.
However, there is a problem with rental cars, common on an airport route. The toll road people send a bill to the rental car agencies, who should simply pass it on to their customers.
Enter the free market – the rental car agencies saw a pivot point for a new revenue stream, and decided to impose additional fees on customers who used toll roads – usually in the area of $8.95 a day in addition to the tolls. Further, for those customers who don’t read the fine print, who don’t agree to the $8.95 fee and then use toll roads, are fined as much as $25 a day in addition to the tolls. So now a $100 car rental deal costs people $250-$300. Care to complain? They sort of have you by the balls, which is where any sociopathic business person strives and plots, day and night, to grab us.
Real competition would mean that one company would see the light, and treat tolls as a mere pass-through cost. But what we learn is that there are not so many rental car agencies as appears – there are but two or three and they go by many names. These two or three companies naturally revert to monopoly behavior, and have all agreed to go by the same rules and not undercut or underprice one another.
It is a microcosm of the the vaunted “free market”. Companies hate competition, and buy each other up to avoid it. Then they masquerade as competitors, fix prices, and agree to play by the same rules.
Which reminds me of another adventure. The American market for cell phones is in a primitive state compared to other countries. The companies that operate here all have the same business plan – they want a revenue stream and therefore demand that you use a phone they supply without any innovations by outsiders. They tie these phones to two-year contracts. It is just like Internet service, where the U.S. is behind the rest of the world because large companies are more interested in divvying up the market to protect revenue streams rather than innovate.
I was thinking about an IPhone, but found that the monthly cost was too high and allotment of monthly minutes too small – $69.99 is the advertised price, but there is also a $30 “data” charge, meaning they want $100 a month to rent their phone. That is their business plan – they want $100 a month from you, and no matter how you slice it, if you want their product, it is $100 per month.
I looked at a new product offered through Verizon called the “Droid” – basically an IPhone with a manual keyboard. Verizon advertised the product for $149.99 with a two year contract, and $59.99 per month for usage. I looked through the website for a data charge, and it was not there. This, I thought, is a viable alternative to the IPhone – we could have one portable phone/internet device for the same price that we currently pay for two cell phones.
We went to the Verizon store yesterday, and here is what we learned: The phone costs $259.99 with a two year contract, and the monthly charge is $69.99, and there is a $30 data charge. The monthly cost is ……. $100. Just like Apple. Same product, same price. “Competition” is fiction as companies hire various ad agencies to differentiate their identical products in the minds of users.
Anyway, when we left Verizon, we had turned off one of our cell phones. We are now $25 per month richer.
Thus endeth today’s lesson in the wonders of the free market.
Piece of Mindful 
…same product, same price…
Sounds like they organized a union.
At least you get some overpriced cell phone service from that “revenue stream”. It would be nice if our State Overlords would deliver something other than overseas wars, bureaucracy for bureaucracies’ sake, and wealth transfer schemes that don’t improve anything.
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I’m always confused by your term ‘free market’.
You apply that term to every instance of an ‘unfree’ market, whereby some grant or edict of government, creates cartels and monopolies.
I really hope you clear up your personal dictionary. It truly makes understanding the problems and issues difficult when you invert the meaning of words.
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What I talk about is the natural progression of your philosophy. I don’t beelive in “free” markets, not that they don’t exist, but that when markets are left to their own devices, they coagulate and form monopolies. You guys (Budge does this too) always step in and say that it is government that is really the culprit, and I regard that as a kind of mysticism, where your markets can do no wrong, and when things go wrong, it is always government to blame.
As I have said many times now, drop the term “free”, use “unregulated”, and you and I will be talking the same language. Freedom has nothing to do with it.
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Please explain your economic theory that would create monopolies in a free market.
Here is mine:
For a free market to have a monopoly, the company must be perfect. That is, it cannot have any weaknesses that a competitor can exploit.
It must have the prefect price – not too high, so not to attract competitors who hunger for high margins – and not too low as to interfere with growth as the consumer’s it services also grows.
To have perfect price (and this is not even going into perfect advertising, perfect employees, and perfect management) – it must have perfect suppliers, who ship goods at the perfect price.
However, perfect suppliers would also need to be monopolies. To be that, they – too – require perfect suppliers, and so on.
Thus, for a free market monopoly to exist, the entire economy must be all monopolies
That is impossible. Thus, there cannot exist a monopoly in a free market.
The only way a monopoly can exist is by writ of government preventing the entry of competition.
This is done by patents, copyrights, trademarks, licenses, regulation.
I have provide economy theory and cause and effect. This is not mysticism.
That is a terrible mis-characterization.
1) Man, being mortal, cannot predict the future. It is not the market nor free men that is at fault for this.
2) The optimum economic decisions are made by free men voluntarily making choices for their own benefit.
3) Use of violence upon free men in voluntary trade will always interfere and distort such trade.
4) Distorting economics away from economic decisions and in favor of political (use of violence to create an outcome) will always be an inferior economic outcome.
Note there is no discussion of ‘blame’ – blame is merely a plea to emotion.
Man can certainly act politically, using violence to enforce an outcome. However, if by such an action that outcome does not happen, then the action is judged a failure.
You shot at A and hit B. We say you missed and failed.
Political action in economics is justified to improve economic outcomes. However, no political decision in economics is superior to an economic decision. Thus, every action of politics in the economy is a failure. There have been no exceptions in all recorded history.
This is not mysticism, either.
Freedom has everything to do with it.
As I pointed out before, the use of ‘unregulated’ simply lumps those that use violence in an economy with those that engage in voluntary trade to be the same condition.
Freedom to trade voluntarily is KEY for optimum economic prosperity for all people.
You wish to prevent free men trading with each other voluntarily.
What do you have against non-violent, free men – why do they scare you that you believe you need to attack them (by government)?
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In addition to “mystical”, I’m adding “Pollyannish”. I won’ address your specific comments – there are simply too many and it goes on too long.
The marketplace you describe is a fiction, and the various scenarios you describe imaginary. Markets are like classic books – talked about but not read. Everyone believes in them, everyone is working an angle to escape them. Unregulated markets are destructive of people, countries, societies.
And there is a strong correlation – the less wealth you have, the more you are subject to market discipline. (Employees without unions know all about free markets.) Corporations are refuges from market discipline, but the dealings behind the scenes are far more instructive – the understanding among various companies is always to refrain from destructive competition – use advertising to distinguish based on image, but never undercut a competitor. Markets are divvied up, lawyers work to protect companies while advertisers lure customers in to bad deals. The whole system is a trap for unsophisticated consumers. And we take no effort to educate them.
Does this system regulate itself? Not hardly. In the end, we get what we had at the end of the nineteenth century – a few companies, a few people, really, controlling most resources, controlling pricing, crushing competition.
That happens naturally. That is why the board game Monopoly was invented – Charles Darrow wanted to demonstrate how the world works in microcosm.
Do I beleive in markets? Yes. The ability to sell goods in the marketplace is a powerful force in human affairs. Markets are like fire – it can be our servant, it can destroy us. Regulated markets, tariffs, anti-trust laws, ease in forming unions, minimum wages, progressive taxation … it all works to bring the beast under control, to make it our servant. Without all of that, we serve the beast, the beast takes over government, and private power triumphs over democratic governance.
And yes, democratic rule is a very difficult way to run a country. It’s hard to keep a republican form of government. It takes an educated citizenry, and extremes of wealth and poverty must be avoided. We are failing at that game.
You asked somewhere how the Waltons, Exxon, Goldman Sachs rule our lives … Sachs controls the U.S. Treasury now, Wal-Mart has undercut the working class and unions, and for sake of Exxon, we invaded Iraq.
That is what happens in a plutonomy.
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Believe me, if all it took was “I’m right and you’re wrong” to convince you of my argument, I’d use it.
But I have a hunch you need more than that.
Thus, you invoke a Law of the Universe.
If thou shalt not accept the perfect wisdom of Black Flag, thou must suffer the long-winded proof.
It is not fiction. You regularly experience it in everyday life.
You have never bought something from someone, a friend, for example? Or a neighbor? Or from the classifed?
Was it not voluntary? Was it non-violent? Did you have the freedom to say “No” or “Yes” to the deal?
You ignore much observational fact, good man.
Explain how the actions of freemen in voluntary trade destroys society?
It is, in fact, the cornerstone of sustainable society.
I am confused.
You rage against free and voluntary trade by complaining that it isn’t free or voluntary (lawyers using government law to ‘protect’ companies).
You point at the innocent to blame them for actions of government action that you then insist are necessary to prevent the very action you insist upon!
All due to government regulation.
As government imposes itself, it creates costs.
These costs are easier to amortize over larger companies, then smaller companies.
It takes the same paper work to the same documents to government to get a patent, for example, whether you earn a billion a year or ten thousand.
Thus, government regulation creates a barrier to entry for smaller companies, as the cost of compliance represents a more significant percentage of revenue.
FDA, for example. No small drug company can afford the necessary compliance to regulation – hundreds of millions of dollars…. thus, with no surprise, there are few, if any, small drug companies in the USA.
Government becomes the tool of cartels – who continue to demand ever more regulation – which protects them from the grass-roots startups that maybe more nimble in a market.
That is a bizarre claim that Monopoly represents the free market.
Monopoly more represents the government-controlled market – where purchases are forced upon the actors by an outside action – in the case of Monopoly the rules – and in the case of the economic model that dominates the USA – it is the government.
By removing the voluntary nature of trade, Monopoly as a game best describes government political decisions in the place of free market system.
For example, in the free market, I would not buy a room on Park Place, for it would bankrupt me. I would chose, instead Vermont Ave. The game however interferes with my free choice and takes my money regardless. I am not free to chose.
As long as the people believe that “Thous shalt not steal, except by majority vote” – Cartels will seize government if only to protect themselves from the thieving people.
Once there, they find government an excellent tool to use to steal.
Again you point to the distortions of government.
Exxon has no army. The government has an army.
Sachs cannot print money. The government can print money.
Take away the government from the equation, Exxon cannot invade Iraq, nor can Sachs print money.
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You make a fair point, but you also make a plethora of points, and I do have other things to do. Thus do I spendeth my morning …
For a free market to have a monopoly, the company must be perfect. That is, it cannot have any weaknesses that a competitor can exploit. … It must have the perfect price – not too high, so not to attract competitors who hunger for high margins – and not too low as to interfere with growth as the consumer’s it services also grows. …To have perfect price (and this is not even going into perfect advertising, perfect employees, and perfect management) – it must have perfect suppliers, who ship goods at the perfect price. …However, perfect suppliers would also need to be monopolies. To be that, they – too – require perfect suppliers, and so on. … Thus, for a free market monopoly to exist, the entire economy must be all monopolies.
You are assuming that by “monopoly” I mean one company only controlling 100%, one market. That is my fault. I use the term loosely – I am also talking about oligopoly and monopsony.
Those who study monopoly behavior note that it begins to appear when a company controls as little as 20% of a market.
Thus it happens that when one firm takes over a large share of one market, it naturally sees that its enemy is not its competitors, with whom it shares a common interest, but rather its customers whom, given freedom to move back and forth between competitors, seek out the lowest price. Those companies that own significant market share then set about agreeing to divvy up market share, buy out minor competitors, and free the market from competition.
Thus we have now but a few competitors in meat packing, communication, cell phone service, Internet service providers, cable TV, and they are not after each other. They are after us.
Thus my example of IPhone versus Droid – two companies who intuitively know that competition will, in the end, screw the pooch. Hence, same product, same price, differing advertising.
That is impossible. Thus, there cannot exist a monopoly in a free market.
This is the problem I have with you – you don’t seem able to look around you. That’s why I sued the word “mystical”.
The only way a monopoly can exist is by writ of government preventing the entry of competition….This is done by patents, copyrights, trademarks, licenses, regulation.
You are referring to legal monopolies, set in force by our constitution to foster ingenuity and development. But you are quite wrong in your use of the word “only”.
I have provided economy theory and cause and effect. This is not mysticism.
You have provided an ethereal rendition of how the world might work if people were not smart and if people who had power did not use power to their own advantage.
1) Man, being mortal, cannot predict the future. It is not the market nor free men that is at fault for this….2) The optimum economic decisions are made by free men voluntarily making choices for their own benefit….3) Use of violence upon free men in voluntary trade will always interfere and distort such trade….4) Distorting economics away from economic decisions and in favor of political (use of violence to create an outcome) will always be an inferior economic outcome….(Note there is no discussion of ‘blame’ – blame is merely a plea to emotion) …Man can certainly act politically, using violence to enforce an outcome. However, if by such an action that outcome does not happen, then the action is judged a failure.
You underestimate the power of humans to understand the limitations of your “free” market and to substitute instead the illusion of choice for real choice. Frankly, you do not understand how clever business people are – they know that if competition goes on unchecked, they eat their young.
We are surrounded by inferior economic outcomes, from overpriced products to sellers who have such power as to be able to dictate prices to suppliers and labor. This is not any fault of government, and took no “violence”, but only cooperation among the various and very smart people who understood enough
to agree among them to bring things under control.
Political action in economics is justified to improve economic outcomes. However, no political decision in economics is superior to an economic decision. Thus, every action of politics in the economy is a failure. There have been no exceptions in all recorded history.
This is not just false, but stupendously false to the degree of delusion. I’ll give but one example of a political decision that yielded better results than an “economic” one (though how you distinguish the two is problematic – I think you really meant to say “government” and “free market”):
The government fought a civil war to end slavery.
Freedom has everything to do with it.
I use the term “Orwellian” because it is nice shorthand. It takes a few more words to say that words can mask ideas as well as shine light on them. “Freedom” is such a diffuse term as to be useless. Freedom to do what? Own slaves? Destroy the commons? I know the feeling of freedom as I am a free man, not bound to an employer, but subject to the rules of the society that I live in. Government enforces my obligation to behave in a socially appropriate manner, thus enhancing all of our “freedoms”.
As I said, use instead the term ”unregulated”, which leads to concentration of power in the marketplace and abuse, as seen in California with the deregulating of electric power and on Wall Street with the deregulation of financial instruments. We are not “free” because of those events.
As I pointed out before, the use of ‘unregulated’ simply lumps those that use violence in an economy with those that engage in voluntary trade to be the same condition. … Freedom to trade voluntarily is KEY for optimum economic prosperity for all people. … You wish to prevent free men trading with each other voluntarily.
Of course we agree on the merits of voluntary trade. But is trade voluntary if I must choose between a Chinese-made product of one sort and a Chinese-made product of another sort? What if I don’t want to do business with China? Where’s my choice? China has such an abundance of cheap labor and has so few laws regarding labor health and safety, and places so few restrictions on pollution of the environment that it is virtually impossible to compete with them.
This is all the result of voluntary choice – Wal-Mart shoppers. Bad outcomes, downward pressure on wages and benefits, unemployed and uninsured people … all the result of voluntary trade.
Fix it.
What do you have against non-violent, free men – why do they scare you that you believe you need to attack them (by government)?
It’s called “greater good”, or in 1790, “general welfare”. Some don’t believe in it, like Rand.
[The marketplace I describe is a fiction, and the various scenarios I describe imaginary.] It is not fiction. You regularly experience it in everyday life….You have never bought something from someone, a friend, for example? Or a neighbor? Or from the classified? Was it not voluntary? Was it non-violent? Did you have the freedom to say “No” or “Yes” to the deal? You ignore much observational fact, good man.
You are confused here, in that you ascribe the smaller parts to the whole – I’m sure there is a knows a Latin name for this fallacy. The rules at work when I buy something on Craigslist are quite different when I buy something from Safeway or Verizon.
Explain how the actions of freemen in voluntary trade destroys society? It is, in fact, the cornerstone of sustainable society.
You are talking about division of labor and the cornucopia that follows … and convoluting it with the natural tendency of those who gain power in the market to limit choices, conspire to fix prices, and buy up competitors. I think you are supremely confused.
I am confused.
Thought so.
You rage against free and voluntary trade by complaining that it isn’t free or voluntary (lawyers using government law to ‘protect’ companies). …You point at the innocent to blame them for actions of government action that you then insist are necessary to prevent the very action you insist upon!
I am talking about power, and how it works against the free and voluntary aspects of your perfect world. Advertising is a force that undermines the individual, and lawyers work to protect companies as advertising does its work. The result is millions of consumers “freely and voluntarily” taking out unwise mortgages, entering into unworthy contracts, buying things they do not need to protect an “economy” that depends on mindless consumption to “grow”.
You could say that people are under-educated. You’d be right. But deeper than that is the psychological manipulation that goes on incessantly day in and out. It’s dehumanizing.
Beyond that is what Smith talked about – that while division of labor produces bounty, people who are relegated to mindless tasks become stupid. It has indeed happened, as he saw in his own day.
All due to government regulation. …As government imposes itself, it creates costs. …These costs are easier to amortize over larger companies, then smaller companies. …It takes the same paper work to the same documents to government to get a patent, for example, whether you earn a billion a year or ten thousand. …Thus, government regulation creates a barrier to entry for smaller companies, as the cost of compliance represents a more significant percentage of revenue. …FDA, for example. No small drug company can afford the necessary compliance to regulation – hundreds of millions of dollars…. thus, with no surprise, there are few, if any, small drug companies in the USA. …Government becomes the tool of cartels – who continue to demand ever more regulation – which protects them from the grass-roots startups that maybe more nimble in a market.
We pretty much agree here. Example – I was looking for an American-made toy for our grandson, and found one made by a small company in Montana, offered at a fair price. In going through the checkout process I found an appeal from the company to contact my representative to stop government from enforcing rules that would force them to endure inspections each year of each product that would cost $1,000 to $5,000 each, putting them out of business.
This could be the result of large companies conspiring to put small companies out of business, but is more likely indifference on the part of government to small companies, as they have no real clout.
If we can agree that this is a bad outcome, then we can do something about it. But if you are an extremist, and cannot distinguish between baby and bathwater, or think that we cannot affect one without destroying the other, then you are to be set aside with other extremists in the world of mysticism.
Monopoly more represents the government-controlled market – where purchases are forced upon the actors by an outside action – in the case of Monopoly the rules – and in the case of the economic model that dominates the USA – it is the government. …By removing the voluntary nature of trade, Monopoly as a game best describes government political decisions in the place of free market system. …For example, in the free market, I would not buy a room on Park Place, for it would bankrupt me. I would chose, instead Vermont Ave. The game however interferes with my free choice and takes my money regardless. I am not free to chose.
Have you played the game? What happens when the same person owns Vermont, Oriental and Connecticut? You’re missing it entirely, though between you and me, it is the result of government regulation that Parker Brothers has a monopoly on the game Monopoly.
As long as the people believe that “Thou shalt not steal, except by majority vote” – Cartels will seize government if only to protect themselves from the thieving people. …Once there, they find government an excellent tool to use to steal.
You live in a world of extremes. Government can get out of control, but the opposite extreme that markets self-regulate is also a road to serfdom.
Exxon has no army. The government has an army…. Sachs cannot print money. The government can print money. … Take away the government from the equation, Exxon cannot invade Iraq, nor can Sachs print money.
This reminds me of the scene in the Godfather I where Michael Corleone and Kay are talking, and Kay says “But Michael, senators and congressmen don’t have people killed.” Michael says “Kay –now who’s being naïve?
Don’t confuse fascism with the normal functions of democratic governance, which is always hard to maintain. We are witnessing the takeover of government by corporate America. It was always a threat on our doorstep, and seems to have pervaded our civilization since the rise of agriculture. We had a reasonable semblance of control, though the need for constant war was apparent to all but the naïve. Then came Ronald Reagan, who opened the door wide.
“A republic, if you can keep it.”
We probably lost it.
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This is one of the problems I see here.
One creates a definition of monopoly, its cause and its effects and its negative impacts upon the economy – and it is accepted.
Then, someone analyzing how a particular market may operate places an emotional, subjective judgment on it – that is a “I don’t like how these guys are operating”.
Trying to find an objective way to present the complaint (since subjective arguments are by definition irrational), they redefine monopoly to include the particular, unfashionable, operation that indulges their complaint – and then claim that it must also have the same effects and negative impacts that the original, true definition provided.
In other words, one takes an agreed concept, undermines the definition, and then demands that this undermining exhibits the same features of the original definition.
This is <Revolution within the form is “a subversive tactic that seeks surreptitiously to replace the form of old things or words with new and/or progressive meanings in order to bring about a contrary state of things that normally would not be accepted by society. Basically, the names of the old things are preserved, but their meanings have been altered”
So, let’s work out your complaint – and you will see that you cannot show that such operation is bad for the consumer.
How can two competitor’s divvy up the market?
They do not own it – the consumer owns it.
The consumer holds the money and the decision of purchase. All the conditions of the market are unchanged by any collusion of the suppliers.
The moment the profit of the market becomes attractive it will attract new suppliers.
It does not matter who the incumbents are or their size. The new competitors, attracted by high profit, will exploit the weaknesses of the incumbents.
If a newbie competitor enters the market, it is because the current suppliers have a deficiency in some component of their offering that the new competitor is exploiting.
The acquisition of this newbie competitor purchases that exploit. In other words, the larger actor fixes his problem by buying the solution.
The end result is a better supplier of goods and services to the consumer. It also enriches the newbie competitor – they have obtained the value of their exploit and converted it into money in their own hands.
Additionally, they have done so at a mutual discount with the larger actor. The smaller player no longer needs to find capital, nor customers, nor costs – he has sold his entire profit fully upfront and cashed out.
The larger actor gets the solution at a huge discount. The cost of the loss of market share would be far higher then the cash payment to buy the exploit (because if it wasn’t they wouldn’t have bought out the smaller actor). They benefit by saving lost market, plus fixing their problem.
So far, there are no losers here.
The consumer gets a better supplier, one who has fixed a problem that had to be costing the supplier – and thus, the consumer – a lot of money. A smaller actor exploited that problem – thereby demonstrating a solution. They got paid out for their insight. Supplier is better, the consumer gets a better product, and the insightful actors got rewarded.
The only time there will be losers is if, by edict of government, one of the actors is prevented from operating.
I find most of your complaints are actually based on ‘envy’.
You do not like that other people have more than you (or other people). Your original complaints always start from this point – your comments of ‘concentration of wealth’.
Because you do not discern at all the source of that wealth, you tend to lump those that stole it with those that earned it, and labeled them equally as sinners.
So, let’s review. Communication a fully regulated industry. Introduction of new competition has a very high barrier to entry due to action of government edicts.
However, even with that deficiency…..
1997. The average rate for flat-rate calling in the 89 cities in the
sample that offered flat-rate service with touch-tone was $19.49. Basic Connection Charge $41.06
2004.The average rate paid by residential customers for unlimited touch-tone calling fell to $24.31 in 2004, a decrease of 0.9% from $24.52 in 2003. Connection charges for residential customers rose from $42.54 to $42.59 during the same period, an increase of 0.1%.
**http://www.fcc.gov/wcb/iatd/lec.html
If we take inflation, what cost $100 in 1994 would cost $126.86 in 2004 – we actually see that the price of communication fell 20% in real terms.
….and you think this is a bad thing? Imagine if there was real competition free from government edicts preventing new actors!
Meat: (again, high barriers to entry due to government edicts, limiting competition)
***http://data.bls.gov/PDQ/outside.jsp?survey=ap
Lean ground beef
1984 $1.290
2009 $2.357
Again, taking in inflation, cost $1.290 in 1984 would cost $2.63995
So, again, we see that the price of meat is lower in real terms ($2.357 vs $2.64)
****Inflation Calculator
http://www.westegg.com/inflation/infl.cgi
Internet Service Cost:
1990 – ~$1.86 per kilobit
2009 – ~$0.005 per kilobit
… and so on.
I cannot see how you can claim the consumer has been a loser?
Even with the massive barriers to entry, the exploitation by nimble competitors has created a price cost decrease across the board for the consumer.
As we see above, the higher the barrier to entry, the less cost decrease. The lower barrier to entry, the faster the drop in unit prices.
Thus, more regulation and edicts of government is the #1 impediment to reduction of costs.
Sir, my definition of monopoly is complete.
My understanding of the necessity of the conditions with in the free market is irrefutable.
You certainly can ignore reasoning and the logic.
But ignoring my reasoning so without any reasoning or logic of your own is the mysticism.
There are many justifications by men to use violence upon non-violent men to increase their wealth.
All of them, including ‘legal’ monopolies fail in principle, morals, and cause suffering of free men.
I see no argument here and only rhetoric, sir.
Only by the use of violent power can a monopoly exist. Use of violence in civilization and in a free market is abhorred.
Thus, the only way a monopoly can exist is by the use of legal violence.
I do not understand what illusion you speak.
Either men are allowed to trade voluntarily or they are not. I cannot see an illusion in a such a physical reality.
Such power can only be leveled by the use of violence (legal or otherwise).
I can only assume you believe inferior economic outcome means “free” of cost. Thus, I find your economic theory has many holes in it.
1) That is historically inaccurate. The war was actually fought over succession. Slavery was at best secondary.
2) This is not an economic outcome. It is a political action for a political outcome. This is an example of geopolitical reconstitution of a nation. It is not an example of economics.
This is akin to using chemistry as a proof for the law of gravity (physics). You are not arguing any economics here.
Freedom to do whatever without imposing upon another man.
That imposes, so no – this is not freedom.
Freedom is easy to understand.
If your action – if used upon yourself by another, would destroy your freedom – it is not an act of freedom.
There is no ‘commons’. If it is valued, it is owned by someone.
So if the rules of society are immoral, are you still bound and subject to them?
If government enforces immoral behavior upon non-violent people, how does this improve their freedom?
How do you improve freedom (or anything) by destroying it?
We already went here.
It is annoying when documentation is provided that demonstrates the invalidity of your claim, but you ignore such documentation and precede with abandon.
California power was and still is very regulated.
Wall Street is full of regulation. We are not free because of those regulations.
I do not understand your argument. You argue that regulation is necessary. You point to events of which consequences are due to such regulation.
You then claim these consequences were the result of a lack of regulation.
And you do not see any contradiction in your argument, sir?
Then do not buy it. Or make your own.
Do without or make your own.
So, your complaint is that they can provide you something you are cannot do for yourself, at a price far less than anyone else could do it for you.
I am at a loss for words to express the utter bizarreness of your position.
One must be wholly economically confused to complain about commodities getting cheaper to buy.
Your argument – to be contrary to mine – must champion that things becoming more expensive over time is a sign of economic prosperity.
Guess what.
Neither do I.
It does not exist.
The Greater Good Theory wholly depends on the transferring of suffering from one person to another who does not deserve it.
You believe that this man over here ‘deserves’ something he did not earn, and you justify stealing it from another man by claiming the other man ‘didn’t need it’, even though he earned it.
Such philosophy – if it becomes dominant – will shatter the core of society, as justified theft cannot be sustained in any society.
It is this justifying of theft by government that is the cause of the shattering of society we are witnessing today.
Sir, you claimed without any uncertain terms or qualifications that a free market did not exist.
Such a claim is cornerstone to most of your argument.
Now, you are faced with the fact you sit in contradiction.
Your next retort is to claim that free market systems are not scalable.
However, there is nothing inherent in the free market that demonstrates your claim.
The Free market is predicated on millions of unique individuals making an aggregate of billions of economic decisions all in their own personal benefit – as they see fit.
The Free market is wholly and infinitely scalable as it does not depend on a master designer.
It is a system of no design – and is the consequence of millions of self-interested individuals in voluntary trade.
The defining difference, sir, is you are wholly without any imposition of government to voluntary enter, offer, negotiate, accept or reject the conditions of your trade on Craigslist.
You do not have this ability against Safeway or Verizon.
The government by its edicts raises your barrier to entry.
You cannot enter without a license or grant, you cannot sell without a license or grant, you cannot negotiate without a license or grant, nor can you accept without a license or grant.
They only thing you can do without a license or grant (for now) is reject trade all together.
They are quite, quite different – indeed.
As this is now too long, a pause.
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So if I understand, your argument now depends on the brainless human being.
You use the existence and operation of regulation as an argument for more regulation. Do you know what a postive-feedback-loop is?
The banking system is a government granted cartel, licensed and regulated by government. You complain that their actions – by grant of government – are the cause of unsatisfactory economic consequences.
Your answer is, a bigger, tighter cartel and more government.
Positive-feedback-loop.
Indoctrination by government school creates educated idiots.
The “brainless” human theory once again. Are you sure you want to introduce this?
The specialization of labor is the single greatest factor in the increase in prosperity of the Western world. As it spreads throughout the world, global prosperity increases.
Excellent video from TED.
As pointed out in the previous response, it is not a bad outcome. If you believe it is, it is usually because you haven’t looked at it economically.
As before, if your measure is envy, then you will always get the answer wrong.
The game, sir, is predicated on the rules that I must buy what I land on. I have no choice. This is not an example of the Free Market, where in voluntary trade, either party can withdraw from the trade.
Monopoly does not represent Free Market theory whatsoever. It is a kid’s game – nothing more.
You have certainly provided plenty of rhetoric – but little economic theory that demonstrates this.
Witnessing? You jest.
You are looking ahead when the revolution has already past you and is over.
The takeover occurred in 1865. You are merely trapped in witnessing the consequences.
The moment the People justified legal theft, the seeds of tyranny was planted.
It was merely time that allowed it to grow.
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Man are we worlds apart!
I have to leave at 8:30 and will be traveling all day. I’ll get back to this tomorrow morning. I’m going to try to eliminate those portions of the argument where we can only repeat our assertions of the other’s blindness wihtout illumination, and try to mercifully shorten it.
I only want to make one point here – I do not believe that people are stupid. Far from it. I know that the “Bell Curve” has validity, but in my mind it is much flatter than normally pictured. People are not stupid, but they are dumbed down by TV, public education, and meaningless jobs.
Take a kid off the street in Trenton, raise him on an estate, as say, Henry Paulson or JFK were raised, and he will operate on the same level as them.
But I also believe in the power of propaganda, which can be easily defeated with mere sunlight. But it isn’t. Propaganda is psychological manipulation. Advertising is very sophisticated propaganda. We have a son in the advertising business – he works very high up in the creative area – he was the one who came up with the idea of “The King” for Burger King. When they put together an ad campaign, they start with a message, a very base message, such as “eat more food”, “fat is good”, “sugar is good”, but such a message is an affront to thinking people. They then come up with campaigns that mask that message by clever use of imagery. They come up with hundreds of ideas, but the ones that succeed are “on message”, that is, are subversive to the individual’s thought processes.
Advertising and propaganda work on smart people. Propaganda is especially effective on highly educated people, who literally self-indoctrinate.
So no, people are not stupid. Far from it. Smith did not think people were stupid, but noted that mindless labor makes them so.
Also, I edited my original post to eliminate any references to Budge. I see you picked up the original with his name in it. Should not be there.
Anyway, Manyana.
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I’m a “people are lazy” theorist.
Thus, many people abdicate thinking for themselves and let others,the so called ‘experts’, do it for them.
TV is an easy way for most people to abdicate.
Public school as well – why do the work in teaching your own kids, let ‘experts’ do it.
And as far as jobs, many seek the least work/highest pay ratio. “Workin’ for the weekend” is their mantra.
See, we aren’t so far apart in somethings!
I do not think so.
I know plenty of silver-spoons people that are wholly useless. I know plenty of born-in-the-dirt people that are magnificent. I think it is the person that makes the differences for themselves.
It is mental laziness. Smart people are lazy too.
It is a matter of attention.
Smart people concentrate on things that they are smart at, and tend to fall into the same traps as ‘normal’ people in areas that they have less interest in.
The disease of “Expertitis” – the more educated, the more they demand people submit to their own expertise. “I’m a DOCTOR! I’ve been educated for 20 YEARS! It cost me $150,000!! I KNOW, and YOU DO NOT!”
Because they demand this of others, they must submit to others who call themselves “experts” too.
….even if what these experts say makes no sense whatsoever.
—–
Drive safe!
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You guys write faster than I read.
Take a kid off the street in Trenton, raise him on an estate, as say, Henry Paulson or JFK were raised, and he will operate on the same level as them.
Research has not been kind to this point of view. Twin and adoption studies tend to show a large genetic basis for the intelligence and personality traits that put one in a JFK/Paulson class.
On the economic side of things, I’m cheering for Black Flag. He makes a good point about business delivering efficiency and lower costs over time. I don’t see much example of government doing any of this. Our federal budget was, what, $500 billion in Carter’s day? ($1.5 trillion inflation adjusted) Now it is going to top $4 trillion. Are we getting that much more service today from the behemoth?
Mark, you seemingly agree that government action has raised costs and barriers to entry, yet you advocate even more government regulation. What’s up with that? Are we to believe there is a more benign regulatory regime somewhere just waiting to get out?
Black Flag, you are a heroic Libertarian. However, you still have to deal with degradation of the commons. Free men can freely agree to submit to a collective effort that leaves them better in the long run, e.g. form a volunteer fire department, or agree to abide by expert opinion in determining how much particulate matter can be spewed into the common resource called the atmosphere. The community needs a way to shun or ostracize those that do not go along. It is not a threat of violence, but a form of the ultimatum game: if you get too far out of line, you cease to be part of the community. I see this with immigration. If someone wants to move here and work, they should agree to not become an economic drain on the larger community. If they fail to live up to this contract, the community needs a way to remove this person. Economic matters require enforcement mechanisms as a practical matter. Some buyers on Craigslist may habitually misrepresent merchandise or hide flaws that escape a reasonable buyer. Free men can freely agree to have enforcement regimes for those who seek undue advantage in such ways.
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Research has not been kind to this point of view. Twin and adoption studies tend to show a large genetic basis for the intelligence and personality traits that put one in a JFK/Paulson class.
I doubt those studies do much more than show that some traits are inherited. But to broaden that to say that the upper classes are probably brighter than the lower classes is a real stretch.
The point is that human development is as much a product of environment as genes. Our brain is a switching device – certain are turned on at various times in an unfettered environment, and especially one in which parents are nurturing.
But put a kid in abject poverty or stress due to drinking and arguing and such, and the switches do not turn on. They learn a different way of living, different survival skills, and don’t ‘fit’ and are judged inferior.
Black kids learn very early their status – it’s been handed down since slavery, and is very very hard to overcome. But their failure to develop is not due to lack of ability. It’s environmental.
Anyway, you’d make a fine phrenologist.
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See now what happens here – this thread has gone hopelessly long, and responding to your posts a daunting and time-consuming challenge. So I am going to use some shorthand here. I used the word “mystical” to describe your philosophy, but I think you are of this world and merely idealize its possibilities. A better word for you is “Utopian”.
So in those areas where I believe that you are merely repeating a Randian kind of Utopian refrain about how the world would work had not “government” interfered in “free and voluntary exchange”, I’m simply going to answer with “impractical and non-descriptive of real human behavior,” or INRHB, and move on. It might toast you a bit, but honestly, you just put up too much to deal with.
One creates a definition of monopoly, its cause and its effects and its negative impacts upon the economy – and it is accepted. Then, someone analyzing how a particular market may operate places an emotional, subjective judgment on it – that is a “I don’t like how these guys are operating”. Trying to find an objective way to present the complaint (since subjective arguments are by definition irrational), they redefine monopoly to include the particular, unfashionable, operation that indulges their complaint – and then claim that it must also have the same effects and negative impacts that the original, true definition provided. In other words, one takes an agreed concept, undermines the definition, and then demands that this undermining exhibits the same features of the original definition. This is <Revolution within the form is “a subversive tactic that seeks surreptitiously to replace the form of old things or words with new and/or progressive meanings in order to bring about a contrary state of things that normally would not be accepted by society. Basically, the names of the old things are preserved, but their meanings have been altered”
This is an ethereal point – pure monopoly is a rarity, but monopolistic behavior is as common as flies. That we have defined its many manifestations with words other than “monopoly” is irrelevant.
“How can two competitor’s divvy up the market? They do not own it – the consumer owns it. The consumer holds the money and the decision of purchase. All the conditions of the market are unchanged by any collusion of the suppliers. The moment the profit of the market becomes attractive it will attract new suppliers. It does not matter who the incumbents are or their size. The new competitors, attracted by high profit, will exploit the weaknesses of the incumbents. If a newbie competitor enters the market, it is because the current suppliers have a deficiency in some component of their offering that the new competitor is exploiting.The acquisition of this newbie competitor purchases that exploit. In other words, the larger actor fixes his problem by buying the solution. The end result is a better supplier of goods and services to the consumer. It also enriches the newbie competitor – they have obtained the value of their exploit and converted it into money in their own hands.
INRHB
Additionally, they have done so at a mutual discount with the larger actor. The smaller player no longer needs to find capital, nor customers, nor costs – he has sold his entire profit fully upfront and cashed out. The larger actor gets the solution at a huge discount. The cost of the loss of market share would be far higher than the cash payment to buy the exploit (because if it wasn’t they wouldn’t have bought out the smaller actor). They benefit by saving lost market, plus fixing their problem. So far, there are no losers here. The consumer gets a better supplier, one who has fixed a problem that had to be costing the supplier – and thus, the consumer – a lot of money. A smaller actor exploited that problem – thereby demonstrating a solution. They got paid out for their insight. Supplier is better, the consumer gets a better product, and the insightful actors got rewarded.
INRHB
The only time there will be losers is if, by edict of government, one of the actors is prevented from operating. I find most of your complaints are actually based on ‘envy’. You do not like that other people have more than you (or other people). Your original complaints always start from this point – your comments of ‘concentration of wealth’.
Now here you are getting personally offensive. I am not an envious person, and I make a fine living. So step back a second.
I am not envious of wealth, as I am happy in my shoes with what I have and need no more. But there are people whose sole obsession in life is to acquire and accumulate. They are useful, but it must be understood that their particular talent, when coupled is a sociopathic makeup (2-6% of the male population), results in empires where the laws of your market are tossed aside and fiefdoms are built. Within fiefdoms, none of your rules apply.
When the fief is a Mafia Don, we call it “organized crime”, or racketeering. When it is the head of a corporation, we honor him. But the objective is the same for both – exemption from your market rules.
Your rules only apply down here on my level. If I were a smart businessman, I would have years ago formed a company, hired other accountants to perform for me in exchange for a modicum of security, and lived off of their wealth production. That insecurity is the primary feeder – tribes were a safe haven from having to compete.
Just understand that everyone honors a competitive environment, but really having to deal with it are those who are not good at acquiring and accumulating.
So, let’s review. Communication a fully regulated industry. Introduction of new competition has a very high barrier to entry due to action of government edicts. However, even with that deficiency…..1997. The average rate for flat-rate calling in the 89 cities in the sample that offered flat-rate service with touch-tone was $19.49. Basic Connection Charge $41.06 …2004.The average rate paid by residential customers for unlimited touch-tone calling fell to $24.31 in 2004, a decrease of 0.9% from $24.52 in 2003. Connection charges for residential customers rose from $42.54 to $42.59 during the same period, an increase of 0.1%.
**http://www.fcc.gov/wcb/iatd/lec.html …If we take inflation, what cost $100 in 1994 would cost $126.86 in 2004 – we actually see that the price of communication fell 20% in real terms.….and you think this is a bad thing? Imagine if there was real competition free from government edicts preventing new actors!
There’s a dynamic there that you are missing – advancing technology, much of which is the result of government investment in infrastructure and invention and protection of monopoly rights to allow for economies of scale. You’re taking all of the invention and development credit for the market, and blaming government for any negative fallout. INRHB!
Meat: (again, high barriers to entry due to government edicts, limiting competition)
***http://data.bls.gov/PDQ/outside.jsp?survey=ap Lean ground beef 1984 $1.290 2009 $2.357 Again, taking in inflation, cost $1.290 in 1984 would cost $2.63995 So, again, we see that the price of meat is lower in real terms ($2.357 vs $2.64) ****Inflation Calculator …
Read, sometime, The Jungle. Understand, if you would, how meat packing firms are the among worst offenders in hiring illegals to avoid paying living wages and benefits and a decent work environment. I was taught in school that agriculture was the closest thing that we ever had to a truly free market, and it automatically collapses on itself unless monopolies step in and it is granted subsidies. Meatpacking is a monopoly that punishes its labor force, engages in cruel behavior to cattle and pigs and chickens to keep costs down, and creates immense pollution of the (non-existent) commons (externalized costs) to survive. Yes, there is an element of free exchange going on there, but it’s mostly of negative impact. If all you see is a lower price, you’re not much of an economist.
Internet Service Cost: 1990 – ~$1.86 per kilobit 2009 – ~$0.005 per kilobit … and so on. I cannot see how you can claim the consumer has been a loser?
Again, understand, that without government, there is no infrastructure, and in this case, no Internet.
Even with the massive barriers to entry, the exploitation by nimble competitors has created a .price cost decrease across the board for the consumer. As we see above, the higher the barrier to entry, the less cost decrease. The lower barrier to entry, the faster the drop in unit prices. Thus, more regulation and edicts of government is the #1 impediment to reduction of costs. That is impossible. Thus, there cannot exist a monopoly in a free market.
The telephone market had naturally coagulated into AT&T. Government had to force it, by edict, to serve rural areas. Because it was a monopoly, it had to be regulated, and because it was a monopoly, innovation had stifled and the whole of the telephone field was as dreary as a Soviet collective. Government stepped in, broke up the monopoly, and innovation took off again. New we see that the baby bells are recombining,and innovation is once again stifled. Cell phones and GPS systmes are wonderufl advancements brought about by government research, and are slowly being un-innovated my monopoly capitalism.
The same in the Internet market – true innovation is left to small firms who are bought up by bigger ones (cheaper to buy than invent), speculative innovation is mostly done by government, and companies are bribing legislators and their spawn (Michael Powell) to seal them off from competition.
When government refuses to interfere in the natural process of formation of monopolies, we suffer. Comcast taking over NBC is not a good thing.
My understanding of the necessity of the conditions with in the free market is irrefutable.
INRHB
You certainly can ignore reasoning and the logic. But ignoring my reasoning so without any reasoning or logic of your own is the mysticism. You are referring to legal monopolies, set in force by our constitution to foster ingenuity and development. There are many justifications by men to use violence upon non-violent men to increase their wealth. All of them, including ‘legal’ monopolies fail in principle, morals, and cause suffering of free men.
This is beyond INRHB – you do not have a working knowledge of what it is to be free.
You have provided an ethereal rendition of how the world might work if people were not smart and if people who had power did not use power to their own advantage.
I see no argument here and only rhetoric, sir.
INRHB
Only by the use of violent power can a monopoly exist. Use of violence in civilization and in a free market is abhorred. Thus, the only way a monopoly can exist is by the use of legal violence.
The Mafia is a manifestation of free markets at work, as were the Pinkertons, the union busters, and slavery itself.
Either men are allowed to trade voluntarily or they are not. I cannot see an illusion in a such a physical reality.
INRHB
The government fought a civil war to end slavery.
1) That is historically inaccurate. The war was actually fought over succession. Slavery was at best secondary.
2) This is not an economic outcome. It is a political action for a political outcome. This is an example of geopolitical reconstitution of a nation. It is not an example of economics.
This is akin to using chemistry as a proof for the law of gravity (physics). You are not arguing any economics here.
“Secession” is an aged fallback for the slavery crowd – the only reason for secession was to keep men free to own slaves. The capturing of free men, putting them on boats where as many as half died, and then selling them to plantation owners whose economy could only survive by means of such forced labor – that is all the product of your free market. It took popular will, as expressed through concerted government violence, to end it. It was a just war.
Freedom is easy to understand. If your action – if used upon yourself by another, would destroy your freedom – it is not an act of freedom.
INRHB
There is no ‘commons’. If it is valued, it is owned by someone.
Randian, and, I’m sorry, utter nonsense. Public ownership creates lasting value. We would not have wilderness if left to your devices – all of our natural habitat would be owned by tribal chiefs and gated for use by those who could pay – there would be no public beaches, no undeveloped lakefront or streamfronts. INRHB!
So if the rules of society are immoral, are you still bound and subject to them?
I am bound to join with others to change those rules if my conscience so dictates. Hence I am what is
known in older parlance as a “radical”. This is why I fight for progressive and estate taxation, and government-sponsored health care.
If government enforces immoral behavior upon non-violent people, how does this improve their freedom? How do you improve freedom (or anything) by destroying it?
Circular. You start with your conclusion, that government enforces immoral behavior on non-violent people, and then ask me to justify based on your premise.
It is annoying when documentation is provided that demonstrates the invalidity of your claim, but you ignore such documentation and precede with abandon. California power was and still is very regulated. Wall Street is full of regulation. We are not free because of those regulations.
This is the impenetrable wall of the Randian – markets cannot fail, therefore when markets fail there must be some reason not having to do with markets. Yes, CA markets were not fully deregulated, but sit down and examine the behaviors that followed. They are indefensible and were not caused by the failure to fully deregulate, but by the mere partial deregulation of that market. That was the match that started the fire.
I do not understand your argument. You argue that regulation is necessary. You point to events of which consequences are due to such regulation. You then claim these consequences were the result of a lack of regulation. And you do not see any contradiction in your argument, sir?
I do not contradict, and odd as it may sound, a Randian lives in massive contradiction which the Randian never seems to be able to come to grips with. INRHB!
China has such an abundance of cheap labor and has so few laws regarding labor health and safety, and places so few restrictions on pollution of the environment that it is virtually impossible to compete with them.
So, your complaint is that they can provide you something you are cannot do for yourself, at a price far less than anyone else could do it for you. I am at a loss for words to express the utter bizarreness of your position.
We live in a world of abundance brought about by agriculture. It is agriculture that freed us from hunting and gathering. Each of us was left with time to develop in other ways, and that, combined with the use of petroleum for energy, has put us in a position where our production far outstrips our need, and where we have a perpetual abundance of labor.
Because of the labor surplus, there is constant downward pressure on the price of labor and the general standard of living. Laborers have formed labor unions to maximize their one greatest power – organization. It is very effective in protecting laborers from competition that eventually makes them all paupers in the surplus labor market.
But the owning class has many weapons at its disposal – one, “right to work”, which in effect makes it impossible to form a union, was the stepchild of slavery in the south. Two, education –most workers are taught that organization of the workforce is a sign of weakness, and they thus cut off their own balls. Three, there are places where labor has no power whatsoever, cannot dictate wages or working condition, and where government is non-responsive to suffering. The owning class is naturally drawn to those places. This is why Nike went form Korea to the Philippines to Thailand to Vietnam in its search for a labor force – if labor had any power at all, Nike did not want to do business with them. If labor became more powerful due to anti-sweatshop laws and such, Nike vamoosed.
The end result of this process is called “slavery”, or the free market at work.
One must be wholly economically confused to complain about commodities getting cheaper to buy.
INRHB! See above.
Your argument – to be contrary to mine – must champion that things becoming more expensive over time is a sign of economic prosperity.
My argument is that we do not need to compete with slaves in order to prosper.
Guess what. Neither do I [believe in greater good]. It does not exist. The Greater Good Theory wholly depends on the transferring of suffering from one person to another who does not deserve it. You believe that this man over here ‘deserves’ something he did not earn, and you justify stealing it from another man by claiming the other man ‘didn’t need it’, even though he earned it. Such philosophy – if it becomes dominant – will shatter the core of society, as justified theft cannot be sustained in any society. It is this justifying of theft by government that is the cause of the shattering of society we are witnessing today.
Randian. Laws that prevent me from stealing your cow serve something larger than my own interest. They make it safe for everyone to own a cow.
Reagrding our capacity to “earn”, there is a class that lives off the earnings of others. They are called “investors”. People who work for a living, be it by flipping burgers or cleaning sewers or raising offspring are all underpaid because they have not learned how to profit from anyone’s labor other than their own, of which they are allowed to keep only part.
Sir, you claimed without any uncertain terms or qualifications that a free market did not exist. Such a claim is cornerstone to most of your argument. Now, you are faced with the fact you sit in contradiction. Your next retort is to claim that free market systems are not scalable. However, there is nothing inherent in the free market that demonstrates your claim. The Free market is predicated on millions of unique individuals making an aggregate of billions of economic decisions all in their own personal benefit – as they see fit. The Free market is wholly and infinitely scalable as it does not depend on a master designer. It is a system of no design – and is the consequence of millions of self-interested individuals in voluntary trade.
I did not say that free markets did not exist – I said that they were not to our benefit, general welfare or greater good.
The defining difference, sir, is you are wholly without any imposition of government to voluntary enter, offer, negotiate, accept or reject the conditions of your trade on Craigslist. You do not have this ability against Safeway or Verizon. The government by its edicts raises your barrier to entry. You cannot enter without a license or grant, you cannot sell without a license or grant, you cannot negotiate without a license or grant, nor can you accept without a license or grant. They only thing you can do without a license or grant (for now) is reject trade all together. They are quite, quite different – indeed.
You confuse economies of scale, which are a natural result of division of labor, with marketplace power, which allows companies to hide from competition. Government can break up natural coagulation and force people to compete, or turn a blind eye. You confuse the turning of the blind eye with “imposition” of force.
OK – I’m done. I can do no more. We’ve got it out in the open. I’m going back to my other life.
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It happened that you expand the discussion points exponentially – and almost all of them underlined a errant belief system.
As this is your blog, perhaps taking one discussion point and fleshing it out may reduce the time challenge.
I always find it interesting that most people understand that no one has a right to initiate violence on another person but yet….
….find the chasm impossible to cross in their mind to demand the same of human organizations.
I’ve come to understand that these people really do not understand rights, nor violence nor freedom and are thus are afraid of their fellow men’s freedoms.
They are afraid of their own inabilities, their own behaviors and their own misunderstanding and confusion – and because of that they are afraid they cannot earn their own keep.
Thus, they keep the use of violence upon their neighbors as a tool of ‘righteousness’.
That a man who earned his keep, non-violently, is somehow evil and deserves to be attacked and violated by the righteous cause!
The sad thing is, the very people feel this righteousness to use violence on non-violent men end up suffering the worse of that abuse. But their fear is too high for them to see that; it blinds them – and they do end up suffering badly.
It hardly toasts me at all.
It is the typical surrender where someone finds it impossible to argue why free men in voluntary exchange is a bad thing.
You cannot argue against freedom least you destroy your own.
You cannot argue against voluntary least you be forced to do something yourself.
But you cannot allow your fellow men to be free and voluntary in their trade. So you attack it anyway – and defeat yourself.
The tactic: You believe free and voluntary is a good thing for you, but deny it is a good thing when others do it.
Polylogism at its finest. Different logic for you then ‘them’.
The underlying rant I hear: “Freedom for me, but not for you”
Again, the definition is merely changed to suit yourself.
“Monopolistic” behavior – is a subjective judgment – and when the demand for a objective measure is leveled, none exists.
It merely becomes “I don’t like how these guys act”.
The typical tactic is to point to a government-created monopoly as cry “See! There’s one!” – and achieve agreement.
Then the tactician points to “Monopolistic behavior” over here and cry “See! There’s one too!” but fails to demonstrate actually any part similar to the government-created monopoly used as the example!
Suddenly all sorts of mush is pulled out – “Well 20% of a market is a like a 100% of a market so we call both a monopoly” – demanding that somehow I have to put my brain on hold to believe 20% is the same as 100%. It is ridiculous. Over and over again the arguments run the same gambit – somewhere is a demand that definition is different, things that are not the same are claimed to be the same, ignorance of the underlying conditions of government grant… and so on.
Pure monopolies are not a rarity. They are quite common. How many entities can print money? How many entities can have an army? Police force?
Monopolies are everywhere – and 100% of them depend on the violence of government to create them.
Well, that is how it works – and of course you can ignore it.
But yours is not an argument, refutation, or demonstration of an alternative.
So you deny the small competitor got paid out?
Then explain the money he holds in his hand.
So you deny the larger competitor has purchased the exploit?
Then explain what he paid the smaller competitor money for?
Again, you have no reasoning at all to explain your understanding of the market.
The best you can do is ignore it – and muddle along with your irrational belief system.
….which isn’t bad. You can be muddled and irrational – it’s your right.
But the moment you attempt to enforce your crackpottery upon society – then there is a problem.
The problem is that your understanding is horribly flawed and enforcing your view by violence -legal or not – on society will be the equivalent of enforcing the belief that man if he flaps his arms fast enough, can fly.
With a gun is to the head of that man and forced off a cliff to prove his flapping arms can fly – death is the only consequence he has left – either by the bullet or by the crush of the ground.
The same with crackpottery beliefs. They are harmless to others as long as the believer keeps them to himself.
The moment he inflicts it on civilization by force – the destruction of civilization is the consequence.
The moment you judge the holders of wealth to be sinners, you are envious.
Envy – covet the goods or things of another person.
Greed – want more than you have.
The sin is envy, not greed.
You profess a belief system which covets the good of another to be given to someone else who did not earn it. This is acting with envy.
You might not always mix that envy with hate (though at times it does appear) – it is an accurate word to describe many of your complaints.
“Coveting the goods of another person”
This is greed. Greed has made humanity healthier, and longer lived.
We agree. The use of violence is destructive.
My “rules” still apply. You do not understand the Universe at all. You can defy gravity. Jump!
The end result: you will eventually fall.
The rules never not stop applying. All that happens is short sightedness that fails to understand the consequences of defying the rules.
Violence upon non-violent man is unsustainable. If it is not mitigated and prohibited, it always leads to the destruction of civilization and society.
That is a rule. You can try to fudge the rule, deny the rule, ignore the rule. But the rule doesn’t change. Civilization will be destroyed if violence upon non-violent men is justified.
Thus, the war is between government (which justifies violence on non-violent men) and civilization (that never justifies violence on non-violent men).
There are only three conditions – government and no civilization, civilization and no government or the transition between one to the other.
The only question is: which way are you pushing?
The Mafia Don achieves his power by violence upon non-violent men.
The head of a free market enterprise achieves his power by non-violent supply of solutions to other people’s problems.
To you, these two people are the same. Hence, total confusion.
The are dealt with. They find jobs.
Government invests nothing it didn’t steal first.
Government did not invent phone, copper, fiber optics, satellites – etc. And it has always been private enterprise that has done the work
Straw man. Your complaint was about market monopolies some how costing the consumer.
Your strawman says you admit you were wrong in your understanding about market and monopolies.
As far as labor, men giving jobs to men who want to work is a good thing. You may not like it, but you are neither the supplier of that labor or the consumer of that labor, so your POV is irrelevant.
When you own your own meat plant, you can hire different men under different terms and you can see if it works out for you.
Then you had bad teachers.
Agriculture has been raped and subsidized by government since the beginning of human history.
When it has been a free market, it was never richer.
I agree it is a monopoly. Government prevents competition by licensing and regulation. In most States, you cannot buy milk directly from a farm – its illegal.
So, your complaint that it is a monopoly is accurate. Your stated cause of the monopoly is bizarre.
Sir, by that statement, you are not an economist at all.
You do not understand price and its purpose in a market place.
Government did not build one single mile of that infrastructure.
That, sir, is wholly untrue and false.
Before 1894, Bell Telephone’s patents protected it from competition by other firms. Its growth averaged 16% per year; annual profits approached 40% of its capital.
Bell catered primarily to the business sector and the wealthy. When the patents expired, other companies began providing affordable telephone service to the middle class and rural areas.
The independents charged less since customers could call only those serviced by the same company. Consumers were evidently pleased to make such a tradeoff; by 1907, some 20,000 independents controlled half of all the new telephone installations. The number of phones zoomed from 266,000 in 1893 to 6.1 million in 1907.
The independents matched Bell’s monopoly market share in 14 short years.
Competition from the independents had caused annual Bell profits to plummet from 40% to %16 as many consumers chose the independents who served them best.
As telephones went from a curiosity to a standard household utility, the independents began developing a plan for sharing each other’s lines to avoid duplication and to increase the number of phones each customer could call.
The marketplace ecosystem was again working to promote cooperation for the benefit of the consumer, without aggression. Service providers voluntarily sought to give the customer better service because they would, in turn, be rewarded by more business and the positive feedback of profit.
Theodore Vail, Bell’s new chairman, was determined to regain a monopoly market. He asked Americans to use the aggression of exclusive licensing against the independents that had served them so well. He claimed that competition caused duplication and penalized the customer (i.e., telephone service was a “natural” monopoly).
By 1910, Americans were persuaded to accept Bell’s proposal. The government of each local community would allow only one telephone company to operate
in that region.
Since Bell was the largest single company, it was in the best position to lobby the state utility commissions effectively and was almost always chosen over the independents.
How do you know? Did God touch your head and now you can foresee the future?
All this is a subjective “I don’t like it”. But you are not Comcast nor NBC, so really, you have no rights there. Your POV, while interesting, is irrelevant.
In fact, I do. I live it every day.
What part of non-violent do you not understand, sir?
Your complaint about the free market is always about some other market system – but you obviously do not understand the words:
“Free men in voluntary trade”.
First, it was the reason for the war, it is not the fallback. A failure to understand this point demonstrates that once again your public schooling failed you.
Second, there were far more issues than slavery. Excise taxes on cotton to Europe, levied against the Cotton growing States, plus import duties on manufactured goods from Europe transferred vast wealth from the South to the North.
No, it was a product of flawed men. You cannot discern the difference it appears.
There is no war that is just. The killing of innocent people can never be justified. As long as men as you continue to believe it can be, war will haunt mankind.
The first “national park” was privately owned.
Again, your history is found very wanting.
Why do you believe you have a right to other people’s property?
I didn’t ask if you would change the rules or not.
I asked if you would obey immoral law.
No, I asked a question. You do not understand the difference between an argument, a discussion, or a question.
Government does enforce immoral behavior upon non-violent people. It criminalizes non-violent behavior – in fact, most of the laws on the government books is the criminalization of non-violent behavior.
So, my question stands and I await your answer.
The market does not fail – people and companies in that market fail all the time.
The free market does not give you a guarantee that you will be successful. It only gives you the freedom to try.
Why don’t you do that?
They were prohibited by law to mitigate the risk that the ‘deregulation’ (which was merely re-regulation) imposed on them.
They were prevented – by law – of purchasing long contracts with suppliers. They had to commit to current market rates for all their supplies.
Your theory is badly flawed.
If you are correct, there should be nearly 95% unemployment – since the world’s population has more than doubled since 1950.
Yet, none of your statements are true
Excepting a market correction – unemployment has been a steady 3-5%. The world — the entire world — has been getting healthier and richer (see the video I asked you to watch).
Your understanding of the world is seriously flawed.
Your mindset does not match the dataset.
Then don’t buy their goods.
No law prevents anything. Again, you do not understand at all law and its features.
What prevents you from stealing my cow is me.
Natural Law of men – the prohibition, prevention, mitigation and restitution due to the initiations of violence creates civilization.
95% of government law is the legal initiation of violence on men.
Indeed, you feel you can justify theft from a man based on what you believe is good for yourself and/or other people.
And above you argued that the law prevented you from having your cow stolen and created a system of trust.
Here, you argue to destroy that law and that trust.
And you wonder why I see you muddled.
A company cannot “hide” from competition if that company participates in a market!
The only way a company can avoid competition is by government preventing competition. Period.
Enjoy the weekend!
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rightsaidfred
I’ll take that as a compliment – I define myself as a Sovereign Individualist; some think that it means “Anarchist”
There is no problem with such organization – as long as the rights of men are respected. No amount of waving hands in the air makes theft justified, etc.
PS: No matter how many hands wave in the air, it is a violation of my rights to pollute my air.
Agreed. But we agree we need to separate actions of violence from actions of disagreement.
The former, violence is justified to suppress initiation of violence.
However, the latter is non-violent – thus, if the response is with violence, it is THAT act that has now violated society.
Acts of non-violent, but disagreeable behavior, requires a response of non-violent societal enforcement.
But if we maintain consistency with our previous establishment, how can the become an economic drain?
Either they earn they way or they do with out.
So preventing a man who wants to work (!!! how can this be an economic drain??? !!!) contradicts the basis of free society.
Be careful as there is no contract with society. There is only acceptance or not. I do not need to accept your moral proclamations and you have no right to force them on me (as I have no right to force mine on you either). But this is not a contract.
Black Flag:
Is not “illegal” immigration by definition violence against the non-violent? If one is breaking the law with their first step, their first breath, in a country, then nothing that follows can mitigate this.
Beyond this, I believe there is a social contract. We don’t get just the initial trade for work with immigrants. We have an expectation that they will contribute to the larger civic life and future economic system. We expect a certain number will run for the school board, become teachers, professionals, join civic groups, run a cross section of businesses. Just like a firm does not have to hire the people who climb the fence and present themselves to the foreman, a nation does not have to accept those who come onto its soil by perfidious means.
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If we accept that government law defines initiation of violence when then get into the question of whether legal genocide is wrong, since it was legal, and hence since it was legal, there was no holocaust – simply the government protecting itself from the ‘violence’ of Jewish children.
Further, why would I submit to words another man wrote on a piece of paper, simply because other men waved their hands in the air?
So we need to look past the polylogism – different definition and logic depending on who is using it or upon who it is applied.
A contract is an obligation entered into voluntarily. You will be very hard pressed to demonstrate that in any argument regarding “social” contract theory.
You can hold whatever expectation you want for anything you want. It is meaningless because you have no right to enforce YOUR expectation on another man.
If you believe you have that right, be prepared for other men to force their expectations upon you too.
You try to equate ‘the nation’ with a person. It is not. It is a concept.
People have the right to hire and the right to be hired. Leave it to the individuals to chose that for themselves.
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You try to equate ‘the nation’ with a person. It is not. It is a concept.
Don’t discount my analogy on technical grounds. A nations wealth is also determined by factors away from the workplace.
It is meaningless because you have no right to enforce YOUR expectation on another man.
I’m not talking about enforcing an expectation. I’m talking about a choice of public policy. We can choose who immigrates to this country.
Maybe we should start the discussion here. Do you think a country can limit/choose its immigrants? Or should we just remove any pretense of a border?
Regarding social contracts, what do you call the expectation that citizens will participate in economic life, not become criminals, and make a positive contribution to the common weal? Give it a different name and I will use it. The kind of sovereign individualism you champion here requires a high degree of intelligence and cooperation. We can’t achieve your ideal in most population groups, so we have to start examining other options.
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A nations wealth is the aggregation of the individuals wealth. We cannot improve wealth by preventing men from working.
We can choose to slaughter left-handed blonds too.
The question is “what right do you have to prevent a man from hiring another man and that a man being hired?” In other words, what business is it of yours? You are neither the employer or the employee…so why do you believe you have a right “butt your nose into other people’s lives??”
Why do you believe a line draw on a piece of paper should make a difference?
As I asked before, since you see no problem with the freedom of movement of labor between the States, why is it a problem between other States?
Economically, we know free trade improves economic conditions of all participating actors. Labor is just another economic good. It reacts to free trade in that good the same as any other good reacts to free trade.
Nothing. I do not bother to even consider any expectations on any other man other than myself. What right do I have to do that?
I have no right to make no such demands on YOU to provide me a positive contribution.
The only demand free men make upon each other is “do not impose upon me, and I will not impose upon you”.
If I find that by voluntary trade with you, I improve MY life, I’ll trade. If I find no trade is possible, I won’t trade. But demanding upon you that, somehow, you have make my life better…..where does that right come from??
It requires nothing but a prohibition on the initiation of violence.
We are 99.9% there already. All that is left is to end the contradiction when it comes to entities like government.
Why do you believe it is impossible to stop the justifications to use violence on non-violent people??
We already believe that right now ….. except for government.
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I appreciate your efforts to elucidate a pure system of economic trade. But, there are confounding factors of criminality, sloth, and indifference such that almost all societies have formed central governments to deal with the intransigent quintile. As an example, let us say one is in a large population group and does a brisk trade in cooking oil. One of the seemingly good suppliers knowingly ships some rancid oil, and death ensues for the tradee. What is to keep the scofflaw from repeating the act without a central authority with some oversight ability?
I advocate a minimal government. The problem is that the Statists among us too easily co-opt the government. If we do not actively trim our central authority, we are subsumed by Zimbabweism.
We cannot improve wealth by preventing men from working.
Sometimes we can.
why do you believe you have a right to “butt your nose into other people’s lives??”
I realize this is fraught with peril, but I do have an interest in my neighbors business. I think the argument here is when we should intervene. If my neighbor engages in overly cruel actions, I can band together with other reasonable people and take collective action against him. I realize you lay out a regime of freely consummated transactions that preclude violence between the agreeing parties. However, an individual can give an employer 8 hours of economically useful labor but then spend off work hours visiting high crimes and misdemeanors upon the population. How does one preclude this with out concerted action by the neighbors?
Why do you believe a line draw on a piece of paper should make a difference?
Because such lines have meaning. They usually divide by race and ethnicity, which do make a difference despite the orthodoxy promulgated by our politically correct overlords.
As I asked before, since you see no problem with the freedom of movement of labor between the States, why is it a problem between other States?
Sometimes there are problems with labor movement between the States. Sometimes those unable to contribute move between the States to expand their sphere of aggravation. Let’s work on our national border, then we can do something about our internal borders.
Economically, we know free trade improves economic conditions of all participating actors.
Agreed, especially when compared to the Zimbabwean/North Korean type regime advocated by some on this forum. But even within a free trade regime, we must be alert for ways to improve the situation.
I do not bother to even consider any expectations on any other man other than myself.
This could be naive/foolish.
I have no right to make no such demands on YOU to provide me a positive contribution.
The only demand free men make upon each other is “do not impose upon me, and I will not impose upon you…But demanding upon you that, somehow, you have make my life better…..where does that right come from??
Well, okay, I won’t demand a positive contribution, but I expect at least a neutral stance. We have many public goods in an advanced industrial society: roads, emergency services, public communications, public entertainment. We should expect one to make a reasonable contribution to such.
Why do you believe it is impossible to stop the justifications to use violence on non-violent people??
I am working on it, but it is not that simple.
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rightsaidfred, Good day to you, sir!
So, to be clear – government is not a tool invented to deal with criminals.
It is a tool to centralize and monopolize violence. As government demands this monopoly, it resists and attacks those that also try to use initiation of violence. Government prohibitions on violence are not there to protect the people, but to protect its monopoly on it.
This position was confirmed by the SCOTUS, who ruled that the police have no obligation to come to the aid of any citizen suffering from violent crime. The role of the police is to enforce government law by its own means, choice and methods – nothing more.
So, such a claim that government exists to protect men is a fantasy. Any such ‘protection’ is by accident.
Free men have no need for government – men have always organized themselves to protect themselves from criminals (those that use violence to obtain their needs and desires) without a need to demand a ‘right’ to attack non-violent men.
Sloth and indifference are non-violent. They may be (but arguable) distractions in a society. However, what right does a man have to attack a lazy, non-violent man?
Why does authority need to be centralized?
What keeps scofflaws from repeating?? The people not buying from that supplier!!!
Would you continue buying from a supplier who supplies badly? I guess not!
Before we go into how to handle restitution – let’s get clear and agree on the basic principles of sustainable society.
It cannot exist for long.
Since government centralizes and monopolizes the initiation of violence so to enforce its edicts, it declares its self-right to attack non-violent people to enforce itself.
Since it declares all actions it makes as ‘legal’, there is no recourse against its eventual expansion to tyranny.
In 10,000+ years of government, each and everyone – regardless of form – has evolved into tyranny for that very reason.
Please explain how the people can enforce itself on government – where government makes the rules for itself, and chooses when, if ever, it wishes enforces those rules upon itself.
If you could make up the rules for which you abide, and you select which rule you want to abide by, and you enforce that rule on yourself – what rule do you think you’d abide by???
Preventing the creation of wealth does not make wealth.
Based on what right?
Be careful here – because the justification you claim will be used against you by the Law of Mutuality.
This is exactly where those that preach mini-government lose the game.
Once you justify using violence upon non-violent people, other people will justify using violence on you, too.
…a claim that government exists to protect men is a fantasy. Any such ‘protection’ is by accident.
I am liking you more and more.
But, I say that government also embodies collective action for utility functions and it maintains an institutional memory in many areas such as law enforcement, military, and financial regulation. I realize that over time the “violence initiating” function overtakes the enterprise, but I’m not ready to abandon the effort just yet. Even under your plans “men have always organized themselves to protect themselves from criminals”, but this is the start towards what we have today. I don’t see how you avoid the same problems we have now. I think the turning point comes when dealing with the “lazy, non-violent man” Under your regime of Sovereign Individualism, we have to be prepared to witness these individuals withering before us on the street, a situation unacceptable to so many that they demand collective action to alleviate that blight, and this ushers in taxes, government, and the initiation of violence on the part of government to collect taxes to pay for the care of the “lazy, non-violent man” and we’re back to where we are today.
In a purely free trade regime, there is no room for the lazy, they have to go, either into the arms of the profligate welfare state (today’s experiment) or into the arms of family, tribe, or local community (which was the rule in the past. I see this as one pernicious consequence of Social Security: it freed the marginal persons from having to maintain family/community ties for sustenance.)
Dealing with the marginal man is the crux of the matter. If immigration is purely non-violent men freely trading their labor, then that is fine. However, if a neighboring country is a criminal enterprise and its immigrants engage in looting and pillaging, then free men need to organize themselves to protect themselves from criminals, and this may include drawing a line on a map.
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rightsaidfred, Greetings!
There’s a few reasons why I resist using the word “government” to also mean ‘collective action’.
I posted awhile back about “Revolution within the Form” where the name remains the same, but the definition changes.
I find most often this tactic in the concepts of government. A worthy soul will define ‘government’ as “collective action for the common welfare” or some such – even get agreement that this can be done while fulfilling the moral demand of no initiation of violence, just self-defense. Then after obtaining the agreement of a ‘good’ – goes and points to government-of-this-world and claims that is a ‘good’ though perhaps slightly misguided.
Of course, no government-of-this-world, in all history for the last 10,000 even comes close to the ‘good’ as all of them ended in total tyranny of one sort or another. But the game-play got an agreement regarding government, and the change of definition underneath was essentially covert and unseen.
So I do not hold Locke’s or Jefferson’s view of government at all – that is, a protector of rights.
I do hold and believe freemen can create an organization that is not government that is a protector of rights. Perhaps a new word needs to be created to distinguish this from the government-of-this-world.
As far as law enforcement and military – great danger exists in the centralizing of these forces of violence, even it these organizations are for defense only.
Centralizing great powers of violence for defense also centralizes great powers of violence for offense.
Financial regulation – not one wit of it.
If you are defrauded, its your fault. You gave your money to an immoral man voluntarily with no gun to your head. If you want it back, you get it back without using a gun either.
As I said previously, we must hold the core principle of no initiation of violence as immutable.
If you give it up for non-violent financial fraud, you will find eventually tyranny has snuck in the door and will eventually enslave you too under the excuse of some redefinition of ‘financial fraud’
Where there is no initiation of violence to enforce non-violent fraud, trust become the most valuable commodity in society when dealing in financial matters.
We do not justify the initiation of violence. Period. No excuse. No matter what.
When we see a man attack another man, we as individuals immediately demand a halt to such attack, and we tend -with good cause- charge the attacker with violating society’s law against violence while defending the victim.
Now, if I said the attacker was a Law Enforcement Officer, be honest and know that the immediate response will be to actually support the attacker against the victim – with no good cause except by paradigm – and charge the victim of the attack with violating law if he resists (even if resistance is to save his life!!).
Now, we as individuals have come to this paradigm honestly – we (erroneously) believe government is there to defend us based on our grant to it of our own right of self-defense.
So we assume that those we have authorized to defend us are, in fact, defending us.
But we are in error in the belief of government. It is not defending us – it is attacking us – and that ‘victim’ might have just as easily been a ‘jay walker’ or smoking dope or buying sex or some other non-violent (and perhaps immoral) behavior.
So we become totally confused – and in that confusion, the elite enslave us.
The Universe is problems.
We will never be rid of problems.
We will never be rid of human suffering either.
Mark T. I believe has a very hard time accepting is that Man’s suffering can never be solved.
He and his kind (and they are mostly kind, too) attempt to relieve suffering of some men by transferring to others that they believe can carry it.
They are not solving suffering, but merely displacing over to a place they aren’t looking or do not care about or themselves acting as a “judge” decide are worthy of carrying the suffering.
But to do this, they must initiate violence.
They justify it under the guise of solving suffering (which they are not), and they need violence to force that suffering somewhere else onto someone else.
Again, with that justification, quickly we see Socialist/Communist systems evolve into wholesale tyranny as more and more justifications to initiate violence are used.
The roots of most (if not all) human-caused suffering comes from the initiation of violence. We as civilized society understand this when it comes to us as individuals.
The next step to advance civilization is to realize this everywhere, including in our structures and organizations.
First, humans by their nature cares for one another.
Charity was not created by government.
Secondly, as I said – suffering will always be with us. Transferring it to others by violence is no solution at all.
Thirdly, not all problems have solutions. Sometimes the courage is to do nothing because nothing can be done.
Fourthly, there are other solutions to problems other than violence.
Violence is easy, which is probably why it is used so often.
However, as we have done individually, when violence is not an option we figure out something else. When we refuse to initiate violence to solve a problem, human ingenuity will derive a new, non-violent answer.
We simply haven’t bothered to be bothered – as long as the ‘crutch’ to use violence is easy at hand, we will use it. We will use it even more when we declare such use of violence was “legal”.
Oh, sure there is! These guys are great! They sit around figuring out how not to work hard – almost all progress is due to some lazy guy figuring out how not to work!
And I agree.
If a band of people wish to commit themselves to feeding the lazy, so be it. I am confident those like Mark T. will be among those working to feed them. Maybe me too.
There is nothing wrong or bizarre with concurrent systems operating at the same time. There is nothing that causes one to be exclusive of the other except the legitimizing of initiation of violence.
We have many concurrent religious beliefs within society with few problems (and of those problems, most are because one group feels justified in using violence to enforce their religion).
There is no reason we can’t have concurrent organizational systems, some of free welfare, some not, others a mix of something else; as long as no group claims they are justified in initiating violence.
As I explicitly stated, the free movement of non-violent men is a right.
Thus, I agree with you that ‘lines in the sand’ as a stand against those that initiate violence is a right and required.
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I am almost ready to wholeheartedly agree with you. I still have some concerns on the edges.
We can agree about the free movement and free trade of non-violent men, but this needs to be policed against fraud, and against false claims of fraud, and I am concerned that the basic corrupt nature of man coupled with the pursuit of these worthy goals eventually ushers in a violence toting central government and we’re back to today’s race.
Sometimes the courage is to do nothing because nothing can be done.
I suspect this type of courage is lacking. Hence the multitude of blogs that delineate problems and demand “government” action.
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rigtsaidfred,
I’m sure we will dialogue again, and I look forward to it.
I was going to give you the last word, but – to let you know you get the last word – it appears I may have taken it!
Cheers!
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