Your political views

[Light of Truth]

On monopolies - http://mises.org/daily/621

An interesting read, if founded on a number of false assumptions, like competition being able to not get quashed by someone who doesn't want competition.
The entire paper seems to be based (if not explicitly) on the same premise that power only corrupts when government is involved. But the kind of bought-and-sold power that being filthy rich gives you? You're a goddamn saint of Capitalism.

When discussing economics, one must always keep in mind the broken window fallacy. You have to take into consideration what is unseen. This is how it goes - a hooligan throws a brick through a baker's window and runs off. People gather by the broken window and state that it is actually a good thing for the economy because the baker will have to purchase a new window, which will boost the glass maker's business. This helps the economy. This is false because the glass maker's gain is merely the baker's loss. The baker had to spend $100 dollars on the new window and because of that he couldn't spend that money on a new coat he wanted, so the glass maker's gain is only the coat maker's loss. There is no gain in the overall economy. You have to take into consideration these unseen factors.

If a company doesn't pay its employees fairly, they will just leave to find a better job. The company will either fail because its production will go down significantly because of a lack of workers, or it will increase the amount it pays its employees, so that it remains viable as a company.

You ever hear of company-owned towns? What about being in debt to that company, allowing them to essentially keep you employed by law in a perpetual debt to them?
And that's just the nice ways that companies can essentially enslave their own employees, leaving things out like physical threats and intimidation in a world where public awareness and law enforcement can be purchased or controlled.

If a company puts out shitty products people will not buy those products. The company will fail or change their products.

Or, they can make you purchase their products because it's a necessary product (like gasoline and pharmaceuticals in the US) or they can control what information you have about their products beforehand or by eliminating their competition.

What's always fun in a world of no government regulation is the game of 'guess what's in tonights dinner' without the courtesy of intervention from the food and drug administration.
Have you heard about the US meat packing Industry in the 1900s? According to your logic, those employees should have just walked out and the meat packing industry should have failed, but thanks to a combination of the book "The Jungle" by Upton Sinclair, Unionization (which is something the government helped with thanks to other events during the mid-20th century), the Civil Rights Movement, and numerous safety, food standard, and sanitation rules, the entire industry managed to improve.
Also: the steel industry, railroads, car manufacturing, and many more.

If a company's efficiency cannot be matched, that's a good thing. Production costs go down, which allows higher wages, or better products, or both. Monopolies are more prevalent when they are given an edge by the government. Governments set high regulation standards that raise the cost for competitors and end up giving the said business a higher market share. More monopolies exist when the government intervenes than when a free market exists.

You cannot enslave someone whether they owe you money or not. It is possible to become indebted to your boss, but you can default on your loan and force them to take the loss for their bad use of credit. Enslaving debtors is not a part of a free market.

The government's role in the economy is to enforce contracts and to protect against fraud. If a consumer is hurt or becomes sick due to the consumption of a company's product, they can hold them liable. A free market provides courts. Instead of holding producers responsible to the consumers, they have been made responsible to the government.


A free market allows consumers to set the standards based on cost and quality.

[Valkyrie]

I think that the problem is none of these political ideologies have much in the way of a theory of value, let alone a correct one, so the only choice people have is reactionary measures.

The main problem with doing that is the reaction is always towards isolated or small sub-groups of incidents, they have a massive problem of conformation bias, looking at the bigger picture seems to be something they either can't or won't do. It's realistically just post-hoc emotional responses and let's face it, they aren't exactly known for effectiveness, especially compared to a base methodology for determining value and consequence.

There has been a prime example of that in NZ at the moment with the deaths of 29 miners at Pike River, calls are being made for major chances to labor laws by some because they think there must necessarily be something more than could have been done to prevent the deaths (though the experience of the miners who worked there couldn't be further from that conclusion) - The reality is the labor laws for workplace safety are already at the point where making them more stringent would have a negative impact on the values of others in the general population as these laws would have to be applied to all industries, which would make one of NZ's largest and most dangerous industries, adventure tourism, effectively unable to operate - Not to mention dozens of other industries that would see costs rise and jobs decline, ultimately effecting everyone else far more so than the current balance of things.

This is the danger of reactionary policies, a failure to overcome that which caused the reaction. That is not to say that all reactionary measures are bad, it is to say that it would be almost certainly more effective to take the most effective theories of values in both ethics and economics and combine them in the way that brings the most value to the most people.

Interesting! So are you aware of a political platform (or system) that addresses value and consequence, as opposed to reactionary response?

[theVOID]

It all depends on what system of values is correct.

At the moment I'm a centre-right non-authoritarian, Sort of Like a Libertarian, but with a focus on securing assets absolutely necessary for society to function, the so called "backbone industry". The state in my opinion should only control these assets directly, all phone and fibre lines are owned by the government and subcontracted to private companies for installation and maintenance, private companies compete on it. Schools, Healthcare, Police, Law and Order, Roads, Power infrastructure.

The government owns no companies that compete on these systems, private companies would still be doing the majority of the work. It's only real job is to follow the moral theory to a state of affairs of higher positive value than the present by creating policies that tend towards a state of affairs in which more and stronger desires are fulfilled than at present, that is done through preventing risk to the desires of the people and providing them with means to fulfil their desires. And is of a consequentialist attitude, no victimless crime, no dictating what people do with their bodies or minds so long as they are of no consequence to anyone else. It poses that all intentional action is the product of a desire and it is our desires that should bne judged in any legal or moral circumstance - Prisons should focus on moulding the malleable desires of the prisoners to help them to be able to live lives where they are not of negative value to society at large. Critical thinking lessons in all schools from age 5. Business is regulated through a theory of value so that as little case by case variations as possible exist, lessening the potential for corruption.

Tax would be on dollar earned, not dollar spent. Business taxes would be lowered in proportion to a mandatory wage increase. This would be done whenever deemed appropriate.

All the other SOAs get sold.

Government would only recognize marriage as a recognition of intent to share resources..

At least that's my evaluation so far, it's a real bitch to try apply a moral theory to a political reality, so I reserve the right to change my mind

[TheDarkestOfAngels]

If a company's efficiency cannot be matched, that's a good thing. Production costs go down, which allows higher wages, or better products, or both. Monopolies are more prevalent when they are given an edge by the government. Governments set high regulation standards that raise the cost for competitors and end up giving the said business a higher market share. More monopolies exist when the government intervenes than when a free market exists.

Bull. Without government intervention, there's nothing stopping the rich and powerful from simply filling the gulf of power left behind and taking whatever they want.
History has already shown and fought a number of bloody battles that led to the regulatory environment that exists now that allows things like Unions to form, which many of the companies (railroad, steel, and meat packing are prevelent examples) fight tooth and nail to make sure never happens. Even today, these companies will say anything and do anything to prevent any chance of paying or treating their employees fairly (assuming they're not already).
Monopolies don't form because the government regulates their competitors more than them, they form because they outcompete, outsell, purchase, or quash through brute force their competition until they're the only seller in town.

You cannot enslave someone whether they owe you money or not. It is possible to become indebted to your boss, but you can default on your loan and force them to take the loss for their bad use of credit. Enslaving debtors is not a part of a free market.

This is a practice that's already been done and is still being done in some ways. The company essentially sets itself up to be your only source of food and shelter and if you bail, they sue you (assuming they don't do something more extreme, like shoot you.)

The government's role in the economy is to enforce contracts and to protect against fraud. If a consumer is hurt or becomes sick due to the consumption of a company's product, they can hold them liable. A free market provides courts. Instead of holding producers responsible to the consumers, they have been made responsible to the government.

A free market allows consumers to set the standards based on cost and quality.

Holding producers responsible to government is the same thing as holding producers responsible to people. It's things like that why they are elected into office.

In a lassiez-faire economy, private enterprises are the only people who can report things like that and they can be bought and sold and owned by the responsible party or one that is sympathetic. Hell, companies that are powerful enough (through money or corrupting public officials) can sway the courts, control information, and so on.

I don't know what kind of optimism you have about people who own businesses over running government, but history is rife with examples of the kind of abuses I'm talking about. It takes a tremendous amount of willing ignorance to assume that the free market will just work itself out when it's already proven beyond a reasonable doubt that as soon as someone has enough power and not enough stops in exercising that power, they can wield it to do whatever they damn well please. There has rarely been a positive outcome of that kind of environment.

[Ubermensch]

My avatar says it all really.

[TheDarkestOfAngels]

My avatar says it all really.

Brutal dictatorship enforced through police-state control and a planned/centralized economy?

[lrh9]

I've recently become a Democratic Socialist.

[Ubermensch]

My avatar says it all really.

Brutal dictatorship enforced through police-state control and a planned/centralized economy?

Nah, not really. I like personal liberty and freedom and all that hippie crap way too much. I just thing Yang is a cool guy who doesn't afraid of anything.

[Jaysyn]

I just thing Yang is a cool guy who doesn't afraid of anything.

What do I care for your suffering? Pain, even agony, is no more than information before the senses, data fed to the computer of the mind.

Yang is a dick & frankly was terrified of my Great Boil Mindworms.

[Ubermensch]

I crushed Santiago a number of times, she started wars, I fucking finished them. This aside from whether I think Yang is right about the 1s and 0s that get fed into your brainputer.