NationStates Jolt Archive

I surpose this has already been talked about heaps before but i just wanted to know some people's opinion about the rapid privatisation of many things today, e.g i think i read that the U.S military has thousands of civilian contractors and all that. And how in capitalist societies governments and corporations interact so intimately.

The corporation is not a good example of private property. It is public property in nearly every sense of the word.

I agree with the market theory behind cooperations, and I see no way for the government to operate without depending upon them. It always has. If the government needs widgets, it should buy some on the public market, not create its own widget factory. This leads to Big Government and inefficient bureaucracy, something none of us want. (after all, we wind up paying for it!) outsourcing work to cooperations in theory means that work will be done in the most cost effective manner, meaning a more efficient government and less taxes for the little guy.

The problem is that people are stupid and many large cooperations today are run in a self destructive manner, eliminating this benefit. For a great if poorly written example, google The Cluetrain Manifesto, and read it. Capitalism seems to have failed in large cooperate monsters, they do not appear to have the will to succeed. I do not know why this has come about, I have a few vague guesses but cannot put them into words at this time.

In most areas the free market is superior to government-controlled operations.

For the very simple reason that free markets are more flexible and can respond to ever-shifting conditions in the human experience, whereas the government must attempt to re-create the free market unnaturally or attempt to impose stasis on the sector.

However, modern corporations in the US not always are free market enterprises. Those most likely to work with the US government are anything but. Some are unrecognized monoplies, others are massively powerful cartels that impose near-stasis on their market or direct it by their whims.

Many skew what little regulation there is to support them instead of the free market, rewrite the rules of the market to take advantage of it, and generally act like the worst State-run ecnomies do. This is why I protest "corporatisation" in the modern world. Because its a misnomer. Its less "letting the market decide" and very much more "handing over total control to interested party."

Basically, much of the "deregulation" I hear about simply is corruption. Taking away safeguards that the state has provided or rules of framework that make life fair, and taking them away so a company can run amok.

In most areas the free market is superior to government-controlled operations.

For the very simple reason that free markets are more flexible and can respond to ever-shifting conditions in the human experience, whereas the government must attempt to re-create the free market unnaturally or attempt to impose stasis on the sector.

However, modern corporations in the US not always are free market enterprises. Those most likely to work with the US government are anything but. Some are unrecognized monoplies, others are massively powerful cartels that impose near-stasis on their market or direct it by their whims.

Many skew what little regulation there is to support them instead of the free market, rewrite the rules of the market to take advantage of it, and generally act like the worst State-run ecnomies do. This is why I protest "corporatisation" in the modern world. Because its a misnomer. Its less "letting the market decide" and very much more "handing over total control to interested party."

Basically, much of the "deregulation" I hear about simply is corruption. Taking away safeguards that the state has provided or rules of framework that make life fair, and taking them away so a company can run amok.

I am against corporatisation myself. In fact, I am communist. However, I still have to correct your misconception because Ive heard it alot and I know it to be completely false.

The US government does not just use giant corporations. Although I am not familiar with all of the regulations involved because I am not upper management, I am still intimately familiar with the government contracts system, because I work in it.

The fact is that there are laws and regulations that govern government contracts. These laws give priority to certain special classes of corporations. Among these special classes are the 8(a) companies, which are defined as socially or economically disadvantaged firms. These corporations are almost exclusively small, and they need to fit certain criteria such as being minority owned, owned by women, or having very small capital. There are contracts specifically set aside for 8(a) companies. Oftentimes one large corporation will be awarded a contract, but they are required to subcontract parts of it to 8(a) companies. The idea that the government only works with large conglomerates is a myth.

I am currently writing a thesis on csr...please carry on :)

Sounds like a good law to help the small fella's.

The US government does not just use giant corporations. Although I am not familiar with all of the regulations involved because I am not upper management, I am still intimately familiar with the government contracts system, because I work in it.

The fact is that there are laws and regulations that govern government contracts. These laws give priority to certain special classes of corporations. Among these special classes are the 8(a) companies, which are defined as socially or economically disadvantaged firms. These corporations are almost exclusively small, and they need to fit certain criteria such as being minority owned, owned by women, or having very small capital. There are contracts specifically set aside for 8(a) companies. Oftentimes one large corporation will be awarded a contract, but they are required to subcontract parts of it to 8(a) companies. The idea that the government only works with large conglomerates is a myth.

You are correct to point this out, but I believe that if you trace the money you'll find that these subcontractors are sometimes little more than dummy or spin-off corperations of the parent company. Also it depends a lot on what sectors of the economy you speak of. Energy, transportation, military; "mom & pop" stores simply don't exists in such fields. There's no 3-person, tiny Enron firms, but Enron made a whole lot of dummy corperations to make it LOOK like there were. THAT'S what I'm talking about.

Some subcontractors are simply induviduals, that's very true. I was once employed by a subcontractor for the US postal service. I was an employee of an employee basically. Delivering mail to rural areas is frequently a job contracted out to others, who then turn and hire workers for a portion of the pay they recieve from the government.

BTW did I say "only" I don't remember that. I'm attempting to say that frequently (not the majority of cases, only that it happens far too often) large corperations or their dummies, proxies, and patsies take up these contracts. If you look into some of these, the webs of decite around the true ownership of some of these companies is almost impossible to untangle.

Corporations are bad ver very bad they allow mass scale consolidation of capital that distorts markets to the point where some huge corporations like GE do more business than many third world economies and thus can coerce and exploit them to an extent never imagined by private owners. They also exist almost as sentient entities wiht little forsight they will plunder resoursces because it raises stock prices now. Because they are a seperate system only administered by people they are not subject to the scruples of private business, if breaking rules raises stock prices then it will be done, and when they guy doing it gets busted he might do time, but the corporation won't. Most of this however is because enforcement is weak and sporadic and corporations. Corporations in the United States often have more civil liberties that people. The whole system just detatches the decision making from the people too much. Also they can perpetually acumulate wealth and never die, never split inheritance or pay estate tax. Even Adam smith, who lived before the era of corporations, whe they were first used as a way to combine business resousces for large projects like bridges, was worried about their potential to accumulate power. I think they should be abolished in favour of privat ownership. The fact is the people who shuffle stock arround in their retirement accounts are never going to be concerned with environmental and labour issues on a large scale, afterall its just fifty shares eh?

You are correct to point this out, but I believe that if you trace the money you'll find that these subcontractors are sometimes little more than dummy or spin-off corperations of the parent company.
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And you say this based on absolutely no evidence. My experience has been that they are all, in fact, small companies owned by minorities.

And you say this based on absolutely no evidence. My experience has been that they are all, in fact, small companies owned by minorities

Haha... that sounds like some rightwing paranoia dribble about how the government is always throwing away money on 'minorities.' Keep it coming, bubba.

Haha... that sounds like some rightwing paranoia dribble about how the government is always throwing away money on 'minorities.' Keep it coming, bubba.

Im a communist, I dont have any need to spread right wing propaganda. My post was in defense of honesty, not in defense if corporations. I am against capitalism in all its forms. But Im not going to lie to get my points across.