NationStates Jolt Archive

I will preface this by saying I am not "Anti FreeTrade". I recognizse that there are lots of benefits to be had by trade between nations. That being said, I am a free trade skeptic. I thing that its proponents overstate its benefits. I do not think that it is going to bring world peace and universal prosperity. I also think that its proponents gloss over its flaws, dismissing them as problems of implementation rather than problems of design.

I think I have identified a major design flaw in free trade. I think its focus on reducing tariffs is fundamentally flawed, and is actually denying underdeveloped countries the opportunity to develop. Here is why.

The WTO regime focuses on reducing tarriff barriers. The theory is that without the distortions created by tarriffs, each country will be able to specialize in producing those goods and services in which it enjoys a comparative advantage. Theoretically, this will enable least developed countries to move from poor rural-based economies to prosperous industrialized states.

However, I'm not sure this actually works in practice. Specifically, the developed countries developed at a time when tariff barriers were still quite high. It enabled them to protect and develop certain domestic industries. Tarriffs also provided the main source of government revenue, allowing these countries to develop proper court systems and effective government institutions that are necessary in order for a free market economy to function. Further, most of the developing countries that have made significant economic progress this century have used protectionist trade policies to further their economic growth. I am having a hard time thinking of any countries that have developed based on an aggressive policy of free trade only.

By not allowing them to levy tarriffs, we are effectively ensuring that least developed countries will never have the opportunity to develop. Not only is it virtually impossible for them to develop any profitable industries in the face of relentless competition from wealthier nations, but also they are denied the source of government revenue that industrializing countries need in order to develop effective organize of government to facilitate free market development. Underfunding will continue to lead to corrupt and ineffective courts and bureaucracies. The WTO's focus on reducing tarriffs will actually be counterproductive. It is the whole design of the system, not just the implementation, that is flawed.

I would be interested if anyone has any information that supports or refutes this theory.

I will close by saying this is not my biggest concern about "free trade". It is just the one that has most recently occurred to me. Among other things, I am concerned about the endless pursuit of growth it what is obviously a world of natural limits. Personally, I think that trying to grow our way out of our economic problems is likely to be about as effective as trying to pave our way out of gridlock. But I digress. I welcome any dissenting views

Tariffs don't protect--they harm. They cause the rest of the populace to pay more for goods than they otherwise would.

I would suggest this essay (http://www.mises.org/econsense/ch89.asp) by Murray Rothbard to help you understand.

It really depends on your aims, in terms of economic policy, free-trade serves the fundemental interests of capitalism, but obviously not those conflicting socio-economic ideologies

Won't they hurt 3rd world nations. Not only will internal business become more powerful but they won't recieve the benefits of cheaper goods from other nations. Not to mention their governments can't exacly be trusted to use tarrifs in the best manner either.

However, I'm not sure this actually works in practice. Specifically, the developed countries developed at a time when tariff barriers were still quite high. It enabled them to protect and develop certain domestic industries. Tarriffs also provided the main source of government revenue, allowing these countries to develop proper court systems and effective government institutions that are necessary in order for a free market economy to function. Further, most of the developing countries that have made significant economic progress this century have used protectionist trade policies to further their economic growth. I am having a hard time thinking of any countries that have developed based on an aggressive policy of free trade only.

a) Actually no, developed countries developed at a time they had colonial empires, which enabled them access to large markets, tax free (which they closed to anyone else true, but in effect what you had were colonial free trade areas). Comes to my mind the British and India, but there are plenty of examples.
) Actually, the world currently isn't as open as we would like to think; Before WW1, the world economy was more integrated than it is now, mainly due to the fact that there was comparatively, reduced proteccionism. This increased alot after WW1, and specially, after the Great Depression, when many countries, in an attempt to "export unemployment" increased trade barriers so high that even after WW2, the GATT (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GATT)was busy throwing them away.



By not allowing them to levy tarriffs, we are effectively ensuring that least developed countries will never have the opportunity to develop. Not only is it virtually impossible for them to develop any profitable industries in the face of relentless competition from wealthier nations, but also they are denied the source of government revenue that industrializing countries need in order to develop effective organize of government to facilitate free market development. Underfunding will continue to lead to corrupt and ineffective courts and bureaucracies. The WTO's focus on reducing tarriffs will actually be counterproductive. It is the whole design of the system, not just the implementation, that is flawed.

Your argument about the funding of institutions is really good actually, but lets go by parts:
a) The problem isn't so much allowing underdeveloped countries to levy tariffs, but the fact that in some cases, the products of developed countries face tax barriers in the order of 25% or more (http://www.fff.org/freedom/0898d.asp), and the products of underdeveloped countries suffer taxation of even greater magnitude. We can sell them stuff, we have the political clout to inforce that, but they can't sell us stuff because we tax the shit out of their products, ence their inability to compete. Note however, that the fact that they are poor doesn't mean, and it never meant that they can't get rich. Look at the examples of Japan post-WW2, China, Egypt, etc.. Give peace, low taxes and a reasonable administration of justice, and any country can develop. Regretfully, underdeveloped countries generally have neither.
b) As i said, I agree with the institutions part. However, funding for those institutions can be arranged in a more free, prosper economy by taxating citizens, consumption and industries, that are made wealthier by living in a free-trade environment.



I will close by saying this is not my biggest concern about "free trade". It is just the one that has most recently occurred to me. Among other things, I am concerned about the endless pursuit of growth it what is obviously a world of natural limits. Personally, I think that trying to grow our way out of our economic problems is likely to be about as effective as trying to pave our way out of gridlock. But I digress. I welcome any dissenting views

One thing are our ecological limits; Those are clearly overstressed and I wished more was done to curtail our predatory behavior on the natural environment. I am in full support of the Kyoto protocol (Sure it costs money, but that's life), and taxation on enviromently unfriendly industries and practices.

However, if we rely more on free trade, our economies can become more efficient, i.e., do more with less. Therefore, it is conceivable that we can become richer, without blowing the ozone layer away, or making the polar bears extinct.

PS: Ill give you links on tax barriers for underdevoped countries, but now i gotta go: If your interested, try out the WTO statistics database, they got that info there. Sorry.

The current trade environment is too biased towards the powerful rich countries to successfully impliment a Free Trade system. There needs to be a levelling of the playing field (i.e. eliminating third world debt so that their money can go towards improving their economies and not ours, and supporting progressive elements within said countries), before Free Trade could work.

The current trade environment is too biased towards the powerful rich countries to successfully impliment a Free Trade system. There needs to be a levelling of the playing field (i.e. eliminating third world debt so that their money can go towards improving their economies and not ours, and supporting progressive elements within said countries), before Free Trade could work.
Countries can eliminate their debt by encouraging development. With the increases in development, the developing nations will be able to accrue more capital, and then pay off their debts.

Furthermore, the term third-world is an obsolete term, reserved specifically for the cold war era. It is a term that denotes the non-aligned nations of the world during that time period, with the "first world" being the western countries, and the "second world" being the Soviet Bloc.

the goal shouldn't be 'Free Trade' as seen by western countries. The current goals of the WTO would not lead to Free or Fair Trade. Rich countries will never remove all their protectionist tarrif and non-tarrif barriers, but force poorer countries to open their markets to our goods. There are some cases where arguments may be made for protectionist measures(infant Industries-which are most prevalent in poor countries)

I believe that if everyone was on a level playing field, and if everyone was at the same start point, and everyone had the same amount of resources (or a balanced start in terms of population, technology, resources, etc), that free trade would be a good idea.

However, the world is set up like a marathon race, with some runners on motorcycles, already halfway down the race route, and some people are on crutches at the start line.

Asking them to accept the idea that from here out, whoever gets to the finish line is the winner doesn't seem "fair", which is what proponents of "free trade" seem to imply about their system.

How, for instance, is a third world nation that has no super-modern infrastructure, supposed to compete with super-modern nations that have super-modern methods to increase productivity (such as robot assembly lines and massive computer networks that allow for just-in-time manufacturing and supply)?

The point is, they can't.

I believe that if everyone was on a level playing field, and if everyone was at the same start point, and everyone had the same amount of resources (or a balanced start in terms of population, technology, resources, etc), that free trade would be a good idea.

However, the world is set up like a marathon race, with some runners on motorcycles, already halfway down the race route, and some people are on crutches at the start line.

Asking them to accept the idea that from here out, whoever gets to the finish line is the winner doesn't seem "fair", which is what proponents of "free trade" seem to imply about their system.

How, for instance, is a third world nation that has no super-modern infrastructure, supposed to compete with super-modern nations that have super-modern methods to increase productivity (such as robot assembly lines and massive computer networks that allow for just-in-time manufacturing and supply)?

The point is, they can't.
Of course they can. Specialization is the key to success in a free trade environment. A poorer country can start off with the basic industrial fields that were key to the industrialization of the developed world, such as clothing manufacturing, and build off of that industrial base much like the industrialized nations did.

You see, international economics is not a race, because a race is a zero sum game. International economics is not a zero sum game, everyone can win. Not only that, but look at the growth patterns of economies. Developed world economies are marked by growth rates of 1-2%. The current US growth rate is an outlier amongst the rates of the other developed nations. Meanwhile, a developing nation can have growth rates of well over 10-15%. It takes time, but this is evidence enough that a developing nation can indeed catch up with a developed nation.

And even at that, developed nations have a vested interest in investing in developing nations. When new, sustainable, markets are opened to their goods, then their total wealth will grow. The classic example is how capital from France and England were vital in building the railroads of the United States in the 1800's. The result being the rapid growth of the American economy, and an increase in demand for their goods.

How, for instance, is a third world nation that has no super-modern infrastructure, supposed to compete with super-modern nations that have super-modern methods to increase productivity
The point is, they can't.

So would Protectionism such as Trade tarrifs be justifiable for poor countries but not rich? In my opnion Free/Fair Trade can be of great help to developing countires(can't dispute Ricardo's Theory on Compararative advantage), except that Rich countries can protect themselves from the natural advantages developing nations have-whereas poor countries cannot do the same.

You see, international economics is not a race, because a race is a zero sum game. International economics is not a zero sum game, everyone can win.
Everyone can win? The basic Economic Problem is a world with finite resources and unlimited wants-which always leaves the majority unsatisfied- no matter how much growth-it is never equitably distributed-so even if developing countries are growing much faster than rich ones, the vast majority of their citizens remain poor-

no matter how much growth-it is never equitably distributed-so even if developing countries are growing much faster than rich ones, the vast majority of their citizens remain poor-

As we say in the American South:
"Them's the breaks"

I'm all for true free trade. It's called mutually beneficial exchange for a reason.;)

Maximisation of free trade (it is, really, not possible to have totally free trade - every country will have certain areas it feels the need to subsidize or protect) will enable lower development countries to access the consumer base of higher development countries. Theoretically, this will allow profit, which can be reintegrated into infrastructure, which will permit the development of a domestic consumer base. It is through the actions of a domestic consumer base that real wealth is generated within a country.

The problem is, all this development will, in a conservative estimate, take up to eight decades to have a major impact (as opposed to the 12-15 decades the developed world took to do the same trick without such a leg-up). The anti-globalisation morons see this as taking too long and want everything now now now! (which is why I consider them morons). They fail to see that the only real alternative is the old status quo - which was the developed countries vampirising the undeveloped mercilessly.

Everyone can win? The basic Economic Problem is a world with finite resources and unlimited wants-which always leaves the majority unsatisfied- no matter how much growth
When we have unlimited wants everyone remains unsatisfied. But growth makes it possible for more people to have more wants satisfied than it would be otherwise.

-it is never equitably distributed-so even if developing countries are growing much faster than rich ones, the vast majority of their citizens remain poor-
That's pure bullshit and you know it. Every single instance of sustained development has seen the population increase their quality of life as growth goes on.

Free trade is good for industrial nations and bad for developing nations. That's why it's being sold in the US. Remember when the North American Free Trade was passed? Everyone was scared of cheap labor in Mexico. But what happened? The US gained and Mexico went bust. The US had to import Mexican labor to keep the Mexican economy from total collapse. It's basic economics that was known at the time of the American Revolution and actually a cause of it. England wanted free trade with the colonies and the colonies wanted economic protection.

Free trade is good for industrial nations and bad for developing nations. That's why it's being sold in the US. Remember when the North American Free Trade was passed? Everyone was scared of cheap labor in Mexico. But what happened? The US gained and Mexico went bust. The US had to import Mexican labor to keep the Mexican economy from total collapse. It's basic economics that was known at the time of the American Revolution and actually a cause of it. England wanted free trade with the colonies and the colonies wanted economic protection.
The Mexican economic problems have to do with things other than NAFTA.

And not only that, the colonies were the ones who rebelled against the taxes and tarriffs, not for them.

England wanted free trade with the colonies and the colonies wanted economic protection.
Who the fuck taught you history? The colonists wanted to trade, free of extra charge, with nations besides Britain, and that was not allowed.

The problem with tariffs in developing countries is that it creates built-in inefficiency that gradually begins to cost them more and more as the economy matures; those industries are not competitive with ones in other countries, but due to artificial political and economic influence they can't be restructured or exposed to the market without severe loss. This is due to political factors, since no politician wants to be responsible for revoking the tariffs due to populist ignorance of economics that would place the blame on them.

The result is an inefficient, underproductive industrial sector that can't provide the kinds of products people demand for the price that they should be paying according to the market; these overpriced and inferior quality goods reduce the buying power of the consumers in the country while simultaneously reducing foreign demand for the good until the industry becomes unprofitable, at which point the government has to step in to subsidize it or it goes under.

The protectionist climate makes it less attractive for foreigners to invest in the country, which means overall growth will be constricted and the country will be even more dependent on its subsidized industries for its growth; as a result, growth will be lower and living standards will not grow. The inflation produced by the lack of productivity growth will further erode living standards and reduce employment. This kind of protectionism develops a country to a certain point, but that point is inferior to that of the developed world and will only level off and decline as the economy develops further.

The problem with tariffs in developing countries is that it creates built-in inefficiency that gradually begins to cost them more and more as the economy matures; those industries are not competitive with ones in other countries, but due to artificial political and economic influence they can't be restructured or exposed to the market without severe loss. This is due to political factors, since no politician wants to be responsible for revoking the tariffs due to populist ignorance of economics that would place the blame on them.

The result is an inefficient, underproductive industrial sector that can't provide the kinds of products people demand for the price that they should be paying according to the market; these overpriced and inferior quality goods reduce the buying power of the consumers in the country while simultaneously reducing foreign demand for the good until the industry becomes unprofitable, at which point the government has to step in to subsidize it or it goes under.


The life story of India's Tata Enterprises.

a) A point of clarification: Are you (the OP) saying that currently developing countries will be deprived of the chance to use tariffs as a source of funding, or that countries that have developed in the past based on tariffs as a source of funding will be undermined now?

In either case, the flaw in your reasoning is the assumption is that tariffs are the only way you can fund a country. Just because countries evolved that way when it was the dominant paradigm doesn't mean they can't do something different now. It's adaptive pressure: countries develop in the way that serves their interests most in the context of the dominant paradigm, whether that's one of protectionism or free trade.

The objection that's sure to be raised is that this transition will cause upheaval and consume resources, possibly to the short-term detriment to some countries, or some sectors thereof. The question being, why waste the time and resources if we're just shifting paradigms that countries can work equally well under/in?

The answer is that free trade is superior: it's a more efficient and productive system that better allocates resources. Protectionism, as you stated, is an artificial barrier and distortion in the global market that prevents arrangements from being maximally Pareto-efficient. Freedom of trade always induces net long-term benefits to a nation's economic situation. So the paradigm shift "pays for itself", so to speak.

b) Referencing the objection to the pattern of growth, this time. What you fail to see when making your objection is that 1) we're not limited to Earth, and 2) growth is to our continuous benefit as a species, and is in truth our absolute duty. To support:

1) You're right: In the long term, Earth has natural limits inside which continuous growth cannot be sustained indefinitely. The universe, on the other hand, lacks such limits. Well, that's not actually true, but it isn't something we really have to worry about until deep time. But in the meaningful term, space is an effectively unlimited source of living space, energy, and material resources.

2) Let's go back to the deep-time, universal point of view again for a moment. In the end, entropy wrecks everything. We have nowhere to go - we're going to slowly cease to exist. That in mind, our greatest duty and our greatest benefit is to minimize entropy and extend our energy-matter resources for the maximum amount of subjective time, activity, cognition, etc.

To this end, we have growth. What is growth? It takes untapped resources and uses them, maximizing the amount of value and efficiency you get out of them. Think about it this way: the mass of the entire ecosystem of Earth, converted into computronium (matter optimized at the atomic level for computation) can store and run the informational content of trillions of similar ecosystems, going by the Beckenstein bound and other features of information physics. Doing the same to the human population's fleshy mass could host trillions of minds. What is the greater good? Growth. It allows us to get the most out of what we have - it's a catalyst for conversion into a more valuable and efficient form.

If you want to 'sustain' civilization, there's nothing better than growth.

The life story of India's Tata Enterprises.

And Hindustan Motors. For a few decades, effectively the only car anyone could buy was a rebadged version of the '48 Morris Oxford. If you look at the Indian economy from 1947-1989 and compare it to 1989-2006, you can see the difference that liberalization makes.

-snip-
If you want to 'sustain' civilization, there's nothing better than growth.

That was an absolutely amazing post. Growth is the engine of civilization; without it, we stagnate and quite likely decline rather than maintain our current level of technology.

Tariffs don't protect--they harm. They cause the rest of the populace to pay more for goods than they otherwise would.

I would suggest this essay (http://www.mises.org/econsense/ch89.asp) by Murray Rothbard to help you understand.

I understand that theory. Now try actually addressing my point.

Countries can eliminate their debt by encouraging development. With the increases in development, the developing nations will be able to accrue more capital, and then pay off their debts.


Please explain how countries can accumulate capital when they have to direct all of their finances to meeting their debt service payments.

a) Actually no, developed countries developed at a time they had colonial empires, which enabled them access to large markets, tax free (which they closed to anyone else true, but in effect what you had were colonial free trade areas). Comes to my mind the British and India, but there are plenty of examples.


I think overall you have made some excellent points. I am not sure if I would describe the colonial empires as "free trade area" exactly. I understand that they gave the metropolitan countries access to the markets of the colonies, and access to their natural resources, in a favourable tarriff environment. However, the main industries of the metropolitan countries were still effectively protected from competition from other industrialized nations. And the metropolitan countries often took steps to actively prevent some of their colonies from competing, like when they sent the troops into India to smash the looms and destroy the textile trade.


b) As i said, I agree with the institutions part. However, funding for those institutions can be arranged in a more free, prosper economy by taxating citizens, consumption and industries, that are made wealthier by living in a free-trade environment.


Agreed. Once they industralize though. My point was that at the early stages of development, there is very little income to tax and it would be almost impossible to tax consumption. My argument was that at that stage, it would be difficult to find any other source of revenue other than tarriffs. They can certainly shift to income and consumption taxes as the economy develops.




However, if we rely more on free trade, our economies can become more efficient, i.e., do more with less. Therefore, it is conceivable that we can become richer, without blowing the ozone layer away, or making the polar bears extinct.



I agree. But the experience has been that as our economies grow, our levels of consumption increase. We may be using the resources more efficiently, but we still use more of them overall.

The current trade environment is too biased towards the powerful rich countries to successfully impliment a Free Trade system. There needs to be a levelling of the playing field (i.e. eliminating third world debt so that their money can go towards improving their economies and not ours, and supporting progressive elements within said countries), before Free Trade could work.

Another way to level the playing field would be to actually allow free trade in agriculture, which is one of the few areas where the least-developed countries have an opportunity to trade.

Of course they can. Specialization is the key to success in a free trade environment. A poorer country can start off with the basic industrial fields that were key to the industrialization of the developed world, such as clothing manufacturing, and build off of that industrial base much like the industrialized nations did.


But the industrialized nations developed those industries behind the protection of high tarriff barriers. As did most of the developing nations that have made progress in recent years.

So would Protectionism such as Trade tarrifs be justifiable for poor countries but not rich? In my opnion Free/Fair Trade can be of great help to developing countires(can't dispute Ricardo's Theory on Compararative advantage), except that Rich countries can protect themselves from the natural advantages developing nations have-whereas poor countries cannot do the same.
I think people have disputed Ricardo's theory because it is based on assumptions that don't hold water in the real world, like the immobility of capital.

The problem is, all this development will, in a conservative estimate, take up to eight decades to have a major impact (as opposed to the 12-15 decades the developed world took to do the same trick without such a leg-up). The anti-globalisation morons see this as taking too long and want everything now now now! (which is why I consider them morons). They fail to see that the only real alternative is the old status quo - which was the developed countries vampirising the undeveloped mercilessly.

First of all, I think it is easy to say ... oh it will only take 8 generations or so ... when we are sitting here enjoying the benefits of industrial society. If the shoe were on the other foot, I am sure we would not be placated by the fact that our great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great granchildren might actually prosper.

Second, I am still not sure it will happen at all, let alone in eight generations. I have some concerns that the inability to use tarriffs to develop domestic industries and to fund the necessary organs of government will ensure that underdeveloped countries never develop.

When we have unlimited wants everyone remains unsatisfied. But growth makes it possible for more people to have more wants satisfied than it would be otherwise.

I think the point was that if we ignore ecological limits, and keep growing in order to satisfy our wants, we will soon undermine the ecosystem that makes life possible. In other words, we will be satisfying current wants at the expense of future needs.

That's pure bullshit and you know it. Every single instance of sustained development has seen the population increase their quality of life as growth goes on.
That's pure bullshit and you know it.

Please explain how countries can accumulate capital when they have to direct all of their finances to meeting their debt service payments. Quite true.



Now for my POV on Free Trade it's not 'Fair' but nothing is fair. I think people need to realize that, everyone can't have everything. And those who seem to think that are fools. All systems will have someone getting the Shaft, with Free Trade it's the nations who got left behind, they will forever lag behind the more devloped nations (Unless they get exploited by a Foregin business, IE Asian slave labor).

The problem with tariffs in developing countries is that it creates built-in inefficiency that gradually begins to cost them more and more as the economy matures;

Agreed, but can they not start off with tarriffs and then phase them out as the economy develops, their industries become competitive, and other sources of government revenue become available? As I have pointed out, most countries have developed using tariffs in this way.

Another way to level the playing field would be to actually allow free trade in agriculture, which is one of the few areas where the least-developed countries have an opportunity to trade.

That would not work straight away though. As the infrastructure is not equal in all countries. For example, a farm in the middle of Africa would have to be able to transport their produce to the coast for shipping, but as roads in Africa are nearly nonexistant, the farmer would have to pay extra money in purchasing a larger, more petrol-hungry 4x4. Whereas a Europeans or American farmer could have their produce transported by an efficiently scaled truck on a modern road. On this basis the First World produce would be cheaper.

This is why there needs to be a transistionary period where trade actually favours the Developing World so that their infrastructures can be brought up to a level where they are more fairly competing with our own. After this equalisation is brought about, complete free trade would be workable and recommendable.

Who the fuck taught you history? The colonists wanted to trade, free of extra charge, with nations besides Britain, and that was not allowed.
You're talking about tax on things they couldn't produce like tea. They wanted protection on things like cloth making factories. England wanted to import cheap cotton from the Americas and suppress the growth of industry in the colonies. After the revolution there was tax on the import of cloth and other things the Americas could produce.

The Mexican economic problems have to do with things other than NAFTA.

And not only that, the colonies were the ones who rebelled against the taxes and tarriffs, not for them.
Protective tarrifs only protect if the country can produce what is being taxed. The Americans couldn't produce tea. The other taxes such as the stamp tax were on legal documents not production. The Americas had small industries that needed protection forcing the people to buy products produced in their own country rather than buy products produced in more efficient industrial nations. The main product in this case was cloth. England wanted cheap cotton to supply their mills and wanted to return that cotton to the Americans as finished product.

That would not work straight away though. As the infrastructure is not equal in all countries. For example, a farm in the middle of Africa would have to be able to transport their produce to the coast for shipping, but as roads in Africa are nearly nonexistant, the farmer would have to pay extra money in purchasing a larger, more petrol-hungry 4x4. Whereas a Europeans or American farmer could have their produce transported by an efficiently scaled truck on a modern road. On this basis the First World produce would be cheaper.

This is why there needs to be a transistionary period where trade actually favours the Developing World so that their infrastructures can be brought up to a level where they are more fairly competing with our own. After this equalisation is brought about, complete free trade would be workable and recommendable.

I'm thinking that it's the lack of parity in infrastructure more than anything else that causes the free trade scheme to off-kilter. Where you look at success stories in 3rd World development (the Mexican miracle, for instance, from roughly 1960-1982, the Taiwanese and Korean post-war booms, and China), you usually see one of two things. The first is said country enacting what are effectively tariffs on their own. An example of this would be the Chinese policy of pegging their currency to the dollar for favorable exchange values or the nationalization of the Mexican oil production and distribution system. The second is a country securing heavy financing from a First-World nation to construct their own infrastructure and internal market, which is effectively what the Taiwanese and South Koreans did with U.S. backing in the last 50 years.

It certainly is true that high tariffs can yield inefficiencies in the market; U.S. tariffs and subsidization of agriculture, for instance, is precisely what results in copious overproduction of food (although I would point out to people who criticize the inefficiency of the subsidy system that poor people, however miserable they might be, don't riot if they are at least well-fed), but it may well be the only tool in the box to really build up infrastructure in the developing world.

a) A point of clarification: Are you (the OP) saying that currently developing countries will be deprived of the chance to use tariffs as a source of funding, or that countries that have developed in the past based on tariffs as a source of funding will be undermined now?


The former. I think people are misunderstanding my argument. I am not saying that tariffs should be introduced on a permanent basis. I am saying that LDC's should be able to use them at the early stages of development and then phase them out.


In either case, the flaw in your reasoning is the assumption is that tariffs are the only way you can fund a country. Just because countries evolved that way when it was the dominant paradigm doesn't mean they can't do something different now. It's adaptive pressure: countries develop in the way that serves their interests most in the context of the dominant paradigm, whether that's one of protectionism or free trade.


If you have alternatives for how you fund the kind of state apparatus that is required for a free market economy to function, then I would be interested to hear them. As I have pointed out, income taxes and consumption taxes are not a viable option for LDC's. And I don't think the dominant paradigm has changed as much as you suggest. The Asian Tigers who emerged in the 1970's and 80's, when free trade ideology was becoming ascendant, nonetheless used protectionist policies. As I said, I'm hard pressed to think of a country that hasn't developed using tarriffs in some way. If you can, I'd be interested to hear it.


The objection that's sure to be raised is that this transition will cause upheaval and consume resources, possibly to the short-term detriment to some countries, or some sectors thereof. The question being, why waste the time and resources if we're just shifting paradigms that countries can work equally well under/in?

The answer is that free trade is superior: it's a more efficient and productive system that better allocates resources. Protectionism, as you stated, is an artificial barrier and distortion in the global market that prevents arrangements from being maximally Pareto-efficient. Freedom of trade always induces net long-term benefits to a nation's economic situation. So the paradigm shift "pays for itself", so to speak.


Free-trade is superior in theory. I am talking about real world application. Free trade theory makes alot of assumptions that don't hold in the real world. For example, in determining comparative advantage it assumes there are no externalities or other distortions.


b) Referencing the objection to the pattern of growth, this time. What you fail to see when making your objection is that 1) we're not limited to Earth, and 2) growth is to our continuous benefit as a species, and is in truth our absolute duty. To support:

1) You're right: In the long term, Earth has natural limits inside which continuous growth cannot be sustained indefinitely. The universe, on the other hand, lacks such limits. Well, that's not actually true, but it isn't something we really have to worry about until deep time. But in the meaningful term, space is an effectively unlimited source of living space, energy, and material resources.


I agree we are not limited to earth but be realistic. We are not about to build mining colonies in Mars or otherwise be able to access the resources of limitless space anytime soon. At current rates of consumption (and environmental destruction) we'll be lucky if we don't exhaust the earth's natural resources or collapse the ecosystem before inter-planetary travel is even viable. We are already past the oil and natural gas peaks, meaning our cheap and abundant sources of energy are rapidly being exhausted. Also, as earth is (to date) the only planet we know of that can support life as we know it, so it would be downright foolish to continue to degrade our biosphere in the hopes that we might someday reach another planet.



2) Let's go back to the deep-time, universal point of view again for a moment. In the end, entropy wrecks everything. We have nowhere to go - we're going to slowly cease to exist. That in mind, our greatest duty and our greatest benefit is to minimize entropy and extend our energy-matter resources for the maximum amount of subjective time, activity, cognition, etc.



To this end, we have growth. What is growth? It takes untapped resources and uses them, maximizing the amount of value and efficiency you get out of them. Think about it this way: the mass of the entire ecosystem of Earth, converted into computronium (matter optimized at the atomic level for computation) can store and run the informational content of trillions of similar ecosystems, going by the Beckenstein bound and other features of information physics. Doing the same to the human population's fleshy mass could host trillions of minds. What is the greater good? Growth. It allows us to get the most out of what we have - it's a catalyst for conversion into a more valuable and efficient form.

If you want to 'sustain' civilization, there's nothing better than growth.

Equilibrium, not growth, is the hallmark of a succesful natural system (and there is no denying we are part of a natural system). A natural system where one species grows at the expense of all else will simply collapse.
.

In a steady state economy, efficiency would actually be used to maximize the value and efficiency from the same amount of resources. In your perpetual growth economy, efficiency simply actually leads to increased throughput of resources over time, leading to more rapid resource depletion.

Growth does not sustain a civilization. Those civilizations that have grown most rapidly have also been the ones that collapsed the most spectacularly.

Agreed, but can they not start off with tarriffs and then phase them out as the economy develops, their industries become competitive, and other sources of government revenue become available? As I have pointed out, most countries have developed using tariffs in this way.

It's very risky. The problem is that tariffs often become motivated by politics and populist appeal rather than economic reality; as a result, it's hard to eliminate those tariffs once they've outlived any usefulness they might have had. Also, the industries protected don't tend to be competitive; otherwise, they wouldn't need tariffs to protect them from outside competition.

Growth does not sustain a civilization. Those civilizations that have grown most rapidly have also been the ones that collapsed the most spectacularly.

Growing too fast is not good, but neither is no growth. The goal is to try and keep growth at a rate that can be accomodated by the larger ecosystem; generally, that rate is between 2-4% per year depending on what drives the growth and how resources are consumed. The more circular the economy is in terms of its resource consumption, the higher the rate of growth that can be sustained.

Also, an economy with more services and information-driven growth can sustain a higher growth rate since there is no real resource limit to the growth of ideas.

It's very risky. The problem is that tariffs often become motivated by politics and populist appeal rather than economic reality; as a result, it's hard to eliminate those tariffs once they've outlived any usefulness they might have had. Also, the industries protected don't tend to be competitive; otherwise, they wouldn't need tariffs to protect them from outside competition.

They could agree a tarriff schedule with the developed nations. Once certain development benchmarks are reached, they would be required to reduce their tariffs.

I know the LDC's already get some breaks, but they are limited and inadequate.

Even when I was still a leftie I never believed in protectionism. Even before I had any feeling for economics and politics I considered myself a citizen of the world before anything else. I was fascinated by travelling, whether to Berlin or to Turkey or anywhere else.

It never seemed excusable to me to do anything to hurt the free flow of people and people-produce to anywhere in the world.

As for the debate...evidence (http://www.stanford.edu/~wacziarg/downloads/integration.pdf) (big pdf-file, but worth it) cuts it short. Trade liberalisation helps poor countries' economies. Full Stop. It's a fact.

And if you wonder why so many countries are still poor, go to this website (http://info.worldbank.org/governance/kkz2002/) and have a look.

Even when I was still a leftie I never believed in protectionism. Even before I had any feeling for economics and politics I considered myself a citizen of the world before anything else. I was fascinated by travelling, whether to Berlin or to Turkey or anywhere else.

It never seemed excusable to me to do anything to hurt the free flow of people and people-produce to anywhere in the world.

As for the debate...evidence (http://www.stanford.edu/~wacziarg/downloads/integration.pdf) (big pdf-file, but worth it) cuts it short. Trade liberalisation helps poor countries' economies. Full Stop. It's a fact.

And if you wonder why so many countries are still poor, go to this website (http://info.worldbank.org/governance/kkz2002/) and have a look.

I honestly don't know why I was ever against this. Really, I don't.

Growing too fast is not good, but neither is no growth. The goal is to try and keep growth at a rate that can be accomodated by the larger ecosystem; generally, that rate is between 2-4% per year depending on what drives the growth and how resources are consumed. The more circular the economy is in terms of its resource consumption, the higher the rate of growth that can be sustained.

Also, an economy with more services and information-driven growth can sustain a higher growth rate since there is no real resource limit to the growth of ideas.

Perpetual growth is not sustainable in a finite world. A growth rate of 2-4% even if not sustainable, as the present development path of the industrialized countries illustrates. Efficiency may be increasing, but so is overall resource use and throughput. Agreed that a more circular economy can help to mitigate the effects, but ultimately it is impossible to have a zero waste economy (as illustrated by the point about entropy above) which is what would be required to sustain indefinite growth.

There is no resource limit on the growth of ideas, but service industries still require resources in order to function.

And if you wonder why so many countries are still poor, go to this website (http://info.worldbank.org/governance/kkz2002/) and have a look.

I agree that good governance and economic development are intricately linked. Which is precisely one of my points. How is a LDC supposed to finance proper institutions of governance without tarriffs as a significant source of revenue?

How is a LDC supposed to finance proper institutions of governance without tarriffs as a significant source of revenue?
Really, it's not like these countries haven't been able to secure pretty substantial funds from aid, loans and the like. The problem is that most of that money wasn't used properly. And taxes are still an option too, of course. It's not like these governments have great welfare or healthcare payments to make. But perhaps they might have to cut spending on their militaries and the rampaging militias in their neighbouring countries...

But the core issue is really that money can't make a corrupt and broken system disappear. It's whether a government is actually intending to get rid of corruption. You don't need money so much as a bit of vision and the willingness to implement it.

Perpetual growth is not sustainable in a finite world. A growth rate of 2-4% even if not sustainable, as the present development path of the industrialized countries illustrates. Efficiency may be increasing, but so is overall resource use and throughput. Agreed that a more circular economy can help to mitigate the effects, but ultimately it is impossible to have a zero waste economy (as illustrated by the point about entropy above) which is what would be required to sustain indefinite growth.

There is no resource limit on the growth of ideas, but service industries still require resources in order to function.

That's why expansion in to space is desirable; resources are abundant enough that the losses from an efficient economy are recovered and growth can continue. There are enough resources out there for us to grow for a long time; ideally, the outcome of growth will be a technological level high enough to render such concerns irrelevant if that is possible.

They could agree a tarriff schedule with the developed nations. Once certain development benchmarks are reached, they would be required to reduce their tariffs.

That's the way financial aid usually works; ideally, we should be focusing on aid rather than tariffs as a means of developing infrastructure and improving the quality of their workforce. That way, they can compete with other nations as part of the world economy rather than being reliant on protections that make them more vulnerable to other nations, especially those that would like access to their markets. After all, if you control the tariffs you can control their trade.

I know the LDC's already get some breaks, but they are limited and inadequate.

We should increase aid and provide more in the form of infrastructure, finance, and education/health services to build the base for an industrial economy rather than try and create an artificial one.

The former. I think people are misunderstanding my argument. I am not saying that tariffs should be introduced on a permanent basis. I am saying that LDC's should be able to use them at the early stages of development and then phase them out.

At the expense of other countries and the productivity, efficiency, free capital, etc. of the market as a whole. I completely understand what you're saying, and agree that it's a fairly reasonable solution, but it certainly isn't an optimal one, which is what I think we should be looking for.

If you have alternatives for how you fund the kind of state apparatus that is required for a free market economy to function, then I would be interested to hear them. As I have pointed out, income taxes and consumption taxes are not a viable option for LDC's. And I don't think the dominant paradigm has changed as much as you suggest. The Asian Tigers who emerged in the 1970's and 80's, when free trade ideology was becoming ascendant, nonetheless used protectionist policies. As I said, I'm hard pressed to think of a country that hasn't developed using tarriffs in some way. If you can, I'd be interested to hear it.

I can't point out an existing country that didn't - I doubt there is; almost every country today arose either from the colonizers or the colonized, both of which grew out of the economic system of mercantilism, for whose adherents protectionism and state manipulation and control of the flow of goods and services across national lines was an axiom, not a subject of debate.

As far as alternatives go, I'd propose a combination. A government whose nation and economy are just starting to truly develop has a lot to lose from clamping down hard on businesses, employers, labor, etc. with regulations and inspections; costs for that sort of thing can and should start out small and ramp up as the economy gets strong enough to support gradual imposition of stricter watchdog policies.

To match this we have an initially small, but gradually more profitable income and property tax. As you would I'm sure agree, such taxes can't be used too strongly early on because there isn't the free capital to support it, and it would cripple the budding economy. In addition, it simply wouldn't make much money for them. But if what the government does for and to business scales along with the taxes, (as it justly and functionally should) the two should for the most part cancel each other out.

But then we come, inevitably, to infrastructure. Business can't provide all of it; not locally formed business, at least. It has to be aided. This costs more money. This is where foreign investment, both commercial and governmental, comes in. It's in the best interests of the external global market for your country to develop; you're a source of value. Not to mention, if they help they get a finger in the pie before it's even finished baking. They want that. So they invest, and get you the money you need for your country to develop. Plus, other governments send aid, such as IMF loans, which the government can put to the task of developing infrastructure.

Now, I have a problem with the current implementation of IMF loans. They provide no oversight and organizational aid to the countries they loan to, which has two sides to the coin: the countries lack knowledge of where and how to invest, both for maximal gain and the ability to pay the loan back; and the IMF and the international community that donate to it with an expectation of a measurable positive effect in the global market and geopolitical theater don't get a quality assurance. This is a problem. The IMF needs to be more careful and responsible about how much it donates, when, and to who, and it absolutely needs to oversee how the monies are being spent.

A reformed IMF, combined with a national economy and government open to investment by foreign individuals and firms, can finance the growth. In the end, the market takes care of everything if you let it do its job.

Free-trade is superior in theory. I am talking about real world application. Free trade theory makes alot of assumptions that don't hold in the real world. For example, in determining comparative advantage it assumes there are no externalities or other distortions.

Which is precisely what a tariff, quota, sanction, unfair trade practice, etc. is. An distortion of the market that imbalances the system and causes the inflationary market bubbles, catastrophic corrections, and unstable local economic conditions and models that devastate developing nations.

In terms of externalities, that's one of the many beauties of the free market system: it's built to handle them. The market is an infinitely flexible and adaptable complex system that naturally balances and corrects its course as new factors come into play - that's one of its greatest strengths! It's the misguided, simplistic stopgaps of tariffs and such that the infinitely slow, static beasts called governments place on the faster, more agile market system that make it harder for that system to deal with externalities.

I agree we are not limited to earth but be realistic. We are not about to build mining colonies in Mars or otherwise be able to access the resources of limitless space anytime soon. At current rates of consumption (and environmental destruction) we'll be lucky if we don't exhaust the earth's natural resources or collapse the ecosystem before inter-planetary travel is even viable.

Then it needs to become viable faster, which coincidentially is happening right now. What did I tell you about the adaptability of the system? :) Space travel is closer than you'd think. Virgin Galactic is taking tourists on the first sunorbital hops through space less than 2 years from now. The private space industry is sucking up the fortunes of a dozen billionaire visionaries, with some public successes and a lot of behind-the-scenes work ramping up to commerical flight. Move over, NASA - private industry is heading for space.

Bottom line is, you can't sacrifice growth. Growth fails, productivity and efficiency fall, economies slow down, unemployment rates rise, profits decrease, standard of life falters, stagnation sets in. Civilization can't run without growth; it's what keeps things running. To make a no-growth situation work, you'd have to instate a global socialist government and impose population control to keep everything static. Is that a bright future for humanity?

We are already past the oil and natural gas peaks, meaning our cheap and abundant sources of energy are rapidly being exhausted.

Far from it. Fossil fuels are disgusting, inefficient, primitive sources of energy that aren't even close to the best we can obtain, without even leaving Earth. Hydrogen to fuel our people-movers and generation-IV nuclear fission reactors, later replaced by fusion reactors, to fuel a renovated superconducting electricity grid are the future of terrestrial energy. As we get into the mid/mid-late century, we can supplement that with orbital arrays of more efficient photovoltaic panels.

In terms of energy in general....we've got nothing but energy. The Sun is a fusion reactor millions of times bigger than the Earth. It produces energy in the form of heat, light, and radiation, with the kinetic energy its gravity field gives the planets, and with the thermal energy it creates in the interiors of planets with its tidal forces. Superconducting loops anchored to small moons of Jupiter orbiting through the Jovian magnetosphere can provide enormous power, as can thermovoltaic converters orbiting the solar poles. More energy than we'll know what to do with for quite a while.

Also, as earth is (to date) the only planet we know of that can support life as we know it, so it would be downright foolish to continue to degrade our biosphere in the hopes that we might someday reach another planet.

More or less anywhere can support us. If you have the material resources and the energy budget, any sector of empty space can be enclosed and turned into a living space. By the same token, some planets that in their natural state aren't suitable for long-term colonization by significant numbers can be terraformed. Mars being a great example.

But in the long run, providing living spaces for biologicals isn't really the issue. The important issue is information, and storage and running capacity for uploaded minds, AIs, etc. You can support a helluva lot more minds on a kilogram of matter than the human brain does. Horribly inefficient.



Equilibrium, not growth, is the hallmark of a succesful natural system (and there is no denying we are part of a natural system). A natural system where one species grows at the expense of all else will simply collapse.

This is true. But a natural system is a cyclical, steady-state one that exists only until the global natural cycle shifts far enough that they are outmoded, and then that particular system dies out. Pfft, extinct. In addition, a natural system doesn't make maximal use of its resources. Without growth, you can't have the technology that allows us to reach the point of advancement where we can get every bit of information and joule of energy out of our resources. The overarching goal is to minimize entropy and make the best use possible of our matter-energy, which requires growth.

An analogy: we're like a runaway virus that converts one organism, very primitive and inefficient, into another one, very efficient and advanced. But we require a constant supply of the former to keep living on inside the converted organisms, and the latter organisms require our continued presence to survive. If you confine us to a vat, eventually the whole thing smells of rotting organic material because the system has died. But if we jump from clump to clump in an endless space, than both we and the system is infinitely better off for our presence and efforts.

In a steady state economy, efficiency would actually be used to maximize the value and efficiency from the same amount of resources. In your perpetual growth economy, efficiency simply actually leads to increased throughput of resources over time, leading to more rapid resource depletion.

But if you can't maximize the efficiency of one resource without consuming other resources in the technological advancement to reach the next efficiency level, you're screwed. And that quandary is hit again and again and again until it applies everywhere - you've hit a glass ceiling in what the imprisoned, static system can obtain, and then you can't pump anymore out of your existing resources. Then you either go absolutely stagnant, and are rapidly outmoded, or you just collapse and die.

Growth does not sustain a civilization. Those civilizations that have grown most rapidly have also been the ones that collapsed the most spectacularly.

Actually, it's the ones that stagnate that collapse. Look at Rome: the most wildly successful civilization in history while it was growing, but when it stagnated and became slow, ingrown, corrupt, and lazy, it collapsed in on itself. Growth is what fueled its power and splendor; without it, it failed.

Really, it's not like these countries haven't been able to secure pretty substantial funds from aid, loans and the like. The problem is that most of that money wasn't used properly. And taxes are still an option too, of course. It's not like these governments have great welfare or healthcare payments to make. But perhaps they might have to cut spending on their militaries and the rampaging militias in their neighbouring countries...

But the core issue is really that money can't make a corrupt and broken system disappear. It's whether a government is actually intending to get rid of corruption. You don't need money so much as a bit of vision and the willingness to implement it.

Aid to date has been totally inadequate. These countries are already overburdened with debt from cold war era weapons purchases, so loans are not a realistic option. Cutting military spending is probably not a realistic option while militias are still rampaging. The only way out of that conundrum is to come up with an agreed way to redraw the borders to take into account the cultural, ethnic and linguistic realities, but that seems unlikely as well.

On the taxation issue ... please read my previous posts. What are they going to tax ... income? There isn't any. Consumption? Requires infrastructure that these countries lack. Tariffs are and have always been the most realistic option.

Corruption is a problem in part because the government is unable to pay anyone from the judiciary to the police to the bureaucracy enough that it isnt worth their while to supplement their income with a little bribery.

That's why expansion in to space is desirable; resources are abundant enough that the losses from an efficient economy are recovered and growth can continue. There are enough resources out there for us to grow for a long time; ideally, the outcome of growth will be a technological level high enough to render such concerns irrelevant if that is possible.

Desirable maybe. Not realistic though. I don't think we will ever reach a level of technology that makes nature irrelevant.

Snip

So essentially what you are advocating is that human beings become an insterstellar parasite or virus of some sort? That's not a future I want any part of ... sorry.

Desirable maybe. Not realistic though. I don't think we will ever reach a level of technology that makes nature irrelevant.

We won't know until we get there; given the accelerating rate of technological advancement, I wouldn't discredit our ability to shape the universe just yet. Given that our technological progress is not just getting faster but those discoveries are getting bigger in scope, I'd say that point is getting closer and closer at a faster rate. It's a singularity, you might say in mathematical terms.

These countries are already overburdened with debt from cold war era weapons purchases, so loans are not a realistic option.
Some of them. Others got pretty substantial cuts recently.

The problem is that these governments are absolutely incompetent at what they do. The only realistic way of giving them loans is if they don't get to decide what happens to them - but then silly people start having issues with sovereignty, like these countries deserve it.

On the taxation issue ... please read my previous posts. What are they going to tax ... income? There isn't any. Consumption? Requires infrastructure that these countries lack. Tariffs are and have always been the most realistic option.
You mean the easiest option.

I repeat: These countries don't need huge amounts of money, they need the willingness and expertise to spend a little in the right way. If there is virtually nothing there, a little improvement goes a long way.

So yes, tax income. Tax foreign companies like you would tax domestic ones. Make sure you foster the sort of industries your country is likely to be at an advantage in (financial haven? cheap labour?), and so on. It isn't impossible, it just takes a little bit more far-sight than manipulating foreign exchange rates to make Mercedes imports cheaper for you and your family to buy. That's pretty common in those countries, by the way.

Corruption is a problem in part because the government is unable to pay anyone from the judiciary to the police to the bureaucracy enough that it isnt worth their while to supplement their income with a little bribery.
It's first and foremost a cultural issue.

So essentially what you are advocating is that human beings become an insterstellar parasite or virus of some sort? That's not a future I want any part of ... sorry.

Why not? It's a beneficial conversion process. Beneficial for us, beneficial for everything. It's precisely what we do now, just extended onto the larger scale of space. We take raw resources and turn them into value.

Dumb matter sitting at the bottom of gravity wells orbiting a big nuclear explosion, wasting energy by vomiting it into the void, is transformed into a perfectly efficient system that uses all the energy and information the resources have to offer.

If you don't like the analogy of a virus because of ingrained negative connotations of disease and death, (I'll admit I should have factored that reaction in before using it as a metaphor) then how about this one? We're a runaway chemical process that turns coal into diamond, or energy.

Sound better?

Desirable maybe. Not realistic though. I don't think we will ever reach a level of technology that makes nature irrelevant.

Again, why not? That's where we've been heading our entire history. That's where growth is taking us. Have you ever seen a graph of technological innovations against time? It's exponential.

It's sometimes called the telescoping effect, or the Law of Accelerating Returns. Each discovery spawn more and bigger discoveries, sooner. It's held throughout our existence as a species and civilizations thereof, and there's no reason to think it will stop or slow down now. There's all the technological potential in the world left to go after. Have you ever heard of nanotechnology, biotechnology, infotechnology? Waves of the future.

That's what I'm talking about. Growing and innovating until you can do a better job of ordering the universe than nature, and then doing it. If you want things to be done the best way possible, you've got to do it yourself, and to do that, you have to grow.

I understand that theory. Now try actually addressing my point.
I did. Try reading what I linked to. Thanks.

It occurs to me that our countries, for the most part, developed quite quickly under protected circumstances, whereas some other countries developed quite slowly under protected circumstances. What makes you think that they will be any more successful in these next fifty years than they have in the last fifty? If history is any indication, they will fall further behind and we will continue to speed ahead. What's more, people will see this gap, say it is not fair, and demand more aid for those countries that are impoverished because they are trying to flourish under a system which inherently causes them to lag behind in the first place. No, it seems clear to me that free trade is going to be the system that alleviates the problem rather than exacerbating it.

As practiced in any capitalist economy, yes. Free trade allows powerful corporations from developed countries to gain access to cheaper labor in developing countries. This accomplishes two things.

First, it cuts the cost of producing commodities through the use of un-skilled labor in countries without worker rights laws.

Secondly, it cuts the value of labor and prevents a company from being completely unionized because only Western workers have the ability to unionize.

Most countries that are outsourced to are unable to form labor unions because of state interference. For common people, it is a lose-lose situation. The wages of common people in first world countries are cut and many people lose their jobs, and third world companies never have the chance the develop their own domestic resources. The wealth of the third world nation is extracted by the multinational corporation.

The point that most anti-free traders are arguing from is not a position of protectionism, but rather a position based on human rights.

free trade is great between equally well off nations(or cose at least)
there becomes a problem when there is such a big difference in wealth between the two countries trading, eg if america was to have free thrade with ethiopia, america would obviously have an advantage so american companies would dominate and fuck over the little ethiopian ones.
This would mean that ethiopia would have to put up trade barriers(protectionism) to redress the balance.
Unfortunatly, with the world as it is the rich nations use protectionism to keep them selves rich(ie america and the EU)where as it should be the other way round.Once most countries are on an equal(ish) footing then free trade will be brilliant!But the IMF and WTO are always telling poor nations to drop their trade barriers, but that only benefits rich countries who have the wealth at their disposal to exploit smaller/poorer countries resources.
Thats my take on things anyway..;)

The point that most anti-free traders are arguing from is not a position of protectionism, but rather a position based on human rights.
No, they'd like to THINK they are, but they are arguing from protectionism. They just wrap it in pseudo-rights (because what they claim are rights--aren't).

We won't know until we get there; given the accelerating rate of technological advancement, I wouldn't discredit our ability to shape the universe just yet. Given that our technological progress is not just getting faster but those discoveries are getting bigger in scope, I'd say that point is getting closer and closer at a faster rate. It's a singularity, you might say in mathematical terms.

Given our current rate of resource depletion and environmental degradation, I'd say we are taking a pretty big chance if all of the technological developments don't enable us to get there in time.

Some of them. Others got pretty substantial cuts recently.


The "substantial" nature of those cuts is debatable. But I don't think this is a crucial point to either of our arguments.


The problem is that these governments are absolutely incompetent at what they do. The only realistic way of giving them loans is if they don't get to decide what happens to them - but then silly people start having issues with sovereignty, like these countries deserve it.


Most of these governments don't have alot of options, and don't have alot of say in matters anyway. Between conditions on aid, conditions on World Bank loans, IMF restructuring programs, and WTO obligations, there are an awful lot of outsiders telling these countries what they can and can't do. And that is precisely part of the problem. None of these outsiders share the rewards of success, and none of them bear the consequences of failure. And as long as people in that position are making all of the decisions, the decision-making will be less than optimal. Self-determination simply makes sense. If you are indeed a Conservative (as I believe you have recently stated yourself to be), this should not be a difficult proposition to agree with. If we actually let these people make some decisions for themselves, we might be surprised what they could do.


You mean the easiest option.


No I don't. I mean the only realistic option. Income tax is not viable because there is so little income to tax. Consumption taxes are not viable because they require a more sophisticated market system to levy. No-one on this thread has yet suggested a more realistic taxation option.


I repeat: These countries don't need huge amounts of money, they need the willingness and expertise to spend a little in the right way. If there is virtually nothing there, a little improvement goes a long way.


You are right. But true self-determination is a pre-condition to the willingness and expertise.


So yes, tax income. Tax foreign companies like you would tax domestic ones. Make sure you foster the sort of industries your country is likely to be at an advantage in (financial haven? cheap labour?), and so on.

Unfortunately, the one area where they are usually forced to compete is low taxes. And I think that is a non-winner in the long run, because they do not get to establish the institutions of governance they require.


It isn't impossible, it just takes a little bit more far-sight than manipulating foreign exchange rates to make Mercedes imports cheaper for you and your family to buy. That's pretty common in those countries, by the way.

Common? Like widespread? Please cite your source for that assertion.


It's first and foremost a cultural issue.

Yes, but probably not in the way you think. Part of the problem is the lack of cultural match between the institutions of governance and the culture in question. Most LDC's are former colonies who simply inherited whatever governance mechanism the colonizing power left behind ... which is usually a rather poor cultural fit.

Obviously there are also cultural issues in terms of the fact that many LDC's borders were drawn up by colonial powers without regard to cultural, linguistic and ethnic groups (actually, they were often drawn up in order to divide such groups and turn them against each other, to the conqueror's benefit). But the point is, this has led to alot of ethnic strife that is hindering economic development and might have been avoided if the borders had been drawn up in a more sensible way.

For some interesting research on the relationship between governance and economic development, try the Insitute for Governance:

http://www.iog.ca/

Also check the Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development:

http://www.ksg.harvard.edu/hpaied/

Their research is on Native Americans obviously, but I think there are alot of paralells.

Why not? It's a beneficial conversion process. Beneficial for us, beneficial for everything. It's precisely what we do now, just extended onto the larger scale of space. We take raw resources and turn them into value.

Dumb matter sitting at the bottom of gravity wells orbiting a big nuclear explosion, wasting energy by vomiting it into the void, is transformed into a perfectly efficient system that uses all the energy and information the resources have to offer.


It is beneficial only if you accept that efficiency is a desirable end in and of itself and that it should trump all other values. I don't agree with that proposition.



Again, why not? That's where we've been heading our entire history. That's where growth is taking us. Have you ever seen a graph of technological innovations against time? It's exponential.

It's sometimes called the telescoping effect, or the Law of Accelerating Returns. Each discovery spawn more and bigger discoveries, sooner. It's held throughout our existence as a species and civilizations thereof, and there's no reason to think it will stop or slow down now. There's all the technological potential in the world left to go after. Have you ever heard of nanotechnology, biotechnology, infotechnology? Waves of the future.

That's what I'm talking about. Growing and innovating until you can do a better job of ordering the universe than nature, and then doing it. If you want things to be done the best way possible, you've got to do it yourself, and to do that, you have to grow.

I think it is pure hubris to believe that humans could ever order nature better than it can order itself. Anyone with any appreciation for the fantastic complexity of nature, anyone who has seen what folly humans have committee in trying to "better manage" nature, and anyone with any concept of the limits to human understanding would agree.

In terms of externalities, that's one of the many beauties of the free market system: it's built to handle them. The market is an infinitely flexible and adaptable complex system that naturally balances and corrects its course as new factors come into play - that's one of its greatest strengths! It's the misguided, simplistic stopgaps of tariffs and such that the infinitely slow, static beasts called governments place on the faster, more agile market system that make it harder for that system to deal with externalities.


Actually, externalities are one of the weaknesses of the free-market system. That is why they call it a "market failure". The market has failed to account correctly for something. And the system does not naturally balance and correct for that. In fact, under our present system, there is every incentive to avoid correcting for them. Businesses externalize costs wherever possible. Would they really willingly take on a cost that will reduce their profits if they can simply get everyone else to pay for it? Governments may be clumsy at times, but they may be the only body capable of establishing the systems required to internalize externalities. These can be as market-based as you like, but you can be darn sure that business won't set them up on their own.


Bottom line is, you can't sacrifice growth. Growth fails, productivity and efficiency fall, economies slow down, unemployment rates rise, profits decrease, standard of life falters, stagnation sets in. Civilization can't run without growth; it's what keeps things running. To make a no-growth situation work, you'd have to instate a global socialist government and impose population control to keep everything static. Is that a bright future for humanity?


It does not require a socialist system, and it is better than the alternative, which is growing until we collapse. And the bigger we get, the harder we will fall.




This is true. But a natural system is a cyclical, steady-state one that exists only until the global natural cycle shifts far enough that they are outmoded, and then that particular system dies out. Pfft, extinct. In addition, a natural system doesn't make maximal use of its resources. Without growth, you can't have the technology that allows us to reach the point of advancement where we can get every bit of information and joule of energy out of our resources. The overarching goal is to minimize entropy and make the best use possible of our matter-energy, which requires growth.


First of all, it depends how you define efficiency. Most natural systems are zero waste. Most human systems are not. Which is the more efficient?

Secondly, it also assumes that effeciency is an end that should trump all other ends, which I also don't agree with.


Actually, it's the ones that stagnate that collapse. Look at Rome: the most wildly successful civilization in history while it was growing, but when it stagnated and became slow, ingrown, corrupt, and lazy, it collapsed in on itself. Growth is what fueled its power and splendor; without it, it failed.


Or it grew too big for its resource base and simply collapsed. Like many civilizations before and since.

By the same token, some planets that in their natural state aren't suitable for long-term colonization by significant numbers can be terraformed. Mars being a great example.Mightn't terraforming Mars alter its gravitational pull on the earth?

Mightn't terraforming Mars alter its gravitational pull on the earth?

I'm assuming you're serious...even if we were to increase it's mass to that of Jupiter, it's gravitational effects on Earth would be too small to be detected.

I would seriously consider getting some books on basic physics and astrophysics. I'm not trying to be insulting, but your question indicates a serious lack of knowledge of either.

When it comes to foreign aid, the best way at the moment is in the form of loans. This is because when given a gift of a large sum of money, the recipient countries spend it in a wasteful manner. The money either goes into more lavish presidential palaces, huge monuments to their leader’s ego, etc. or it is just throwing more good money after bad by using it to continue a loss making venture.

Aid is then given in loans so that the recipients have to use it in a productive manner. This usually works pretty well, and when it doesn’t, most donor countries ‘forgive’ the debt if the recipient is unable to pay it off. These loans do not permanently cripple the recipient countries, that is simply a misconception a lot of anti-establishment protesters continue to foster because they do not care about distorting the facts of the case to try to make their point that “government bad, capitalism bad, my parents are idiots, I'm just so misunderstood, waaaa”.

Loans are the best way to ensure that:
1- the amount available for aid is far larger than would be otherwise (donors are more likely to give a lot when they have at least a nominal repayment as its easier to justify in the budget)
2- the money is far more likely to be spent in a reasonable manner.
3- donor countries do not get as much of a sense of entitlement or dependency on aid

Loan repayments are what fund a lot of the new loans given out to developing nations. Without that income, there is less money to go around.

The US has been proposing that while most countries should be getting loans, any country with a per-capita income of $500 or less should get the aid in the form of grants – while it does make it more likely to be squandered, even a good government with such a tiny economy would lack the ability to repay a loan in any meaningful way.

As practiced in any capitalist economy, yes. Free trade allows powerful corporations from developed countries to gain access to cheaper labor in developing countries. This accomplishes two things.
First: it cuts the cost of producing products through the use of cheaper labor, which allows companies to charge less for their products.

Secondly, it gives people in poorer countries jobs they would otherwise not have.

Win-win


The wages of common people in first world countries are cut and many people lose their jobs, and third world companies never have the chance the develop their own domestic resources.

Those that loose their jobs or have their wages cut are in the minority, and this loss is greatly offset by the gain everyone else has with cheaper products. Thus, the argument that offshore production is harmful is only the case if you put the welfare of a few workers above the welfare of the people.


free trade is great between equally well off nations(or cose at least) there becomes a problem when there is such a big difference in wealth between the two countries trading, eg if america was to have free thrade with ethiopia, america would obviously have an advantage so american companies would dominate and fuck over the little ethiopian ones. This would mean that ethiopia would have to put up trade barriers(protectionism) to redress the balance.

Unfortunatly, with the world as it is the rich nations use protectionism to keep them selves rich(ie america and the EU)where as it should be the other way round.Once most countries are on an equal(ish) footing then free trade will be brilliant!But the IMF and WTO are always telling poor nations to drop their trade barriers, but that only benefits rich countries who have the wealth at their disposal to exploit smaller/poorer countries resources.
Thats my take on things anyway..;)

The concept of free trade is basically that both countries are pretty much the same market – if American companies can meet the needs of the Ethiopians better than Ethiopian companies, the Ethiopian people are better off. Basically the question boils down to which is more important to you: having a high quality product from elsewhere or having a low quality bit of garbage that was produced locally: with free trade you can choose which one you want, with protectionism you are forced to take the garbage.

The rich nations of the world do not use tariffs to keep themselves rich – that is ridiculous. Trade barriers are used to protect a certain industry with enough political clout to get unfair benefits and shove the costs onto the rest of the nation. This is not to keep the nation rich, as it has a negative effect on the economy as a whole. Agricultural subsidies and tariffs cost those in rich nations billions of dollars every year, and keep other nations from exporting their products into said nations. Both the citizenry of the rich nation and the farmers of poor nations loose out on this for the benefit of the farmers in rich nations. The rich nations do not in any way keep themselves rich with tariffs as it costs them a lot of money to keep those tariffs.

The biggest problem with developing nations is the trade barriers between them – far more benefit can be had if they freely traded among themselves than if the wealthy nations dropped their barriers. Integration of developing economies would expand the market for their goods and give them a wider choice of goods to choose from – hardly anyone in wealthy nations are going to buy a lot of the low-end products and not many of those in developing nations are going to buy the high-end products of rich nations. Countries with similar levels of development could see a massive improvement and much better growth if they simply dropped their barriers to trade with each other.

I always get a laugh out of seeing anti-globalization groups – you have those misguided idiots who think globalization is harmful to developing nations (because somehow building a new factory in Tanzania and providing more jobs is ‘exploiting’ the people who would otherwise be unemployed and starving – and consumers paying lower prices is somehow a bad thing) and those who want to keep barriers so they can keep ludicrously high union wages (average compensation for a united auto workers union member is $81/hr) both together on the same issue. One who supposedly wants what’s best for the ‘poor people’ and the other who doesn’t want that poor person to have a job.

When it comes to foreign aid, the best way at the moment is in the form of loans. This is because when given a gift of a large sum of money, the recipient countries spend it in a wasteful manner. The money either goes into more lavish presidential palaces, huge monuments to their leader’s ego, etc. or it is just throwing more good money after bad by using it to continue a loss making venture.

Aid is then given in loans so that the recipients have to use it in a productive manner. This usually works pretty well, and when it doesn’t, most donor countries ‘forgive’ the debt if the recipient is unable to pay it off.


I think you may be contradicting yourself here. If the country knows they are unlikely to be required to repay the loan, that will not provide any more incentive than a grant to use it in a productived manner.

Also, the above examples you provide of misspending are governance issues, not issues of how the funding is received. If the people of that country had a choice, they would want that money spent on development rather than the leader's ego.




Those that loose their jobs or have their wages cut are in the minority, and this loss is greatly offset by the gain everyone else has with cheaper products. Thus, the argument that offshore production is harmful is only the case if you put the welfare of a few workers above the welfare of the people.


Disagree. The effects of free trade vary from country to country, depending on what comparative advantages they do and don't enjoy. In some cases job losses can greatly exceed the gains of lower prices, at least in the short term. The disruption may be temporary, but a hard pill for people to swallow nonetheless.


The concept of free trade is basically that both countries are pretty much the same market – if American companies can meet the needs of the Ethiopians better than Ethiopian companies, the Ethiopian people are better off. Basically the question boils down to which is more important to you: having a high quality product from elsewhere or having a low quality bit of garbage that was produced locally: with free trade you can choose which one you want, with protectionism you are forced to take the garbage.


Again, Ethiopians are only better off if the gains in lower prices exceed the loss of the income from the job losses. Which may or may not be the case.

In reality, it almost never boils down to an issue of quality. It boils down to an issue of price. The foreign piece of junk is slightly cheaper than the domestic piece of junk, so we buy it. It doesn't change the fact that most of what we buy these days is garbage.


The rich nations of the world do not use tariffs to keep themselves rich – that is ridiculous. Trade barriers are used to protect a certain industry with enough political clout to get unfair benefits and shove the costs onto the rest of the nation. This is not to keep the nation rich, as it has a negative effect on the economy as a whole. Agricultural subsidies and tariffs cost those in rich nations billions of dollars every year, and keep other nations from exporting their products into said nations. Both the citizenry of the rich nation and the farmers of poor nations loose out on this for the benefit of the farmers in rich nations. The rich nations do not in any way keep themselves rich with tariffs as it costs them a lot of money to keep those tariffs.


I would agree that the barriers to trade that developed countries use do now keep them rich, but they do contribute to keeping the LDC's poor, b denying them access to the one market in which they enjoy an advantage (i.e. agriculture).



The biggest problem with developing nations is the trade barriers between them – far more benefit can be had if they freely traded among themselves than if the wealthy nations dropped their barriers. Integration of developing economies would expand the market for their goods and give them a wider choice of goods to choose from – hardly anyone in wealthy nations are going to buy a lot of the low-end products and not many of those in developing nations are going to buy the high-end products of rich nations. Countries with similar levels of development could see a massive improvement and much better growth if they simply dropped their barriers to trade with each other.



Agreed ... but the dispute here has not been over whether similarly wealthy countries gain from trade with each other, but whether poorer countries gain from trading with richer ones.



I always get a laugh out of seeing anti-globalization groups – you have those misguided idiots who think globalization is harmful to developing nations (because somehow building a new factory in Tanzania and providing more jobs is ‘exploiting’ the people who would otherwise be unemployed and starving – and consumers paying lower prices is somehow a bad thing) and those who want to keep barriers so they can keep ludicrously high union wages (average compensation for a united auto workers union member is $81/hr) both together on the same issue. One who supposedly wants what’s best for the ‘poor people’ and the other who doesn’t want that poor person to have a job.

I don't think many people are anti-gloablization per se. It is more an issue of who is controlling the agenda.

A new factory may or may not be a benefit, depending on what people were doing before. People may be far happier as susbsistence farmers thaqn factory workers. It all depends on the circumstances.

Most of these governments don't have alot of options, and don't have alot of say in matters anyway. Between conditions on aid, conditions on World Bank loans, IMF restructuring programs, and WTO obligations, there are an awful lot of outsiders telling these countries what they can and can't do. And that is precisely part of the problem. None of these outsiders share the rewards of success, and none of them bear the consequences of failure. And as long as people in that position are making all of the decisions, the decision-making will be less than optimal.
Care to give me a few examples? Fact of the matter is that South Korea after the war had it worse than most of Africa. They did not get gigantic amounts of aid.
What they did do is run some decent policies, which many African countries have never done.
What about Singapore? Virtually no aid at all, and little more than a decently placed harbour in terms of resources. No schools, no proper system of government, other than what the Brits had left. A few good policies, and voilà: one of the highest GDP per capita ratings in the world.

Today you can find conditions on a lot of the money that is sent. Until not too long ago, that wasn't really the case. It was simply incompetent governments run by tinpot dictators or socialist ideologues that screwed up Africa. Not colonialism, not imperialism, not the Cold War.

And now you're proposing exactly what? Give these jokers even more power to do whatever they want to their people, and give them our tax money as well, unconditionally.
I am not against aid, but I am against aid that simply goes into Swiss bank accounts or is used to buy weapons to hack little kids' arms off.

Self-determination simply makes sense. If you are indeed a Conservative (as I believe you have recently stated yourself to be), this should not be a difficult proposition to agree with. If we actually let these people make some decisions for themselves, we might be surprised what they could do.
Don't ever call me that again! I think conservatism is the worst disease a human brain can have (aside perhaps from racism).
I'm probably best descibed as a libertarian and third year econ student.

No I don't. I mean the only realistic option. Income tax is not viable because there is so little income to tax.
Please tell me what they need a lot of money for. What exactly costs a lot of money about cleaning up a government? They've got the power to throw people in jail, that's all they need. And they've got the power to ask for help. Help, not money. A Marshall Plan, perhaps - clear targets to achieved with limited amounts of money, with strong control of the giving party over what happens to the funds.
You probably know the concept of diminishing marginal returns. To establish a functioning system of infrastructure in these places does not have to cost nearly as much as similar projects would in the Western world. Especially not if you let major international construction firms compete for such a deal.

You are right. But true self-determination is a pre-condition to the willingness and expertise.
These countries have been determining themselves for nigh-on sixty years now, and the governments have brought nothing but suffering for most of the people in Africa. Giving them even more freedom to do whatever the government this week feels is a good idea isn't exactly going to make things better.
It's not like we don't have the knowledge to make it better. Any half-decent development economist in the West can draw up a thirty-year plan for any of these countries. These governments probably have those plans on their desks.
They just don't care, because they think it's more important to play daily politics.

Common? Like widespread? Please cite your source for that assertion.
One of my lecturers did a paper about that once and told us about it. Not sure whether it would be freely on the web, but I'll have a look later.

Most LDC's are former colonies who simply inherited whatever governance mechanism the colonizing power left behind ... which is usually a rather poor cultural fit.
"Cultural fit" of what? Economics doesn't need a cultural fit.
These were either parliamentary systems (which were usually nothing but puppets), or dictatorships of some sort. It's not the system that is to blame, it's the retards who used them for their own ends.

But the point is, this has led to alot of ethnic strife that is hindering economic development and might have been avoided if the borders had been drawn up in a more sensible way.
Potentially, yes. Not that that can be changed, nor that it is somehow predetermined that these people had to fight each other. It was still people's choices that started wars.
But what are you really trying to achieve? Do you really just want to make tax money disappear into the pockets of the next Mobuto Sese Seko, so you can say afterwards: "But I threw money at the problem, it should've gone away!"

Given our current rate of resource depletion and environmental degradation, I'd say we are taking a pretty big chance if all of the technological developments don't enable us to get there in time.

That's where the world's governments and the resource markets have to step in. Expanding in to space will require a lot more than just technology to happen; however, I do think it will happen. Humans survived the Black Plague, WWI, WWII, and all manner of near destruction so we can undoubtedly do it again. Even resource depletion is a manageable challenge if we put effort in to overcoming it.

It occurs to me that our countries, for the most part, developed quite quickly under protected circumstances, whereas some other countries developed quite slowly under protected circumstances. What makes you think that they will be any more successful in these next fifty years than they have in the last fifty? If history is any indication, they will fall further behind and we will continue to speed ahead. What's more, people will see this gap, say it is not fair, and demand more aid for those countries that are impoverished because they are trying to flourish under a system which inherently causes them to lag behind in the first place. No, it seems clear to me that free trade is going to be the system that alleviates the problem rather than exacerbating it.
I don't normally push people for a response, but I am curious to see how an anti-free trader would respond to this. What makes you think that the fact that these nations failed to flourish in the hundreds of years when they were isolated from the rest of the world or even after the fall of imperialism will be more successful this time they hide themselves away from the rest of the world?

Actually, externalities are one of the weaknesses of the free-market system.
Wrong.


That is why they call it a "market failure".
Only because they don't know what the hell they are talking about and they compare a utopia (it requires omniscience) to reality, and then blame reality for getting it wrong. The whole "market failure" bullshit is one big use of the Nirvanna Fallacy.

The Market Failure Myth (http://www.mises.org/story/1035)
Why Externalities Are Not A Case Of Market Failure (http://www.mises.org/asc/2003/asc9simpson.pdf) (PDF)
What Are You Calling Failure? (http://www.mises.org/story/1806)


The market has failed to account correctly for something. And the system does not naturally balance and correct for that. In fact, under our present system, there is every incentive to avoid correcting for them.
Our present system isn't free trade, nor a free market.

It is beneficial only if you accept that efficiency is a desirable end in and of itself and that it should trump all other values. I don't agree with that proposition.

I would think that you, like most sane people, desire maximal utility from life, the universe, and everything. Given that there is x mass/volume/information in/of (the) universe and y amount of time left before entropy runs everything down, there is an amount z utils that can be derived from the universe across the time remaining. Once this is realized, getting as much utility out of the universe as possible becomes a question of efficiency.

If all this is too academic, think of it in terms of lives - how many lives, how many minds, can exist, perceive, and think before the universe ends? How many entities can have that chance? How many ideas will be had, how many ecosystems on the scale of galaxies can flourish in digital information-space, before it's all over? Is maximizing that number not a worthy goal?

I think it is pure hubris to believe that humans could ever order nature better than it can order itself.

Hubris is what I do best - I consider it a positive characteristic.

Anyone with any appreciation for the fantastic complexity of nature, anyone who has seen what folly humans have committee in trying to "better manage" nature, and anyone with any concept of the limits to human understanding would agree.

:rolleyes: Nice argument from intimidation. Care to offer any actual compelling points? Because as it is, all I see is you confusing your failure of vision for absolute reality. There are no arbitrary "limits" to human understanding - tell me, where do you claim these limits are? What, precisely, is the point beyond which humans cannot comprehend? Do you have any specifics as to what is beyond us and why, exactly, it is so? What is the upper limit and what compelling logic lies behind your claim of its existence?

The closest thing to a limit to our understanding is Goedel's Incompleteness Theorem, but though it frustrates pure mathematicians, I think we can safely write off absolute proof of the theoretical subset-of-a-subset of abstract mathematical theorems (of which an example has yet to be found) which are true but cannot be proved as not that important.

Actually, externalities are one of the weaknesses of the free-market system.

Actually....no. Externalities are a problem of flexibility - adapting to a change in circumstances fast enough to deal with the problem they present. The free market system, being the freest, more decentralized, and most motivated, changes at the greatest speed and with the greatest eases, allowing it react with maximal efficacy to externalities.

That is why they call it a "market failure". The market has failed to account correctly for something. And the system does not naturally balance and correct for that. In fact, under our present system, there is every incentive to avoid correcting for them.

What exactly are you talking about? Can you point to an undisputed, logically proven so-called "market failure" that has actually occurred? Can you outline a scenario in which a market system absolutely fails to deal with a problem?

Businesses externalize costs wherever possible. Would they really willingly take on a cost that will reduce their profits if they can simply get everyone else to pay for it?

Externalities and "externalizing costs" have no relation other than semantic similarity....

It does not require a socialist system, and it is better than the alternative, which is growing until we collapse.

But that isn't coming. In nature, a non-sapient organism that grows continuously eventually hits a limit and collapses, because it is incapable of foreseeing this limit and finding a way around it. Such is not the case with humans. Our limit is the biosphere; we have developed space travel. Gotta love us.

And also, it obviously requires a socialist system. A zero-growth economic state is achievable only by controlling economic transactions and forces using a central mechanism; this also happens to be very similar to the definition of socialism, which is a form of tyranny.

First of all, it depends how you define efficiency. Most natural systems are zero waste.

a) No system is zero waste. It's called the Second Law of Thermodynamics. All actions and systems cause a net increase in entropy.

Most human systems are not. Which is the more efficient?

"If you want to make an omelette, you've got to break some eggs." It's a necessary intermediate step. Every stage in the technological development of a sapient species is not going to be minimal-waste. Such is the nature of the dawn of technology, industry, etc. But these stages are necessary to reach the later ones, which will be infinitely more efficient than any natural system.

If you want an example of a massive possible improvement, look no further than the Sun. What does it do with all that energy? Jack shit. It vomits it uselessly into the void, with only a tiny fraction going to support any kind of life, mind, complexity, etc. The rest is waste, lost to the outer darkness. But a sentient species could conceivably advance to the point where you can engage in the level of stellar engineering required to build a Dyson sphere that absorbs all of a star's radiated energy. Now that's an efficiency improvement.

Or it grew too big for its resource base and simply collapsed. Like many civilizations before and since.

....but it didn't. Look at your history. Rome was no longer capable of keeping its vast territories in line only after an integral component of its system - growth - stopped. A lack of outward drive and impetus, an outlet for revolutionary pressures, a constant military pressure to supress the northern Germanics, a constant inflow of capital and new ideas, etc. etc. destroyed what a plethora of those things created - the greatest civilization humanity had ever seen.

Mightn't terraforming Mars alter its gravitational pull on the earth?

[winces] Please tell me you aren't serious?

If you are....I would recommend some textbooks, or even just a wiki article, on the basics of the gravitational force. To put it in perspective, that question is like asking Einstein if you'll live longer because you married a fat woman.

Wait, that was another physics example. Umm. Like asking a chem major if an oxidation reaction will make the chemicals rust?

I'm assuming you're serious...even if we were to increase it's mass to that of Jupiter, it's gravitational effects on Earth would be too small to be detected.

I would seriously consider getting some books on basic physics and astrophysics. I'm not trying to be insulting, but your question indicates a serious lack of knowledge of either.Um, I'm aware that I have a lack of knowledge of basic physics and astrophysics, which is why I phrased it as a question. So why wouldn't increasing Mars's mass and volume via terraforming it alter its gravitational pull on Earth?

That's where the world's governments and the resource markets have to step in. Expanding in to space will require a lot more than just technology to happen; however, I do think it will happen. Humans survived the Black Plague, WWI, WWII, and all manner of near destruction so we can undoubtedly do it again. Even resource depletion is a manageable challenge if we put effort in to overcoming it.

So the government will have to step in at the end? Wouldn't id be desirable if we attempt to address the problem before it reaches crisis proportions rather than waiting until it really hits the fan?

Care to give me a few examples? Fact of the matter is that South Korea after the war had it worse than most of Africa. They did not get gigantic amounts of aid.
What they did do is run some decent policies, which many African countries have never done.
What about Singapore? Virtually no aid at all, and little more than a decently placed harbour in terms of resources. No schools, no proper system of government, other than what the Brits had left. A few good policies, and voilà: one of the highest GDP per capita ratings in the world.


Exactly. And they were one of the examples I cited of countries that used protectionist trade policies. Among other things, they maintained high tarriffs to discourage domestic consumption. They also had heavy state investment in education, and other forms of state interventionism (financed in large part through said tarriffs). Singapore remains very much a nanny state to this day.


Today you can find conditions on a lot of the money that is sent. Until not too long ago, that wasn't really the case. It was simply incompetent governments run by tinpot dictators or socialist ideologues that screwed up Africa. Not colonialism, not imperialism, not the Cold War.


And who exactly do you think supported these tinpot dictators? Their own people, or the military superpowers of the Cold War era? Be honest ... a good chunk of Africa, most of Latin America, and a good part of Asia were beholden to one side or the other. And when they were puppets of one side, the other side was usually actively trying to overthrow them. These kind of conditions do not exactly lend themselves to economic development.


And now you're proposing exactly what? Give these jokers even more power to do whatever they want to their people, and give them our tax money as well, unconditionally.
I am not against aid, but I am against aid that simply goes into Swiss bank accounts or is used to buy weapons to hack little kids' arms off.


As am I. But if you are truly a libertarian, I don't understand why you think the western governments should have even more power to intervene in the lives of these people. Rather, we should be encouraging self-determination both of the states themselves, and the people within them.


Please tell me what they need a lot of money for. What exactly costs a lot of money about cleaning up a government? They've got the power to throw people in jail, that's all they need. And they've got the power to ask for help. Help, not money. A Marshall Plan, perhaps - clear targets to achieved with limited amounts of money, with strong control of the giving party over what happens to the funds.


They don't need alot of money. But they do need enough to pay their judges, police and bureaucrats well enough that they are not easily corrupted. If they can't establish an independent judiciary and police force, then all of the power in the world to throw people in jail is not going to enable them to overcome corruption.

And more importantly, if the money is raised by their own means (i.e. tarriffs), there will be all the more incentive to spend it wisely. It is easier to piss away something someone else has given you than something you earn yourself.


These countries have been determining themselves for nigh-on sixty years now, and the governments have brought nothing but suffering for most of the people in Africa. Giving them even more freedom to do whatever the government this week feels is a good idea isn't exactly going to make things better.


As I have pointed out above, most of these countries have not been self-determining. Many were puppet states, or beholden in some other way to the great powers. Give their people the real opportunity to determine their course, and the resources and options they need to do it, and would be amazed by the results.


It's not like we don't have the knowledge to make it better. Any half-decent development economist in the West can draw up a thirty-year plan for any of these countries. These governments probably have those plans on their desks.
They just don't care, because they think it's more important to play daily politics.


30-year plan? It sounds vaguely Soviet. :) But seriously, the only knowledge we have is that of our own experience. And in this case we aren't even applying it. We are asking them to do it a different way. My argument is make all of the options available to them (including the use of tarriffs) and see which one they use. Someone who is on the ground in one of these countries is going to have a far better idea of what suits that situation and what doesn't than some Western economist who has never been there.


"Cultural fit" of what? Economics doesn't need a cultural fit.


Sure it does, and I find it frightening that they teach otherwise in Econ school. Cultural attitudes regarding everything from private property to wealth accumulation are going to affect the success of an economic system. One of the reasons that the Asian Tigers are considered to have done well is that the economic systems they adopted were a good fit with existing Asian philosophies.

And the fit between the political system and culture (which is the main point I was arguing) is even more important.


These were either parliamentary systems (which were usually nothing but puppets), or dictatorships of some sort.
It's not the system that is to blame, it's the retards who used them for their own ends.

So you agree with my point above ... most of them were puppets. Also, if the system continually produces unfit leaders, then the problem lies with the system.


But what are you really trying to achieve? Do you really just want to make tax money disappear into the pockets of the next Mobuto Sese Seko, so you can say afterwards: "But I threw money at the problem, it should've gone away!"

Throwing more money at the problem is exactly what I am trying to avoid. What I have been arguing for all along is a system that enables these countries to raise their own revenues (through tarriffs initially), and establish the infrastructure needed to support a modern economic system.

At the end of the day, what I am advocating should be very much in line with your beliefs as a libertarian. Limit the interference of western governments in the day to day lives of the peoples of the less developed countries. Allow them to choose their own path to development, and enjoy the rewards of success or reap the whirlwind of failure.

I would think that you, like most sane people, desire maximal utility from life, the universe, and everything. Given that there is x mass/volume/information in/of (the) universe and y amount of time left before entropy runs everything down, there is an amount z utils that can be derived from the universe across the time remaining. Once this is realized, getting as much utility out of the universe as possible becomes a question of efficiency.


I do desire maximum utility, but I don't equate that with economic efficiency or wealth maximization. I will illustrate with an example. As a lawyer and a businessperson, it is most economically efficient for me to specialize in those areas. They are the tasks at which I am most efficient, and at which I can produce the most wealth. It does not make economic sense for me to grow my own food. It makes more sense for me to work, and pay someone else to grow my food. However, I happen to enjoy gardening. I may not be very good or very efficient, but It helps me relax, and enjoy life more. It is not economically efficient to engage in this activity, but it increases the utility I get from life, in terms of my enjoyment. I could think of tons more examples. What provides the greatest quality of life is not always what maximizes wealth or is most efficient.



:rolleyes: Nice argument from intimidation. Care to offer any actual compelling points? Because as it is, all I see is you confusing your failure of vision for absolute reality. There are no arbitrary "limits" to human understanding - tell me, where do you claim these limits are? What, precisely, is the point beyond which humans cannot comprehend? Do you have any specifics as to what is beyond us and why, exactly, it is so? What is the upper limit and what compelling logic lies behind your claim of its existence?


The limit is not so much a limit on the human capacity to understand as it is the simple vastness of all potential knowledge combined with the limited timespan in which we have to learn it. Given infinite time, we could probably eventually unlock all of the secrets of the universe. At this point in time, human knowledge is already vaster than a single human could possibly learn and comprehend. And the universe is vaster and more complex than we could ever comprehend in a million lifetimes.


Actually....no. Externalities are a problem of flexibility - adapting to a change in circumstances fast enough to deal with the problem they present. The free market system, being the freest, more decentralized, and most motivated, changes at the greatest speed and with the greatest eases, allowing it react with maximal efficacy to externalities.

What exactly are you talking about? Can you point to an undisputed, logically proven so-called "market failure" that has actually occurred? Can you outline a scenario in which a market system absolutely fails to deal with a problem?

Externalities and "externalizing costs" have no relation other than semantic similarity....


In most cases, the kind of external costs I am talking about are an individual manifestation of the economic phenomenon known as externalities. A cost that has been imposed on a person who is not party to a given market transaction. If a corporation does business in a certain way, and neither it nor the consumers of its products bear the costs of any part of the sale or consumption of its products, then there is an externality. That is exactly the kind of externality I am talking about, and exactly the kind our free-market system fails to discourage (in fact, it only encourages them).

An example of such a market failure would be global warming. Producers of CO2 emmissions do not bear the costs of their emissions, and therefore they are not factored into their economic decision-making with the consequence that CO2 is overproduced. The costs are externalized onto society at large and onto future generations. Potential solutions could be market-based, but a great deal of state intervention would be required even to put a carbon-trading system into place.



But that isn't coming. In nature, a non-sapient organism that grows continuously eventually hits a limit and collapses, because it is incapable of foreseeing this limit and finding a way around it. Such is not the case with humans. Our limit is the biosphere; we have developed space travel. Gotta love us.


Again with the god complex. Man knows better than nature ...


And also, it obviously requires a socialist system. A zero-growth economic state is achievable only by controlling economic transactions and forces using a central mechanism; this also happens to be very similar to the definition of socialism, which is a form of tyranny.


Socialism, like capitalism, requires perpetual growth. It is what the system is premised on. It just provides a different system of incentives. How else to deliver all those state-funded amenities? Capitalism and socialism are the flip side of the same disastrous coin.


a) No system is zero waste. It's called the Second Law of Thermodynamics. All actions and systems cause a net increase in entropy.


Fair enough. But the natural system is still lower waste than most human systems.



"If you want to make an omelette, you've got to break some eggs." It's a necessary intermediate step. Every stage in the technological development of a sapient species is not going to be minimal-waste. Such is the nature of the dawn of technology, industry, etc. But these stages are necessary to reach the later ones, which will be infinitely more efficient than any natural system.


And if the egg we breaks happens to be the only planet we know of at this point capabale of supporting life as we know it?


If you want an example of a massive possible improvement, look no further than the Sun. What does it do with all that energy? Jack shit. It vomits it uselessly into the void, with only a tiny fraction going to support any kind of life, mind, complexity, etc. The rest is waste, lost to the outer darkness. But a sentient species could conceivably advance to the point where you can engage in the level of stellar engineering required to build a Dyson sphere that absorbs all of a star's radiated energy. Now that's an efficiency improvement.


Possibly, but not a terribly realistic one at this point.


....but it didn't. Look at your history. Rome was no longer capable of keeping its vast territories in line only after an integral component of its system - growth - stopped. A lack of outward drive and impetus, an outlet for revolutionary pressures, a constant military pressure to supress the northern Germanics, a constant inflow of capital and new ideas, etc. etc. destroyed what a plethora of those things created - the greatest civilization humanity had ever seen.


So if Rome had kept on growing it would have just continued to grow indefinitely?

In most cases, the kind of external costs I am talking about are an individual manifestation of the economic phenomenon known as externalities. A cost that has been imposed on a person who is not party to a given market transaction. If a corporation does business in a certain way, and neither it nor the consumers of its products bear the costs of any part of the sale or consumption of its products, then there is an externality. That is exactly the kind of externality I am talking about, and exactly the kind our free-market system fails to discourage (in fact, it only encourages them).
What you call "externality" is, in reality, something called "cause-and-effect".

And if there are negative externalities, there are positive ones as well. Let's say I plant some flowers. They make the area around my house smell nice and look pretty. Others get to enjoy that without bearing the cost. Therefore, reality has failed because the cost was not borne by everyone.

ok, i read half the first page, so bear with me if this has already been covered:

my problem with free trade isn't so much it's effect on the poor nations or the rich ones, but those caught in the middle.

completely free trade either generates microsoft like entintys in all sectors, or favours nations like china. they've got the technology to compete wtih the richer nations, and the workforce/labour costs/materials cost to out do the smaller, poorer nations.

you cannot have every nation sift to specializeing in what it does well. if that were the case, china would do... almost everything, at low quality and low price. everyone else would buy chinese stuff because it was Cheaper... the masses don't take into account that a washing machine that costs ten times as much but will last for you, your children, and their children is a better deal than a 200 dollar washing machine that you'll have to replace in 15 years.

return That mentality, free trade MIGHT work.

in the mean time, all you get is the bulk of nations utterly crippled, the few that arn't makeing money of vertual [or litteral] slave labour, and the corperate bosses being the only ones with any money.

pure free trade ultimately ends with the bulk of people liveing in africa like conditions.

on the OTHER hand, unrestrained tariffs and subsides, excessive taxation, and the like, also screw over a nation. it's economy will boom, then implode.


i would suggest a system of slideing tariffs. if you produce it internaly at all, tariff it. the tarifs should bring it's sale price to NO MORE than the regular sale price of the same product produced internaly, and should vary depending on how vital the product is, and how much you can produce internaly compaired to needs.

on the other side of the coin, exports of goods that you do not produce enough of internaly should be taxed also, makeing it unprofitable to sell a nessisary resorce to another country at the expence of your own [sometimes it is more profitable to export, which causes a shortage of supply in the produceing nation, driveing the prices up and screwing with the entire system]

end of the day, it occurse to me that a good idea would be a [idealy independant, reports to the head of state, not part of the normal system] government run trade company whihc would handle all imports and exports, as well as keeping records of stockpiles of various things.

not comunisem, individuals still own there own stuff.

the idea being that the sell price to this entity would never be higher than the highest recorded domestic sell price, and the buy price from them would also never be lower than the highest recorded domestic price.

the trade company would buy and sell on the domestic market at the going rates, perhaps, but would always do it's best to get the best price/quality/quantity deals it could in both directions. any profet or deficit would go in and out of the national tresury.

humm....

i've lost track of where i was going... still, if this enty were sucessful enough, it would allow for a reduction in taxes within the nation. managed properly, it could also completly replace either the goods and services tax [or whatever other equivilant exists] or the income tax.


the thing people seem to compleatly fail to take into account is this: a governments first duty is to IT"S OWN NATION. not it's people, mind, nor it's members, certainly not to random third world nations on the other side of the planet, or first world nations accross the sea. of course, helping the third world when you can is a good thing, but never at the expence of your own nation....


no government really truely seems to remember this.

if they did, methinks there would be less problems. things for the good of the nation are generaly for the good of the economy, for the people [long term, at least, if not always short term] and so on.


so freaken tangental.

economics, politics, and the like are all tied far to tightly togeather.

heh, personaly, i'd also advocate centralized warehouses for raw materials and goods....

there's probilby a word for my line of thinking.. it's not capitalizem, and it's not communisem... it's an odd arangment, useually used by empires or in times of war....

err... i'll stop now, i'm rambleing too much.

my problem with free trade isn't so much it's effect on the poor nations or the rich ones, but those caught in the middle.
How so? Free trade benefits everyone in the system, not just the outliers. Just because Microsoft is the largest software company does that mean it is unprofitable for any other firm to make software?

completely free trade either generates microsoft like entintys in all sectors, or favours nations like china. they've got the technology to compete wtih the richer nations, and the workforce/labour costs/materials cost to out do the smaller, poorer nations.

Free trade does no such thing – it encourages competition as if someone is dissatisfied with your product, business practices, or whatever they can look elsewhere. Monopolies are formed because of government regulation and restrictions on trade allowing a company to reduce competition. The only exception to this is when a company is so efficient at producing a very high quality product for little money, and manages to have a snazzy PR team to make sure everyone is happy with them – and if they make a great product for little money and everyone is happy I do not see that as a bad thing.

You really need to reevaluate what ‘free trade’ really means if you think China has open borders. Even with your example of China, despite their attempt to restrict higher end growth with currency manipulation, market forces are developing that economy to the point where some firms are moving on to other nations. As the standard of living has gone up, and wage expectations are increasing, raising the cost of labor. The “technology to compete with richer nations” comes from the firms from those richer nations, who take it wherever they want to go setup.

The only way China could at all compete with the ‘smaller, poorer nations’ it is out doing, is by keeping its currency artificially low – which not only did not work all that well, the distortion is getting so strong that they are revaluating the Yuan.

By the way, artificially pegging one’s currency is not typically considered free trade.

you cannot have every nation sift to specializeing in what it does well. if that were the case, china would do... almost everything, at low quality and low price.
Ah, I get it now – you are operating under a rather common fallacy. Countries specialize in what they have a comparative advantage in, not what they have an absolute advantage in producing. Every country has limited resources – if Lesotho suddenly became the most efficient producer of every product in the world, it still could not produce every product in the world. Other countries, which are less efficient at producing something, would still produce widgets because Lesotho is too busy producing gewgaws.

everyone else would buy chinese stuff because it was Cheaper... the masses don't take into account that a washing machine that costs ten times as much but will last for you, your children, and their children is a better deal than a 200 dollar washing machine that you'll have to replace in 15 years.
So you want to force people to buy what you think they should buy, because you know far better than they do what is best for them. In your example, perhaps I really need a washing machine but I cannot afford to spend $2000 on a washing machine – no matter how good – but I can afford a $200 one. And on another note, in your example the more expensive washing machine would have to last for 150 years just to break even, and somehow I think there might be enough reasons to justify changing washing machines a little more often than that.

Ever actually go look at washing machines? They have a whole array to choose from (wonderful thing about free markets – you actually get a choice in what to buy) so it is up to the individual which one to buy. Perhaps you are still living in a communist country where you only have one item of very low quality, but here a lot of people do go for the more expensive higher quality goods all the time. If that were not the case, every store would be a Wal-Mart and there wouldn’t be any Nordstrom’s.

in the mean time, all you get is the bulk of nations utterly crippled, the few that arn't makeing money of vertual [or litteral] slave labour, and the corperate bosses being the only ones with any money.
You really need to travel outside of your little ghetto – the world is not economically crippled and everyone is not slave labor. Let me know where you are from, because it is obviously not a nice place to live.

pure free trade ultimately ends with the bulk of people liveing in africa like conditions.
I strongly disagree that free trade will leave the entire world in poverty – free trade reduces distortions and makes the world more efficient at producing. So how does everyone have a drastic fall in living standards? Do we suddenly have space aliens coming down to collect most of what is produced?


i would suggest a system of slideing tariffs. if you produce it internaly at all, tariff it. the tarifs should bring it's sale price to NO MORE than the regular sale price of the same product produced internaly, and should vary depending on how vital the product is, and how much you can produce internaly compaired to needs.
So basically internal producers can charge whatever they want and the general populace gets screwed? This is exactly why conditions where the company bosses have money and nobody else does can come into existence.

on the other side of the coin, exports of goods that you do not produce enough of internaly should be taxed also, makeing it unprofitable to sell a nessisary resorce to another country at the expence of your own [sometimes it is more profitable to export, which causes a shortage of supply in the produceing nation, driveing the prices up and screwing with the entire system]

How do you define a ‘necessary resource’? If you do not domestically produce enough for domestic consumption, you import some – oh wait you can’t because you’ve imposed prohibitive tariffs. If it is more profitable to export something in a free market, local demand is not sufficient to justify the production. If there is a shortage of supply, there must be some outside factor causing such a disruption to the market – such as government price controls or trade barriers. Aside from unforeseen natural disasters or war, there is no other reason for such a shortage.

end of the day, it occurse to me that a good idea would be a [idealy independant, reports to the head of state, not part of the normal system] government run trade company whihc would handle all imports and exports, as well as keeping records of stockpiles of various things.
Wow, I am truly flabbergasted. You are actually suggesting the government give a monopoly on trade to a company answerable only to the head of state?

the idea being that the sell price to this entity would never be higher than the highest recorded domestic sell price, and the buy price from them would also never be lower than the highest recorded domestic price.
So basically you want to eliminate any potential benefit from trade? Trade brings benefits precisely because you export what you can easily produce domestically (less than global cost) and import what is more difficult (higher than global cost).

In your system the price of oil in Suadi Arabia would be practically worthless – so not being able to export it for any more than they could sell it domestically would mean it is not worth investing any money in production. The cost of raising salmon in Saudi Arabia is pretty high so the domestic price is much higher than the global price – so you import it to bring the cost down so that the people can afford to buy salmon.

Trade benefits everyone – the only ones who do not benefit are those trying to do something highly inefficient (like grow pineapples in Finland). Quite frankly I think the resources of Finland are better spent elsewhere.

i've lost track of where i was going... still, if this enty were sucessful enough, it would allow for a reduction in taxes within the nation. managed properly, it could also completly replace either the goods and services tax [or whatever other equivilant exists] or the income tax.

The only way this company could be profitable was by importing cheap goods and placing a high markup on it (taxing it). Basically you are placing a tariff on all incoming goods. You are not replacing a tax on goods, you are merely shifting the tax to the point of importation.

the thing people seem to compleatly fail to take into account is this: a governments first duty is to IT"S OWN NATION. not it's people, mind, nor it's members, certainly not to random third world nations on the other side of the planet, or first world nations accross the sea. of course, helping the third world when you can is a good thing, but never at the expence of your own nation....

How do you define a ‘nation’ then if the very people in it? So you think a government’s first duty is to those in power, and screw the common people? I believe that a government’s first and only duty is to the people.

Oh, by the way, all foreign aid is at the expense of the donor country – that money or material does not magically appear out of thin air. You are effectively saying you are opposed to all aid.

no government really truely seems to remember this.
Actually, while monarchies are out of style these days, there are quite a few dictatorships still around. Aristocracies that care only about themselves and not the people have to become more and more oppressive and will eventually see a revolt.

if they did, methinks there would be less problems. things for the good of the nation are generaly for the good of the economy, for the people [long term, at least, if not always short term] and so on.
This particular argument has been used by just about every monarch and dictator throughout history – and history generally refutes this.


Additionally… and I know you are likely to ignore my entire post and go off on this rather than take the time to think about my points… while I am not in any way a spelling or grammar nazi (as my own is far from perfect) – your post was atrocious. Even if you are just learning the language, you might want to consider using a spell checker as it will make you more understandable and probably help learn proper spellings.

yeah, the spelling and grammer thing is a result of typeing at three or four am without haveing slept, and the fact that i just suck at spelling.

i am aware that my proposed system has flaws. it was mearly a thought. i know full well that it wouldn't actually work as is.

a nation is an entity taken as a whole. the people are a part of this. the system is a part of this. the raw materials and land are a part of this. esentually, everything under the jurisdiction of the governing entity. at the end of the day, it boils down to the people, yes, but not their demands and whims. their actual needs. the continued existance of the nation for thier children and their childrens children. the constant improvement that means each successive generation will have a better life than the one previous. certianly a nation is Not those at the top of the heap, much as a ship is not it's rudder.

i'm aware my washing machine example was exagerated and a bit screwy.. how about this. i can buy a 5 dollar shirt made in china [i know it sounds like i'm picking on china, but it's the only one i have any significant experiance with] which will last me, oh, about a year. when there was actually some sort of tarif and so on properly managed and in place, one could buy a 20 dollar shirt made here [which is New Zealand, btw, not exactly a hell hole, though not perfect either] that would last 5 years, easily. i'm not sure on the exact numbers, but that's close. now though, the only way the local people can compete is to do designer gear. specialized stuff.

so, i can have an imported shirt for 5 dollars last me one year, and probibly not be a great shirt [from past experiance] or i can spend 120 dolllars or more on a fancy shirt that will last 5 or 6 years.

can you see where that's going? that's your specialization at work, in effect. now, i may not have the numbers perfect, they do change regularly, but that's a real life example.

on my original statement, where you say it benifites everyone, not just outlayers, i would argue that it doesnt' benifit the outliers either.

in an enviroment of total free trade and, by extention as the two philosophys seem very closely linked, at least very free market, the slave [or near slave] labour becomes nessisary to compete, simply becuase if one group can do it, everyone else either does it or fails.

a true freemarket, and, on a different scale, true free trade, apply a sort of natural selection to the system. the ultimate result of such is monopolys in everything. it is likely the system would break down before reaching thispoint. someone would panic and do Something, but still, that is where you end up.

i'm not quite sure how to argue the comparative/absolute idea. it doesn't sit right... i'll get back to you on it.

at any rate, trade is a 0 sum equation, at least in terms of money. every gain is someone else's loss. the underlaieing purpose of trade is to aquire goods, services, and resorces you require, in exchage for those you have a surplus of. keeping your imports balanced with your exports [or the other way round] is important, ... and i forget the rest of what i was getting at just there.

drat. it was a good point too. hate when that happens. maybe it'll come back to me. anyway. that is my responce, such as it is.

Angermanland: Specialization occurs all the time within your country. People do what they are good at, and as a result more is produced. What is so special about the border between your country and others, an arbitrary line drawn in the sand, that makes this impossible to occur on a larger scale?

at any rate, trade is a 0 sum equation, at least in terms of money. every gain is someone else's loss. the underlaieing purpose of trade is to aquire goods, services, and resorces you require, in exchage for those you have a surplus of. keeping your imports balanced with your exports [or the other way round] is important, ... and i forget the rest of what i was getting at just there.

Actually, everyone gains from trade. All countries have their production possibility curves shifted outward, which means that the people in each country have more access to more things than they had before they started to trade. By exporting the goods you make better than any other nation and importing the ones others can make better, your economy maxmizes the number of goods available to consumers.

so, i can have an imported shirt for 5 dollars last me one year, and probibly not be a great shirt [from past experiance] or i can spend 120 dolllars or more on a fancy shirt that will last 5 or 6 years.

The only reason why that $5 shirt would outsell and eventually eliminate the $120 dollar competition is because consumers are willing to sacrifice quality for lower cost; in this case, it would be a better value to buy 6 shirts for $30 and simply replace them each year than to pay the equivalent of $20/year for one shirt that lasts the same amount of time.

I do desire maximum utility, but I don't equate that with economic efficiency or wealth maximization. I will illustrate with an example. As a lawyer and a businessperson, it is most economically efficient for me to specialize in those areas. They are the tasks at which I am most efficient, and at which I can produce the most wealth. It does not make economic sense for me to grow my own food. It makes more sense for me to work, and pay someone else to grow my food. However, I happen to enjoy gardening. I may not be very good or very efficient, but It helps me relax, and enjoy life more. It is not economically efficient to engage in this activity, but it increases the utility I get from life, in terms of my enjoyment. I could think of tons more examples. What provides the greatest quality of life is not always what maximizes wealth or is most efficient.

Ah, but how do you have time to garden, but still make enough money to have all the other trappings of a civilized, affluent lifestyle also? By the wealth you make from your productive pursuits. A lot of people who might enjoy gardening don't get the chance to because they live in a poor area with no available space, they don't have the time to garden and support themselves and their family, etc. Efficiency and productivity in the market make everyone wealthier and decrease the marginal value of survival necessities, so more and more people can engage in non-business pasttimes that they enjoy. Utility is maximized - by growth.

That's kind of microeconomics example - here's a bigger one. You can have no utility if you don't exist. Given a totally normal, biological state of affairs and closed-system, zero-growth economy contained on Earth, we have ~5 billion years and an average 75-year lifespan. So that equates to a certain number of lives, and thus a certain limit on utility. But this limit does not even begin to approach the amount the resources of this solar system alone could support. In the end, growth always maximizes utility.

The limit is not so much a limit on the human capacity to understand as it is the simple vastness of all potential knowledge combined with the limited timespan in which we have to learn it.

At the rate we're going, we'll know enough to do a better job than blind Nature at most things exceedingly soon. We're approaching a technological singularity - progress is accelerating along an exponential curve, and at the current value of a the rate of change will be arbitrarily close to infinity within a century or so. Now obviously, there is a finite number of things to discover, period, so you can't actually have infinite discoveries per unit time, but to an ordinary twen-cen human being it'll appear infinite.

Not to mention, you're absolutely right, and this is again where growth comes in. Our current brains run at a certain subjective rate, but computers run massively faster - a mind running on a computer could have dozens of times more experience in a given time than the natural, inefficient human brain. Apply this to the lifespan of the universe, and you gain potentially hundreds of trillions of years of subjective time more in which to unlock more secrets and have more experiences. None of this can be accomplished without growth.

Given infinite time, we could probably eventually unlock all of the secrets of the universe. At this point in time, human knowledge is already vaster than a single human could possibly learn and comprehend. And the universe is vaster and more complex than we could ever comprehend in a million lifetimes.

Such is why we must transcend our natural humanity. One unaugmented person can only know so much, but with enhancement of technology we can know so much more. Utility maximized.

In most cases, the kind of external costs I am talking about are an individual manifestation of the economic phenomenon known as externalities. A cost that has been imposed on a person who is not party to a given market transaction.

An externality is (dictionary.com) "An incidental condition that may affect a course of action". This may include "hidden" costs imposed by a business on the commons, or costs imposed on a business by uncontrollable outside events - it's a broad term that covers the entire run of unintended or uncontrolled market perturbations.

If a corporation does business in a certain way, and neither it nor the consumers of its products bear the costs of any part of the sale or consumption of its products, then there is an externality.

This makes no sense. When would this ever be true? A company always pays for the procurement/production/etc. of its products, and a consumer always pays a company for the products he or she buys. Production, resource acquirement, sales, distribution, etc. factor into this.

It may be that you're saying something obvious but just not being clear, but in any case if you could restate that would be helpful.

Producers of CO2 emmissions do not bear the costs of their emissions, and therefore they are not factored into their economic decision-making with the consequence that CO2 is overproduced.

But the companies are made to pay for the costs they impose on other users of the commons by those users, via the social contract that binds all of those users together: a society or government. That's the market-based justification behind antipollution laws: companies pay the costs they impose on others in the market via the social contract, which is at root just a syndicate of all the users of the commons, a.k.a. all economic actors, a syndicate created in order to prevent the violation of rights between economic actors, (imposing costs on others via pollution being an example of a violation of rights) that being a necessary prerequisite to a functional market economy.

Again with the god complex. Man knows better than nature ...

Only man knows anything - nature is a deterministic side-effect of the Big Bang, essentially a highly complex accident with fundamentally temporary results. Man is a self-aware, sapient intelligence which is actually capable of knowing things, and finding ways to do things besides flowing down the easiest path and operating blind natural selection; he is a fundamentally different, more powerful, and less limited entity. Anything nature does, he can incorporate, comprehend, improve upon; the opposite is not true.

Socialism, like capitalism, requires perpetual growth. It is what the system is premised on. It just provides a different system of incentives. How else to deliver all those state-funded amenities? Capitalism and socialism are the flip side of the same disastrous coin.

Socialism is a broader umbrella than you realize. Control of the economy via a central state apparatus is socialism. Now, it can be a classical-economics entity that operates via growth (or tries to; socialism can never actually induce growth in the long run) or it can be used as the mediator that imposes zero-growth conditions on actors - what you are proposing.

Fair enough. But the natural system is still lower waste than most human systems.

For the time being. But we improve, and have a self-interest in minimizing waste, whereas nature neither improves nor has any interests of any kind, much less in minimizing waste.

And if the egg we breaks happens to be the only planet we know of at this point capabale of supporting life as we know it?

That's why we need multiple eggs in multiple baskets - hence, space travel.

Possibly, but not a terribly realistic one at this point.

Again, a failure of vision. All the pieces are ready to be in place - nanotechnology, space travel, the information revolution, next-gen energy. It's all there, and as the developments come thicker and faster, very little is less than realistic.

So if Rome had kept on growing it would have just continued to grow indefinitely?

Well, until it ran into a major competitor, (who it would have to strive against in a form of growth) covered all of Earth before it developed even basic modern technology (and thus space travel) and collapsed, or (likely) stretched out its primitive communication and state systems beyond their capabilities and fell apart.

No, they'd like to THINK they are, but they are arguing from protectionism. They just wrap it in pseudo-rights (because what they claim are rights--aren't).

That's because you only define rights as having an economic source. Your view of the world is not the only view. It doesn't matter what you believe are rights-- it matters that a large number of people consider that people have a right not to be screwed by large, multinational corporations.

I will preface this by saying I am not "Anti FreeTrade". I recognizse that there are lots of benefits to be had by trade between nations. That being said, I am a free trade skeptic. I thing that its proponents overstate its benefits. I do not think that it is going to bring world peace and universal prosperity. I also think that its proponents gloss over its flaws, dismissing them as problems of implementation rather than problems of design.

I think I have identified a major design flaw in free trade. I think its focus on reducing tariffs is fundamentally flawed, and is actually denying underdeveloped countries the opportunity to develop. Here is why.

The WTO regime focuses on reducing tarriff barriers. The theory is that without the distortions created by tarriffs, each country will be able to specialize in producing those goods and services in which it enjoys a comparative advantage. Theoretically, this will enable least developed countries to move from poor rural-based economies to prosperous industrialized states.

However, I'm not sure this actually works in practice. Specifically, the developed countries developed at a time when tariff barriers were still quite high. It enabled them to protect and develop certain domestic industries. Tarriffs also provided the main source of government revenue, allowing these countries to develop proper court systems and effective government institutions that are necessary in order for a free market economy to function. Further, most of the developing countries that have made significant economic progress this century have used protectionist trade policies to further their economic growth. I am having a hard time thinking of any countries that have developed based on an aggressive policy of free trade only.

By not allowing them to levy tarriffs, we are effectively ensuring that least developed countries will never have the opportunity to develop. Not only is it virtually impossible for them to develop any profitable industries in the face of relentless competition from wealthier nations, but also they are denied the source of government revenue that industrializing countries need in order to develop effective organize of government to facilitate free market development. Underfunding will continue to lead to corrupt and ineffective courts and bureaucracies. The WTO's focus on reducing tarriffs will actually be counterproductive. It is the whole design of the system, not just the implementation, that is flawed.

I would be interested if anyone has any information that supports or refutes this theory.

I will close by saying this is not my biggest concern about "free trade". It is just the one that has most recently occurred to me. Among other things, I am concerned about the endless pursuit of growth it what is obviously a world of natural limits. Personally, I think that trying to grow our way out of our economic problems is likely to be about as effective as trying to pave our way out of gridlock. But I digress. I welcome any dissenting views

Free trade is only flawed if a man can become richer than 250 average citizens... and I think it is possible... :(

Um, I'm aware that I have a lack of knowledge of basic physics and astrophysics, which is why I phrased it as a question. So why wouldn't increasing Mars's mass and volume via terraforming it alter its gravitational pull on Earth?

This might have been already answered, but there's multiple reasons why.

a) Terraforming would not produce any significant alteration to the mass of Mars. It's a surface alteration only, and makes use of what's already on Mars plus a bit of solar energy input. You get some boil-off of gases into space, but not enough to change anything significantly.

b) It wouldn't matter anyway. The formula for acceleration due to gravity is (GM[1])/R^2. To give this meaning, G=6.673 * 10^-11. Considering that the mass involved is multiplied by this and divided by the square of the radius of the planet (very big), the relevant mass would have to be far bigger than that of a planet to significantly affect the orbit of the Earth.

Free trade is only flawed if a man can become richer than 250 average citizens... and I think it is possible... :(
Why is that a bad thing?

Why is that a bad thing?

Because it usually requires a lot of people being screwed in order for that kind of inequality to occur.

That's because you only define rights as having an economic source. Your view of the world is not the only view. It doesn't matter what you believe are rights-- it matters that a large number of people consider that people have a right not to be screwed by large, multinational corporations.
Right not to be screwed? Well, that means that they are being coerced by large corporations. If there is no coercion then there is no problem. In this nation, and in other nations it is not the corporations that are doing the coercing, it is the government. Corporations are supported by our purchases and our government, they do not support themselves and I know BAAWA hates the government support and believes that they should only be supported by trading with the people.

That's because you only define rights as having an economic source.
No, I define them as having a rational source. Check out contractarianism.


Your view of the world is not the only view.
But it's the correct one, and that's what matters.


It doesn't matter what you believe are rights-- it matters that a large number of people consider that people have a right not to be screwed by large, multinational corporations.
And no one is. Of course, a lot of people think they have the right to healthcare also. But they don't.

Because it usually requires a lot of people being screwed in order for that kind of inequality to occur.
I would say that 250 is a completely arbitrary number and means nothing. Inequality is not bad in and of itself, only coercion is bad, and if somebody can make that much without coercing others then there is no problem to it. Heck, have you ever heard of the man who traded a paperclip up to a house? He never forced any trades but in the end was able to get a massive profit from just one paperclip.

Guy's blog (http://www.oneredpaperclip.blogspot.com/)

CNN source (http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/internet/07/10/paper.clip.to.house.ap/index.html)

And no one is. Of course, a lot of people think they have the right to healthcare also. But they don't.

If you lived in a Third World country, you would be singing a different tune. Rights are not defined absolutely. A "right" can be recognized as being anything that society deems it to be. You define rights as only being negative or Natural rights. But any positive right has a corresponding natural right. A positive right to health care implies a negative right not to get sick or die needlessly.

If you lived in a Third World country, you would be singing a different tune. Rights are not defined absolutely. A "right" can be recognized as being anything that society deems it to be.

Wrong. Rights arise from reason and logic. Applying A=A to the quality of actorship results in a right to one's self, and the principle of self-ownership. From this arises a variety of rights, including the right to the produce of one's labor: property, capital, possessions, etc. Involuntary taxation and theft are violations of this right.

Logically speaking, rights cannot have contradictions, because this would invalidate their logical foundation. Thus, having a "right" to healthcare is impossible; the money has to come from somewhere, and a "right" implies that others are obligated to provide it, which violates a person's right to the produce of their own efforts.

The so-called "positive rights" are not rights at all, but privileges. Things society as a whole decides to accord to each individual are privileges - a right implies that others are morally and ethically obligated to give you what the so-called positive right accords you, which is not the case. I have no moral obligation, rooted in reason, to give you my money to buy your healthcare for you.

You define rights as only being negative or Natural rights. But any positive right has a corresponding natural right. A positive right to health care implies a negative right not to get sick or die needlessly.

This makes no sense. How can disease observe a moral obligation? That's like saying you have a right not to die, or right not to be hit by a hurricane - it doesn't make sense.

What a positive "right" to healthcare is is a positive "right" to another person's money; simple as that. You are claiming a right to the fruits of my labor. And that makes no sense: what logical precept do you found that on? What compelling, logically sound moral reason do I have to sacrifice myself for your well-being? None.

This is not to imply that any form of taxation or charity is morally wrong; if I desire to give you money to support your well-being because I'm a nice person, well ok then. To this end we have social contracts, in which each actor voluntarily agrees to be accorded certain responsibilities and privileges to and by the rest of the group who also sign on to your social contract.

Because it usually requires a lot of people being screwed in order for that kind of inequality to occur.
So it's not the inequality per se to which you're objecting. It's the people getting screwed.

I don't see why inequality, in and of itself, is bad. And everytime I ask, no one else does, either. So stop complaining about inequality. Complain about the thing that actually bothers you.

If you lived in a Third World country, you would be singing a different tune.
No I wouldn't.


Rights are not defined absolutely.
Rights cannot conflict with other rights. There are no such things as positive rights.


A "right" can be recognized as being anything that society deems it to be.
Society doesn't deem anything, and you've just allowed the tyranny of the majority. Good going!

Exactly. And they were one of the examples I cited of countries that used protectionist trade policies. Among other things, they maintained high tarriffs to discourage domestic consumption.
As did many, many of the African countries. That just isn't it.

They also had heavy state investment in education, and other forms of state interventionism (financed in large part through said tarriffs). Singapore remains very much a nanny state to this day.
What Singapore did, moreso than tariffs (everyone used tariffs back then and, looking back, economic analysis tells us that we shouldn't have) was that they properly invested into the future.
Education, settling industry, providing infrastructure, developing an export-based industry. That sort of thing - it was a long-term strategy that made Singapore so successful.
No African country has tried to implement anything even remotely close to it, and that's why they failed.

Oh, and Singapore ain't a nanny state: http://www.heritage.org/research/features/index/country.cfm?id=Singapore

And who exactly do you think supported these tinpot dictators? Their own people, or the military superpowers of the Cold War era?
Give me examples.
Unlike in South America, these guys weren't installed by anyone. Often they only got the most basic levels of foreign support. Only after they somehow managed to get in power did they try to forge alliances with whatever superpower seemed closer to them ideologically, to help them stay in power. Africa just generally carried virtually no meaning during the Cold War, not to forget that many countries at one point or another joined the Non-Alligned Movement of neutrals.

But if you are truly a libertarian, I don't understand why you think the western governments should have even more power to intervene in the lives of these people. Rather, we should be encouraging self-determination both of the states themselves, and the people within them.
These governments have failed. Utterly, completely and whenever they tried. I'm not after intervening in the lives of ordinary Africans, I'm after giving those ordinary people the chance to do what they wish to do and what they surely are able to do if they weren't kept back by their incompetent governments.
Remember: Governments have no rights.

But they do need enough to pay their judges, police and bureaucrats well enough that they are not easily corrupted.
The details of how corruption is related to income need to be looked at, yes. But I would argue that quite a lot of people on decent income still take bribes of all sorts, simply because that is how things are done (China? Many Arab countries?)
The determining factor here is not the low wages, it's a culture of kickbacks. And that can be fought without any money at all, just with a bit of determination, and ruthlessness against those who steal ordinary citizens' money and abuse their trust.

And more importantly, if the money is raised by their own means (i.e. tarriffs), there will be all the more incentive to spend it wisely.
Tarriffs isn't raising money by their own means though. Tarriffs is stealing from foreigners.
And so far these governments haven't been spending money wisely regardless of where it came from. Without some proper controls being placed on where that money goes (regardless of where exactly it comes from), it's going down the drain, we can treat that virtually as a given.

Give their people the real opportunity to determine their course, and the resources and options they need to do it, and would be amazed by the results.
Indeed. But so far we've had maniacs, warlords and "pan-African" racists in charge.

Someone who is on the ground in one of these countries is going to have a far better idea of what suits that situation and what doesn't than some Western economist who has never been there.
That is a gigantic mistake to make. It is precisely a neutral party of specially trained people who can analyse what is happening and make recommendations.
I mean, there's elections on at the moment in the Congo. What is the main argument of the opposition against Kabila? Not that he's got no long-term policy. Not that he hasn't done enough to encourage investment. No, the main argument is that he spend his childhood in Rwanda.

And you want to leave people to themselves there? It's a death sentence for millions.

Sure it does, and I find it frightening that they teach otherwise in Econ school. Cultural attitudes regarding everything from private property to wealth accumulation are going to affect the success of an economic system. One of the reasons that the Asian Tigers are considered to have done well is that the economic systems they adopted were a good fit with existing Asian philosophies.
Says who?
They made sense according to endogenous growth models, which is why they worked. The basic facts of economics are about half-way rational people making half-way rational choices. No more, no less.

And the fit between the political system and culture (which is the main point I was arguing) is even more important.
So, would you then argue that the brutal dictatorship is a better fit with African culture than the sort of parliamentary systems the West left behind?

Limit the interference of western governments in the day to day lives of the peoples of the less developed countries.
And leave them to face the claws of their own governments, unprotected and unheard?

What Singapore did, moreso than tariffs (everyone used tariffs back then and, looking back, economic analysis tells us that we shouldn't have) was that they properly invested into the future.

So economic analysis tells us one thing, but real world experience tells us another. That probably tells us something about the application of economic analysis to the real world ...

Education, settling industry, providing infrastructure, developing an export-based industry. That sort of thing - it was a long-term strategy that made Singapore so successful.

All fine examples of state intervention in the economy. Once again ignoring conventional economic wisdom.

No African country has tried to implement anything even remotely close to it, and that's why they failed.

That is because they listen to western economists who tell them none of teh above works in spite of evidence to the contrary.

Oh, and Singapore ain't a nanny state

A state that imposes so many restrictions on its citizens that it is (or was) illegal to chew gum is not a nanny state?

Unlike in South America, these guys weren't installed by anyone. Often they only got the most basic levels of foreign support. Only after they somehow managed to get in power did they try to forge alliances with whatever superpower seemed closer to them ideologically, to help them stay in power. Africa just generally carried virtually no meaning during the Cold War, not to forget that many countries at one point or another joined the Non-Alligned Movement of neutrals.

So I take it we are narrowing it down to Africa then? Having eliminated all the LDC's in Asia and South America which conveniently don't support your thesis?

There were many states in Africa that aligned with one side or the other. And those that didn't were usually fighting rebels who were.

These governments have failed. Utterly, completely and whenever they tried. I'm not after intervening in the lives of ordinary Africans, I'm after giving those ordinary people the chance to do what they wish to do and what they surely are able to do if they weren't kept back by their incompetent governments.
Remember: Governments have no rights.

Right, but their citizens do. The right to self-determination. The right to pursue their own path to development, in spite of what Western governments might tell them to do.

The details of how corruption is related to income need to be looked at, yes. But I would argue that quite a lot of people on decent income still take bribes of all sorts, simply because that is how things are done (China? Many Arab countries?)
The determining factor here is not the low wages, it's a culture of kickbacks. And that can be fought without any money at all, just with a bit of determination, and ruthlessness against those who steal ordinary citizens' money and abuse their trust.

And fighting corruption also requires an independent police force and judiciary, which requires money. As I pointed out ... please try and address my main points and not the subsidiary ones.



And so far these governments haven't been spending money wisely regardless of where it came from. Without some proper controls being placed on where that money goes (regardless of where exactly it comes from), it's going down the drain, we can treat that virtually as a given.

Controls being imposed by foreign governments? Are you sure you are really a libertarian?

People always take a greater interest when it is their money being spent ...

That is a gigantic mistake to make. It is precisely a neutral party of specially trained people who can analyse what is happening and make recommendations.

Neutral people who have no first-hand knowledge of the context in which their recommendations are to be applied are not so helpful, otherwise all of the Western "experts" would have fixed this mess a long time ago. With no interest in the outcome, when all their recommendations fail, they can just walk away and say they tried their hardest, rather than bearing the consequences of their actions. In that situation, decision-making will always be sub-optimal


I mean, there's elections on at the moment in the Congo. What is the main argument of the opposition against Kabila? Not that he's got no long-term policy. Not that he hasn't done enough to encourage investment. No, the main argument is that he spend his childhood in Rwanda.

And Bush's main argument against John McCain was that his time in a Vietnamese POW camp had somehow unhinged him. Elections in the western world often focus on style over substance, so I hardly think that is a knock against African nations. It is a concern about modern democracies in general ...



They made sense according to endogenous growth models, which is why they worked. The basic facts of economics are about half-way rational people making half-way rational choices. No more, no less.

The assumption that people are rational wealth-maximizing actors is probably the weakest assumption in free market economics.

So, would you then argue that the brutal dictatorship is a better fit with African culture than the sort of parliamentary systems the West left behind?

No, but their are models of democratic government that would better fit the needs of most African nations than those that the colonizers left behind.

And leave them to face the claws of their own governments, unprotected and unheard?

No, to stop propping up these governments with our aid and loans, and to leave them to face the claws of their people ...

Ah, but how do you have time to garden, but still make enough money to have all the other trappings of a civilized, affluent lifestyle also? By the wealth you make from your productive pursuits. A lot of people who might enjoy gardening don't get the chance to because they live in a poor area with no available space, they don't have the time to garden and support themselves and their family, etc. Efficiency and productivity in the market make everyone wealthier and decrease the marginal value of survival necessities, so more and more people can engage in non-business pasttimes that they enjoy. Utility is maximized - by growth.


My point was that I am not maximizing my economic efficiency and wealth maximizing potential. I could spend more time at the office, less in my garden, and pay someone to grow my food, and we would all be "better off" economically speaking. But my quality of life would be lesser.

Anyway, I was just using it as an example to illustrate a point about how other values can trump efficiency and wealth maximization. In other situations, someone might choose a lower paying job, or one where they are less productive or otherwise contributing less to society's growth, because that other job provides them with other, greater forms of non-economic satisfaction.


At the rate we're going, we'll know enough to do a better job than blind Nature at most things exceedingly soon. We're approaching a technological singularity - progress is accelerating along an exponential curve, and at the current value of a the rate of change will be arbitrarily close to infinity within a century or so. Now obviously, there is a finite number of things to discover, period, so you can't actually have infinite discoveries per unit time, but to an ordinary twen-cen human being it'll appear infinite.


Yet the fact, that we know more than "blind nature" does not mean that we will understand nature to the point where we will be able to safely manipulate it and be confident that we understand the consequences of what we are doing.


Not to mention, you're absolutely right, and this is again where growth comes in. Our current brains run at a certain subjective rate, but computers run massively faster - a mind running on a computer could have dozens of times more experience in a given time than the natural, inefficient human brain. Apply this to the lifespan of the universe, and you gain potentially hundreds of trillions of years of subjective time more in which to unlock more secrets and have more experiences. None of this can be accomplished without growth.


Such is why we must transcend our natural humanity. One unaugmented person can only know so much, but with enhancement of technology we can know so much more. Utility maximized.


So we are to become androids then?


An externality is (dictionary.com) "An incidental condition that may affect a course of action". This may include "hidden" costs imposed by a business on the commons, or costs imposed on a business by uncontrollable outside events - it's a broad term that covers the entire run of unintended or uncontrolled market perturbations.

This makes no sense. When would this ever be true? A company always pays for the procurement/production/etc. of its products, and a consumer always pays a company for the products he or she buys. Production, resource acquirement, sales, distribution, etc. factor into this.


They pay all of their direct costs. They do not necessarily pay all of the indirect costs, such as the externalities which you correctly cite above. If there is some hidden costs imposed on the commons or otherwise on society at large, then this is not borne by the business, and is not factored into the costs of the products and services paid for by the consumer.

As an example, polluters prior to the implementation of emissions controls meant to curb acid rain did not pay the economic costs of the acid rain that they were contributing to.


But the companies are made to pay for the costs they impose on other users of the commons by those users, via the social contract that binds all of those users together: a society or government. That's the market-based justification behind antipollution laws: companies pay the costs they impose on others in the market via the social contract, which is at root just a syndicate of all the users of the commons, a.k.a. all economic actors, a syndicate created in order to prevent the violation of rights between economic actors, (imposing costs on others via pollution being an example of a violation of rights) that being a necessary prerequisite to a functional market economy.


Agreed, that is what should happen in theory. But in reality, business interests in keeping externalities external are narrow and focused, while the common interest in internalizing them is dispersed, and so the externalities rarely get internalized, except when the situation becomes totally untenable, such as with acid rain.


Only man knows anything - nature is a deterministic side-effect of the Big Bang, essentially a highly complex accident with fundamentally temporary results. Man is a self-aware, sapient intelligence which is actually capable of knowing things, and finding ways to do things besides flowing down the easiest path and operating blind natural selection; he is a fundamentally different, more powerful, and less limited entity. Anything nature does, he can incorporate, comprehend, improve upon; the opposite is not true.


But again, that does not mean he is capable of understanding nature well enough to safely manipulate it in the kinds of ways you are proposing.


Socialism is a broader umbrella than you realize. Control of the economy via a central state apparatus is socialism. Now, it can be a classical-economics entity that operates via growth (or tries to; socialism can never actually induce growth in the long run) or it can be used as the mediator that imposes zero-growth conditions on actors - what you are proposing.


Control of the economy via state apparatus is a characteristic of socialism, but it is not the only one. So it does not follow that any system that involves state control of the economy is necessarily socialist in nature. In any event, what I am proposing does not involve state ownership of the means of production. It may involve some limited amount of state intervention however. By and large it would require some kind of social compact to implement.


That's why we need multiple eggs in multiple baskets - hence, space travel.


But if we break this egg before we find any others, we are hooped.

Anyway ... I think this is an interesting and worthwhile discussion, but we have definitely strayed pretty far from the topic of the OP. Maybe we should set up a seperate thread so that other people would have the opportunity to contribute?

This might have been already answered, but there's multiple reasons why.

a) Terraforming would not produce any significant alteration to the mass of Mars. It's a surface alteration only, and makes use of what's already on Mars plus a bit of solar energy input. You get some boil-off of gases into space, but not enough to change anything significantly.Wouldn't the first step be to give Mars an atmosphere? That would mean increasing the mass and volume of the entire planet.

b) It wouldn't matter anyway. The formula for acceleration due to gravity is (GM[1])/R^2. To give this meaning, G=6.673 * 10^-11. Considering that the mass involved is multiplied by this and divided by the square of the radius of the planet (very big), the relevant mass would have to be far bigger than that of a planet to significantly affect the orbit of the Earth.Well, if it could affect the earth but only insignificantly, which would mean that the answer to my initial question is "yes." Anyway, thank you for answering.

Applying A=A to the quality of actorship results in a right to one's self, and the principle of self-ownership.Explain this further, does this mean that because we have the capacity to act, we have self-ownership?

Involuntary taxation What would involuntary taxation be?

The so-called "positive rights" are not rights at all, but privileges. Things society as a whole decides to accord to each individual are privileges - a right implies that others are morally and ethically obligated to give you what the so-called positive right accords you, which is not the case.Like the positive right of ownership?

I have no moral obligation, rooted in reason, to give you my money to buy your healthcare for you.True, but those of us who argue in favor of the right of healthcare don't suggest that this happen.

Anyway ... I think this is an interesting and worthwhile discussion, but we have definitely strayed pretty far from the topic of the OP. Maybe we should set up a seperate thread so that other people would have the opportunity to contribute?It's your thread, I don't see why you shouldn't be allowed to hijack your own thread.

Like the positive right of ownership?
We've gone through this before and you were soundly thrashed: ownership is not a positive right. You own yourself by the very fact of your thoughts and actions, so don't believe for one moment that your performative contradiction will get you anywhere.

We've gone through this before and you were soundly thrashed: ownership is not a positive right. You own yourself by the very fact of your thoughts and actions, so don't believe for one moment that your performative contradiction will get you anywhere.Yes, we have been through this before, and it was you who lost, though of course you didn't know it. Since there is a right to use things, people have the right to use their own bodies, but this does not mean that they own them.

Yes, we have been through this before, and it was you who lost, though of course you didn't know it.
Big words from one trying a performative contradiction.


Since there is a right to use things, people have the right to use their own bodies, but this does not mean that they own them.
Actually, people own their bodies, and thus have the right to use them. You, as usual, have everything backward.

Actually, people own their bodies, and thus have the right to use them. You, as usual, have everything backward.And where does this supposed ownership come from, or did you just declare it, as usual?

So economic analysis tells us one thing, but real world experience tells us another. That probably tells us something about the application of economic analysis to the real world ...
Not really. We can tell exactly what worked, and what didn't.

An example:
Person A eats well, exercises regularly, and smokes.
Person B doesn't do any of these things.

Person A ends up living longer than Person B. And now you are suggesting that everyone should take up smoking as a way to live longer.

All fine examples of state intervention in the economy. Once again ignoring conventional economic wisdom.
So, in other words you don't know what the conventional economic wisdom actually is.
Tariffs: Bad.
State Intervention: Can be bad but doesn't have to be, it depends on what exactly it is.

That is because they listen to western economists who tell them none of teh above works in spite of evidence to the contrary.
Find me the evidence.

And establish a proper link. Don't tell me about correlation, tell me about causation. Because the economics-community would love to hear about it, I'm sure.

I have posted a truly gigantic study in this thread, probably more than 80 pages, of evidence gathered from many, many LDCs before and after trade liberalisation. The evidence suggests that trade liberalisation leads to higher growth rates. That's cold, hard maths.
It's not a universal cure for these country's economic hardships, but it's one step of a long way.

A state that imposes so many restrictions on its citizens that it is (or was) illegal to chew gum is not a nanny state?
Were you talking economics, or something unrelated. It's hardly a liberal paradise, yes. But economically, people are as free to do as they please as almost nowhere else in the world.

So I take it we are narrowing it down to Africa then?
Oh, I'm sure we can pick others too. The poorest countries just generally are in Africa.
Be as specific as you please, just don't make sweeping generalisations alá 'Africa was the playing ground for the Cold War'. Because the Cold War, as well as Imperialism, were experienced in many other places of the world, and somehow many of those countries (and even some in Africa, I suppose) managed to establish half-way decent economies.

Right, but their citizens do. The right to self-determination. The right to pursue their own path to development, in spite of what Western governments might tell them to do.
Let me make this very clear: I do not propose Western governments tell random people in LDCs what to. I do propose Western governments (better still, Western NGOs or perhaps smart economists like Amartya Sen) tell the governments in LDCs what to do.
As far as the people in LDCs are concerned, they usually don't get much choice in their government anyways.

And fighting corruption also requires an independent police force and judiciary, which requires money. As I pointed out ... please try and address my main points and not the subsidiary ones.
Yes, it requires money. But not so much money that it couldn't be gathered from income taxes and corporate taxes on everyone doing business in the country.
And I'd be glad if you could just present your cohesive main point for why LDC governments require (or indeed are responsible with) funds of such size as could only be gained through stealing the money of foreigners for committing the crime of wanting to do business in that country.
The problems they are facing are not monetary in nature. They are cultural and they are organisational.

Controls being imposed by foreign governments? Are you sure you are really a libertarian?
If given the choice between oppressive and incompetent government, and relatively liberal and competent government, I choose the latter.
Note that being libertarian is also being internationalist.

People always take a greater interest when it is their money being spent ...
Governments don't have money, remember? They only ever spend other people's money. It doesn't make a difference where it comes from.

You have one option that promises to hurt the economy a lot (tariffs).
You have one option that promises to hurt the economy a little, but not badly (sensible income taxes).
And you have one option that promises to help the economy (foreign aid with conditions on where and how it is spent).

Neutral people who have no first-hand knowledge of the context in which their recommendations are to be applied are not so helpful, otherwise all of the Western "experts" would have fixed this mess a long time ago.
The "context" in this case was government incompetence and unwillingness to consider anything but the leader's personal ideology or material interests.
It is not the economist's job to work around that sort of thing. The development economist, being a social scientist with a well-established framework of proven knowledge, can tell you what works and what doesn't. He can give you examples, case studies and instructions.
You can lead a horse to water...I propose we make it drink.

With no interest in the outcome, when all their recommendations fail, they can just walk away and say they tried their hardest, rather than bearing the consequences of their actions. In that situation, decision-making will always be sub-optimal.
So you propose that economic advisors to people like Mobotu Sese Seko pay for the dictator not implementing their polices?

Elections in the western world often focus on style over substance, so I hardly think that is a knock against African nations. It is a concern about modern democracies in general ...
Except that Bush would then point towards all sorts of economic policies next. Kabila, nor his enemies, don't.
Yes, elections are fought style over substance in many Western nations. But not to that extent, and the alternative is not ranting about a different ethnic group (although that might be changing these days...).

The assumption that people are rational wealth-maximizing actors is probably the weakest assumption in free market economics.
Right. Because we are all irrational animals who don't want to maximise their satisfaction (not wealth, people, please listen when economists talk to you!) and prefer to make ourselves unhappy if we get that choice.

No, but their are models of democratic government that would better fit the needs of most African nations than those that the colonizers left behind.
Give me examples. Be specific, for a change.

No, to stop propping up these governments with our aid and loans, and to leave them to face the claws of their people ...
Been there, done that, got the (blood-soaked) T-Shirt.

And where does this supposed ownership come from,
Is it your body, or someone else's?

Tell me, Mr. Performative Contradiction--who types your messages?

And you wonder why I look down upon you.

yeah, the spelling and grammer thing is a result of typeing at three or four am without haveing slept, and the fact that i just suck at spelling.
Not a crime, though you should work on it. When tired I usually resort to typing in a word processor with a spell checker, then copy n pasting it over – this should hold you in good stead until your spelling improves.

i am aware that my proposed system has flaws. it was mearly a thought. i know full well that it wouldn't actually work as is.
There are flaws in everything – nothing is perfect. People look at the way things are and see the flaws, and think we should scrap it. The problem is, since everything has flaws, you choose a system based on which has fewer flaws and are the type of flaws you can live with. As Winston Churchill once said “Democracy is the worst form of government except for all those others that have been tried”.

at the end of the day, it boils down to the people, yes, but not their demands and whims. their actual needs.
And here in lies the problem – who decides what the people need? Central planning does not work – it has been tried time and again with the same disastrous results. Saying “but they just didn’t do it right – I would do it better” is nothing but hubris. In the end, a person knows what is best for themselves – and most people are fairly good at knowing what they need vs what they want. Ask any parent trying to work and raise kids – they are pretty good at working within a budget to get what they need before what they want.

i can buy a 5 dollar shirt made in china which will last me, oh, about a year. when there was actually some sort of tarif and so on properly managed and in place, one could buy a 20 dollar shirt made here that would last 5 years, easily. i'm not sure on the exact numbers, but that's close. now though, the only way the local people can compete is to do designer gear. specialized stuff.
Before you had no choice but to buy that $20 shirt, now you can choose between buying that $20 shirt or a $5 one from China. You get to choose, isnt that lovely? Or do you think it a better system where I get to choose what clothes you buy? I could do that ya know –I could do a little online shopping for you and pick out what I think you need. Better than letting you choose what clothing you want based upon your whims eh?

in an enviroment of total free trade and, by extention as the two philosophys seem very closely linked, at least very free market, the slave [or near slave] labour becomes nessisary to compete, simply becuase if one group can do it, everyone else either does it or fails.

The best way to point out the fallacy of this ‘race to the bottom’ idea you have is what is typically known in economic circles as the American paradox. You see, in the US we have very high labor costs and relatively low capital costs - thus you would expect us to export capital intensive goods. This is not the case – we export labor intensive goods because the difference in productivity of American workers is greater than the difference in wages (this is obviously not for every industry – textiles for example need a very low skill set and thus productivity does not vary as much from worker to worker).
Please read this page as I think it might help you to understand: http://neumann.hec.ca/pages/germain.belzile/documents/myths.html

a true freemarket, and, on a different scale, true free trade, apply a sort of natural selection to the system. the ultimate result of such is monopolys in everything. it is likely the system would break down before reaching thispoint. someone would panic and do Something, but still, that is where you end up.
Natural monopolies (those not caused by government restriction on competition) are nearly non-existent (I cannot say they do not exist because in some really weird circumstances they are possible – but those examples are theoretical and do not occur in practice). Whenever there exists a free market, with minimal barriers to entry, there will be competition because someone will have a better idea – or at the very least there will be enough people who want some variety. Only when everyone in the world wants exactly the same thing, never changes their mind, and innovation stops will monopolies be possible in a free trade system.

i'm not quite sure how to argue the comparative/absolute idea. it doesn't sit right... i'll get back to you on it.
Think of it this way – Bob is the best in the world at everything. He is the best surgeon and the best plumber. Why then does Sally get employed as a plumber if she isn’t as good as Bob?

trade is a 0 sum equation, at least in terms of money. every gain is someone else's loss.
This is wholly wrong, but not uncommon. Money is simply a medium of exchange to make it easier to trade than through barter – so saying something about trade that only applies to money is irrelevant. Were trade a 0 sum game, there would never be anything more than there always had been – which is obviously a ridiculous statement.

By focusing on what we can produce more efficiently than attempting to produce everything, we can produce a lot more of it. People then specialize so that everyone is producing something, and then trades their excess for the excess of others. Were this not the case, we never would have stopped making everything for ourselves.

keeping your imports balanced with your exports [or the other way round] is important,
Though I'm not sure where you are going with this either – but a trade balance is fairly irrelevant so long as you keep a current accounts balance. It doesn’t matter how much in terms of solid goods go in and out as it is important how much money is transferred. The US has had a severe trade deficit for at least 50 years, yet the economy has doing great – this is because we have had a current accounts deficit as well (more money coming into the country than going out). This is also a self-correcting system – if you send out more than you take in, you depreciate your currency so imports are more expensive for you and your exports are cheaper for others. If you send out more than you take in, your currency appreciates and your exports are more expensive for others to buy but your imports are cheaper. Either way, free markets correct such imbalances automatically – the problems come in when you have a government (be it China or Argentina) which decides to keep its currency at an artificial level.

New Zealand is a great example of globalization – it was highly protectionist and tried to provide a welfare state to its people. Obviously this bankrupted the government to the point where it had to sell off its assets (privatize its government monopolies) and eliminate the subsidies it paid to producers. Fortunately when they did this, they also dropped their trade barriers and enter into an era of free trade (or at least as close to it as anyone was likely to come in the 80s).

While it caused some major disruptions during the transition – complete with a large segment of the population going on and on about how opening up trade was going to ruin the economy and everyone was going to be thrust back to a standard of living common in Africa – the market soon adapted. Monopolies lost their grip, allowing other firms to compete which lead to a massive improvement in service and price (ask your parents what they thought about Telecom before privatization). Inefficient firms were forced to innovate and become efficient, industries which could not compete (such as large scale textiles) largely went out of business – with a huge net gain to the economy as a whole – and other industries became leaner and more productive.

A good example of this is the dairy industry – which the doom and gloomers said would disappear without subsidies and tariffs – became one of the best in the world. It is currently on the cutting edge of technology making more innovations and advancements in dairy production than anywhere else in the world. All because they had to compete in a global market without being heavily subsidized.

Is it your body, or someone else's?

Tell me, Mr. Performative Contradiction--who types your messages?There is a difference between "possession" and "ownership". I suggest you look them up.

And you wonder why I look down upon you.Yes, you do - from your own petard.

There is a difference between "possession" and "ownership". I suggest you look them up.
Ownership is the state or fact of exclusive possession or control of property, which may be an object, land/real estate, intellectual property or some other kind of property. (Pulled from wiki)
Given that I have exclusive possesion of my body, and that the thing only moves when I tell it to, I'd say that qualifies as ownership.

Yes, you do - from your own petard.
He's looking down on you from a small bomb used for breaching.?
That makes little sense.

There is a difference between "possession" and "ownership". I suggest you look them up.
Not when it comes to your body, Mr. False Dichotomy. You cannot do anything without it, period. It's yours.


Secondly, it must be noted that argumentation does not consist of free-floating propositions, but is a form of action requiring the use of scarce means; and furthermore that the means, then, which a person demonstrates as preferring by engaging in propositional exchanges are those of private property. For one thing, obviously, no one could possibly propose anything, and no one could become convinced of any proposition by argumentative means, if a person's right to make exclusive use of his physical body were not already presupposed. It is this recognition of each other's mutually exclusive control over one's own body which explains the distinctive characteristic of propositional exchanges that, while one may disagree about what has been said, it is still at least possible to agree that there is disagreement. And obvious, too: Such property right in one's own body must be said to be justified a priori. For anyone who tried to justify any norm whatsoever would already have to presuppose an exclusive right to control over his body as a valid norm simply in order to say "I propose such and such." And anyone disputing such right, then, would become caught up in a practical contradiction, since arguing so would already implicitly have to accept the very norm he was disputing.
http://www.hanshoppe.com/publications/econ-ethics-10.pdf

How can free trade be flawed? You have iron. I need iron. I pay you for iron. How is that flawed?

How can free trade be flawed? You have iron. I need iron. I pay you for iron. How is that flawed?

Some people believe that the state has a right to force businesses and consumers to pay more for iron of equal or lesser quality just so that their country can retain its ironmaking industry. No matter if the industry is inefficient and costs jobs in other sectors that would be gained through comparative advantage.

Ownership is the state or fact of exclusive possession or control of property, which may be an object, land/real estate, intellectual property or some other kind of property. (Pulled from wiki)
Given that I have exclusive possesion of my body, and that the thing only moves when I tell it to, I'd say that qualifies as ownership.

Possession is having some degree of control over something else. Generally, to possess something, a person must have an intention to possess it. A person may be in possession of some property (although possession does not always imply ownership).....Control (sometimes called factual possession) means physical control. Only tangible things, such as a book, dog, or parcel of land, can be controlled in this way.....It is possible to obtain possession of a thing without anyone else's consent. First, you might take possession of something which has never been possessed before. (Also pulled from Wiki)

Not when it comes to your body, Mr. False Dichotomy. You cannot do anything without it, period. It's yours.



http://www.hanshoppe.com/publications/econ-ethics-10.pdfNothing in your sentence nor in the Hoppe quote requires ownership.

Nothing in your sentence nor in the Hoppe quote requires ownership.
Perhaps you could demonstrate it rather than just declaring it, as usual.

Perhaps you could demonstrate it rather than just declaring it, as usual.Well, if you insist.

For one thing, obviously, no one could possibly propose anything, and no one could become convinced of any proposition by argumentative means, if a person's right to make exclusive use of his physical body were not already presupposed.When I talk about possession, I mean in the context of having the right to use something. Certainly I mean the right to use exclusively, unless someone can find a use which doesn't interfere with the initial use. Such uses when it comes to somebody's body are fortunately rare. If there were conditions upon that use, it wouldn't be a right, it would be a priviledge, unless the conditions were established beforehand, which in the case of a person's body, there are no conditions upon use.

And obvious, too: Such property right in one's own body must be said to be justified a priori.Certainly, since the first person to use Person X's body is Person X himself, at birth, anything that Person X does after the fact is done with his possession and therefore right to use established.

The rest of the quote is either similar to the parts I've quoted or a continuation of his initial assumptions.

Well, if you insist.
I do, I do. (Blazing Saddles reference)


When I talk about possession, I mean in the context of having the right to use something.
And where does that right come from?


Certainly I mean the right to use exclusively, unless someone can find a use which doesn't interfere with the initial use. Such uses when it comes to somebody's body are fortunately rare. If there were conditions upon that use, it wouldn't be a right, it would be a priviledge, unless the conditions were established beforehand, which in the case of a person's body, there are no conditions upon use.
So you're saying that a person's right to exclusive use of his or her own body is presupposed, just as Professor Hoppe said.


Certainly, since the first person to use Person X's body is Person X himself, at birth, anything that Person X does after the fact is done with his possession and therefore right to use established.
So you're saying that a person's right to exclusive use of his or her own body also comes from homesteading, which with both Murray Rothbard and Prof. Hoppe would agree.

And where does that right come from?Natural rights.

So you're saying that a person's right to exclusive use of his or her own body is presupposed, just as Professor Hoppe said.Yes, as an extension of the right to use. Ownership implies many things in addition to exclusive use.

So you're saying that a person's right to exclusive use of his or her own body comes from homesteading, which with both Murray Rothbard and Prof. Hoppe would agree.No, it comes from natural rights, and homesteading is a mutation of the right to use.

My point was that I am not maximizing my economic efficiency and wealth maximizing potential. I could spend more time at the office, less in my garden, and pay someone to grow my food, and we would all be "better off" economically speaking. But my quality of life would be lesser.

Anyway, I was just using it as an example to illustrate a point about how other values can trump efficiency and wealth maximization. In other situations, someone might choose a lower paying job, or one where they are less productive or otherwise contributing less to society's growth, because that other job provides them with other, greater forms of non-economic satisfaction.

You're misunderstanding what I mean by efficiency. I mean utils/[x]. How much utility you derive from the resources, such as time, labor, material goods, etc., available. Your gardening is efficient - but to be truly efficient, you work highly productive, in-demand jobs that make you a great deal of money, which allow you to derive satisfaction from the goods you buy in addition to gardening, thus maximizing the utility-efficiency of your time. All work would be inefficient, because you derive a lot of utility from gardening. But too much gardening is also inefficient - but becomes less so as your labor becomes more productive and economically efficient.

In the end, it still all comes down to economic productivity, but it's more flexible than the dollar-per-second you think I'm saying.

Yet the fact, that we know more than "blind nature" does not mean that we will understand nature to the point where we will be able to safely manipulate it and be confident that we understand the consequences of what we are doing.

Why not? We've got a lot of time and resources and an exponential trend in understanding and use; unless we adopt a zero-growth, limited-innovation system like the one you propose, there's nothing stopping us.

So we are to become androids then?

Nah. Robotic bodies are a waste. Why bother housing a machine intelligence in a corporeal form like that on a general basis? It's useful in some cases, and the ability certainly can and will be there, but in general a machine intelligence will be happier and more naturally suited to a purely digital environment - living in simulation. Uploads will exist in simulation universes, with windows and exits into reality when they feel like it.

They pay all of their direct costs. They do not necessarily pay all of the indirect costs, such as the externalities which you correctly cite above. If there is some hidden costs imposed on the commons or otherwise on society at large, then this is not borne by the business, and is not factored into the costs of the products and services paid for by the consumer.

As an example, polluters prior to the implementation of emissions controls meant to curb acid rain did not pay the economic costs of the acid rain that they were contributing to.

But now we have emissions controls - companies, and thus consumers, pay the costs. This is exactly what should, and now does, happen. What's your point? Social contracts are just as much a part of and based in the free market as anything else, as long as they don't become statist systems of arbitrary military control, like most so-called "democracies" are right now, including the United States.

Agreed, that is what should happen in theory. But in reality, business interests in keeping externalities external are narrow and focused, while the common interest in internalizing them is dispersed, and so the externalities rarely get internalized, except when the situation becomes totally untenable, such as with acid rain.

But it did happen - the market corrected itself, and the acid rain decreased again. I agree that the system is flawed, but this is the government's fault, not the market's. If the government was an actual minarchist, participatory social contract, not an arbitrary statist bureaucracy, it and the market would interface better, and an issue with broad-based support but no focused political spearhead, like many environmentalist concerns, would still affect the system.

But again, that does not mean he is capable of understanding nature well enough to safely manipulate it in the kinds of ways you are proposing.

Again, why not? If you have precedence, you logically extrapolate possibility until you run into a compelling state change that renders further extrapolation inaccurate.

I don't propose things that are impossible; what I propose is solidly grounded in current and past knowledge and rates of progress, and highly reliably predictable near-future progressions. You, on the other hand, keep saying things are impossible without solid backing.

Control of the economy via state apparatus is a characteristic of socialism, but it is not the only one. So it does not follow that any system that involves state control of the economy is necessarily socialist in nature. In any event, what I am proposing does not involve state ownership of the means of production. It may involve some limited amount of state intervention however. By and large it would require some kind of social compact to implement.

It would require far more than a limited amount of state intervention. Think about what you're proposing - a total destruction and replacement of the capitalist system, a fundamental alteration in the way the economy functions, and the whole thing contrary to the natural way humans behave, that will probably remove motivation from economic actors and impact quality of life. No one would do this voluntarily, and even more important individuals would be unable to independently operate their businesses in keeping with the patterns necessary to maintain zero growth. Coordinating the entire economy to fit in with your designs of zero growth requires centralized state control of the entire economy. That's not "limited state intervention".

But if we break this egg before we find any others, we are hooped.

Well, we'll have to last 50-ish years. But considering the on-the-horizon advances in energy generation (our biggest current problem) such as generation IV nuclear reactors, hydrogen, fusion, etc., I think we can safely predict that we'll manage for those 5 decades.

Anyway ... I think this is an interesting and worthwhile discussion, but we have definitely strayed pretty far from the topic of the OP. Maybe we should set up a seperate thread so that other people would have the opportunity to contribute?

True, lol. Can we get a mod to split off the relevant posts into a new thread, or do we have to just start over ourselves?

Natural rights.
Rights don't come from "nature".


Yes, as an extension of the right to use.
But where, precisely, does that right come from?


No, it comes from natural rights, and homesteading is a mutation of the right to use.
Perhaps you mean extension?

Rights don't come from "nature".
Do too.

But where, precisely, does that right come from?
Bears.

Bears.
The right to arm bears?

The right to arm bears?
The right to mount bear arms on a wall.

The right to arm bears?

NO! If they are armed they will revolt and destroy the Empire! :eek:

Wouldn't the first step be to give Mars an atmosphere? That would mean increasing the mass and volume of the entire planet.

Not really. Most of the components of a breathable Martian atmosphere are already on Mars; they're just locked up in the rocks, soil, ice caps, etc. Where else would we get it? We can hardly ship the gaseous contents of a planetary atmosphere across interplanetary space by ship. Not to mention that the Earth doesn't have enough of the necessary gases to support two atmospheres....

Wow, that gives me major flashbacks to the movie Spaceballs....

Well, if it could affect the earth but only insignificantly, which would mean that the answer to my initial question is "yes."

Well, anything and everything affects it insignificantly. You do. Your mass exerts a gravitational pull on the Earth, just like every other object in the visible universe.

Anyway, thank you for answering.

Anytime.

Explain this further, does this mean that because we have the capacity to act, we have self-ownership?

Well, an object is equal to itself. A=A. Since a person is conscious and thus has the quality of volition, this means that logically speaking, he automatically reserves the position of actor - the person who decides the actions made possible by the quality of volition - to himself. Thus, another person that attempts through the use of force to coerce the first person to act against their rational volition is guilty of an attempted logical contradiction. Thus, because a person is rationally morally obligated not to attempt to contravene the capability of actorship in another person, the capability of actorship is held to be a right per definition.

What would involuntary taxation be?

If the person being taxed did not agree to give up their funds. In a social contract, theoretically each person agrees to certain taxation when they "sign up". In a democracy, they also are given the right to decide what this taxation is along with the other members of the group. The problem here, as I mentioned in another post in this thread, is that current so-called democracies are not minarchist, democratically participatory social contracts, but arbitrary, non-transparent statist bureaucracies where the actual citizens lack any real power or knowledge, and membership in the contract is not truly voluntary, informed, and democratically participatory.

Like the positive right of ownership?

That's different. It more resembles a negative right, in that is not an obligation to be given anything, but not to have what is naturally yours by individual action involuntarily removed from your possession. So-called "positive rights" require that others give away the value produced by their labor in order to provide you with something you can't or won't produce yourself. It is a non-self-independent privilege that does not logically fall back to a negative, the way the principle of a right to ownership does.

True, but those of us who argue in favor of the right of healthcare don't suggest that this happen.

How else? The resources have to come from somewhere, and obviously these people can't work for themselves, or none of it would be an issue.

Oh, I think I get it. Sorry, failure of....breadth of comprehension? The idea of other people having money that is theirs, and not the state's or other people's, and having any right to decide whether or not they want to give away what they possess instead of having it decided for them by the masses or Big Brother, would have been abolished first thing.

Rights don't come from "nature".That depends on what your definition of rights is. If you argue that rights are solely granted by governments, then I can agree, and when people speak of natural rights, they simply mean natural abilities. However, if they aren't solely granted by governments, then there's no reason why they couldn't come from nature.
Nonetheless, the purpose of natural rights is to use them as a basis for comparing living in a system to living outside of that system. A system should not make people worse off than they would be if they were in the state of nature.

Perhaps you mean extension?No, I mean mutation. As far as a person claiming unused resources, adding their labor them, and then claiming them as their own, that's perfectly keeping in line with the right to use. The mutation comes from the person ceasing to use those resources and still being able to own them; presumably it comes from the same place as the idea of ownership does.

Not really. Most of the components of a breathable Martian atmosphere are already on Mars; they're just locked up in the rocks, soil, ice caps, etc. Where else would we get it? We can hardly ship the gaseous contents of a planetary atmosphere across interplanetary space by ship. Not to mention that the Earth doesn't have enough of the necessary gases to support two atmospheres....

Wow, that gives me major flashbacks to the movie Spaceballs....So are you suggesting that people would simply be wearing spacesuits and 'unlocking' these gases gradually? Wouldn't it make more sense to do it on a greater scale so people wouldn't have to go around in spacesuits?

Well, anything and everything affects it insignificantly. You do. Your mass exerts a gravitational pull on the Earth, just like every other object in the visible universe. True, but Mars already exerts a measureable gravitational pull on the Earth; I'm not certain if there are machines that can measure the gravitational pull of individual humans yet.

Well, an object is equal to itself. A=A. Since a person is conscious and thus has the quality of volition, this means that logically speaking, he automatically reserves the position of actor - the person who decides the actions made possible by the quality of volition - to himself. Thus, another person that attempts through the use of force to coerce the first person to act against their rational volition is guilty of an attempted logical contradiction. Thus, because a person is rationally morally obligated not to attempt to contravene the capability of actorship in another person, the capability of actorship is held to be a right per definition.Yes, but not all acts are acceptable; you gave an example of one yourself. Additionally, - while we may disagree on what other acts may be - there are other acts which are unacceptable that don't involve a person interfering with another's volition.

If the person being taxed did not agree to give up their funds. In a social contract, theoretically each person agrees to certain taxation when they "sign up". In a democracy, they also are given the right to decide what this taxation is along with the other members of the group. The problem here, as I mentioned in another post in this thread, is that current so-called democracies are not minarchist, democratically participatory social contracts, but arbitrary, non-transparent statist bureaucracies where the actual citizens lack any real power or knowledge, and membership in the contract is not truly voluntary, informed, and democratically participatory. But if the person in the contract agrees to a contract that isn't truly voluntary, informed, and democratically participatory, then it's perfectly acceptable to have a contract where this is the case. And clearly people do agree to these contracts, otherwise they wouldn't continue to live under them.

That's different. It more resembles a negative right, in that is not an obligation to be given anything, but not to have what is naturally yours by individual action involuntarily removed from your possession. So-called "positive rights" require that others give away the value produced by their labor in order to provide you with something you can't or won't produce yourself. It is a non-self-independent privilege that does not logically fall back to a negative, the way the principle of a right to ownership does.I can see where you might draw the line here, but I don't see why simply the value of one's past or present labor should be the sole determining factor here; I would also argue that giving up the produce of one's future labor is also a factor. This is what people do when they agree to the government granting titles of ownership - I could easily contribute my labor to a piece of land which is owned but currently being unused. Therefore, by giving this up, I am giving up the produce of my future labor.

How else? The resources have to come from somewhere, and obviously these people can't work for themselves, or none of it would be an issue. Certainly these people can't work for themselves in a system which requires unemployment.

Oh, I think I get it. Sorry, failure of....breadth of comprehension? The idea of other people having money that is theirs, and not the state's or other people's, and having any right to decide whether or not they want to give away what they possess instead of having it decided for them by the masses or Big Brother, would have been abolished first thing.Not at all. You touched upon it yourself earlier in this post - the social contract. People agree to give up a certain portion of resources (usually called a tax) in exchange for being allowed to live in a society. This tax can be used for anything - including healthcare.
Even if we were talking about systems that were fully informed, truly voluntary, and democratically participatory, it's still conceivable that people would agree to the right of healthcare.

That depends on what your definition of rights is.
There's only one. It's not some relative thing.


If you argue that rights are solely granted by governments, then I can agree, and when people speak of natural rights, they simply mean natural abilities. However, if they aren't solely granted by governments, then there's no reason why they couldn't come from nature.
Because it's ontologically queer.


No, I mean mutation. As far as a person claiming unused resources, adding their labor them, and then claiming them as their own, that's perfectly keeping in line with the right to use. The mutation comes from the person ceasing to use those resources and still being able to own them; presumably it comes from the same place as the idea of ownership does.
I do not see how that is a mutation.

So are you suggesting that people would simply be wearing spacesuits and 'unlocking' these gases gradually? Wouldn't it make more sense to do it on a greater scale so people wouldn't have to go around in spacesuits?

Well, in any case you'd spend a while having to wear spacesuits outside of a sealed base environment.

The two major first steps I can think of:
- Use orbital arrays of mirrors to focus and direct solar energy at the Martian poles, vaporizing the ice into water vapor that would thicken the atmosphere and allow it to trap more heat, as well as making the water more widely available once weather patterns develop.
- Genetically engineer strains of moss, lichen, algae, etc. to live in the natural Martian climate and convert minerals in the rocks they're growing over into human-breathable waste gases that would again thicken the atmosphere and enrich it with Earth-like chemical components.

True, but Mars already exerts a measureable gravitational pull on the Earth; I'm not certain if there are machines that can measure the gravitational pull of individual humans yet.

Even the pull of Mars is so minute it only produces a wobble in our orbit as close to immeasurable as something we've just barely noticed can be.

Yes, but not all acts are acceptable; you gave an example of one yourself.

I did? When? Sorry, I'm kind of scatterbrained like that.

Additionally, - while we may disagree on what other acts may be - there are other acts which are unacceptable that don't involve a person interfering with another's volition.

Like what? I can think of no wrong or unacceptable act which does not involve the violation of another's rights. Murder, assault, theft, fraud, breach of contract, etc. etc. are all covered by violation of rights rooted in the property of self-directed volition.

But if the person in the contract agrees to a contract that isn't truly voluntary, informed, and democratically participatory, then it's perfectly acceptable to have a contract where this is the case. And clearly people do agree to these contracts, otherwise they wouldn't continue to live under them.

Not really. On two points:

a) At root, we never agreed to that form of government. Now, I'm talking about America, and that may not apply to you, but that's my experience so that's what I'll run with. America was unique, the first of its kind, in that from the beginning it was designed to be a minarchist, informed, truly democratically participatory social contract, rather than the statist systems of control that characterized all other countries of the time. Since the latr 1700s, we've rather lost our libertarian values, succumbing to statist bureaucratization.
b) Unfortunately, people are by and large unaware of this. The basic expectation remains that we are a democracy with limited government, even when this in practice is no longer, for the most part, true. If you actually laid out the facts for people and asked them "do you want to be part of a social contract that makes you subject to the whims of an arbitrary statist-bureaucratic regime" the overwhelming majority would say no. The problem is that people are neither informed nor really given a choice. They're born, they assume the US is still really what it was supposed to be, and they never question the system besides the occasional gripes about taxation.

In principle, yes, a social contract in which entrants voluntarily sacrificed their rights to a statist government would be perfectly acceptable, if rather distasteful. But that's not what's happening.

I can see where you might draw the line here, but I don't see why simply the value of one's past or present labor should be the sole determining factor here; I would also argue that giving up the produce of one's future labor is also a factor. This is what people do when they agree to the government granting titles of ownership - I could easily contribute my labor to a piece of land which is owned but currently being unused. Therefore, by giving this up, I am giving up the produce of my future labor.

But the potentiality of future labor-value is dependent upon the uncompensated surrender of the rights to someone else's property. It doesn't actually exist, and wouldn't exist unless you removed from them what their labor earned them. Though the equations of physics require no direction to time, the universe we observe has a clear arrow of cause-and-effect that sets precedence in terms of the relevance of factors.

Certainly these people can't work for themselves in a system which requires unemployment.

How does the system require unemployment? I've heard this claim before, but never really spelled out. I don't think you'd say it without some argument to back it up, so could I get an explanation for that?

Not at all. You touched upon it yourself earlier in this post - the social contract. People agree to give up a certain portion of resources (usually called a tax) in exchange for being allowed to live in a society. This tax can be used for anything - including healthcare.

a) But the necessary elements missing are the people being taxed having actual control both over if and how much they are being taxed, and what this money is going to be used for. If, in a minarchist, participatory government, each individual truly agreed to surrender so much to government, and agreed that their money could be used so, that would be one thing. Your situation, where they surrender money with no control over where it goes, it far less acceptable, as is the general current practical situation where taxation is effectively involuntary.

b) Just because it can be done ethically in a social contract, that doesn't mean it is an equally legitimate government function. In any case, it is the theft of resources from the producers to help the parasites. It's a solution to the free rider problem that lies on the extreme appeasement end of the spectrum. Theoretically, if it was optionalized and reduced to effectively a government-run general charity with possible very small minimal donation requirements broadly agreed to, it would be legit. As a government wealth-redistribution program? Not at all.

Even if we were talking about systems that were fully informed, truly voluntary, and democratically participatory, it's still conceivable that people would agree to the right of healthcare.

Of course. But as nitpicky as it is, I have to insist - the privilege of healthcare.

Ironically, the society that could actually practically afford this would have to be the most economically productive one. Food, shelter, water, and healthcare will be free commodities available to the poor iff the marginal value of those commodities drops close to zero. This is only achievable in a highly productive market.

If you actually laid out the facts for people and asked them "do you want to be part of a social contract that makes you subject to the whims of an arbitrary statist-bureaucratic regime" the overwhelming majority would say no. The problem is that people are neither informed nor really given a choice. They're born, they assume the US is still really what it was supposed to be, and they never question the system besides the occasional gripes about taxation.
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Be careful where you take this. If you laid out the facts for most people they'd accept some level of taxation and if the choice was a strong state or privatisation of education, roads or other services I don't think most people would be happy.


How does the system require unemployment? I've heard this claim before, but never really spelled out. I don't think you'd say it without some argument to back it up, so could I get an explanation for that?
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It doesn't require unemployment but it works best with some. It keeps wages lower and allows for a more flexible labour market in which companys can hire more workers more easily.


a) But the necessary elements missing are the people being taxed having actual control both over if and how much they are being taxed, and what this money is going to be used for.
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Thats pretty much what elections are about. A party putting forward a manefesto saying this is our basic plans for tax and spending and what we want to spend it on. If you don't like it you can always run yourself and put forward your own plans.


Of course. But as nitpicky as it is, I have to insist - the privilege of healthcare.
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What privilege. We want to encourage people to go to doctors and hospitals as much as possible, this is how we stop the spread of disease that yes can spread to the rich as well.

But if the person in the contract agrees to a contract that isn't truly voluntary, informed, and democratically participatory, then it's perfectly acceptable to have a contract where this is the case. And clearly people do agree to these contracts, otherwise they wouldn't continue to live under them.
Tell that to the jews who lived in the Warsaw Ghetto.


Not at all. You touched upon it yourself earlier in this post - the social contract. People agree to give up a certain portion of resources (usually called a tax) in exchange for being allowed to live in a society.
No, they don't agree to that. They are simply forced to do it.

Be careful where you take this. If you laid out the facts for most people they'd accept some level of taxation and if the choice was a strong state or privatisation of education, roads or other services I don't think most people would be happy.

a) I disagree. Taxes rank even higher than inlaws and the price of gas on the average person's list of things-I-hate. Maybe I'm being Americacentric again, but that's my experience.

b) Also, you misunderstand what I'm saying. Some level and form of taxation practically speaking has to be a part of a large, stable social contract. I completely understand that. What I'm talking about in the comment you quoted is not the fact of taxation or services, but the nature of their collection and use. The systems I'm saying people would reject are arbitrary, non-transparent, non-democratically-participatory statist bureaucracies, not any systems involving taxation or services.

c) I'm also not talking about the wholesale privatization of absolutely everything. That'd be anarchocapitalism. (which is also an interesting concept I've been toying with, but off-topic) Road infrastructure would remain a government function - the general physical connectivity of all parts of the territory is a basic requirement for the running of the state, plus the lack of it makes commerce almost impossible, making facilitization a compelling interest of the social contract, one which I think all contractees would agree to. Education I see as a free-market-structured system, but one that funding-wise is at least strongly, and probably primarily, backed by the state, but definitely bridges the private and public sectors, and is structured and intentioned as an investment in the future workforce and voter population.

It doesn't require unemployment but it works best with some. It keeps wages lower and allows for a more flexible labour market in which companys can hire more workers more easily.

I suppose that makes sense. But those aren't chronically unemployed people - they're workers in temporary transition between jobs. This, of course, is a practical necessity in the market, and it's certainly desirable - jobs need to change to maximize the potential of the system.

I thought you meant chronic unemployment.

Thats pretty much what elections are about. A party putting forward a manefesto saying this is our basic plans for tax and spending and what we want to spend it on. If you don't like it you can always run yourself and put forward your own plans.

But in reality, parties are distant political machines focused on gaining power for themselves. The funds are filled and the shots are called by people with deep pockets and long histories in the politicosphere. There's not a whole lot of difference between the parties at core. The media tricks us into thinking we're in control and the government is doing something besides internal powerbroking using talking heads, staged roundtable "debates", and propoganda-rich electoral circuses.

There's no real popular sovereignty, no true transparency, no direct channels of action and information making the government an extension of the public.

What privilege. We want to encourage people to go to doctors and hospitals as much as possible, this is how we stop the spread of disease that yes can spread to the rich as well.

That's what the CDC is for - and it serves a very legitimate purpose. It's not what Medicaid is for. Heart disease, broken legs, drug overdose, and cancer don't spread, and common infectious diseases treated by the average doctor or emergency room can be dealt with by the population and the private sector without the Hillary Plan; free healthcare does little to nothing meaningful in way of that.

Encouraging people to go to doctors and hospitals as much as possible just costs the producing people lots of money to little or no clear, unambiguous benefit. Don't try to fog up the issue; healthcare is a beneficial and expensive service given to people for free as a privilege.

There's only one. It's not some relative thing.Of course it is; there are separate ideas for where rights come from, except for those people who believe they are solely provided by governments.

Because it's ontologically queer.<shrug> I'm not concerned if we consider them natural abilities; either way a system should not make people worse off than they would be in the state of nature.

I do not see how that is a mutation.It is a mutation in the same way ownership is a mutation of possession, but if you hold to the idea of ownership then you would simply see it as a natural progression.

Tell that to the jews who lived in the Warsaw Ghetto.In the instance where people cannot emigrate, I would agree with you that they don't have a choice. Fortunately, most of us can emigrate.

No, they don't agree to that. They are simply forced to do it.They are not forced to do it, they can always leave. By staying in a country that taxes them they agree to be taxed.

Well, in any case you'd spend a while having to wear spacesuits outside of a sealed base environment.

The two major first steps I can think of:
- Use orbital arrays of mirrors to focus and direct solar energy at the Martian poles, vaporizing the ice into water vapor that would thicken the atmosphere and allow it to trap more heat, as well as making the water more widely available once weather patterns develop.
- Genetically engineer strains of moss, lichen, algae, etc. to live in the natural Martian climate and convert minerals in the rocks they're growing over into human-breathable waste gases that would again thicken the atmosphere and enrich it with Earth-like chemical components.Right, this was similar to what I was thinking of; nonetheless it would add at least some mass and volume to the planet.

Even the pull of Mars is so minute it only produces a wobble in our orbit as close to immeasurable as something we've just barely noticed can be. It wouldn't need to have to alter our orbit; causing stronger tides would also be bad.

I did? When? Sorry, I'm kind of scatterbrained like that.In the instance of people acting to restrict the ability of others to act.

Like what? I can think of no wrong or unacceptable act which does not involve the violation of another's rights. Murder, assault, theft, fraud, breach of contract, etc. etc. are all covered by violation of rights rooted in the property of self-directed volition. I can think of some. Dumping toxic waste, cruelty to animals...of course these are just my opinions. Nonetheless, unless you don't believe in jails, certainly you agree that sometimes it is acceptable to act in such a way to restrict someone else's ability to act.

Not really. On two points:

a) At root, we never agreed to that form of government. Now, I'm talking about America, and that may not apply to you, but that's my experience so that's what I'll run with. America was unique, the first of its kind, in that from the beginning it was designed to be a minarchist, informed, truly democratically participatory social contract, rather than the statist systems of control that characterized all other countries of the time. Since the latr 1700s, we've rather lost our libertarian values, succumbing to statist bureaucratization.
b) Unfortunately, people are by and large unaware of this. The basic expectation remains that we are a democracy with limited government, even when this in practice is no longer, for the most part, true. If you actually laid out the facts for people and asked them "do you want to be part of a social contract that makes you subject to the whims of an arbitrary statist-bureaucratic regime" the overwhelming majority would say no. The problem is that people are neither informed nor really given a choice. They're born, they assume the US is still really what it was supposed to be, and they never question the system besides the occasional gripes about taxation. I'm from the U.S., so I can agree with this assessment of what's happening here. Nonetheless, people continue to live in a system as you described where they could emigrate to another system, therefore they give their consent to this system.

In principle, yes, a social contract in which entrants voluntarily sacrificed their rights to a statist government would be perfectly acceptable, if rather distasteful. But that's not what's happening.Sure it is; if people did not wish to do so, they would leave.

But the potentiality of future labor-value is dependent upon the uncompensated surrender of the rights to someone else's property. It doesn't actually exist, and wouldn't exist unless you removed from them what their labor earned them. Though the equations of physics require no direction to time, the universe we observe has a clear arrow of cause-and-effect that sets precedence in terms of the relevance of factors.Yes, but their labor can only earn them pieces of land that they don't use in a system which allows such a thing, in much the same way that a person's labor can justly earn them a dead wife only in a system where people are allowed to hire hitmen. (No, I'm not saying that owning property is morally the same as hiring a hitman, it is just an analogy.)

How does the system require unemployment? I've heard this claim before, but never really spelled out. I don't think you'd say it without some argument to back it up, so could I get an explanation for that? Blood has been shed touched upon it - that unemployment keeps wages lower. If there was no unemployment, employees would organize for better wages, as the fear of unemployment is gone. This would result either in the company going out of business, or the company having control turned over to the workers. If this happens across the board where the workers own the means of production - surprise, you're in a socialist system.

I suppose that makes sense. But those aren't chronically unemployed people - they're workers in temporary transition between jobs. This, of course, is a practical necessity in the market, and it's certainly desirable - jobs need to change to maximize the potential of the system.

I thought you meant chronic unemployment.Even if it is merely this type of thing, it isn't going to be a rotating type of thing where everyone changes jobs roughly the same amount of time. There are going to be people who change jobs more often than others - the poor - who are going to be unemployed for part of that time. It's impossible to build a life with no income, but it's difficult to build one without a stable income, which many people don't, and can't have.


a) But the necessary elements missing are the people being taxed having actual control both over if and how much they are being taxed, and what this money is going to be used for. If, in a minarchist, participatory government, each individual truly agreed to surrender so much to government, and agreed that their money could be used so, that would be one thing. Your situation, where they surrender money with no control over where it goes, it far less acceptable, as is the general current practical situation where taxation is effectively involuntary.Certainly, and I would prefer to have control over where my tax money goes. However, by choosing to live in a system where I don't have control, I voluntarily give it up.

b) Just because it can be done ethically in a social contract, that doesn't mean it is an equally legitimate government function. In any case, it is the theft of resources from the producers to help the parasites. It's a solution to the free rider problem that lies on the extreme appeasement end of the spectrum. Theoretically, if it was optionalized and reduced to effectively a government-run general charity with possible very small minimal donation requirements broadly agreed to, it would be legit. As a government wealth-redistribution program? Not at all.No, it isn't the theft from the producers, it is taking the fee that the producers pay to live in the society as per the contract; completely voluntary.

Of course. But as nitpicky as it is, I have to insist - the privilege of healthcare.<shrug> I'm not concerned with whether or not it is a right or a priviledge, but I would use a different definition of what a priviledge is than what you describe.

Ironically, the society that could actually practically afford this would have to be the most economically productive one. Certainly, just not necessarily the most capitalist one.

Food, shelter, water, and healthcare will be free commodities available to the poor iff the marginal value of those commodities drops close to zero. This is only achievable in a highly productive market.I disagree. In a highly productive market supply will be restricted to match up with demand. Additionally, the suppliers will necessarily want to make a profit off of what they are supplying. In a socialist system, this needn't be the case.

Of course it is; there are separate ideas for where rights come from,
And each religion has its own creation story. That means nothing as well.


<shrug> I'm not concerned if we consider them natural abilities; either way a system should not make people worse off than they would be in the state of nature.
Rather, should not make a person worse off relative to the ex ante position, rather than just state of nature.


It is a mutation in the same way ownership is a mutation of possession, but if you hold to the idea of ownership then you would simply see it as a natural progression.
I do.


In the instance where people cannot emigrate, I would agree with you that they don't have a choice. Fortunately, most of us can emigrate.
That's irrelevant, though. Why should people have to move?


They are not forced to do it, they can always leave. By staying in a country that taxes them they agree to be taxed.
Non sequitur.

And each religion has its own creation story. That means nothing as well.And they are all equally valid. (In the case of religion, not valid.)

Rather, should not make a person worse off relative to the ex ante position, rather than just state of nature.And what is the ex ante position, if not the state of nature?

That's irrelevant, though. Why should people have to move?I dunno, why should people have to find the company that will give them the wage and conditions that they want? Why should people have to move to find work?

Non sequitur.Not at all. It's well known that people will be taxed for living here, therefore by continuing to live here, they agree to the tax.

And they are all equally valid. (In the case of religion, not valid.)
In the case of religion, yes, they are all equally invalid. In the case of rights, only one is valid.


And what is the ex ante position, if not the state of nature?
We currently aren't in it.


I dunno, why should people have to find the company that will give them the wage and conditions that they want? Why should people have to move to find work?
So you're begging the question that the government officials have title to the land.



Not at all. It's well known that people will be taxed for living here, therefore by continuing to live here, they agree to the tax.
Non sequitur. Implicit consent does not work.

a) I disagree. Taxes rank even higher than inlaws and the price of gas on the average person's list of things-I-hate. Maybe I'm being Americacentric again, but that's my experience.
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Great for others I'm sure they dislike poverty or enviromental damage or whatever. In Britain at the moment should a party say we want to lower taxes they'd get a backlash from people saying they want to kill off our public services.


b) Also, you misunderstand what I'm saying. Some level and form of taxation practically speaking has to be a part of a large, stable social contract. I completely understand that. What I'm talking about in the comment you quoted is not the fact of taxation or services, but the nature of their collection and use. The systems I'm saying people would reject are arbitrary, non-transparent, non-democratically-participatory statist bureaucracies, not any systems involving taxation or services.
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And those should be kept as small as possible, I doubt anyone would disagree. But clearly if they have a use we can't elect every single one of them ourselves but its best to let the government handle it.


c) I'm also not talking about the wholesale privatization of absolutely everything. That'd be anarchocapitalism. (which is also an interesting concept I've been toying with, but off-topic) Road infrastructure would remain a government function - the general physical connectivity of all parts of the territory is a basic requirement for the running of the state, plus the lack of it makes commerce almost impossible, making facilitization a compelling interest of the social contract, one which I think all contractees would agree to. Education I see as a free-market-structured system, but one that funding-wise is at least strongly, and probably primarily, backed by the state, but definitely bridges the private and public sectors, and is structured and intentioned as an investment in the future workforce and voter population.
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I agree :D



I suppose that makes sense. But those aren't chronically unemployed people - they're workers in temporary transition between jobs. This, of course, is a practical necessity in the market, and it's certainly desirable - jobs need to change to maximize the potential of the system.

I thought you meant chronic unemployment.
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Wasn't my point origonally and I agree it is desirable as well. I think the origonal critic felt any system where someone wants work but is unemployed is wrong. Obviously its wrong but destroying capitalism and the economy in the process is kinda worse....


But in reality, parties are distant political machines focused on gaining power for themselves. The funds are filled and the shots are called by people with deep pockets and long histories in the politicosphere. There's not a whole lot of difference between the parties at core. The media tricks us into thinking we're in control and the government is doing something besides internal powerbroking using talking heads, staged roundtable "debates", and propoganda-rich electoral circuses.

There's no real popular sovereignty, no true transparency, no direct channels of action and information making the government an extension of the public.
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I agree. But atleast if things ever get really bad we're still the ones in control.



Encouraging people to go to doctors and hospitals as much as possible just costs the producing people lots of money to little or no clear, unambiguous benefit. Don't try to fog up the issue; healthcare is a beneficial and expensive service given to people for free as a privilege.

Okay I can accept that. Of course people should use it within reason when and only when they think they might need it. But its certainly a benefit to have a healthy workforce who don't take as long of work because they can have health cheacks and so forth.

So are you suggesting that people would simply be wearing spacesuits and 'unlocking' these gases gradually? Wouldn't it make more sense to do it on a greater scale so people wouldn't have to go around in spacesuits?
Mars has sufficient mass to hold a breathable atmosphere. It just doesn't happen to have one (though there's significant evidence it used to have a much thicker atmosphere - it may have been blown off the planet by a large impact, perhaps the same one that created the Tharsis Bulge). Adding such an atmosphere (by warming the planet and releasing trapped gasses) wouldn't add to the planet's mass or volume at all.

Mars could probably support some terrestrial plants and lichens right now.

In the case of religion, yes, they are all equally invalid. In the case of rights, only one is valid.If you're referring to the concept of self-autonomy being the basis of rights, there's a leap between that and the concept of ownership which hasn't been explained.

We currently aren't in it.What are some of the conditions of the ex ante position? For instance, in the state of nature there is the right (or ability) to self-defense, the right (or ability) to combine your labor with things, etc.

So you're begging the question that the government officials have title to the land.No, I'm saying that the government is endorsed and emplowered by the people to run the land; the title has nothing to do with it.

Non sequitur. Implicit consent does not work.Why wouldn't it?

Mars has sufficient mass to hold a breathable atmosphere. It just doesn't happen to have one (though there's significant evidence it used to have a much thicker atmosphere - it may have been blown off the planet by a large impact, perhaps the same one that created the Tharsis Bulge). Adding such an atmosphere (by warming the planet and releasing trapped gasses) wouldn't add to the planet's mass or volume at all.

Mars could probably support some terrestrial plants and lichens right now.Ah, I see. Giving the planet an atmosphere would simply mean moving the gases from one place on the planet to another.

Ah, I see. Giving the planet an atmosphere would simply mean moving the gases from one place on the planet to another.
That's just crazy.

Um, quick question, JB...are you male or female? Not that it matters, but all this time I had you pictured as a guy, and a recent comment I saw of yours had my head flipped around saying, JB's a she???

That's just crazy.

Um, quick question, JB...are you male or female? Not that it matters, but all this time I had you pictured as a guy, and a recent comment I saw of yours had my head flipped around saying, JB's a she???I is male. :) (Sorry for the bad grammar, I just wanted to type and post just one sentence like that.)

I is male. :) (Sorry for the bad grammar, I just wanted to type and post just one sentence like that.)
Whew. My penis-senses were correct after all. Thanks;)

Well, an object is equal to itself. A=A.

True.

Since a person is conscious and thus has the quality of volition, this means that logically speaking, he automatically reserves the position of actor - the person who decides the actions made possible by the quality of volition - to himself.

Yes, but this observation isn't very useful. It's just a repetition of what we already know - the person controls her own actions, that is, she is the actor with the volition behind her own actions as opposed to someone else.

Thus, another person that attempts through the use of force to coerce the first person to act against their rational volition is guilty of an attempted logical contradiction.

No. That simply doesn't follow. Firstly, someone "coerced" is not acting against her volition; she still controls her actions, but her circumstances are such that her options are either something completely awful (say, death) or obeying the person coercing her. She retains her will and her status as actor. Secondly, even if she didn't, it wouldn't be a logical contradiction; the new person would simply usurp the position of "actor" from her. If it really were logically contradictory, it would be impossible.

Thus, because a person is rationally morally obligated not to attempt to contravene the capability of actorship in another person, the capability of actorship is held to be a right per definition.

If you want to prove that we cannot rationally will a certain thing, you have to show that willing it is inherently contradictory. For instance, I cannot rationally act in order to make something both completely black and completely white; something can't be both completely black and completely white, so I'm trying to achieve an impossibility, and am thus acting irrationally. You can't merely say that because two different people will two different things (in this case, the coerced and the person performing the coercion) there is some sort of contradiction simply because one of the alternatives must be chosen.

Whew. My penis-senses were correct after all. Thanks;)Lol. You're welcome. I assume it was one of my comments in the BDSM thread you were referring to?

Lol. You're welcome. I assume it was one of my comments in the BDSM thread you were referring to?
Yeah, not that it matters, just made me think maybe I was wrong. I used to think Santa Barbara (now Trostia) was female for the longest time. Boy he proved me wrong:)

Not really. We can tell exactly what worked, and what didn't.

An example:
Person A eats well, exercises regularly, and smokes.
Person B doesn't do any of these things.

Person A ends up living longer than Person B. And now you are suggesting that everyone should take up smoking as a way to live longer.



No, I am suggesting we allow these nations to try what actually works. You are suggesting we ignore what has happened in the real world because economic theory tells you it shouldn't work.

So, in other words you don't know what the conventional economic wisdom actually is.
Tariffs: Bad.
State Intervention: Can be bad but doesn't have to be, it depends on what exactly it is.

Strangely, I was told earlier in this thread that any state intervention was "socialism".


Find me the evidence.

And establish a proper link. Don't tell me about correlation, tell me about causation. Because the economics-community would love to hear about it, I'm sure.

I'm sure they wouldn't. The economics community tends to come up with pet theories, focus on the data that supports their thesis, and ignore the mountains of evidence that contradict it.

I have posted a truly gigantic study in this thread, probably more than 80 pages, of evidence gathered from many, many LDCs before and after trade liberalisation. The evidence suggests that trade liberalisation leads to higher growth rates. That's cold, hard maths.
It's not a universal cure for these country's economic hardships, but it's one step of a long way.

Tell that to the people in Haiti. But seriously, LDC's or developing countries? Cause I would agree that trade liberalization is beneficial once they have reached a certain level of industrialization and access to Western markets actually means something. But before that time, tarriffs are a useful tool of economic policy, as the experience of the Asian tigers and others illustrates.


Were you talking economics, or something unrelated. It's hardly a liberal paradise, yes. But economically, people are as free to do as they please as almost nowhere else in the world.

Social policies are policies too.


Oh, I'm sure we can pick others too. The poorest countries just generally are in Africa.
Be as specific as you please, just don't make sweeping generalisations alá 'Africa was the playing ground for the Cold War'. Because the Cold War, as well as Imperialism, were experienced in many other places of the world, and somehow many of those countries (and even some in Africa, I suppose) managed to establish half-way decent economies.

I didn't say Africa was a playing ground for the cold war. I said alot of underdeveloped countries were. You leaped to the conclusion we were talking about Africa. I could cite tons of examples in Asia and South America too.


Let me make this very clear: I do not propose Western governments tell random people in LDCs what to. I do propose Western governments (better still, Western NGOs or perhaps smart economists like Amartya Sen) tell the governments in LDCs what to do.
As far as the people in LDCs are concerned, they usually don't get much choice in their government anyways.

Well why not give them more choice rather than trying to impose our views from without? Why not put them in a position where they have real choice as to whose advice they are going to follow?

Yes, it requires money. But not so much money that it couldn't be gathered from income taxes and corporate taxes on everyone doing business in the country.
And I'd be glad if you could just present your cohesive main point for why LDC governments require (or indeed are responsible with) funds of such size as could only be gained through stealing the money of foreigners for committing the crime of wanting to do business in that country.

So instead they should "steal" from their own people through property and income taxes? Seriously, if all taxes are theft, why is stealing from their own impoverished people superior to stealing from wealthy foreigners?

The problems they are facing are not monetary in nature. They are cultural and they are organisational.

I agree that part of the problems are organizational ... and again, proper institutions require funding, and a tax on the non-existent income and non-existent property values is not going to cut it. I also agree part of the problem is cultural ... the lack of cultural fit between the existing institutions and economic systems and the cultures in question.


If given the choice between oppressive and incompetent government, and relatively liberal and competent government, I choose the latter.
Note that being libertarian is also being internationalist.

Fair enough. But why does it make more sense to have an outside government impose rather than try to replace the oppressive incompent government with a more liberal and competent one?
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You have one option that promises to hurt the economy a lot (tariffs).
You have one option that promises to hurt the economy a little, but not badly (sensible income taxes).
And you have one option that promises to help the economy (foreign aid with conditions on where and how it is spent).

Except the real world evidence suggests that tarriffs work and aid doesn't, and you have to have income to be able to tax it, which at this point you don't (in some of these countries the income per capita is declining ...)


So you propose that economic advisors to people like Mobotu Sese Seko pay for the dictator not implementing their polices

No, but I would suggest that people make better decisions when they reap the rewards or suffer the burdens of their good or bad decisions. Again, that should not be a hard pill for you to swallow, as a libertarian.


Except that Bush would then point towards all sorts of economic policies next. Kabila, nor his enemies, don't.
Yes, elections are fought style over substance in many Western nations. But not to that extent, and the alternative is not ranting about a different ethnic group (although that might be changing these days...).

Lets just say that debating economic policy is not Bush's strong point ...


Right. Because we are all irrational animals who don't want to maximise their satisfaction (not wealth, people, please listen when economists talk to you!) and prefer to make ourselves unhappy if we get that choice.

Unfortunately, too many economists do equate more money with greater happiness. Why else would we focus on such flawed measures of economic success as the GDP and income per capita?

Been there, done that, got the (blood-soaked) T-Shirt.[/QUOTE]

Look ... people are dying there every day. 35,000 a day of starvation and preventable diseases, while Western government continue to prop up the corrupt and unrepresentative governments who do nothing about it. True democracy is not likely to come about without the blood of a few tyrants being spilled ... I think either they bleed a little for a short while and move on to better things, or they slowly bleed to death over time.

If you're referring to the concept of self-autonomy being the basis of rights, there's a leap between that and the concept of ownership which hasn't been explained.
No there isn't.


What are some of the conditions of the ex ante position? For instance, in the state of nature there is the right (or ability) to self-defense, the right (or ability) to combine your labor with things, etc.
No, there are no rights in the state of nature. You can't get any worse than that.


No, I'm saying that the government is endorsed and emplowered by the people to run the land;
Empowered by which people? Certainly not me. If I don't consent, they can't do it.

And yes--title has everything to do with it.


Why wouldn't it?
The second is that taxation is part of a social contract. Essentially, tax is payment in exchange for services from government. This kind of argument is suitable for defending almost any tax as part of a contract. Many libertarians accept social contract (for example, essentially all minarchists must to insist on a monopoly of government.) Of course they differ as to what should be IN the contract.
While it may be true that minarchists need a social contract to justify their support of a government monopoly over the use of retaliatory force, my experience is that very few of them, at least in the online population, make that argument.

The obvious reason not to is that the social contract argument doesn't work very well as anything more than a metaphor. Contracts get their moral force, in the view of most people, including most libertarians, from the agreement of the parties. But the "social contract" has the form "I will give you these services and you will pay me for them, whether you agree to or not."

The standard response, and Mike's, is that you "implicitly agree" by remaining in the country. But this works only if the government already has the right to throw you out of the country--i.e. if the government is somehow the owner of the entire territory it rules. Without a social contract, it is hard to see how you can justify such a claim. And until you can justify it, you can 't get your social contract.

I could, after all, propose a contract to Mike under which he agrees to pay me a thousand dollars a month in exchange for the valuable services I am providing by critiquing his FAQ. I could also inform him that by breathing, he agrees to accept that contract. But unless he already believes that he has no right to breath without my permission, it is hard to see why he should feel obligated to pay.

No, I am suggesting we allow these nations to try what actually works. You are suggesting we ignore what has happened in the real world because economic theory tells you it shouldn't work.
But you haven't proven at all that the evidence presented in this thread (that has shown very clearly that tariffs hurt the economy) is somehow faulty. You just continue asserting that tariffs are what works. Tell us why, and prove it!

Strangely, I was told earlier in this thread that any state intervention was "socialism".
I'm thinking that might have been BAAWAKnights. Rest assured that he does not represent the consensus in modern economics, if there is such a thing. :p

I'm sure they wouldn't. The economics community tends to come up with pet theories, focus on the data that supports their thesis, and ignore the mountains of evidence that contradict it.
And you propose to prove that how?
Read this thread, see the disagreement. Do you really think that the economics community is any better? Every pet theory gets debated for many years, evidence is dug up until a clear picture emerges. Things that hold true for the available data (and I concede that there are often problems associated with finding that data, not so much with the bias of the economist himself) are accepted, things that don't land on the trash heap of the discipline.
I'm doing a macroeconomics course right now. People who aren't economists will tell me that it is either Keynesian, or Friedmanite or something like that: The truth is: it's a bit of everything. Years and years of debates and arguments have resulted in models that include bits and pieces from everything, but which seem to work very well indeed for predictions.
Are they perfect? No. Particularly Psycho-economics from Switzerland will surely add more facets to them. But they're pretty damn close, and provide much better reasoning than anything anyone of us is likely to come up with.

Tell that to the people in Haiti. But seriously, LDC's or developing countries? Cause I would agree that trade liberalization is beneficial once they have reached a certain level of industrialization and access to Western markets actually means something. But before that time, tarriffs are a useful tool of economic policy, as the experience of the Asian tigers and others illustrates.
http://www.stanford.edu/~wacziarg/downloads/integration.pdf
A bit of everyone.

Again, don't talk about the Asian Tigers as examples. Correlation does not imply causation, a causal relationship just has not been established.

Social policies are policies too.

I could cite tons of examples in Asia and South America too.
And are these anywhere near as poor as these African countries? They had the same sort of past experiences, so by your deterministic view, they should have the exact same outcome.
Note that most of those African countries also had huge tariffs in place.

Well why not give them more choice rather than trying to impose our views from without? Why not put them in a position where they have real choice as to whose advice they are going to follow?
Because, if no one in the country has the expertise, it doesn't matter who they vote for: economic policy will still be crap.
Quite apart from the fact that good economic policy is never going to be populism, and populism is what you need to win if your voters aren't educated.

So instead they should "steal" from their own people through property and income taxes? Seriously, if all taxes are theft, why is stealing from their own impoverished people superior to stealing from wealthy foreigners?
That is a good question. It isn't - except perhaps for them, seeing as to how tariffs will hurt their own people more.
Taking money from people by threat of punishment is never going to be truly acceptable. But taking money from people who are free to leave whenever they please, that's not only morally questionable, that's just plain stupid too.

I agree that part of the problems are organizational ... and again, proper institutions require funding, and a tax on the non-existent income and non-existent property values is not going to cut it.
Why are you telling me these people don't earn any income? The farmers somewhere out in the bush might not, maybe some of the poor labourers won't really earn anything either.
But there's still corporations and businesspeople, the rich upper class of past and current government affiliates that all poor countries invariably have.

And as I said before, I'm doing a management and econ degree at the moment. As such, I also learn about organisational structure and -culture. Believe me: money is not the key to changing these things, especially as a government.

I also agree part of the problem is cultural ... the lack of cultural fit between the existing institutions and economic systems and the cultures in question.
You said this before, yet evidence has been scarce.

Fair enough. But why does it make more sense to have an outside government impose rather than try to replace the oppressive incompent government with a more liberal and competent one?
So regime change is the answer. Send in the marines.
We can either influence the governments they have, or we can replace them with our own ideas (there's your cultural fit for you :rolleyes: ). Note that we will have to do that against the wishes of the existing government and against popular opinion in those countries.
But I suppose, if Afghanistan ends up working out, it might be an option to be considered...

Except the real world evidence suggests that tarriffs work and aid doesn't...
Show me.
http://ideas.repec.org/p/wbk/wbrwps/3251.html
Fact of the matter is that aid works like any other money, it's origins are irrelevant. If you spend it well, it's going to do wonders, if you don't, it's not.

No, but I would suggest that people make better decisions when they reap the rewards or suffer the burdens of their good or bad decisions. Again, that should not be a hard pill for you to swallow, as a libertarian.
Well, I suppose economic advisors could be hired on commission, but given the time frames involved, I'm not sure that's going to work. But then, that's the job of the poor government in question, not mine, to figure out.

Unfortunately, too many economists do equate more money with greater happiness. Why else would we focus on such flawed measures of economic success as the GDP and income per capita?
Because it is such a good indicator of living standards. Do try to find me a really poor country with a low GDP per capita that you would prefer to a horrible place with a high GDP per capita. Note that you will only get that GDP per capita in income, you don't get to take your money with you.

GDP per capita is a precursor to good healthcare, to good education, to good infrastructure, to a high quality of life. In some ways, it's also a result of these things, but either way: chances are you won't find one without the other.

True democracy is not likely to come about without the blood of a few tyrants being spilled ... I think either they bleed a little for a short while and move on to better things, or they slowly bleed to death over time.
The problem is just that
a) these people don't want a government imposed by the West. They'll have enough issues with policies imposed by the West.
b) history suggests that regime change in these countries (or anywhere for that matter) is not a quick or clean affair.

Yes, but this observation isn't very useful. It's just a repetition of what we already know - the person controls her own actions, that is, she is the actor with the volition behind her own actions as opposed to someone else.

No. That simply doesn't follow. Firstly, someone "coerced" is not acting against her volition; she still controls her actions, but her circumstances are such that her options are either something completely awful (say, death) or obeying the person coercing her. She retains her will and her status as actor. Secondly, even if she didn't, it wouldn't be a logical contradiction; the new person would simply usurp the position of "actor" from her. If it really were logically contradictory, it would be impossible.

My point is one of effective control. Person (defined as a conscious, volitional entity capable of actorship) A is presented with a certain situation in the environment around her which she comes to a rational, self-interested decision about. If Person B enters the situation and alters it in such a way as to substitute the decisions of his capacity of actorship for A's own without the free consent of A, A's volitional capacity has been effectively subverted away from the natural response of rational self-interest. The difference is the presence of another conscious being acting in direct respect to A.

A situation in the environment does not violate a person's rights; it can't. It lacks any capacity of actorship to substitute, because it lacks the capabilities of reason and volition. When another entity enters the situation and volitionally alters it with direct respect to A and A's relationship with it, with the aim and effect of effectively substituting A's rational, volitional response to the environment with his own, that entity is making an attempted logical contradiction. At a core level, there is of course no contradiction; such true contradictions are impossible in our logical universe. But on the...macroscopic? social level, an apparent or effective contradiction is created.

Even a situation that involves other conscious actors already coercively modifying the natural situation is itself a natural situation; any context that is any number of degrees of separation away from purely environmental can be set as the base, from which a new actor compounds the contradiction by inserting himself as another layer of the pyramid between the central/primary subject in question and the natural situation.

Let's go through this step by step.

My point is one of effective control. Person (defined as a conscious, volitional entity capable of actorship) A is presented with a certain situation in the environment around her which she comes to a rational, self-interested decision about.

Okay.

If Person B enters the situation and alters it in such a way as to substitute the decisions of his capacity of actorship for A's own without the free consent of A,

Which, as I already pointed out, would require mind control. A is still making decisions regarding his own actions whatever B does, unless B breaks the connection of A's conscious mind to A's body. Mere coercion, however extreme, does not qualify.

A's volitional capacity has been effectively subverted away from the natural response of rational self-interest.

"Rational self-interest" puts a whole different spin on things. A's actions may or may not be self-interested and they may or may not be rational, regardless of B. B's coercion may or may not alter the rationality or self-interested nature of A's actions.

What you seem to be getting at is that A is doing something he'd rather not do, thanks to B's actions. That is indeed the case, but there is no usurpation of actorship.

The difference is the presence of another conscious being acting in direct respect to A.

Okay.

A situation in the environment does not violate a person's rights; it can't. It lacks any capacity of actorship to substitute, because it lacks the capabilities of reason and volition.

Circumstances can most definitely be influenced by another actor, and they never substitute actorship because they don't influence actorship. Even if A is being threatened with the worst fate imaginable, he is still an actor.

When another entity enters the situation and volitionally alters it with direct respect to A and A's relationship with it, with the aim and effect of effectively substituting A's rational, volitional response to the environment with his own, that entity is making an attempted logical contradiction.

B is not "substituting A's rational, volitional response to the environment with his own," he is changing the environment with the intent of making A's volitional (at no point is it necessarily rational) response to it more amenable to B's preferences.

And even if it were substitution, what's the logical contradiction in substitution?

At a core level, there is of course no contradiction; such true contradictions are impossible in our logical universe. But on the...macroscopic? social level, an apparent or effective contradiction is created.

A conflict is created. Two people have different preferences, and only a single alternative can be chosen. So what? You still haven't rationally demonstrated any immorality, or indeed, any irrationality on the actions of any of the players.

Again, if you want to prove that a person ought not to do something on the basis of rationality, you have to demonstrate that the action requires an intent to do something impossible, and is thus irrational.

A mere conflict of interest is not irrational.

Right, this was similar to what I was thinking of; nonetheless it would add at least some mass and volume to the planet.

Heat, rather than mass or volume. You're just shifting around chemicals already there; all you need to do it is energy input.

It wouldn't need to have to alter our orbit; causing stronger tides would also be bad.

Not strong enough. The moon is a tiny fraction the distance away from us, and still requires the cumulative effects of acting over a massive body of water, such as an ocean, to produce the full motion of the tides. Mars barely influences them by comparison, and in any case terraforming wouldn't alter its relevant characteristics enough to have a changed effect.

In the instance of people acting to restrict the ability of others to act.

Yes, because this violates their rights, which is a logical self-contradiction. The only general rule which presents a cogent whole with no contradictions is the following: that any entity may take any action without interference, so long as it does not involuntarily violate the rights of others.

I can think of some. Dumping toxic waste, cruelty to animals...of course these are just my opinions. Nonetheless, unless you don't believe in jails, certainly you agree that sometimes it is acceptable to act in such a way to restrict someone else's ability to act.

a) Dumping toxic waste violates the rights of other users of the commons by disrupting their health, life, resources, etc. and is therefore unacceptable. Animals (some of them, at least) possess some small resemblance to computational sentience that entitles them to basic protections from extreme inhumane treatment.
b) A person is jail has violated the rights of others, proving themselves not to be rational actors and breaking the social contract they agreed to be judged under the terms of. Jail is perfectly acceptable in light of their ethical status.

I'm from the U.S., so I can agree with this assessment of what's happening here. Nonetheless, people continue to live in a system as you described where they could emigrate to another system, therefore they give their consent to this system.

Where would they emigrate to, that's my question. Western Europe, Australia, South Africa, and Russia are the same, most of East Asia is worse, and Africa and the rest of Asia don't bear thinking about moving to.

What we really need is a breakaway libertarian polity, probably space-based....

Sure it is; if people did not wish to do so, they would leave.

This presupposes that the people are informed and aware, that they realistically are given, and know they are given, a choice, etc., all of which are rather hasty assumptions to make.

Yes, but their labor can only earn them pieces of land that they don't use in a system which allows such a thing, in much the same way that a person's labor can justly earn them a dead wife only in a system where people are allowed to hire hitmen. (No, I'm not saying that owning property is morally the same as hiring a hitman, it is just an analogy.)

At some point in the past, either someone mixed their labor with the land or paid the group of other users of the commons for exclusive possession of it via buying it from the social contract. Since then, it may or may not have changed hands as an exchange of value between actor. It's irrelevant. They have sunk value in the property whether they, by the standards of others, appear to use it or not. No one keeps land they literally have absolutely no use for; it is kept in reserve for planned projects or as a liquidatable asset for future problems at the very at least, and even this is fairly rare.

Blood has been shed touched upon it - that unemployment keeps wages lower. If there was no unemployment, employees would organize for better wages, as the fear of unemployment is gone. This would result either in the company going out of business, or the company having control turned over to the workers. If this happens across the board where the workers own the means of production - surprise, you're in a socialist system.

Which is only accomplished by forcing employers to continue paying workers against their will - a violation of their rights if anything is. That's what you dress up as "unemployment protection" is - the stripping of the rights of the producers in order to guarantee a stream of appropriated value to laborers.

Even if it is merely this type of thing, it isn't going to be a rotating type of thing where everyone changes jobs roughly the same amount of time. There are going to be people who change jobs more often than others - the poor - who are going to be unemployed for part of that time. It's impossible to build a life with no income, but it's difficult to build one without a stable income, which many people don't, and can't have.

Such is the nature of reality - everyone is not equal. Actors who have little to offer others and the system will find stable sources of income more difficult to acquire and keep. But in no case is it impossible. Sure, you may have to work 2 jobs a lot of hours, and get very good at job-seeking in the low wage labor market. But it is still possible, and if you do your job well those jobs are all potential paths to higher levels.

Certainly, and I would prefer to have control over where my tax money goes. However, by choosing to live in a system where I don't have control, I voluntarily give it up.

True, but I think you would agree (as you implied with your statement of preference) that a system in which you had more direct control is more desirable and superior.

No, it isn't the theft from the producers, it is taking the fee that the producers pay to live in the society as per the contract; completely voluntary.

a) This again brings up one of my previous points; while it is technically acceptable, this does not imply that it is an equally legitimate model and function of government. Considering that the producers are the ones that sustain the rest of the society, forcing them to pay a special "fee" to provide this valuable service in order to reward the less capable and less productive is an inferior and less legitimate use of government power.
b) And if these producers decided to splinter off into their own, territorially adjacent social contract, taking citizens and resources with them? Would you just let them go?

Certainly, just not necessarily the most capitalist one.

Capitalist economies are more efficient and thus productive than socialist ones. I believe (though I hate to do this) that you have admitted it, though dismissed it, on previous threads.

A socialist system provides free healthcare to all by reducing the quality of living of the producers and using the freed-up value to elevate the healthcare standards of the free riders. A capitalist economy grows and becomes more efficient until the marginal value of basic healthcare becomes so low giving it away for free is effectively costless.

I disagree. In a highly productive market supply will be restricted to match up with demand. Additionally, the suppliers will necessarily want to make a profit off of what they are supplying. In a socialist system, this needn't be the case.

If it costs effectively nothing to produce, the situation inevitably arises where someone provides it for free, and supply is effectively unlimited. Only in a world of anticompetitive supercorporations would this fail to occur - and that's not capitalism.

I believe that if everyone was on a level playing field, and if everyone was at the same start point, and everyone had the same amount of resources (or a balanced start in terms of population, technology, resources, etc), that free trade would be a good idea.

However, the world is set up like a marathon race, with some runners on motorcycles, already halfway down the race route, and some people are on crutches at the start line.

Asking them to accept the idea that from here out, whoever gets to the finish line is the winner doesn't seem "fair", which is what proponents of "free trade" seem to imply about their system.

How, for instance, is a third world nation that has no super-modern infrastructure, supposed to compete with super-modern nations that have super-modern methods to increase productivity (such as robot assembly lines and massive computer networks that allow for just-in-time manufacturing and supply)?

The point is, they can't.

Thats what happens when you apply common sense to econometrics. As Colbert put it, you are 'thinking with your gut'. A lot of the more complex aspects of physics contravene common sense too.

Thats what happens when you apply common sense to econometrics.
:eek:

How does econometrics go into all this? Development economics, fine. Macroeconomics, fine. But econometrics?

I mean, you're all welcome to talk about econometrics, but I think we'd start scaring people away from NS...:D

But you haven't proven at all that the evidence presented in this thread (that has shown very clearly that tariffs hurt the economy) is somehow faulty. You just continue asserting that tariffs are what works. Tell us why, and prove it!

Because, as I have pointed out numerous times, virtually every country that has ever industrialized has done so using tariffs. I have explained that I believe this is for a couple of reasons:tariffs provide a source of government revenue to establish the institutions necessary to sustain a viable modern economy at a stage of development when income taxes, property taxes and consumption taxes are not viable. They also protect fledgling industries at a crucial stage of development, before the grow sufficiently to develop the necessary economies of scale to compete in the world market.

I do not deny that once a country reaches a certain stage of development (as your evidence suggests), tariffs become a detriment and should be phased out. However, I think they are crucial at the initial stages of industrialisation.

You have yet to point to any countries that have industrialized without the use of tarriffs, in a way that would tend to disprove my theory.

I'm thinking that might have been BAAWAKnights. Rest assured that he does not represent the consensus in modern economics, if there is such a thing. :p

I think it was Free Mercantile States, but point well taken.


And you propose to prove that how?
Read this thread, see the disagreement. Do you really think that the economics community is any better? Every pet theory gets debated for many years, evidence is dug up until a clear picture emerges. Things that hold true for the available data (and I concede that there are often problems associated with finding that data, not so much with the bias of the economist himself) are accepted, things that don't land on the trash heap of the discipline.
I'm doing a macroeconomics course right now. People who aren't economists will tell me that it is either Keynesian, or Friedmanite or something like that: The truth is: it's a bit of everything. Years and years of debates and arguments have resulted in models that include bits and pieces from everything, but which seem to work very well indeed for predictions.
Are they perfect? No. Particularly Psycho-economics from Switzerland will surely add more facets to them. But they're pretty damn close, and provide much better reasoning than anything anyone of us is likely to come up with.

I realize there is disagreement amongst economists, and that many of the theories that emerge have been debated and argued. But I think economists would do well to spend less time arguing with each other and more time engaging with other disciplines, and with ordinary people, because their theories often seem very far removed from real world experience.


Again, don't talk about the Asian Tigers as examples. Correlation does not imply causation, a causal relationship just has not been established.

The causal relationship is no less tenuous than the causal relationship you are alleging between trade liberalization and economic growth. Besides, as I mentioned above, it is not just the Asian Tigers. It is pretty much all industrialized countries.

And are these anywhere near as poor as these African countries? They had the same sort of past experiences, so by your deterministic view, they should have the exact same outcome.
Note that most of those African countries also had huge tariffs in place.

My view is not deterministic. My view is that in trying to determine why these countries are poor, we should look at all of the factors, and not just blame it on some vague factor like "culture" and that it can be fixed by equally vague prescriptions like "vision" and "planning".

Because, if no one in the country has the expertise, it doesn't matter who they vote for: economic policy will still be crap.
Quite apart from the fact that good economic policy is never going to be populism, and populism is what you need to win if your voters aren't educated.

I am not precluding them being able to tap into some foreign expertise. But I don't think that expertise shoudl be foisted on them as a mandate, with no regard for the local context. I think they need to be able to consult foreign "experts", and then decide for themselves whether it is appropriate for their context.

Populism gets votes everywhere. It doesn't mean you can't have sound economic policies as well.

That is a good question. It isn't - except perhaps for them, seeing as to how tariffs will hurt their own people more.
Taking money from people by threat of punishment is never going to be truly acceptable. But taking money from people who are free to leave whenever they please, that's not only morally questionable, that's just plain stupid too.

Tariffs will not hurt their own people more if they are applied selectively and temporarily as I have described above. What will hurt their people is being exposed to a barrage of competition from better-developed economies that enjoy economies of scale and other advantages they cannot hope to duplicate in the short run.

I agree that part of the problems are organizational ... and again, proper institutions require funding, and a tax on the non-existent income and non-existent property values is not going to cut it.
Why are you telling me these people don't earn any income? The farmers somewhere out in the bush might not, maybe some of the poor labourers won't really earn anything either.
But there's still corporations and businesspeople, the rich upper class of past and current government affiliates that all poor countries invariably have.

Well, aside from the obvious fact that wealthy elites in these countries probably have the government in their back pocket (like just about everywhere else), that elite is small enough numerically that taxing them won't begin to address the problem. And corporations are almost non-existent except for foreign ones that expect "tax holidays".

And as I said before, I'm doing a management and econ degree at the moment. As such, I also learn about organisational structure and -culture. Believe me: money is not the key to changing these things, especially as a government.

And I've done a business degree (including economics) and worked in the business world (Finance, banking, accounting) and a law degree and I work in corporate law. So I have studied organizational structure and culture ... and lived it. And I agree that money is not the key to changing these things ... the problems are getting strong culturally appropriate institutions in place. And no amount of outside interference is going to achieve that.

So regime change is the answer. Send in the marines.
We can either influence the governments they have, or we can replace them with our own ideas (there's your cultural fit for you :rolleyes: ). Note that we will have to do that against the wishes of the existing government and against popular opinion in those countries.
But I suppose, if Afghanistan ends up working out, it might be an option to be considered...

Regime change imposed from abroad is precisely not the answer. It has to come from within.


Fact of the matter is that aid works like any other money, it's origins are irrelevant. If you spend it well, it's going to do wonders, if you don't, it's not.

Well, its origins may not be irellevant if it comes with strings attached. But my point is that we are always more careful with how we spend money we have earned ourselves, than what we receive from others.

Well, I suppose economic advisors could be hired on commission, but given the time frames involved, I'm not sure that's going to work. But then, that's the job of the poor government in question, not mine, to figure out.

I'm not saying the economic advisors should be on commission. I am saying they should be advisers ... and nothing more. The people that should ultimately be making the decisions are those that will have to live with the consequences.


Because it is such a good indicator of living standards. Do try to find me a really poor country with a low GDP per capita that you would prefer to a horrible place with a high GDP per capita. Note that you will only get that GDP per capita in income, you don't get to take your money with you.

GDP per capita is a precursor to good healthcare, to good education, to good infrastructure, to a high quality of life. In some ways, it's also a result of these things, but either way: chances are you won't find one without the other.

There is a positive correlation between GDP and quality of life, but it is far from perfectly correlated. The countries that top the PQLI indicators list (which I'll admit has it's limitations, but so does GDP) are usually wealthy countries, but not necessarily the wealthiest. Also, poorer countries tend to be at the bottom of the list, but some poor countries actually do reasonably well from a quality of life standpoint. I would rather live in a moderately wealthy country with good quality of life than an extremely wealthy one with mediocre quality of life.


The problem is just that
a) these people don't want a government imposed by the West. They'll have enough issues with policies imposed by the West.
b) history suggests that regime change in these countries (or anywhere for that matter) is not a quick or clean affair.
a) Is the very point I have been trying to make.
b) It certainly may not be clean, but as I said, it will be quicker and more effective than continuing to let these countries bleed to death slowly.

Yes, because this violates their rights, which is a logical self-contradiction. The only general rule which presents a cogent whole with no contradictions is the following: that any entity may take any action without interference, so long as it does not involuntarily violate the rights of others. Which is fine, except that the right to act isn't the only right that a person can have.

a) Dumping toxic waste violates the rights of other users of the commons by disrupting their health, life, resources, etc. and is therefore unacceptable. Animals (some of them, at least) possess some small resemblance to computational sentience that entitles them to basic protections from extreme inhumane treatment. I agree, but this is different than interrupting another person's right to act.

b) A person is jail has violated the rights of others, proving themselves not to be rational actors and breaking the social contract they agreed to be judged under the terms of. Jail is perfectly acceptable in light of their ethical status.So we are agreed that it is sometimes acceptable to interfere with a person's right to act.

Where would they emigrate to, that's my question. Western Europe, Australia, South Africa, and Russia are the same, most of East Asia is worse, and Africa and the rest of Asia don't bear thinking about moving to. There are plenty of deserted islands in the world. Or perhaps a nice shanty in the woods, far away from snoopy government officials.

What we really need is a breakaway libertarian polity, probably space-based....I agree with the idea of secession, it doesn't necessarily have to be space-based, though.

This presupposes that the people are informed and aware, that they realistically are given, and know they are given, a choice, etc., all of which are rather hasty assumptions to make. They aren't any less informed and aware than they are when it comes to decide which brand of jeans to buy.

At some point in the past, either someone mixed their labor with the land or paid the group of other users of the commons for exclusive possession of it via buying it from the social contract. Since then, it may or may not have changed hands as an exchange of value between actor. It's irrelevant. Of course it's relevant; at some point before that the land was stolen from somebody who had either paid the commons in that group or mixed their labor with it. It seems to me that what's good for the goose is good for the gander.

They have sunk value in the property whether they, by the standards of others, appear to use it or not. No one keeps land they literally have absolutely no use for; it is kept in reserve for planned projects or as a liquidatable asset for future problems at the very at least, and even this is fairly rare. But that's the point - it's quite easy for all land to be held in reserve, it's much more difficult for all land to be used.

Which is only accomplished by forcing employers to continue paying workers against their will - a violation of their rights if anything is. That's what you dress up as "unemployment protection" is - the stripping of the rights of the producers in order to guarantee a stream of appropriated value to laborers. Or perhaps by using some of the tax value that the producers paid voluntarily to do things for the commons; build roads, etc.

Such is the nature of reality - everyone is not equal. Actors who have little to offer others and the system will find stable sources of income more difficult to acquire and keep. Which is fine as long as the system is willing to work with the actor to try to make it so the actor has something to offer the system. This would usually be accomplished with (free) education.

But in no case is it impossible. Sure, you may have to work 2 jobs a lot of hours, and get very good at job-seeking in the low wage labor market. But it is still possible, and if you do your job well those jobs are all potential paths to higher levels.Right, but nonetheless it would be the same group of people doing this; also, of course, there is the instability of the labor market to take into account.

True, but I think you would agree (as you implied with your statement of preference) that a system in which you had more direct control is more desirable and superior.Of course, but this doesn't mean I don't consent to the lesser system.

a) This again brings up one of my previous points; while it is technically acceptable, this does not imply that it is an equally legitimate model and function of government. No, not equally legitimate, but still legitimate.

Considering that the producers are the ones that sustain the rest of the society, forcing them to pay a special "fee" to provide this valuable service in order to reward the less capable and less productive is an inferior and less legitimate use of government power.Why shouldn't those who benefit more from the society pay more?

b) And if these producers decided to splinter off into their own, territorially adjacent social contract, taking citizens and resources with them? Would you just let them go?Of course, though I might argue with them and try to convince them not to, I wouldn't try using force against them to prevent them.

Capitalist economies are more efficient and thus productive than socialist ones. I believe (though I hate to do this) that you have admitted it, though dismissed it, on previous threads.In the case of the economy being more efficient, I meant that it enabled people to make decisions more quickly than in a socialist economy. There are other instances where it could be more efficient, but this doesn't necessarily mean that they'd be more productive, if only because part of the efficiency of a capitalist economy is cutting production when the supply is too high to make a decent profit.

A socialist system provides free healthcare to all by reducing the quality of living of the producers and using the freed-up value to elevate the healthcare standards of the free riders. A capitalist economy grows and becomes more efficient until the marginal value of basic healthcare becomes so low giving it away for free is effectively costless.Yes, but I see no reason why a socialist economy couldn't also make it so that healthcare is effectively costless; everybody suffers when they pay more needlessly.

If it costs effectively nothing to produce, the situation inevitably arises where someone provides it for free, and supply is effectively unlimited. Only in a world of anticompetitive supercorporations would this fail to occur - and that's not capitalism.Wouldn't the supercorporation be the most likely one to have the ability to reduce costs?

Which is fine, except that the right to act isn't the only right that a person can have.

It's the root one, from which all others stem. There is no other root right, and if you can't logically trace a hypothesized right back to it, the one under consideration is not a right per se.

I agree, but this is different than interrupting another person's right to act.

But it isn't. Dumping toxic waste is a form of assault, no different from punching someone or shooting them. It coercively restricts the economic potential of another actor by disrupting health and possibly life, and contaminates the resources of others, again involuntarily compromising their ability to economically act. It's sabotage, in that case.

So we are agreed that it is sometimes acceptable to interfere with a person's right to act.

Only if they have violated one's rights and one is defending oneself from further violation, or if in the context of a social contract the person has freely and knowingly agreed to a certain code of behavior, with the stipulation that breaking this code will lead to such-and-such surrender of his own rights. And then breaks the code anyway.

There are plenty of deserted islands in the world. Or perhaps a nice shanty in the woods, far away from snoopy government officials.

True. I'm personally favoring either space or deserted islands+floating cities made of linked-together barge-like arrangments. Artificial islands, if you will.

I agree with the idea of secession, it doesn't necessarily have to be space-based, though.

Well, it's really the best place to go in the long run. No governments have any influence there, you're out of reach of their military powers (mostly, for a little while), and you have plenty of free territory and resources. The trick is having the tech on hand to live there.

They aren't any less informed and aware than they are when it comes to decide which brand of jeans to buy.

Scarily enough, I actually know people who are probably more informed about the relative merits of different brands of jeans than politics or elections. :eek:

Of course it's relevant; at some point before that the land was stolen from somebody who had either paid the commons in that group or mixed their labor with it. It seems to me that what's good for the goose is good for the gander.

Why has it necessarily been stolen? Well, I suppose if the country was invaded or there was a revolution. But if that's the case, it's kind of water under the bridge to the usurpers trading it around among them anyway.

The only people ever originally acquire land is by homesteading (mixing their labor with it) or buying it up from the social contract of the day and place, which is paying the commons.

Just to note: I'm no neocon - I don't favor war, or especially the initiatory rights violations that take place in it. ("collateral damage", confiscation of civilian property, etc.)

But that's the point - it's quite easy for all land to be held in reserve, it's much more difficult for all land to be used.

I'm confused - what is the point?

Or perhaps by using some of the tax value that the producers paid voluntarily to do things for the commons; build roads, etc.

What does that have to do with making unemployment illegal?

Which is fine as long as the system is willing to work with the actor to try to make it so the actor has something to offer the system. This would usually be accomplished with (free) education.

Which I agree with. In my view, any society with two brain cells to rub together will volunteer money for an investment in the rising workforce and voting population. It only makes sense.

On the other hand, there's no reason a social contract has to do this - a free market functions equally legitimately without free education. It's just that, as I see it, the actors in the free market deciding to invest in an organization that provides free schooling for the next generation will do so, via a social contract or not, (the SocCont being a free market entity itself, ideally) because it's more Pareto-efficient for the market and will profit them in the long run. It's the same process and rationale as mutual funds and corporations.

Right, but nonetheless it would be the same group of people doing this; also, of course, there is the instability of the labor market to take into account.

a) Oh well for them. They should have paid more attention and tried harder in school. If they had graduated and had actually done a good job to merit that certificate, they in almost no case would still have to end up working the very worst jobs. If everyone did better in education, the price of low-quality labor (the wages for bd jobs) would increase, the lower end would make more, and the jobs that are always, period, going to be shit jobs were filled by immigrant labor, the system would advance majorly. That's how free traffic of labor and goods between countries, plus a smart societal investment in education, improve things.

b) Market instability is a part of its functioning and flexibility. As new factors, conditions, and changes are introduced, it has to constantly correct and rebalance itself to take them into account. This leads to constantly altered movements of goods, labor, services, capital, etc. This affects everyone: the 2000 market correction laid of a helluva lot of welloff software engineers, too, as did all of the smaller bumps throughout the tech boom in the late 90s.

Haven't you ever seen Office Space? :D

Of course, but this doesn't mean I don't consent to the lesser system.

Why do you consent to it? I certainly don't. It's an inferior system that by its inferiority prevents me from making it different, because part of its inferiority is its statism and non-participatory nature. This pisses me off. I'll either get into the state and make things different through politics, or I'll damn well leave.

Why shouldn't those who benefit more from the society pay more?

Because they don't benefit from society - they benefit from themselves, and society benefits from them. Where would any country be without its great producers, geniuses, and entrepreneurs? Nowhere. They'd collapse in a day, because the economic value of the system flows, eventually, from the same set of sources. Labor screams about wages and conditions - recall that they would have no jobs at all without an employer to conceive of, work for, and market a product.

Of course, though I might argue with them and try to convince them not to, I wouldn't try using force against them to prevent them.

Well, good for you. That's a major departure from the probable policy of most places.

In the case of the economy being more efficient, I meant that it enabled people to make decisions more quickly than in a socialist economy. There are other instances where it could be more efficient, but this doesn't necessarily mean that they'd be more productive, if only because part of the efficiency of a capitalist economy is cutting production when the supply is too high to make a decent profit.

But this only happens sometimes, and even then it acts to maximize utility overall, and pumps back money into the system that produces product and process innovations. In any case, the market system as a very strong and rapid overall trend constantly increases productivity, and they can only do this by increasing efficiency, because it allows them to make more from the same resources - more product. The two are intimately related, and the results show empirically.

Yes, but I see no reason why a socialist economy couldn't also make it so that healthcare is effectively costless; everybody suffers when they pay more needlessly.

Really? Do the shareholders in the health companies suffer when they get some more money in the mail every month? Do the people who are treated by better doctors and treatments funded by the increased revenue suffer?

Wouldn't the supercorporation be the most likely one to have the ability to reduce costs?

Not really. In practice, small groups of dominant supercorporations act as plutooligarchies that disrupt the market by discouraging competition (thereby reducing innovation and possible lower cost competition) and artificially manipulating prices, supplies, etc. which does the consumer no good.

You have yet to point to any countries that have industrialized without the use of tarriffs, in a way that would tend to disprove my theory.
Okay, let's assume that correlation does indeed imply causation. In this case - we are talking about a different time.
Back when the US got most of its government revenue from tariffs, this was common. Not only that, but the nature of the global economy at the time made it nearly impossible for people to do business somewhere else instead.
Even in the sixties and seventies, when South Korea for example had the giant tariffs, the global economy was like that everywhere. There was no country without tariffs.

Today, if any of these countries put up tariffs, business can go somewhere else. And that is a very, very good thing indeed. Even if tariffs were needed at some point (which I don't think they ever were, Japan industrialised in the Meiji era - no tariffs there) they don't work anymore.

As for infant industries: http://www.hooverdigest.org/974/friedman.html
The second is the "infant industry" argument advanced, for example, by Alexander Hamilton in his Report on Manufactures. There is, it is said, a potential industry that, if once established and assisted during its growing pains, could compete on equal terms in the world market. A temporary tariff is said to be justified in order to shelter the potential industry in its infancy and enable it to grow to maturity, when it can stand on its own feet. Even if the industry could compete successfully once established, that does not of itself justify an initial tariff. It is worthwhile for consumers to subsidize the industry initially--which is what they in effect do by levying a tariff--only if they will subsequently get back at least that subsidy in some other way, through prices lower than the world price or through some other advantages of having the industry. But in that case is a subsidy needed? Will it then not pay the original entrants into the industry to suffer initial losses in the expectation of being able to recoup them later? After all, most firms experience losses in their early years, when they are getting established. That is true if they enter a new industry or if they enter an existing one. Perhaps there may be some special reason why the original entrants cannot recoup their initial losses even though it may be worthwhile for the community at large to make the initial investment. But surely the presumption is the other way.

The infant industry argument is a smoke screen. The so-called infants never grow up. Once imposed, tariffs are seldom eliminated. Moreover, the argument is seldom used on behalf of true unborn infants that might conceivably be born and survive if given temporary protection; they have no spokesmen. It is used to justify tariffs for rather aged infants that can mount political pressure.

But I think economists would do well to spend less time arguing with each other and more time engaging with other disciplines, and with ordinary people, because their theories often seem very far removed from real world experience.
They do, you know. Economics has connections with every social science. Some indeed argue that economics is the only social science, and everything else is just one field within it.
And the theories are not removed from the real world, except in one thing: Politics.
Our modern framework in economics works just fine, and would be great, if it wasn't for politicians deliberately disregarding it, peddling fallacies and all the rest. I agree that a better understanding of that sort of behaviour would make a great addition to our theories, but the fact of the matter is that any discrepancy is not so much caused by a misunderstanding of the problem or the solution, but exogenous influences that come from people who don't work for money, but for ideology and nepotism.

The causal relationship is no less tenuous than the causal relationship you are alleging between trade liberalization and economic growth.
Except that one makes economic sense, the other doesn't. But then, you can of course choose to disregard economics and just hope that blind faith, or hurting others will help yourself.

My view is not deterministic. My view is that in trying to determine why these countries are poor, we should look at all of the factors, and not just blame it on some vague factor like "culture" and that it can be fixed by equally vague prescriptions like "vision" and "planning".
But we know what is wrong, we know all the factors. And we know the solution. It just can't be implemented without a decent government, and indeed some vision and planning.

I am not precluding them being able to tap into some foreign expertise. But I don't think that expertise shoudl be foisted on them as a mandate, with no regard for the local context. I think they need to be able to consult foreign "experts", and then decide for themselves whether it is appropriate for their context.
Hasn't worked so far, has it.

But I suppose we can try for another fifty years.

Populism gets votes everywhere. It doesn't mean you can't have sound economic policies as well.
In LDCs it obviously does. Who are the current great populists for example? Mr. Chavez? Mr. Morales?
Oh, well, nationalisation might fit into your great scheme of things as well, hey. Just chase all the foreigners away, then they can't "exploit" them anymore.

What will hurt their people is being exposed to a barrage of competition from better-developed economies that enjoy economies of scale and other advantages they cannot hope to duplicate in the short run.
They're not supposed to compete on equal terms. They're supposed to find their competitive advantage, and use that to make a place for themselves. It's just like running a company - do what you're good at, that's where everything starts.

And corporations are almost non-existent except for foreign ones that expect "tax holidays".
That's sorta silly. Much of Africa is full of valuable resources. Don't you think that these resources would play more of a role than trying to shift money around, which they can do much better somewhere else where they can also expect more stability?
Natural resources and cheap labour. That's the reasons corporations will go there. India just created a 200 million middle class in their country on the back of these things (the latter moreso than the former).

So I have studied organizational structure and culture ... and lived it. And I agree that money is not the key to changing these things ... the problems are getting strong culturally appropriate institutions in place. And no amount of outside interference is going to achieve that.
Outside interference doesn't have to come in the form of people telling other people what to do. It can come in the form of: "Clean up your act, or we'll let you starve. We might put sanctions on your government too, for failing your people. How's North Korea sound to you?"

We've been doing "nice" for too long now, and watched millions and millions die needlessly. These governments have a responsibility to their people, and if their people can't hold them accountable, we'll have to.

Well, its origins may not be irellevant if it comes with strings attached. But my point is that we are always more careful with how we spend money we have earned ourselves, than what we receive from others.
On the most basic level, you might be right. But it's irrelevant here, because governments don't earn money. All money they have is received from others who did earn it. Without the strings attached, it'll go to waste.
Example: http://www.odiousdebts.org/odiousdebts/index.cfm?DSP=content&ContentID=8577
That's what unconditional aid is. I'm saying that we attach the strings, and attach them properly. It's not their money, it's ours, and we decide to present it as a gift to their people, not to them.

The people that should ultimately be making the decisions are those that will have to live with the consequences.
Ie the poor and uneducated who have no idea how to make political or economic decisions.
Not the government of that country, regardless of whether elected or imposed.

I would rather live in a moderately wealthy country with good quality of life than an extremely wealthy one with mediocre quality of life.
I believe I challenged you to name one. And don't make it a Sweden vs US example, because that doesn't work. Both have very high GDP per capitas, both have crossed the threshold where marginal returns kick in.
No, I mean two countries with, lets say 15-20k difference in GDP per capita. One rich, the other poor or middle.

And then tell me that GDP per capita is not a good measure of quality of life.

It's the root one, from which all others stem. There is no other root right, and if you can't logically trace a hypothesized right back to it, the one under consideration is not a right per se. I am not comfortable with agreeing to this, but I don't yet have a counterargument, so I will let this one slide.

But it isn't. Dumping toxic waste is a form of assault, no different from punching someone or shooting them. It coercively restricts the economic potential of another actor by disrupting health and possibly life, and contaminates the resources of others, again involuntarily compromising their ability to economically act. It's sabotage, in that case. I don't think you view compromising a person's ability to economically act - you did speak in favor of hoarding resources, which compromises the ability of those without resources to economically act.

Only if they have violated one's rights and one is defending oneself from further violation, or if in the context of a social contract the person has freely and knowingly agreed to a certain code of behavior, with the stipulation that breaking this code will lead to such-and-such surrender of his own rights. And then breaks the code anyway.I can agree with this; of course, we have different concepts of rights and what should be in a social contract.

True. I'm personally favoring either space or deserted islands+floating cities made of linked-together barge-like arrangments. Artificial islands, if you will. I personally don't like outer space, but don't have a problem with space travel, and I think it should be encouraged, so this is fine to me.

Well, it's really the best place to go in the long run. No governments have any influence there, you're out of reach of their military powers (mostly, for a little while), and you have plenty of free territory and resources. The trick is having the tech on hand to live there.True, but if you can get there, then so can other people (and their government agents.) :)

Scarily enough, I actually know people who are probably more informed about the relative merits of different brands of jeans than politics or elections. :eek: Well, I was talking about the information regarding the conditions that the workers who made them in, sweatshops (I knew we'd come around to the topic eventually!) But yeah, you're right, lots of people probably buy jeans because the know the brand they're buying makes their ass look the best.

Why has it necessarily been stolen? Well, I suppose if the country was invaded or there was a revolution. But if that's the case, it's kind of water under the bridge to the usurpers trading it around among them anyway.Eh. This point was going to be the first step in my argument in favor of secession, but as you already approve of succession I don't need to make the argument.

The only people ever originally acquire land is by homesteading (mixing their labor with it) or buying it up from the social contract of the day and place, which is paying the commons. Well, they homestead in societies which allow homesteading.

Just to note: I'm no neocon - I don't favor war, or especially the initiatory rights violations that take place in it. ("collateral damage", confiscation of civilian property, etc.) Good to know.

I'm confused - what is the point?That claiming that reserving land is an acceptable use is folly, because that means that all land can be potentially reserved.

What does that have to do with making unemployment illegal?I don't think I said unemployment should be illegal (if I did, I didn't mean it), I said that the system shouldn't have unemployment, which can be accomplished by having the commons pay people.

Which I agree with. In my view, any society with two brain cells to rub together will volunteer money for an investment in the rising workforce and voting population. It only makes sense.Right, agreed.

On the other hand, there's no reason a social contract has to do this - a free market functions equally legitimately without free education. It's just that, as I see it, the actors in the free market deciding to invest in an organization that provides free schooling for the next generation will do so, via a social contract or not, (the SocCont being a free market entity itself, ideally) because it's more Pareto-efficient for the market and will profit them in the long run. It's the same process and rationale as mutual funds and corporations. The businessmen in the market (usually) don't give two shits about future generations if they're not going to live long enough to see the future generations. They want their money, now.

a) Oh well for them. They should have paid more attention and tried harder in school. If they had graduated and had actually done a good job to merit that certificate, they in almost no case would still have to end up working the very worst jobs. If everyone did better in education, the price of low-quality labor (the wages for bd jobs) would increase, the lower end would make more, and the jobs that are always, period, going to be shit jobs were filled by immigrant labor, the system would advance majorly. That's how free traffic of labor and goods between countries, plus a smart societal investment in education, improve things.That doesn't go far enough - education can't end at some arbitrary point.

b) Market instability is a part of its functioning and flexibility. As new factors, conditions, and changes are introduced, it has to constantly correct and rebalance itself to take them into account. This leads to constantly altered movements of goods, labor, services, capital, etc. This affects everyone: the 2000 market correction laid of a helluva lot of welloff software engineers, too, as did all of the smaller bumps throughout the tech boom in the late 90s. Not all new factors, conditions, and changes are going to be good, I see no reason why a system should change for the worse if it can help it.

Haven't you ever seen Office Space? :D Yep - good movie.

Why do you consent to it? I certainly don't. It's an inferior system that by its inferiority prevents me from making it different, because part of its inferiority is its statism and non-participatory nature. This pisses me off. I'll either get into the state and make things different through politics, or I'll damn well leave.I consent to it because it's better than the alternatives, which, as we established, are similar governments, worse governments, or living alone on a deserted island or in the woods.

Because they don't benefit from society - they benefit from themselves, and society benefits from them. Where would any country be without its great producers, geniuses, and entrepreneurs? Nowhere.Where would those great producers, geniuses, and entrepreneurs be without societies? Living in the woods where their greatness would remain unappreciated and where they can't benefit from it.

They'd collapse in a day, because the economic value of the system flows, eventually, from the same set of sources. Labor screams about wages and conditions - recall that they would have no jobs at all without an employer to conceive of, work for, and market a product. If capitalists didn't hoard resources, labor could conceive of, work for, and market their own products. (Worker-owned co-ops, etc.)

Well, good for you. That's a major departure from the probable policy of most places. True, but most places don't believe in the right of secession, either, usually because they're either dictators or hypocrites.

But this only happens sometimes, and even then it acts to maximize utility overall, and pumps back money into the system that produces product and process innovations. In any case, the market system as a very strong and rapid overall trend constantly increases productivity, and they can only do this by increasing efficiency, because it allows them to make more from the same resources - more product. The two are intimately related, and the results show empirically. I personally dislike market systems, but my dislike isn't very strong. Either way, I see no reason why market socialism couldn't do most of this.

Really? Do the shareholders in the health companies suffer when they get some more money in the mail every month? Do the people who are treated by better doctors and treatments funded by the increased revenue suffer? Well, the shareholders in most socialist societies would be everyone in them, I think they'd rather pay less initially, unless they never ever get sick.
I think getting better doctors and treatments would count as a needed expense, and therefore spending more wouldn't be needless.

Not really. In practice, small groups of dominant supercorporations act as plutooligarchies that disrupt the market by discouraging competition (thereby reducing innovation and possible lower cost competition) and artificially manipulating prices, supplies, etc. which does the consumer no good.True, but they're more likely to be able to negotiate lower prices via their economies of scale. Wal-Mart dominates the retail industry because of this.

Okay, let's assume that correlation does indeed imply causation.


We might have to, because that is pretty much the only way the trade = jobs and prosperity argument works. No-one can conclusively prove that increased propserity since the Second World War is a result of increased trade, rather than vice versa.


Today, if any of these countries put up tariffs, business can go somewhere else. And that is a very, very good thing indeed. Even if tariffs were needed at some point (which I don't think they ever were, Japan industrialised in the Meiji era - no tariffs there) they don't work anymore.

If the only thing that has ever worked in practice somehow no longer works, then what does work? And how exactly do tariffs affect a business decision as to where to locate? Businesses might choose not to export to a certain country because of high tarriffs, but they certainly would not choose not to locate there because of them. If anything, the high tariffs provide an incentive for companies to locate their production facilities in that country.

They do, you know. Economics has connections with every social science. Some indeed argue that economics is the only social science, and everything else is just one field within it.
And the theories are not removed from the real world, except in one thing: Politics.

If economics is unable to factor politics into its models, then it is probably the most flawed of social sciences.

Except that one makes economic sense, the other doesn't. But then, you can of course choose to disregard economics and just hope that blind faith, or hurting others will help yourself.

You haven't proven that either of these things make more economic sense than the other, except in theory, which is not borne out by the real world examples I have provided.


But we know what is wrong, we know all the factors. And we know the solution. It just can't be implemented without a decent government, and indeed some vision and planning.

You look at the economic factors, but ignore the social and cultural dimensions (or at least refuse to engage with them meaningfully). Of course they need decent government ... that is my whole point. They need well-resourced and culturally appropriate institutions to support all of this, otherwise the best laid plan and vision will fail. And I have proposed that the only realistic way to fund said institutions is through tariffs. And so far, you have not suggested a realistic alternative.


Hasn't worked so far, has it.

What hasn't worked so far is what you are proposing more of ... Western intervention.

In LDCs it obviously does. Who are the current great populists for example? Mr. Chavez? Mr. Morales?
Oh, well, nationalisation might fit into your great scheme of things as well, hey. Just chase all the foreigners away, then they can't "exploit" them anymore.

Now you are being alarmist. I am not advocating for nationalization. I am advocating for self-determination. If people opt for a populist politician so be it ... they are the ones that will have to bear the consequences. But they should have the right to make the decision, and reap the consequences.


They're not supposed to compete on equal terms. They're supposed to find their competitive advantage, and use that to make a place for themselves. It's just like running a company - do what you're good at, that's where everything starts.
And if they have no competitive advantage? What if their natural competitive advantage lies in a field where another country currently has a cost advantage simply due to economies of scale? Should they not pursue this until they are able to be cost competitive as well?


That's sorta silly. Much of Africa is full of valuable resources. Don't you think that these resources would play more of a role than trying to shift money around, which they can do much better somewhere else where they can also expect more stability?
Natural resources and cheap labour. That's the reasons corporations will go there. India just created a 200 million middle class in their country on the back of these things (the latter moreso than the former).

In the resource rich African countries, the western resource companies pretty much own the government ... witness Shell in Nigeria or the diamond companies in SOuth Africa. And they are hardly going to tax themselves now are they?


Outside interference doesn't have to come in the form of people telling other people what to do. It can come in the form of: "Clean up your act, or we'll let you starve. We might put sanctions on your government too, for failing your people. How's North Korea sound to you?"

Not telling people what to do and letting them be responsible for the consequences of their actions is exactly what I am advocating.

Sanctions won't work cause the ruling elite won't suffer ... only the people do. In South AFrica in the aprtheid era, white people could still pretty much buy whatever they wanted, in spite of the economic sanctions. It wasn't until the black population started boycoting white business (i.e. the people holding their ruling class to account) that things started to change.

We've been doing "nice" for too long now, and watched millions and millions die needlessly. These governments have a responsibility to their people, and if their people can't hold them accountable, we'll have to.

In most cases their people can't hold them accountable, because the necessary institutional structure to do so is not in place. The government are either unelected tyrants, puppets of Western governments or corporations, or have their hands so tied by the kind of measures you are proposing that they are hopelessly ineffective. Why should we have to hold them accountable? Their people will, given the chance.

On the most basic level, you might be right. But it's irrelevant here, because governments don't earn money. All money they have is received from others who did earn it.

Fair enough. But people are more likely to hold the government to account when it is there money being spent than some "gift" from a foreign government.


Without the strings attached, it'll go to waste.
That's what unconditional aid is. I'm saying that we attach the strings, and attach them properly. It's not their money, it's ours, and we decide to present it as a gift to their people, not to them.

And this will only work if we truly have their best interests at heart and are better able to identify their interests than they are. Both of which are extremely unlikely. What you are proposing will simplu result in more tied aid (i.e. aid given with the condition that they use it to by stuff from us that they may or may not need) and dams being built in the desert (i.e. projects that are totally inappropriate because we lack the requisite knowledge of the specific context). This kind of aid has been a monumental failure so far, and it will continue to fail.

Ie the poor and uneducated who have no idea how to make political or economic decisions.
Not the government of that country, regardless of whether elected or imposed.

Most people in wealthy countries have no idea how to make political or economic decisions. That does not mean by extension that their leaders won't. They don't have to be able to make all of the political and economic decisions themselves, they merely have to be able to select the leaders that do. And this is most likely to happen when they themselves bear the consequences of the political and economic decisions their leaders are making. And make the leaders bear the consequences in turn. That is democracy.

I believe I challenged you to name one. And don't make it a Sweden vs US example, because that doesn't work. Both have very high GDP per capitas, both have crossed the threshold where marginal returns kick in.
No, I mean two countries with, lets say 15-20k difference in GDP per capita. One rich, the other poor or middle.


I already accepted that the two are positively correlated, but that they are not perfectly correlated, and Sweden and the US are a good example of that or even Canada and the US for that matter)

But if you must have specific examples ... Cuba is much higher on the HDI than several countries with much higher GDP per capita.


And then tell me that GDP per capita is not a good measure of quality of life.

GDP per capita is a good measure of wartime production. Which is what it was intended to be. As a measure of quality of life, it is a very vague general indicator and nothing more.

I don't think you view compromising a person's ability to economically act - you did speak in favor of hoarding resources, which compromises the ability of those without resources to economically act.

No. The person without resources still has the same full capabilities of action that they would in any case - they just don't have the materials available to facilitate their actions. They certainly have no right to this material - this would require that other people who had earned such materials give them theirs, which they have no obligation to do. People with less resources have no intrinsic right to the property of those with more resources.

The right to property is derived from the right to ownership differently compared to the right to freedom from coercion - seeing as your actions and effort are an extension of your will and consciousness, the value you create is by direct logical extrapolation similarly an extension of yourself, and is thus your property in the same way you are. Thus, you have the same rights vis-a-vis your property as with yourself.

No person has the right to happiness or resources - rather, to the pursuit thereof.

Well, I was talking about the information regarding the conditions that the workers who made them in, sweatshops (I knew we'd come around to the topic eventually!) But yeah, you're right, lots of people probably buy jeans because the know the brand they're buying makes their ass look the best.

The situation I see with sweatshops is that quality of life was poor, period. Rural or urban, the Chinese (for example) had 12+/6+/52 manual labor jobs, made just enough to live on or less, and lived in hovels. Whether the jobs made rice or TVs, and whether the hovels were tiny huts or tiny apartments, is all more or less equal. What makes the industrial model better, though, is that it makes the workers part of the global market, which means that it makes their society wealthier too, which means their standard of living increases, plus it makes their wages and lifestyles part of the cycle of supply and demand.

This means that as capital floods the country and the Chinese economic superboom begins to slow down and deflate a little, things settle down and standards of living rise as wages do. Productivity and innovation increase, the short-term money is invested in pursuits besides manufacturing American creations and cheap knockoffs, and into actual new ideas and products of their own, demand rises at the higher end of the job spectrum, capital begins to filter down to the masses as the noveau Chinese rich start to invest and spend their sudden fortunes, education becomes higher and more commonplace as the middle class rises in delayed reaction to the boom, education and highend job demand fall into the same frame, kickstarting another wave of increases in the average income.

The two biggest problems are gigantic populations and unfair trade practices. If the Chinese would start fairly evaluating the worth of their currency and encourage responsible business practices instead of promoting the same policies that kept the superboom going 5 years ago but which will result in a market crash if continued now, things would work out a helluva lot better. The US can do things from their end too: Reduce the deficit and debt, improve education, make sure inflation is kept down.

Well, they homestead in societies which allow homesteading.

Homesteading is homesteading whether society officially allows it or not. It's what happens any time unclaimed land is claimed and used by settlers on a frontier.

That claiming that reserving land is an acceptable use is folly, because that means that all land can be potentially reserved.

Well, it could, but why would it? There'd then be no land for any actual activities or pursuits. There's no future to hold it in reserve for if you don't do something to create that future today.

I don't think I said unemployment should be illegal (if I did, I didn't mean it), I said that the system shouldn't have unemployment, which can be accomplished by having the commons pay people.

Any functioning system has some unemployment. If nothing else, people change jobs. You have layoffs, companies merge or downsize, people just quit. For a certain period, they've got to find a new job, retrain for a new, non-obsolete profession, etc.

Ideally, you'd have this transient unemployment only. But in reality, having near-zero true unemployment in a sector of bracket of jobs means that you have a shortage of that kind of employee. The market doesn't work in one-second-long cycles; it doesn't instantly account for every single-worker-sized fluctuation. The precise number of jobs doesn't always match up to the precise number of applicants. But that's what you strive for, yes. And this is generally achieved by growth and greater productivity, which creates more jobs for more people.

The other component is education, which is especially in issue in the current time, because the rising workforce is simply not being educated and trained for the market's future. 60% of new jobs being created require skills and knowledge possessed by only 20% of the population.

The businessmen in the market (usually) don't give two shits about future generations if they're not going to live long enough to see the future generations. They want their money, now.

But they probably will live to see it, though it admittedly depends on where in the business cycle they were born. As older workers retire, new ones have to be brought in. You're always looking for new employees to fill job spots, as long as your business keeps growing and/or people keep aging. That creates an interest in the rising workforce.

Plus, they (generally) have kids, whom one would presume they care about the future of. And while I realize this goes against the grain, the assumption that no entrepreneurs value anything in the universe besides immediate financial gains, and therefore don't care about the long term of their business or the economy, is rude and generally false. As much as the radical left likes to demonize us, we're people too.

Some businessmen are even paid to think beyond their immediate personal interests - they're called executives, or CEOs. They think about the long-term (well, before the stupidity born of overenthusiasm during the 90s) interests of the company they work for.

That doesn't go far enough - education can't end at some arbitrary point.

Of course not. General education should last until the students have a full grounding in all subject areas and are prepared to enter the real world, should continue into higher education whenever possible, and should continue in the form of constant retraining and skills/knowledge-updating in whatever their profession is as time goes on - the 21st century is simply moving much too fast for workers to get by using the same skill set they had when they entered the workforce two decades ago.

Not all new factors, conditions, and changes are going to be good, I see no reason why a system should change for the worse if it can help it.

It never does - not in the long-term, at least. Many major changes that improve productivity or introduce new innovation create smaller, shorter-term negative fluctuations, but such is the nature of all paradigm shifts. The net effect is postive.

Where would those great producers, geniuses, and entrepreneurs be without societies? Living in the woods where their greatness would remain unappreciated and where they can't benefit from it.

They need to have other people to trade with to be maximally efficient, but think about it this way - everyone else could be replaced. They could trade with each other and be perfectly fine. Highly productive automation could cover every task but that of the creator, the mind-worker who comes up with and implements ideas.

Of course, this could never actually happen, but it illustrates the direction, at base, of the net dependency - it connects the masses to the gifted, not vice-versa.

If capitalists didn't hoard resources, labor could conceive of, work for, and market their own products. (Worker-owned co-ops, etc.)

Not really. The workers are generally not the same people who are capable of building businesses or innovating new processes or products. Plus, what exactly is the benefit of this? It only differs from the current situation in that the actors who own an economic organization could not pay other actors to do things without offering them an equal share in the organization, which is a rather arbitrary restriction.

The current model and so-called "hoarding of resources" allows for the stock market system, which works to further maximize utility and efficiency and acts as a sort of next-level market system bolted on top of the more down-to-earth one that facilitates even more optimal allocation of resources.

The transition would also massively decrease profit - no one would make as much money because the manipulation of currency and the flow thereof would be more neglected, and the owner base would be inflated. This would lead to a deficit of investment and venture capital for new businesses and innovations, plus a decreased average income, and thus quality of life.

I personally dislike market systems, but my dislike isn't very strong. Either way, I see no reason why market socialism couldn't do most of this.

[shrug] It's the same, just worse at its job (optimal allocation of resources, maximal efficiency and productivity, maximization of utility) and less free.

Well, the shareholders in most socialist societies would be everyone in them, I think they'd rather pay less initially, unless they never ever get sick.

Hmm. That gives me the spark of an idea - total social contracts organized along profit-making lines, with citizens as the shareholders in a real, corporate sense.... Probably some variant and/or subset of anarchocapitalism.

We might have to, because that is pretty much the only way the trade = jobs and prosperity argument works. No-one can conclusively prove that increased propserity since the Second World War is a result of increased trade, rather than vice versa.
I am going to say this once again, and then I'm done repeating it: We know how the economy works. We have complex models that are good at predicting the directions certain economic changes take. Our models are based on the correlations, true, but they have been shown to have predictive abilities, so they capture some form of causation.
Quite aside from generations of businesspeople contributing a lot of money to their local economies by selling stuff overseas. Just look at countries like Germany, South Korea, Taiwan and Japan...where would they have been without trade? And where would for example the US economy have been without the sort of products they imported from these places?

You, on the other hand, have no theory, no models, no logical connections. I have been asking you for a long time now to build some sort of theory, but you just get hung up on little bits and pieces:
a)
You talk about the correlation. Fine, but no causal relationships.

b)
You talk about institutional quality. But your proposition is that if only they had money, they'd fix it. All evidence suggests that this is wrong...for many decades many of these countries have had profitable company-owned businesses. But this money went straight into the pockets of the few, only strengthening the culture of corruption.

c)
You talk about cultural fit. But so far you have steadfastly refused to say anything further. Governments were imposed by "the West" (tm), which didn't fit the culture.
Does this mean then that Kingdoms and Tribalism would result in better institutional quality and more economic development? I have my doubts.
Particularly since traditional native societies don't often value the sort of education that is needed these days.

If the only thing that has ever worked in practice somehow no longer works, then what does work?
Again, you haven't shown that it ever worked.

As for what does work - decent infrastructure, a good source of capital for borrowing, lots of education and an environment that rewards entrepreneurship. Plus access to the resources to combine, ie technology and cost-effective labour.

Tariffs are first and foremost a statement saying: "I don't give a shit about the world. I don't want to trade, I don't value my overseas trading partners."
They're a political statement as much as an economic policy. Especially these days.

And how exactly do tariffs affect a business decision as to where to locate? Businesses might choose not to export to a certain country because of high tarriffs, but they certainly would not choose not to locate there because of them.
Depends on the details of the supply chain, I'd say. Either way, imports are a vital part of making an economy work properly. Only through imports can competition (particularly in technology) be kept alive.

If anything, the high tariffs provide an incentive for companies to locate their production facilities in that country.
If the market is that attractive, yes. Most developing countries don't have the sort of market that would make it worth it.
Quite aside from the fact that international business is growing some long-needed self-confidence, and if a government wants to hurt them, they'll no longer just sit back and take it.

If economics is unable to factor politics into its models, then it is probably the most flawed of social sciences.
They're trying very hard. The problem is just that politicians are often quite mutated people. Neither theories assuming total selfishness on their part, nor theories regarding mass voting behaviour tell you the whole truth.
Ideology plays a role waaay too often, and that doesn't follow rationality, or even any sort of predictable psychology. Especially if you leave the Western world and go to LDCs.

You haven't proven that either of these things make more economic sense than the other, except in theory, which is not borne out by the real world examples I have provided.
Economic sense is the theory. Theory is based on the logic of Economics, the logic of Choice.

And I have proposed that the only realistic way to fund said institutions is through tariffs. And so far, you have not suggested a realistic alternative.
Sure I have. I have suggested that they don't need a lot of money to do the important things, and if they do need a lot of money for a project, they can ask for it, just as any entrepreneur would ask a bank. Either loans, or development aid.

What hasn't worked so far is what you are proposing more of ... Western intervention.
Come again?

They've had advisors come to them (on request) for all this time. They decided that things were appropriate for their cultures and institutions (ie whenever it meant money for their Swiss accounts) and sometimes they decided that it wasn't (when it meant less money for aforementioned accounts).

No one told Mobuto to f*ck up the place like he did. No one told Kim Sung Il, no one told Mao, no one told Idi Amin, no one told Nyere.

It is not America's fault, it is not Europe's fault, it is not Russia's fault. It's their own bloody fault!

I am saying that we need to quit ignoring this fact. Governments in LDCs are almost by definition incompetent, corrupt and unwilling or unable to give their people better living standards.
And they are very unlikely to take help if it is offered, since they are not real governments, but little more than gangs of armed thugs.

Therefore we have to make them take it.

Now you are being alarmist. I am not advocating for nationalization. I am advocating for self-determination.
How is nationalisation anything but "self-determination"?

This is where I don't believe that most people understand free trade, or indeed globalisation. "Nations" are meaningless. We are individuals, that is all. Self-determination can only work for individuals, not for countries.

If you choose to imbue countries with the characteristics of individuals, it loses all meaning, and results in nothing but the rights and wishes of individuals being trampled upon.

If people opt for a populist politician so be it ... they are the ones that will have to bear the consequences. But they should have the right to make the decision, and reap the consequences.
And, did that foreign investor or exporter choose the populist? I don't think so.
Ergo, no self-determination. Just punishment without a crime.

And if they have no competitive advantage? What if their natural competitive advantage lies in a field where another country currently has a cost advantage simply due to economies of scale?
A country can't not have a competitive advantage. The sheer number of possible combinations of people, skills and resources sees to that.
What can happen is that people either haven't spotted an opportunity yet or their competitive advantage is smothered by government policy. Note also that competitive advantages can often be started by only a few entrepreneurs or investors.

Should they not pursue this until they are able to be cost competitive as well?
That's impossible. If one country already has the economies of scale, another that has virtually nothing won't catch up on numbers.
It's a lot like me wanting to start a furniture business. Unfortunately IKEA already has one of those, and they can produce and offer furniture cheaper.
Your solution: Try and hurt (or steal from) IKEA.
My solution: Find something about my business that is unique and can be used to compete with IKEA on a different level than cost.

In the resource rich African countries, the western resource companies pretty much own the government ...
Conspiracy Theories.

Prove them.

Sanctions won't work cause the ruling elite won't suffer ... only the people do.
What do I care? If these governments decide to hurt randoms, isn't it only right for us to hurt randoms back?

You need to understand what tariffs are: They are innocent people being punished for committing no crime whatsoever.

Why should we have to hold them accountable? Their people will, given the chance.
Which leaves us with two options: Either we do it my way and only give aid when we are deciding exactly how and where it is spent.
Or we do it your way and we quit giving aid completely and only exploit their resources when absolutely necessary. Because if they're gonna start a trade war with my government, you can be guaranteed that I'll be writing the letters to my local rep to do exactly the same.
And once their people have pulled themselves out of the bog by their own hair, we might start talking to them again.

Naturally I tend toward the former because it reduces the number of innocents that suffer. But the latter has its advantages too, you're right.

And this will only work if we truly have their best interests at heart and are better able to identify their interests than they are. Both of which are extremely unlikely.
I told you the interests I mean: infrastructure, education, fostering entrepreneurship.

Most people in wealthy countries have no idea how to make political or economic decisions.
That's silly. You can disagree with the decisions, but they don't pick people at random or simply because they belong to the same ethnic group.

They don't have to be able to make all of the political and economic decisions themselves, they merely have to be able to select the leaders that do.
Which is what I mean, and which they are unable to do.

I already accepted that the two are positively correlated, but that they are not perfectly correlated, and Sweden and the US are a good example of that or even Canada and the US for that matter)
Which tells us absolutely nothing with respect to development economics. All of these are developed countries, all of these have high GDPs per capita.
That's what I meant when I was speaking of diminishing marginal returns...but none of the LDCs are even close to that stage.

But if you must have specific examples ... Cuba is much higher on the HDI than several countries with much higher GDP per capita.
Hmmm, a little predictable, don't you think?

Firstly, my question was not about random statistics, but about whether you would want to live there (and why you prefer your current location to it).

Secondly, a major component of HDI is indeed GDP per capita.

And also - Cuba is on the 52nd place. That's lower than the Baltic countries or Slovakia for example. Looking for a country with a significantly higher (let's say the difference should be $10,000) GDP per capita below it on the list - I find none.
Indeed, only Russia (with about $6,500 difference) really jumps at you, being 10 places lower. But we know the reasons for that, and they tell us nothing about the relationship in question.

GDP per capita is a good measure of wartime production. Which is what it was intended to be. As a measure of quality of life, it is a very vague general indicator and nothing more.
The onus is on you to show me why GDP per capita is a bad measure for living standards and ultimately quality of life. That was your point.

I'm arguing that the two are so closely correlated that they can almost be used interchangably, and indeed that without a good GDP per capita it is very difficult to do anything else to raise the standard of living.

I am going to say this once again, and then I'm done repeating it: We know how the economy works. We have complex models that are good at predicting the directions certain economic changes take. Our models are based on the correlations, true, but they have been shown to have predictive abilities, so they capture some form of causation.


I have asked you again and again to prove that your models work ... that reducing tariffs will result in economic development. I have asked you to provide real world examples. You have failed to do this. So you are correct ... this aspect of the discussion is over.

Quite aside from generations of businesspeople contributing a lot of money to their local economies by selling stuff overseas. Just look at countries like Germany, South Korea, Taiwan and Japan...where would they have been without trade? And where would for example the US economy have been without the sort of products they imported from these places?

And I have agreed that these places have benefitted from trade and pointed out how they used protectionist trade policies to do so.

You, on the other hand, have no theory, no models, no logical connections. I have been asking you for a long time now to build some sort of theory, but you just get hung up on little bits and pieces:

You are absolutely right. I have no theories or models. I have only real world experience in assisting everything from family-owned businesses to banks to accounting firms to aboriginal communities to NGO's to develop tne the institutional capacity necessary to succesfully pursue their objectives. Unfortunately, all you have are theories and models.

a)
You talk about the correlation. Fine, but no causal relationships.

And you can no more prove the causal relationships than I can.

b)
You talk about institutional quality. But your proposition is that if only they had money, they'd fix it. All evidence suggests that this is wrong...for many decades many of these countries have had profitable company-owned businesses. But this money went straight into the pockets of the few, only strengthening the culture of corruption.
Once again you have either misunderstood or misrepresented my argument. I have argued that culturally appropriate institutions are necessary to success, and that funds are necessary to make these institutions work. I do not think money along will fix it. I think complete institutional reform is required. And to ensure that reform has legitimacy with those people the institutions are meant to serve (i.e. the people of those countries) then it has to be driven by their agendas.

c)
You talk about cultural fit. But so far you have steadfastly refused to say anything further. Governments were imposed by "the West" (tm), which didn't fit the culture.

Exactly. If the insitutional structure and processes do not meet cultural norms of how these institutions should operate, they will have no legitimacy with the people, and they will never be able to mobilize them toward a common goal. This is the case in everything from business organizations to government.

Does this mean then that Kingdoms and Tribalism would result in better institutional quality and more economic development? I have my doubts.

Probably not. Because these cultures have evolved and adapted since their contact with European cultures, and so old institutions would probably no longer be valid as such. But that does not mean that their cultures are not still different and require a different set of institutional arrangements than Western governments.


Particularly since traditional native societies don't often value the sort of education that is needed these days.

Well there is a sweeping (and racist) generalization if I have ever heard one. Many of the native societies I have dealt with value education far more than Western society does ... they encourage their young people to pursue a Western education, but also provide other aspects of education that make their young leaders more well-rounded and complete.

Again, you haven't shown that it ever worked.

I have. You have just categorically refused to acknowledge the point.


As for what does work - decent infrastructure, a good source of capital for borrowing, lots of education and an environment that rewards entrepreneurship. Plus access to the resources to combine, ie technology and cost-effective labour.

Agreed. All of which requires funding. Even an environment that rewards entrepreneurship requires a strong independent judiciary and police who can enforce contracts, protect property, etc. And you have yet to explain how they are to get this money except to do it the way it has always been done ... through tariffs.

Depends on the details of the supply chain, I'd say. Either way, imports are a vital part of making an economy work properly. Only through imports can competition (particularly in technology) be kept alive.

And tariffs do not prohibit imports. They merely shift the comparative advantage.


They're trying very hard. The problem is just that politicians are often quite mutated people. Neither theories assuming total selfishness on their part, nor theories regarding mass voting behaviour tell you the whole truth.
Ideology plays a role waaay too often, and that doesn't follow rationality, or even any sort of predictable psychology. Especially if you leave the Western world and go to LDCs.

Agreed. Human behaviour is far too complex for economists to ever try to predict. Which is why economic models, theories and predictions should all be taken with a hefty grain of salt.


Sure I have. I have suggested that they don't need a lot of money to do the important things, and if they do need a lot of money for a project, they can ask for it, just as any entrepreneur would ask a bank. Either loans, or development aid.
Neither of which have worked so far.

They've had advisors come to them (on request) for all this time. They decided that things were appropriate for their cultures and institutions (ie whenever it meant money for their Swiss accounts) and sometimes they decided that it wasn't (when it meant less money for aforementioned accounts).

No one told Mobuto to f*ck up the place like he did. No one told Kim Sung Il, no one told Mao, no one told Idi Amin, no one told Nyere.

It is not America's fault, it is not Europe's fault, it is not Russia's fault. It's their own bloody fault!

I am saying that we need to quit ignoring this fact. Governments in LDCs are almost by definition incompetent, corrupt and unwilling or unable to give their people better living standards.
And they are very unlikely to take help if it is offered, since they are not real governments, but little more than gangs of armed thugs.


Now you are victi-blaming, trying to hold the oppressed people accountable for the crimes of their oppressive leaders. Is it their own fault that they were ruled by tyrants (often supported by foreign governments)? Should they have stood up to the gangs of armed thugs (again, armed by outside powers) and get shot for their troubles? Or should we stop playing a role in propping up these tyrants and let their people hold them to account ...

This is where I don't believe that most people understand free trade, or indeed globalisation. "Nations" are meaningless. We are individuals, that is all. Self-determination can only work for individuals, not for countries.

Well, that is a result of your individualistic world-view. But many people do believe in the self-determination of peoples. And that nations are indeed important. And in that regard, they are as entitled to self-determine as a people or a nation as you are as an individual. Unless you would prefer to impose your worldview on them.



A country can't not have a competitive advantage. The sheer number of possible combinations of people, skills and resources sees to that.
What can happen is that people either haven't spotted an opportunity yet or their competitive advantage is smothered by government policy. Note also that competitive advantages can often be started by only a few entrepreneurs or investors.

OK ... then nationals of that country can gain competitive advantage. Stop splitting hairs and address the substantive point.


That's impossible. If one country already has the economies of scale, another that has virtually nothing won't catch up on numbers.


If they enjoy some form of comparative advantage already, then they won't necessarily need the same scale of production to catch up with the economies enjoyed by the other country.

What do I care? If these governments decide to hurt randoms, isn't it only right for us to hurt randoms back?

No it is not. If it is not right in the first place, then the fact that someone else does it does not make it right. Again, you are punishing the victim for the crimes of the agressor, which will solve absolutely nothing.

You need to understand what tariffs are: They are innocent people being punished for committing no crime whatsoever.

No. They are a payment in exchange for a right, the right to do business in a given country. The country does not have to give those rights away for free.

Which leaves us with two options: Either we do it my way and only give aid when we are deciding exactly how and where it is spent.
Or we do it your way and we quit giving aid completely and only exploit their resources when absolutely necessary.

I didn't say cut off aid completely. I merely said stop imposing inappropriate conditions.

I told you the interests I mean: infrastructure, education, fostering entrepreneurship.

And of course, you know better than they do what their best interests are.


That's silly. You can disagree with the decisions, but they don't pick people at random or simply because they belong to the same ethnic group.

They don't have to be able to make all of the political and economic decisions themselves, they merely have to be able to select the leaders that do.
Which is what I mean, and which they are unable to do.

You are aboslutely right. To date they have been unable to pick their leaders. Because they weren't given a choice.


Firstly, my question was not about random statistics, but about whether you would want to live there (and why you prefer your current location to it).
I would certainly rather live in poorer Cuba than wealthier Russia.


The onus is on you to show me why GDP per capita is a bad measure for living standards and ultimately quality of life. That was your point.


No ... that argument is not going to cut ice with me. You are the one who thinks that GDP is a useful measure ... you prove that it is. Stop trying to reverse the onus and get my top disprove things you can't prove in the first place.

No. The person without resources still has the same full capabilities of action that they would in any case - they just don't have the materials available to facilitate their actions. They certainly have no right to this material - this would require that other people who had earned such materials give them theirs, which they have no obligation to do. People with less resources have no intrinsic right to the property of those with more resources.How can you have the same capabilities without the same materials?

The right to property is derived from the right to ownership differently compared to the right to freedom from coercion - seeing as your actions and effort are an extension of your will and consciousness, the value you create is by direct logical extrapolation similarly an extension of yourself, and is thus your property in the same way you are. Thus, you have the same rights vis-a-vis your property as with yourself.I'm not sure why people should be able to extend themselves indefinitely.

No person has the right to happiness or resources - rather, to the pursuit thereof. Well, I agree that simply because someone owns resources doesn't mean they have the right to them. (Yes, I know you didn't mean that, just pointing out what you said here. :))

The situation I see with sweatshops is that quality of life was poor, period. Rural or urban, the Chinese (for example) had 12+/6+/52 manual labor jobs, made just enough to live on or less, and lived in hovels. Whether the jobs made rice or TVs, and whether the hovels were tiny huts or tiny apartments, is all more or less equal. What makes the industrial model better, though, is that it makes the workers part of the global market, which means that it makes their society wealthier too, which means their standard of living increases, plus it makes their wages and lifestyles part of the cycle of supply and demand.Well, sort of. A sweatshop isn't simply a place where people work for long hours for little pay, though the differences between sweatshops vary depending on who's running them. (And by this, I am
referring to their negative qualities.)

This means that as capital floods the country and the Chinese economic superboom begins to slow down and deflate a little, things settle down and standards of living rise as wages do. Wouldn't part of the boom slowing down be factories out of China in search of lower wages, thus increasing Chinese unemployment? How would standards of living and wages rise in this case?

Productivity and innovation increase, the short-term money is invested in pursuits besides manufacturing American creations and cheap knockoffs, and into actual new ideas and products of their own, Evil Cantadia touched upon this, and I would say that the Chinese should be doing this first, and then manufacturing for the foreign sector afterwards.

demand rises at the higher end of the job spectrum, capital begins to filter down to the masses as the noveau Chinese rich start to invest and spend their sudden fortunes, education becomes higher and more commonplace as the middle class rises in delayed reaction to the boom, education and highend job demand fall into the same frame, kickstarting another wave of increases in the average income.I suppose the Chinese have the infrastructure to have all of this occur; they would, if anyone would.

The two biggest problems are gigantic populations and unfair trade practices. If the Chinese would start fairly evaluating the worth of their currency and encourage responsible business practices instead of promoting the same policies that kept the superboom going 5 years ago but which will result in a market crash if continued now, things would work out a helluva lot better. The US can do things from their end too: Reduce the deficit and debt, improve education, make sure inflation is kept down. Well, those aren't the unfair trade practices I would refer to, though those are probably good ideas, too.

Homesteading is homesteading whether society officially allows it or not. It's what happens any time unclaimed land is claimed and used by settlers on a frontier. I meant homesteading with regard to it becoming a way to claim ownership after the family is no longer using it; if society won't protect the land from squatters then there is no implied right to ownership.

Well, it could, but why would it? There'd then be no land for any actual activities or pursuits. There's no future to hold it in reserve for if you don't do something to create that future today. I did say all land; I meant to say all currently unclaimed land.

Any functioning system has some unemployment. If nothing else, people change jobs. You have layoffs, companies merge or downsize, people just quit. For a certain period, they've got to find a new job, retrain for a new, non-obsolete profession, etc. If you had society organize employment before people quit, they can move from one job to the next without the period of unemployment.

Ideally, you'd have this transient unemployment only. But in reality, having near-zero true unemployment in a sector of bracket of jobs means that you have a shortage of that kind of employee. The market doesn't work in one-second-long cycles; it doesn't instantly account for every single-worker-sized fluctuation. The precise number of jobs doesn't always match up to the precise number of applicants. But that's what you strive for, yes. And this is generally achieved by growth and greater productivity, which creates more jobs for more people.And what happens when workers fall through the cracks?

The other component is education, which is especially in issue in the current time, because the rising workforce is simply not being educated and trained for the market's future. 60% of new jobs being created require skills and knowledge possessed by only 20% of the population.Do you think the problem could become severe enough to cause shifts in the market away from these jobs that require the new skills and knowledge?

But they probably will live to see it, though it admittedly depends on where in the business cycle they were born. As older workers retire, new ones have to be brought in. You're always looking for new employees to fill job spots, as long as your business keeps growing and/or people keep aging. That creates an interest in the rising workforce.

Plus, they (generally) have kids, whom one would presume they care about the future of. True, but with the way the world is working now, they can simply move the business to a country which is educating its own workforce, perhaps doing the move with the promise of tax breaks and other gifts.

And while I realize this goes against the grain, the assumption that no entrepreneurs value anything in the universe besides immediate financial gains, and therefore don't care about the long term of their business or the economy, is rude and generally false. As much as the radical left likes to demonize us, we're people too. I wouldn't say that all entrepreneurs are that way, no, some are fine, however even the ones who don't appear to have immediate financial gains are open to having their motives questioned.

Some businessmen are even paid to think beyond their immediate personal interests - they're called executives, or CEOs. They think about the long-term (well, before the stupidity born of overenthusiasm during the 90s) interests of the company they work for. Is there a particular reason to think this is going to blow over as opposed to continuing?

Of course not. General education should last until the students have a full grounding in all subject areas and are prepared to enter the real world, should continue into higher education whenever possible, and should continue in the form of constant retraining and skills/knowledge-updating in whatever their profession is as time goes on - the 21st century is simply moving much too fast for workers to get by using the same skill set they had when they entered the workforce two decades ago. I agree; I was just thinking that just because someone was a bad student at some point in their life doesn't mean they don't deserve another change; this comment of yours seems to allow for that.

It never does - not in the long-term, at least. Many major changes that improve productivity or introduce new innovation create smaller, shorter-term negative fluctuations, but such is the nature of all paradigm shifts. The net effect is postive. Ah.

They need to have other people to trade with to be maximally efficient, but think about it this way - everyone else could be replaced. They could trade with each other and be perfectly fine. Highly productive automation could cover every task but that of the creator, the mind-worker who comes up with and implements ideas.

Of course, this could never actually happen, but it illustrates the direction, at base, of the net dependency - it connects the masses to the gifted, not vice-versa. It also connects the gifted to the masses - the masses as a whole can't be replaced either.

Not really. The workers are generally not the same people who are capable of building businesses or innovating new processes or products. Plus, what exactly is the benefit of this? At the very least, even if only a few of the workers are capable of doing this when they control the means of production but not when they don't have the resources to do so means that there are a few more processes and products invented.

It only differs from the current situation in that the actors who own an economic organization could not pay other actors to do things without offering them an equal share in the organization, which is a rather arbitrary restriction. It's not an arbitrary distinction, it's an important one as it ensures that the people profiting from the businesses actually work there.

The current model and so-called "hoarding of resources" allows for the stock market system, which works to further maximize utility and efficiency and acts as a sort of next-level market system bolted on top of the more down-to-earth one that facilitates even more optimal allocation of resources.

The transition would also massively decrease profit - no one would make as much money because the manipulation of currency and the flow thereof would be more neglected, and the owner base would be inflated. Stock speculation tend to lead more to negative things than positive things.

This would lead to a deficit of investment and venture capital for new businesses and innovations, plus a decreased average income, and thus quality of life. There's no reason to think that there wouldn't be the same amount of investment, it's just that there would be more investors.

[shrug] It's the same, just worse at its job (optimal allocation of resources, maximal efficiency and productivity, maximization of utility) and less free. I'm not an advocate of market socialism, so I can't argue against this and so I will accept your point; I just intended to point out that it exists if people really want a market system.

Hmm. That gives me the spark of an idea - total social contracts organized along profit-making lines, with citizens as the shareholders in a real, corporate sense.... Probably some variant and/or subset of anarchocapitalism.Aside from the rejection of certain capitalist principles, would it be something similar to mutualism?: (The mutualist economics part would probably be most relevant to this point.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutualism_%28economic_theory%29

I have asked you again and again to prove that your models work ... that reducing tariffs will result in economic development. I have asked you to provide real world examples. You have failed to do this. So you are correct ... this aspect of the discussion is over.
Listen, I know it's a pain to have to step out of the old ways of just arguing an ideological viewpoint and look at some evidence, and it's even worse when it is such a gigantic lot of it, but I implore you: Quit ignoring this paper!
Third time's the charm, I guess. :rolleyes:
http://www.stanford.edu/~wacziarg/downloads/integration.pdf

And I have agreed that these places have benefitted from trade and pointed out how they used protectionist trade policies to do so.
Oh, you mean Germany has benefitted from protectionism. The Federal Republic had nothing. It was one of the poorest nations on earth.
Instead of imposing tariffs, it started free trade deals with its neighbours, which eventually formed the EU.
Initial money was provided in large part by the Marshall Plan - clearly defined aid packages that were to be spent according to strict rules worked out by the US.

You are absolutely right. I have no theories or models. I have only real world experience in assisting everything from family-owned businesses to banks to accounting firms to aboriginal communities to NGO's to develop tne the institutional capacity necessary to succesfully pursue their objectives. Unfortunately, all you have are theories and models.
Do I have to look for the Latin name for this particular fallacy now? Let's just say you're missing the point.
Unless you're a specialist in macroeconomics or development economics, none of your "real world experience" matters one bit, just like a physics degree wouldn't matter.

I think complete institutional reform is required. And to ensure that reform has legitimacy with those people the institutions are meant to serve (i.e. the people of those countries) then it has to be driven by their agendas.
And since their agendas are, quite frankly, crap, I propose that we then stop giving them money to put them in place. Simple enough.

If the insitutional structure and processes do not meet cultural norms of how these institutions should operate, they will have no legitimacy with the people, and they will never be able to mobilize them toward a common goal.
Bring back post-WWII Germany: Victorious Allies impose a form of government, even impose the leaders of that government on the nation.
Result - free, democratic country with a pretty decent standard of living.

And we know what happened previously, as Germans were left to choose whatever institutions fit with their cultural norms and national objectives.

But that does not mean that their cultures are not still different and require a different set of institutional arrangements than Western governments.
Which brings me back to my problem with your argument: What does different mean, for crying out loud?
I don't want to hear more "it depends". Just tell me: if it is not a dictatorship of some sort, and it is not a democratic parliamentary system of some sort, and it is (presumably) not the sort of system poor people established themselves in their dozens as previous governments were overthown - then what in hell's name is it you mean? If you think it depends, pick a country and tell me the specifics.

Well there is a sweeping (and racist) generalization if I have ever heard one.
Meh, I'm sorry. Must be the fact that outside the "developed" major civilisations, eg the Western one, the Islamic one and the East Asian ones (if you really want the now defunct South- and Central American ones too)...there was no proper schooling system.
People taught their kids basic facts about their life, and that was it. Reading and writing was (if known) kept to some select few for religious purposes, science pretty much non-existent and often money was not even known.

Ergo: In international competition, they will fail. That's a fact, and I don't care how unfashionable that is.

A few select other civilisations have developed beyond that stage, and their members are therefore in a prime position to compete in the global marketplace.

Many of the native societies I have dealt with value education far more than Western society does ... they encourage their young people to pursue a Western education, but also provide other aspects of education that make their young leaders more well-rounded and complete.
Doesn't work so well for Australian Aboriginals. Sure, they value education (or at least the Elders do), but not maths, and reading and writing and that crap. It's more about what sort of plants you can eat.
Which used to be fine, but will never allow them to succeed in the modern, globalised world.
And if you want, you can now start a rant about what is so great about modernity, and why we shouldn't all value living in nature and dying with 30 or 40 and don't understand jack about the universe, but rest assured that I don't buy it.

I have. You have just categorically refused to acknowledge the point.
No, you just pointed out random correlations. Why don't you, for example, show me how England industrialised by using tariffs? How about Singapore? How about South Korea?
I want proper case studies, not sweeping statements.

And you have yet to explain how they are to get this money except to do it the way it has always been done ... through tariffs.
Through attracting foreign aid projects and foreign investment, propped up by income taxes.

And tariffs do not prohibit imports. They merely shift the comparative advantage.
That doesn't even make sense. Tariffs are not a way to raise money, that's just a secondary effect, it's been that way since the 19th century. Tariffs are a mercantilist measure to reduce imports, used to support locals who otherwise wouldn't do their job well enough to survive.

Agreed. Human behaviour is far too complex for economists to ever try to predict. Which is why economic models, theories and predictions should all be taken with a hefty grain of salt.
:rolleyes:
I'm not talking about human behaviour. We know quite well how humans behave. Modern economic models feature a lot of imput from psychology, sociology and so on. And modern psychology and sociology also begins to feature input from economics.
I'm talking about politics, which is not normal human behaviour, since it is not a normal environment. Personal wealth is not all that important anymore, even personal happiness isn't. Random and irrational behaviour comes to the forth, and no social science can predict it reliably. Not even PoliSci. And since I understand and accept that (that being the reason I don't trust the State in the first place), I don't think it is the job of good economics to try and predict ideologically driven economic policy (normal, practical fiscal and monetary policy is a different matter, of course).

Economics only assumes one thing about human behaviour, and that is that they will try to maximise personal happiness. In the material context that macroeconomics is concerned with, that means they will try and maximise the utility they get from the combination of earning (and spending) money, and their free time.

People who say that economics is removed from the real world have no idea what economics is and does. This has held true for everyone who has said this sort of thing to me. They all had weird assumptions in their head, for whatever reason.

Neither of which have worked so far.
Neither of which have been tried properly so far.

Now you are victi-blaming, trying to hold the oppressed people accountable for the crimes of their oppressive leaders.
Old, Hitler-related story. I never believed the "I didn't know" or "I didn't want any of this" excuse either.
Every one of these leaders has had the big crowds to support them.

And besides, I'd rather blame the victims than blame myself, or blame "the man".

Or should we stop playing a role in propping up these tyrants and let their people hold them to account ...
To quote myself: "Been there, done that, got the (blood-soaked) T-Shirt."

The problem is that people who think like you have gone absolutely incapable of looking for guilt with these people's own actions. I know, because not too long ago I was the same.
Poor? Blame capitalism!
Hamas suicide bomber? Blame Israeli policies!
Third World? Blame the West!

Well, that is a result of your individualistic world-view. But many people do believe in the self-determination of peoples. And that nations are indeed important.
And many people believe in Scientology. If the views of the mob mattered, well, we wouldn't be where we are today.

And in that regard, they are as entitled to self-determine as a people or a nation as you are as an individual. Unless you would prefer to impose your worldview on them.
This is like saying that their world view to murder me is okay, and I would be imposing mine by asking not to be murdered.
I don't want to be paying tariffs, just because their world view tells them that I am less worthy a human being than those who happen to have been born within the arbitrary lines on some map.

OK ... then nationals of that country can gain competitive advantage. Stop splitting hairs and address the substantive point.
The substantive point of yours was that countries can sometimes not have any competitive advantage.
I showed that this is impossible, and in the case in which those advantages that do exist are not spotted, it is their own fault. If you are indeed a libertarian, you will accept this point.

If they enjoy some form of comparative advantage already, then they won't necessarily need the same scale of production to catch up with the economies enjoyed by the other country.
Exactly. Because economies of scale is hardly the only comparative advantage, it's not even a very good one.

Example: The US had a gigantic industrial base. Japan had a very small industrial base.
The Japanese ultilised what they had differently (and ultimately, it turned out, better), and ran the Americans out of many markets, doing quite well for themselves.

So, can a government help create comparative advantages to allow local business (note that "local" can also be owned by foreigners, to living standards it doesn't matter) to be successful? Certainly.
Can it do so by trying to hurt other countries? Most certainly not.

Again, you are punishing the victim for the crimes of the agressor, which will solve absolutely nothing.
So at least now you understand that the population of an LDC is part of the victims of any tariff being imposed by its government.

No. They are a payment in exchange for a right, the right to do business in a given country. The country does not have to give those rights away for free.
The government does not give the right to do business anywhere, to anyone. How can you claim to be libertarian but believe that the ability to exchange goods and services with other people has to be granted by our gracious overlords?

I didn't say cut off aid completely. I merely said stop imposing inappropriate conditions.
But we already know what happens then: incapable governments keep the money to themselves. We watched it go on for decades.
So therefore we stop giving it to them until their populations make those governments responsible and accountable.

...

I've got time. There might even be a tax cut in it for me.

And of course, you know better than they do what their best interests are.
Sort of like I know that breathing is in your best interest, yes.

You are aboslutely right. To date they have been unable to pick their leaders. Because they weren't given a choice.
Are you so naive? I don't think so.
All these dictators and democratically elected Presidents/Dictators had massive support from big parts of their countries. And those that didn't support them supported some other potential dictator.

I would certainly rather live in poorer Cuba than wealthier Russia.
You know, I put quite a bit of effort into my posts. When there are facts to check and things to prove, I'm quite ready to spend half an hour searching the web to find the relevant facts and figures.
I'd hope you'll do the same thing in the future. I mentioned the example of Cuba vs Russia, and I told you that the difference isn't great enough to enable us to draw a clear distinction. They're both only semi-developed countries.
Look for your own examples. Try and surprise me...debate me.

No ... that argument is not going to cut ice with me. You are the one who thinks that GDP is a useful measure ... you prove that it is.
Well, here are a few things:

1. GDP per capita measures the amount of money around per head in the country. The more money, the more nice things one can buy, the better your standard of living.

2. GDP per capita is very, very strongly related to the level of technological development in a country. There is no country with a low GDP per capita that can be considered highly developed technologically.

3. The HDI, and pretty much all alternative measures of standard of living, have GDP per capita as a major part of their calculations.

4. Of the top twenty countries by HDI, none has a GDP per capita lower than $23,000. Indeed, looking at GDP per capita (http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/eco_gdp_ppp_percap-economy-gdp-ppp-per-capita), and HDI (http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/eco_hum_dev_ind-economy-human-development-index), the correlation is obvious (and shouldn't surprise, given how HDI is calculated, and how GDP per capita leads to increases in available technology, education and healthcare).

Stop trying to reverse the onus and get my top disprove things you can't prove in the first place.
Whoever makes a claim has to prove it. While I was talking about GDP per capita in terms of development, you questioned what its worth was in the first place. Therefore, it is your job to prove why it wouldn't be a good indicator.

How can you have the same capabilities without the same materials?

I still have the ability to do everything I could do with or without resources, and am not impeded from the rational decision to pursue those courses of action. Nothing is being withheld from me that I have a right to; my pursuit of happiness within my own rights, means, and powers is unobstructed or -coerced.

I'm not sure why people should be able to extend themselves indefinitely.

I don't know about indefinitely - if your property has property, then it itself can't be property, because only conscious entities can have property, and they can't be property.

On the other hand, the value or property created by your property is still your property, so I suppose you could view that as indefinite extension. Not really, though - it still has the same logical connection back to you and falls into the same category.

But all that aside, in the event that you could extend indefinitely, why not? The right carries over by logical extrapolation, and this holds unless you have a compelling logical reason that it stops at a certain arbitrary point.

Wouldn't part of the boom slowing down be factories out of China in search of lower wages, thus increasing Chinese unemployment? How would standards of living and wages rise in this case?

I didn't quite get the first sentence, but I'm assuming you mean companies leaving China because wages are rising. A few problems with that:
- There's not many cheaper places to go. And most of those that exist (mostly in Africa) aren't at this point really suitable for development at this time.
- Many rising companies are Chinese, and have a lot of sunk capital in China. They have money, they're rooted in China with their new fortunes, and they're ready to start investing in new innovations, new businesses, new jobs.
- Considering the dependence of many Western (especially US, of course) companies on East Asia already, the fact that their wages still won't be across-the-board as high as in First-World countries, and the fact that process innovations in existing Chinese factories will cut jobs on the lower end, balancing the wage rise out, and increase jobs at the higher end in step with the rise of such workers in China, there will still be incentive for companies to continue to do business in China.

Evil Cantadia touched upon this, and I would say that the Chinese should be doing this first, and then manufacturing for the foreign sector afterwards.

Ideally true, but in practice doesn't happen. America did the same thing in the 1800s for a while. You have to make money to spend money.

I did say all land; I meant to say all currently unclaimed land.

Is there any unclaimed land? I'm pretty sure it's all either private or government property.

If you had society organize employment before people quit, they can move from one job to the next without the period of unemployment.

How would you do that? Who would be required to hold a job in reserve for a person who might never get fired? How would you know when the person was going to be laid off? How would you ensure that the job continued to exist and be necessary?

And what happens when workers fall through the cracks?

They work themselves back up if they can. I'm sorry for them, but it happens. Things change, and no transition is perfectly nonlossy.

Do you think the problem could become severe enough to cause shifts in the market away from these jobs that require the new skills and knowledge?

No. There's nothing to shift back to; no one is going to accept a decrease in standard of living and a technological antirevolution. If anything, it'll drive a market downsizing, rises in productivity and automation, and a massive widening of the gap between the wealthy technoenabled, and poor technopeasantry. With a very severe market recession during the process.

But remember that that's a worst-case scenario, if no solutions at all are pursued. If at least some people are smart and start preparing now, it'll cushion the impact and jumpstart recovery. And I think that's happening - among companies and government.

True, but with the way the world is working now, they can simply move the business to a country which is educating its own workforce, perhaps doing the move with the promise of tax breaks and other gifts.

And what's the problem there? Then, the countries who do the best job educating their citizens reap the most rewards. If companies start doing this frequently and in large numbers, states will see this and start competing. I see nothing wrong with this scenario.

I wouldn't say that all entrepreneurs are that way, no, some are fine, however even the ones who don't appear to have immediate financial gains are open to having their motives questioned.

....same as everyone else. Believe it or not, workers are equally likely to have questionable motivations.

Is there a particular reason to think this is going to blow over as opposed to continuing?

Yeah, it'll blow over. It's just the temporary result of 90s overexuberance. Once the measurable impact on the market and company of their dearth of long-term planning becomes obvious around 2010 and beyond, they'll start planning for the long-term again. Some are already staring to see it now.

It also connects the gifted to the masses - the masses as a whole can't be replaced either.

But theoretically, they could be. All functions that don't require cognitive and creative capacity can potentially be replaced. The opposite is not true. Thus, while there is to be sure dependency on both sides, but the net is from masses to gifted.

At the very least, even if only a few of the workers are capable of doing this when they control the means of production but not when they don't have the resources to do so means that there are a few more processes and products invented.

The problem there is that you limit resources available. The practical benefit of a big corporation with big profits and tons of "hoarded" money is that you can afford to accept risks and absorb losses in the pursuit of the next innovation, and that you can provide massive funding for the development of a new idea.

In practice, your workers who have the capacity to do this do it right now - they're engineers, R&D researchers, scientists, small business owners, etc.

It's not an arbitrary distinction, it's an important one as it ensures that the people profiting from the businesses actually work there.

Why? Shares in a company are just another economic transaction - we give you money to develop your company and ideas with, because we expect that you do something worthwhile with it that will make us money in return for our investment.

Stock speculation tend to lead more to negative things than positive things.

Totally incorrect. I know where you're coming from - you think of sudden bubbles, crashes, Black Fridays and such, and assume this is the norm and general effect. In reality, the stock market goes about its positive function on a daily basis - you just don't hear about it unless you're a stock broker or something terrible happens. The stock market is a feedback loop that amplifies the shifts in the market, which makes both booms and crashes disproportionate, but has a net positive effect because by the nature of the growing market the booms outweigh the crashes, (shown by the unbroken upward trend in the economy) so the amplified economy ends up doing more for us.

There's no reason to think that there wouldn't be the same amount of investment, it's just that there would be more investors.

Which is a problem. A million people with a couple of dollars each are vastly harder to persuade to give the 2M you need than a single investor. This is exacerbated by the nature of these new investors: they're workers, likely with little knowledge of money management, entrepreneurship, or technological innovation. It takes a special kind of person to succeed in venture capital investment, and that kind of person is who the money does and should go to.

I still have the ability to do everything I could do with or without resources, and am not impeded from the rational decision to pursue those courses of action.Yes, but decisions are meaningless without the ability to implement them.

Nothing is being withheld from me that I have a right to; my pursuit of happiness within my own rights, means, and powers is unobstructed or -coerced. Well, in order to show that there is a right to it, I have to establish the first premise above.

I don't know about indefinitely - if your property has property, then it itself can't be property, because only conscious entities can have property, and they can't be property.

On the other hand, the value or property created by your property is still your property, so I suppose you could view that as indefinite extension. Not really, though - it still has the same logical connection back to you and falls into the same category.

But all that aside, in the event that you could extend indefinitely, why not? The right carries over by logical extrapolation, and this holds unless you have a compelling logical reason that it stops at a certain arbitrary point. The point of the end of resources is not an arbitrary point; currently we only have the ability to extract resources from the earth.

I didn't quite get the first sentence, but I'm assuming you mean companies leaving China because wages are rising. Yes. We're seeing the trend of moving to Vietnam already.

A few problems with that:
- There's not many cheaper places to go. And most of those that exist (mostly in Africa) aren't at this point really suitable for development at this time.They could go cyclically, in the meantime doing what they can about the Africa situation.

- Many rising companies are Chinese, and have a lot of sunk capital in China. They have money, they're rooted in China with their new fortunes, and they're ready to start investing in new innovations, new businesses, new jobs.
- Considering the dependence of many Western (especially US, of course) companies on East Asia already, the fact that their wages still won't be across-the-board as high as in First-World countries, and the fact that process innovations in existing Chinese factories will cut jobs on the lower end, balancing the wage rise out, and increase jobs at the higher end in step with the rise of such workers in China, there will still be incentive for companies to continue to do business in China.Why don't these incentives apply to the Western companies more than they do?

Ideally true, but in practice doesn't happen. America did the same thing in the 1800s for a while. You have to make money to spend money. They have the resources, they can spread them around within their own countries; use them to build infrastructure, etc.

Is there any unclaimed land? I'm pretty sure it's all either private or government property. In which case the situation is even worse, because that means that there is no way to homestead land.


How would you do that? Who would be required to hold a job in reserve for a person who might never get fired? How would you know when the person was going to be laid off? How would you ensure that the job continued to exist and be necessary? By having society take over the entire economy.

They work themselves back up if they can. I'm sorry for them, but it happens. Things change, and no transition is perfectly nonlossy. What happens if they can't?

No. There's nothing to shift back to; no one is going to accept a decrease in standard of living and a technological antirevolution. If anything, it'll drive a market downsizing, rises in productivity and automation, and a massive widening of the gap between the wealthy technoenabled, and poor technopeasantry. With a very severe market recession during the process.

But remember that that's a worst-case scenario, if no solutions at all are pursued. If at least some people are smart and start preparing now, it'll cushion the impact and jumpstart recovery. And I think that's happening - among companies and government. Ah, okay. It seems to me that if people wouldn't be willing to accept a decrease in standard of living and a technological antirevolution then they'd become educated in those field, but perhaps the situation isn't well known yet.

And what's the problem there? Then, the countries who do the best job educating their citizens reap the most rewards. If companies start doing this frequently and in large numbers, states will see this and start competing. I see nothing wrong with this scenario. Simply that businesses will have little reason to invest in the infrastructure of a country if they can avoid it.

....same as everyone else. Believe it or not, workers are equally likely to have questionable motivations.True, but they have much less power in making their questionable motivations felt.

Yeah, it'll blow over. It's just the temporary result of 90s overexuberance. Once the measurable impact on the market and company of their dearth of long-term planning becomes obvious around 2010 and beyond, they'll start planning for the long-term again. Some are already staring to see it now. Well, I suppose I can accept your optimism.

But theoretically, they could be. All functions that don't require cognitive and creative capacity can potentially be replaced. The opposite is not true. Thus, while there is to be sure dependency on both sides, but the net is from masses to gifted. I see no reason why masses of people are somehow more replaceable than one person; if one person invents something, there's no reason that someone else couldn't have done it at some later point in time.

The problem there is that you limit resources available. The practical benefit of a big corporation with big profits and tons of "hoarded" money is that you can afford to accept risks and absorb losses in the pursuit of the next innovation, and that you can provide massive funding for the development of a new idea.

In practice, your workers who have the capacity to do this do it right now - they're engineers, R&D researchers, scientists, small business owners, etc.So then the benefits and losses from the risks taken should be felt by the entire society; that way nobody gains or loses too much at a time.

Why? Shares in a company are just another economic transaction - we give you money to develop your company and ideas with, because we expect that you do something worthwhile with it that will make us money in return for our investment.Not all economic transactions are acceptable.

Totally incorrect. I know where you're coming from - you think of sudden bubbles, crashes, Black Fridays and such, and assume this is the norm and general effect. In reality, the stock market goes about its positive function on a daily basis - you just don't hear about it unless you're a stock broker or something terrible happens. The stock market is a feedback loop that amplifies the shifts in the market, which makes both booms and crashes disproportionate, but has a net positive effect because by the nature of the growing market the booms outweigh the crashes, (shown by the unbroken upward trend in the economy) so the amplified economy ends up doing more for us. I would say that the reason we don't hear about more Black Fridays has a lot to do with Keynesian economics; nonetheless, there are other harmful forms of speculation as well, such as currency speculation.

Which is a problem. A million people with a couple of dollars each are vastly harder to persuade to give the 2M you need than a single investor. As they should be, we'd see fewer useless products on the market that way.

This is exacerbated by the nature of these new investors: they're workers, likely with little knowledge of money management, entrepreneurship, or technological innovation. I see no reason why they couldn't be educated in these fields, given free education.

It takes a special kind of person to succeed in venture capital investment, and that kind of person is who the money does and should go to.The money in most cases should not go to such a person; resources are far too limited for a single person to have so much money.

Yes, but decisions are meaningless without the ability to implement them.

Not meaningless - if anything, they are the only things with true meaning. Everything else could be an illusion, but your mind is real.

But speaking less abstractly, you have a right to your decisions, and actions and efforts arising from them. You have no right to be able to implement every decision you make.

The point of the end of resources is not an arbitrary point; currently we only have the ability to extract resources from the earth.

A state which is rapidly approaching being outmoded. Private spaceflight ahoy!

They could go cyclically, in the meantime doing what they can about the Africa situation.

The Africa situation would be much more tractable if their governments weren't so pathetic, the IMF wasn't so stupid about how they loan money, and aid and investment would stop being obstructed by family values conflicts and hippie anti-"exploitation" issues.

Why don't these incentives apply to the Western companies more than they do?

Mainly because the world isn't quite flat yet, with Southeast Asia and Africa being prime examples. Also because of Chinese economic policies and trade practices.

They have the resources, they can spread them around within their own countries; use them to build infrastructure, etc.

If you mean initial, in-country resources, then of course. Let me qualify: You have to develop resources to make money to spend money. If you mean financial resources, then again you only get this by [initially] dependent, export-focused trade and business.

In which case the situation is even worse, because that means that there is no way to homestead land.

Not at this late date, no. But homesteading only occurs when there is unclaimed land. On Earth, this isn't really true anymore - no exploration, no holes on the map, no unclaimed, uncharted territories. It sucks. In this aspect, at least, I think I would have been better suited to an earlier era. :(

By having society take over the entire economy.

This does not address the question. That's a given: you could never effect any kind of absolute change like that without imposing a total command economy. But even if you do: what then? Statist control of the economy is a necessary prerequisite, but it isn't the action itself. I think you'll find that it's impossible to do without totally wrecking the economy and plunging into a downward spiral of debt, corruption, and minimal productivity. But wait, that's how socialist systems go anyway. :rolleyes:

What happens if they can't?

a) I see no reason why they can't. Except in the utmost extremes of untenable circumstances, there's no way a person can not at least subsist in the economy, if they have and want to. Really, welfare if anything is bad for the poor. People rely on that and never get the motivation to get off their asses and work two jobs or get some sort of cheap online-community-college training.
b) If they're in a totally untenable situation as mentioned above, that's what private charities are for. Run a homeless shelter with aid in job-seeking built in. Now, I can also see as perfectly legitimate an arrangement where you can choose to donate a certain portion of tax money to a list of major private charities via a government collection-and-distribution service, just because government is ideally situated to help with that kind of broad service, in a totally noncompulsory way.

Simply that businesses will have little reason to invest in the infrastructure of a country if they can avoid it.

Nothing could be further from the truth. Think about it: what does Africa have, besides war, plagues, and tyrants? RESOURCES. Resources, resources, and more resources. But these resources can't be tapped, because the infrastructure is missing. An ambitious business then invests in this infrastructure in order to get access to the profit on the resources. Everyone benefits.

True, but they have much less power in making their questionable motivations felt.

Which is kind of a balance thing, I suppose. They do less for the economy, but they have less power to do really bad things to it. A fitting symmetry.

I see no reason why masses of people are somehow more replaceable than one person; if one person invents something, there's no reason that someone else couldn't have done it at some later point in time.

My point is that the small class of individuals who invent things can't be replaced, while the vastly larger class of people who make the pieces of things other people invent can be.

So then the benefits and losses from the risks taken should be felt by the entire society; that way nobody gains or loses too much at a time.

Why? Their money, their risk, and their possible gain. Plus, in reality you'll just end up with fewer and worse risks taken and less money going into venture investment. As I said, convincing half of society to give up money when most of them don't understand what you're proposing is a whole helluva lot harder.

Not all economic transactions are acceptable.

Which ones specifically, and exactly why not?

As they should be, we'd see fewer useless products on the market that way.

Useless? How so? Useless products are screened out by market capitalism - if people don't want, they don't buy it, and the companies that make it go out of business. On the contrary, it's a command economy that creates oversupply of unnecessary products and undersupply of necessary ones through simplistic, regimented manipulation and artificial bolstering of "underdog" individuals and businesses that have a "right" to be successful and have the same money as companies with more necessary products.

I see no reason why they couldn't be educated in these fields, given free education.

You're going to give everyone an MBA and what, mandate a constantly updated knowledge of current events in science, technology, and business, in addition to their normal professions? Everyone is simply not suited to it. You're just trying to abolish specialization and division of labor.

The money in most cases should not go to such a person; resources are far too limited for a single person to have so much money.

The money should go to whoever deserves it and can do the most with it. And that's what the market does. Plus, resources are unlimited: we've got all of space to get them from, and we'll get there long before we hit the real limiting crisis point here on Earth.

Not meaningless - if anything, they are the only things with true meaning. Everything else could be an illusion, but your mind is real.

But speaking less abstractly, you have a right to your decisions, and actions and efforts arising from them. You have no right to be able to implement every decision you make. Certainly not, but the ability to implement decisions goes hand in hand with making the decision; you would agree with this if I suggested banning cars; the ability to buy a car is just as important as the decision to do so.

A state which is rapidly approaching being outmoded. Private spaceflight ahoy!So then the situation can be worsened by the resources of space being concentrated in the hands of fewer people. Oh joy.

The Africa situation would be much more tractable if their governments weren't so pathetic, the IMF wasn't so stupid about how they loan money, and aid and investment would stop being obstructed by family values conflicts and hippie anti-"exploitation" issues. Exploitation is a very real issue.

Mainly because the world isn't quite flat yet, with Southeast Asia and Africa being prime examples. Also because of Chinese economic policies and trade practices. Ah, I see.

If you mean initial, in-country resources, then of course. Let me qualify: You have to develop resources to make money to spend money. If you mean financial resources, then again you only get this by [initially] dependent, export-focused trade and business. Of course - have people extract the resources, distribute most of the resources amongst the population and sell the rest, and use that money to build factories to convert the resources into other things, and then repeat the process, distributing them amongst the populace and selling the rest.

Not at this late date, no. But homesteading only occurs when there is unclaimed land. On Earth, this isn't really true anymore - no exploration, no holes on the map, no unclaimed, uncharted territories. It sucks. In this aspect, at least, I think I would have been better suited to an earlier era. :(I can concur with the idea of being suited to an earlier era...it would've been fun to participate in the 1848 uprisings.

This does not address the question. That's a given: you could never effect any kind of absolute change like that without imposing a total command economy. But even if you do: what then? Statist control of the economy is a necessary prerequisite, but it isn't the action itself.An examples might be:

"We need someone to do job X, is anyone willing to do job X"
"I am. I am qualified to do so, too, look."
"Ah, person Y seems to be qualified to do so, does anyone want to discuss person Y doing job X"
-A discussion of person Y's qualifications ensues, with the end result, in this case, being person Y doing job X. Variations on this might be educating Person Y to have the ability to do job X.

I think you'll find that it's impossible to do without totally wrecking the economy and plunging into a downward spiral of debt, corruption, and minimal productivity. But wait, that's how socialist systems go anyway. :rolleyes: Which systems are there where the workers own the means of production?

a) I see no reason why they can't. Except in the utmost extremes of untenable circumstances, there's no way a person can not at least subsist in the economy, if they have and want to. Really, welfare if anything is bad for the poor. People rely on that and never get the motivation to get off their asses and work two jobs or get some sort of cheap online-community-college training.We've already established that there will be unemployment, that would be why they can't.
How are people supposed to live while they're getting the online-training?

b) If they're in a totally untenable situation as mentioned above, that's what private charities are for. Run a homeless shelter with aid in job-seeking built in. Now, I can also see as perfectly legitimate an arrangement where you can choose to donate a certain portion of tax money to a list of major private charities via a government collection-and-distribution service, just because government is ideally situated to help with that kind of broad service, in a totally noncompulsory way. Private charities are insufficient, this is why the government got into it in the first place.

Nothing could be further from the truth. Think about it: what does Africa have, besides war, plagues, and tyrants? RESOURCES. Resources, resources, and more resources. But these resources can't be tapped, because the infrastructure is missing. An ambitious business then invests in this infrastructure in order to get access to the profit on the resources. Everyone benefits. I hardly consider building a mine and a road connecting the mine to the port to be a substantial investment in infrastructure.

Which is kind of a balance thing, I suppose. They do less for the economy, but they have less power to do really bad things to it. A fitting symmetry. Not at all, a fitting symmetry would be for everyone to have equal capacity to do things for the economy, including bad things to it.

My point is that the small class of individuals who invent things can't be replaced, while the vastly larger class of people who make the pieces of things other people invent can be. They can only be replaced with other people, in which case you would have the same situation over again. The gifted people can't (yet) replace the masses with nonhumans, therefore, the gifted people benefit from the masses.

Why? Their money, their risk, and their possible gain. Plus, in reality you'll just end up with fewer and worse risks taken and less money going into venture investment. As I said, convincing half of society to give up money when most of them don't understand what you're proposing is a whole helluva lot harder. Not at all, you would end up with fewer but better risks.

Which ones specifically, and exactly why not?The economic transactions involving owning things you don't use, because your ownership prevents other people from using them, too.

Useless? How so? Useless products are screened out by market capitalism - if people don't want, they don't buy it, and the companies that make it go out of business. Really? Everything that people want is useful? No. The companies convince people that what they want is useful, but really it isn't.

On the contrary, it's a command economy that creates oversupply of unnecessary products and undersupply of necessary ones through simplistic, regimented manipulation and artificial bolstering of "underdog" individuals and businesses that have a "right" to be successful and have the same money as companies with more necessary products. If the command economy determines what is necessary, then by definition the only co-ops that will exist will be the ones making necessary products. If someone can't cut it, they can always be retrained to do job that's more suitable for them.

You're going to give everyone an MBA and what, mandate a constantly updated knowledge of current events in science, technology, and business, in addition to their normal professions? Everyone is simply not suited to it. You're just trying to abolish specialization and division of labor. Not abolish it, just blur the lines some.

The money should go to whoever deserves it A single individual doesn't deserve that much money.

And that's what the market does. Plus, resources are unlimited: we've got all of space to get them fromResources in space are not unlimited, they are finite, there's just a really really huge amount of them.

and we'll get there long before we hit the real limiting crisis point here on Earth.We're already there, as you said, all of the resources have been claimed.

Certainly not, but the ability to implement decisions goes hand in hand with making the decision; you would agree with this if I suggested banning cars; the ability to buy a car is just as important as the decision to do so.

It's more like having a car is a prerequisite of implementing the capacity to drive one - but this does not mean I should be given a car whether I can pay for it or not.

See, the difference is that myself and the owner of the car I'm buying have the right to do with our value what we want, which includes exchanging it in the form of a sale transaction. Neither of us, on the other hand, have the right to take the other's value without consent or compensation.

So then the situation can be worsened by the resources of space being concentrated in the hands of fewer people. Oh joy.

Precisely the opposite - you're talking about the current nature of space exploration and pseudoownership. A few governments control space and restrict access to and use of it to their particular national interests. The extension of the free market into space allows the entrepreneurs, workers, tourists, engineers, property buyers, etc. of any and every stripe and location to make money and stake claim in the new frontier.

Exploitation is a very real issue.

Slavery, physical punishment, active prevention of unionization, mafia-esque tactics against truant workers or non-worker local citizens and their families are all exploitation. Giving jobs and infrastructure and technology - even without world-class safety or US-standard pay - to people who in previous circumstances lived in hovels and hunted dangerous animals to find food is not exploitation. They have no obligation to work a normal job - there is nothing forcing them to change their lifestyle. If they want to subsistence farmer or hunter-gatherers, so be it. But if they want a job, there is nothing exploitative about giving those jobs to them, even with poor safety or low wages, because they can always leave with no net loss.

Ah, I see.

Is that an actual "Ah, I see", or a semisarcastic "you're being totally opaque" "Ah, I see"?

Of course - have people extract the resources, distribute most of the resources amongst the population and sell the rest, and use that money to build factories to convert the resources into other things, and then repeat the process, distributing them amongst the populace and selling the rest.

This still ignores the costs of initial infrastructure, the possibility of worthless goods that can be turned into something highly valuable through the use of [costly] infrastructure, products or pre-products that would be useless to the populace you were distributing it to, (such as uranium, chemical extracts from rainforest plants, etc.) etc.

Plus, what exactly is the advantage of this over the common external-investment-in-infrastructure-that-will-make-them-money-in-exchange-for-a-share-of-the-subequent-profits that works beautifully and rationally, is a positive-sum interaction, and proceeds on the simple logic of a non-instantaneous financial transaction?

I can concur with the idea of being suited to an earlier era...it would've been fun to participate in the 1848 uprisings.

What happened in 1848?

An examples might be:

"We need someone to do job X, is anyone willing to do job X"
"I am. I am qualified to do so, too, look."
"Ah, person Y seems to be qualified to do so, does anyone want to discuss person Y doing job X"
-A discussion of person Y's qualifications ensues, with the end result, in this case, being person Y doing job X. Variations on this might be educating Person Y to have the ability to do job X.

Since unemployment does not exist, one wonders where Y comes from. He must be either unnecessary to his current unemployer, who wishes to get rid of him, or living on some sort of government handout while the Big G advertises him to companies looking for a worker. With that out of the way, a more realistic situation would look like this:

Company A: Worker O who performs Job X is no longer acceptable. We need someone to perform Job X, and to get rid of Worker O. It's really too bad we can't just fire him, and instead have to sit here watching him cost us money because we have to wait for this dumb dialogue before we can replace him.
Company B: We have a Worker P who we no longer really need, and he is suitable for Job X.
Everyone: [no one needs Worker O]
Government: We'll take Worker O off your hands to sit around a government center doing work for the government to pay for the handout we're giving him to support him while we search for a new place of employment. Unfortunately, the basic labor he'll do as an unemployed civil-service-temp won't be worth his living costs, and the shortfall will be made up by the taxpaying employers who don't want or need him.
Worker P: [finds memo on desk one morning telling him to finish up all tasks and take his stuff out, because he'll be reporting to Cubicle Y and Job X in Company A's HQ tomorrow instead]
Worker O:
Government: Loses money.
Company A: Loses money.
Worker O: Loses autonomy.
Worker P: Has his lack of true autonomy displayed to him.
Company B: No change.

The deficits of this realistic situation are obvious, and have an interesting correlation to the paradigm under the USSR. But wait, you say, we wouldn't do any of this without the worker's consent. Think of it this way, though - if people can refuse, the system won't work for some cases and unemployment will exist, or companies will be forced to keep a useless worker paid for no benefit. In any case, either the system fails or someone has their rights violated.

Which systems are there where the workers own the means of production?

It was attempted in the USSR, and it failed spectacularly in a characteristic pattern replicated in every other such attempt, which is absolutely relevant to the value, functionality, nature, and future/consequences of any collectivist system.

We've already established that there will be unemployment, that would be why they can't.

[I]Transient unemployment. In such instances, they can still find a new job.

How are people supposed to live while they're getting the online-training?

Such is what little beauty there is in WalMart and McDonalds. If it was me, personally, I'd be all over the Geek Squad at Best Buy.

Private charities are insufficient, this is why the government got into it in the first place.

There's never been the confluence of necessity, opportunity, and resources to make a highly successful large-scale private charity possible, until recent decades, by which point Welfare dependence and government-centric complacency had already set it.

I hardly consider building a mine and a road connecting the mine to the port to be a substantial investment in infrastructure.

Dig the mine, insert structural support and transportation infrastructure in and out of the mine, build adjunct facilities, build one or more modern roads, build a modern port and all of the associated facilities, build refineries or processing plants. Not cheap, and not going to happen without outside investment.

Not at all, a fitting symmetry would be for everyone to have equal capacity to do things for the economy, including bad things to it.

But unfortunately for your vision, reality doesn't work that way. People have differing capacities for production, innovation, and administration; contrary to what the guidance counselor type would have you believe, some people are in fact better than others. You can't avoid differing abilities to contribute to the economy; you can only coercively restrict their rights to enforce false equality. Outside of that, it's a form of payment or trust - risk goes hand in hand with benefit. A computer repairman can do a lot of good for your system, but you risk that he could fuck it up worse, too, or that he could be an identity thief looking to steal private info off of your hard drive.

They can only be replaced with other people, in which case you would have the same situation over again. The gifted people can't (yet) replace the masses with nonhumans, therefore, the gifted people benefit from the masses.

The masses are replaced by nonhumans all the time: it's called automation. That's the practical case. The theoretical case, which displays the underlying inequality, is that the masses could, hypothetically, be totally replaced by automation. The gifted could not - a computer or robot that could be creative, have spontaneous ideas, flexibly solve complex problems in varied circumstance by itself, handle human issues, etc. must per definition be intelligent in its own right, and is thus just another gifted person.

Not at all, you would end up with fewer but better risks.

What the majority of an average group thinks is the best risk is not a better risk - it's an average risk. And since you're replacing a group of above-average capability with the average of the masses, you're actually decreasing quality of risk and thus the benefit-loss ratio.

The economic transactions involving owning things you don't use, because your ownership prevents other people from using them, too.

The fallacious assumption being that those other people have a right to their use.

Really? Everything that people want is useful? No. The companies convince people that what they want is useful, but really it isn't.

So your assumption here is that consumers are as a group stupid and credulous, and that companies are manipulating them into buying things they don't really want through evil advertising full of subliminal mind-control? :rolleyes: Please. It's called persuasion. I argue that my product is useful, and am required to use only factual information by a little thing called the prohibition against fraud. People evaluate my argument and choose to buy or not buy my product. They don't buy things if they don't, at that moment at least, want them for some reason. It's as simple as that.

If the command economy determines what is necessary, then by definition the only co-ops that will exist will be the ones making necessary products.

Can I get a hoo-rah! for more fallacious assumptions? Reality check: a bureaucrat deciding that something is necessary or unnecessary or is best produced in such-and-such number does not make it so. Applying simplistic rules and heuristic judgments based on limited viewpoints does not result in a system that actually allocates resources where they are needed.

If someone can't cut it, they can always be retrained to do job that's more suitable for them.

Paid for by other people, of course. As is their cost-of-living while not employed. My question: where's the money coming from, and why can't that person do it themselves instead of relying on Nanny Government?

Not abolish it, just blur the lines some.

Why? Specialization of labor has direct correlation to efficiency, productivity, and standard of living. Theoretical economics and empirical history both show this with total consistency. There's no rational basis for blurring the lines - it only leads to retrogression.

A single individual doesn't deserve that much money.

Says who? You? Why should your arbitrary judgements of deservingness be the standard by which others rise or fall, or allocate their resources and property? The money a Board of Directors allocates to the salary of a CEO is not yours, a random worker's, a union's, or Karl Marx's.

A person is exactly as deserving as the value he can produce. If what he does is worth enough or he is clever enough or whatever that people are willing to pay so much of their value for his products or services that he becomes megarich, he deserves it. Value is in the eye of the beholder, and the communicative consensus reality of all beholders, the market, derives deservingness from the interaction of one actor's capability and another's demand.

Resources in space are not unlimited, they are finite, there's just a really really huge amount of them.

Here we tread into the bounds of theoretical physics, which would really be off-topic. But I'm sure we can agree that regardless of the actual infinity or lack thereof of resources in the universe, multiverse, polyverse, whatever, they are effectively infinite for the purposes of any meaningful discussion of the present day, and many millions of teragoogols of days to come.

We're already there, as you said, all of the resources have been claimed.

If you speak of the resources of space, how so? No actual resources have been claimed - they're sitting there, unused and unowned.

Certainly not, but the ability to implement decisions goes hand in hand with making the decision; you would agree with this if I suggested banning cars; the ability to buy a car is just as important as the decision to do so.

It's more like having a car is a prerequisite of implementing the capacity to drive one - but this does not mean I should be given a car whether I can pay for it or not.

See, the difference is that myself and the owner of the car I'm buying have the right to do with our value what we want, which includes exchanging it in the form of a sale transaction. Neither of us, on the other hand, have the right to take the other's value without consent or compensation.

So then the situation can be worsened by the resources of space being concentrated in the hands of fewer people. Oh joy.

Precisely the opposite - you're talking about the current nature of space exploration and pseudoownership. A few governments control space and restrict access to and use of it to their particular national interests. The extension of the free market into space allows the entrepreneurs, workers, tourists, engineers, property buyers, etc. of any and every stripe and location to make money and stake claim in the new frontier.

Exploitation is a very real issue.

Slavery, physical punishment, active prevention of unionization, mafia-esque tactics against truant workers or non-worker local citizens and their families are all exploitation. Giving jobs and infrastructure and technology - even without world-class safety or US-standard pay - to people who in previous circumstances lived in hovels and hunted dangerous animals to find food is not exploitation. They have no obligation to work a normal job - there is nothing forcing them to change their lifestyle. If they want to subsistence farmer or hunter-gatherers, so be it. But if they want a job, there is nothing exploitative about giving those jobs to them, even with poor safety or low wages, because they can always leave with no net loss.

Ah, I see.

Is that an actual "Ah, I see", or a semisarcastic "you're being totally opaque" "Ah, I see"?

Of course - have people extract the resources, distribute most of the resources amongst the population and sell the rest, and use that money to build factories to convert the resources into other things, and then repeat the process, distributing them amongst the populace and selling the rest.

This still ignores the costs of initial infrastructure, the possibility of worthless goods that can be turned into something highly valuable through the use of [costly] infrastructure, products or pre-products that would be useless to the populace you were distributing it to, (such as uranium, chemical extracts from rainforest plants, etc.) etc.

Plus, what exactly is the advantage of this over the common external-investment-in-infrastructure-that-will-make-them-money-in-exchange-for-a-share-of-the-subequent-profits that works beautifully and rationally, is a positive-sum interaction, and proceeds on the simple logic of a non-instantaneous financial transaction?

I can concur with the idea of being suited to an earlier era...it would've been fun to participate in the 1848 uprisings.

What happened in 1848?

An examples might be:

"We need someone to do job X, is anyone willing to do job X"
"I am. I am qualified to do so, too, look."
"Ah, person Y seems to be qualified to do so, does anyone want to discuss person Y doing job X"
-A discussion of person Y's qualifications ensues, with the end result, in this case, being person Y doing job X. Variations on this might be educating Person Y to have the ability to do job X.

Since unemployment does not exist, one wonders where Y comes from. He must be either unnecessary to his current unemployer, who wishes to get rid of him, or living on some sort of government handout while the Big G advertises him to companies looking for a worker. With that out of the way, a more realistic situation would look like this:

Company A: Worker O who performs Job X is no longer acceptable. We need someone to perform Job X, and to get rid of Worker O. It's really too bad we can't just fire him, and instead have to sit here watching him cost us money because we have to wait for this dumb dialogue before we can replace him.
Company B: We have a Worker P who we no longer really need, and he is suitable for Job X.
Everyone: [no one needs Worker O]
Government: We'll take Worker O off your hands to sit around a government center doing work for the government to pay for the handout we're giving him to support him while we search for a new place of employment. Unfortunately, the basic labor he'll do as an unemployed civil-service-temp won't be worth his living costs, and the shortfall will be made up by the taxpaying employers who don't want or need him.
Worker P: [finds memo on desk one morning telling him to finish up all tasks and take his stuff out, because he'll be reporting to Cubicle Y and Job X in Company A's HQ tomorrow instead]
Worker O:
Government: Loses money.
Company A: Loses money.
Worker O: Loses autonomy.
Worker P: Has his lack of true autonomy displayed to him.
Company B: No change.

The deficits of this realistic situation are obvious, and have an interesting correlation to the paradigm under the USSR. But wait, you say, we wouldn't do any of this without the worker's consent. Think of it this way, though - if people can refuse, the system won't work for some cases and unemployment will exist, or companies will be forced to keep a useless worker paid for no benefit. In any case, either the system fails or someone has their rights violated.

Which systems are there where the workers own the means of production?

It was attempted in the USSR, and it failed spectacularly in a characteristic pattern replicated in every other such attempt, which is absolutely relevant to the value, functionality, nature, and future/consequences of any collectivist system.

We've already established that there will be unemployment, that would be why they can't.

[I]Transient unemployment. In such instances, they can still find a new job.

How are people supposed to live while they're getting the online-training?

Such is what little beauty there is in WalMart and McDonalds. If it was me, personally, I'd be all over the Geek Squad at Best Buy.

Private charities are insufficient, this is why the government got into it in the first place.

There's never been the confluence of necessity, opportunity, and resources to make a highly successful large-scale private charity possible, until recent decades, by which point Welfare dependence and government-centric complacency had already set it.

I hardly consider building a mine and a road connecting the mine to the port to be a substantial investment in infrastructure.

Dig the mine, insert structural support and transportation infrastructure in and out of the mine, build adjunct facilities, build one or more modern roads, build a modern port and all of the associated facilities, build refineries or processing plants. Not cheap, and not going to happen without outside investment.

Not at all, a fitting symmetry would be for everyone to have equal capacity to do things for the economy, including bad things to it.

But unfortunately for your vision, reality doesn't work that way. People have differing capacities for production, innovation, and administration; contrary to what the guidance counselor type would have you believe, some people are in fact better than others. You can't avoid differing abilities to contribute to the economy; you can only coercively restrict their rights to enforce false equality. Outside of that, it's a form of payment or trust - risk goes hand in hand with benefit. A computer repairman can do a lot of good for your system, but you risk that he could fuck it up worse, too, or that he could be an identity thief looking to steal private info off of your hard drive.

They can only be replaced with other people, in which case you would have the same situation over again. The gifted people can't (yet) replace the masses with nonhumans, therefore, the gifted people benefit from the masses.

The masses are replaced by nonhumans all the time: it's called automation. That's the practical case. The theoretical case, which displays the underlying inequality, is that the masses could, hypothetically, be totally replaced by automation. The gifted could not - a computer or robot that could be creative, have spontaneous ideas, flexibly solve complex problems in varied circumstance by itself, handle human issues, etc. must per definition be intelligent in its own right, and is thus just another gifted person.

Not at all, you would end up with fewer but better risks.

What the majority of an average group thinks is the best risk is not a better risk - it's an average risk. And since you're replacing a group of above-average capability with the average of the masses, you're actually decreasing quality of risk and thus the benefit-loss ratio.

The economic transactions involving owning things you don't use, because your ownership prevents other people from using them, too.

The fallacious assumption being that those other people have a right to their use.

Really? Everything that people want is useful? No. The companies convince people that what they want is useful, but really it isn't.

So your assumption here is that consumers are as a group stupid and credulous, and that companies are manipulating them into buying things they don't really want through evil advertising full of subliminal mind-control? :rolleyes: Please. It's called persuasion. I argue that my product is useful, and am required to use only factual information by a little thing called the prohibition against fraud. People evaluate my argument and choose to buy or not buy my product. They don't buy things if they don't, at that moment at least, want them for some reason. It's as simple as that.

If the command economy determines what is necessary, then by definition the only co-ops that will exist will be the ones making necessary products.

Can I get a hoo-rah! for more fallacious assumptions? Reality check: a bureaucrat deciding that something is necessary or unnecessary or is best produced in such-and-such number does not make it so. Applying simplistic rules and heuristic judgments based on limited viewpoints does not result in a system that actually allocates resources where they are needed.

If someone can't cut it, they can always be retrained to do job that's more suitable for them.

Paid for by other people, of course. As is their cost-of-living while not employed. My question: where's the money coming from, and why can't that person do it themselves instead of relying on Nanny Government?

Not abolish it, just blur the lines some.

Why? Specialization of labor has direct correlation to efficiency, productivity, and standard of living. Theoretical economics and empirical history both show this with total consistency. There's no rational basis for blurring the lines - it only leads to retrogression.

A single individual doesn't deserve that much money.

Says who? You? Why should your arbitrary judgements of deservingness be the standard by which others rise or fall, or allocate their resources and property? The money a Board of Directors allocates to the salary of a CEO is not yours, a random worker's, a union's, or Karl Marx's.

A person is exactly as deserving as the value he can produce. If what he does is worth enough or he is clever enough or whatever that people are willing to pay so much of their value for his products or services that he becomes megarich, he deserves it. Value is in the eye of the beholder, and the communicative consensus reality of all beholders, the market, derives deservingness from the interaction of one actor's capability and another's demand.

Resources in space are not unlimited, they are finite, there's just a really really huge amount of them.

Here we tread into the bounds of theoretical physics, which would really be off-topic. But I'm sure we can agree that regardless of the actual infinity or lack thereof of resources in the universe, multiverse, polyverse, whatever, they are effectively infinite for the purposes of any meaningful discussion of the present day, and many millions of teragoogols of days to come.

We're already there, as you said, all of the resources have been claimed.

If you speak of the resources of space, how so? No actual resources have been claimed - they're sitting there, unused and unowned.

It's more like having a car is a prerequisite of implementing the capacity to drive one - but this does not mean I should be given a car whether I can pay for it or not.Certainly not - not in a society where people don't have equal rights, anyway. A person with a car has more rights than a person without one. It's up to you to argue whether or not different people deserve different standards of rights. As you said, a person with a car has the right to implement the capacity to drive one, a person without a car does not have that right.

See, the difference is that myself and the owner of the car I'm buying have the right to do with our value what we want, which includes exchanging it in the form of a sale transaction. Neither of us, on the other hand, have the right to take the other's value without consent or compensation.Owner? Who said anything about an owner. I'm arguing against ownership.

Precisely the opposite - you're talking about the current nature of space exploration and pseudoownership. A few governments control space and restrict access to and use of it to their particular national interests. The extension of the free market into space allows the entrepreneurs, workers, tourists, engineers, property buyers, etc. of any and every stripe and location to make money and stake claim in the new frontier.And who, exactly, is going to be able to afford spaceflight? It's not going to be made available to the rabble for a long time after the resources have been claimed.

Slavery, physical punishment, active prevention of unionization, mafia-esque tactics against truant workers or non-worker local citizens and their families are all exploitation. Giving jobs and infrastructure and technology - even without world-class safety or US-standard pay - to people who in previous circumstances lived in hovels and hunted dangerous animals to find food is not exploitation. They have no obligation to work a normal job - there is nothing forcing them to change their lifestyle. If they want to subsistence farmer or hunter-gatherers, so be it. But if they want a job, there is nothing exploitative about giving those jobs to them, even with poor safety or low wages, because they can always leave with no net loss.Claiming the land (or buying it) and kicking the people off of it and telling them to work it is exploitative.

Is that an actual "Ah, I see", or a semisarcastic "you're being totally opaque" "Ah, I see"?It was an actual 'ah, I see'.

This still ignores the costs of initial infrastructure, the possibility of worthless goods that can be turned into something highly valuable through the use of [costly] infrastructure, products or pre-products that would be useless to the populace you were distributing it to, (such as uranium, chemical extracts from rainforest plants, etc.) etc.If the products are useless to the populace, then they can be sold and the money returned to the populace, as opposed to taken away by some outside nation and the money going to someone in that outside nation.

Plus, what exactly is the advantage of this over the common external-investment-in-infrastructure-that-will-make-them-money-in-exchange-for-a-share-of-the-subequent-profits that works beautifully and rationally, is a positive-sum interaction, and proceeds on the simple logic of a non-instantaneous financial transaction?That the majority of the wealth stays in the country where the resources are extracted from.

What happened in 1848?There were various communist uprisings in Europe then. I don't support violence, I support democracy, but those places weren't democratic then...

Since unemployment does not exist, one wonders where Y comes from. He must be either unnecessary to his current unemployer, who wishes to get rid of him, or living on some sort of government handout while the Big G advertises him to companies looking for a worker. Or the job he had could have been temporary, or it could be a new person entering the workforce, or it could be a job considered to be more important than the one being done currently.

With that out of the way, a more realistic situation would look like this:

Company A: Worker O who performs Job X is no longer acceptable. We need someone to perform Job X, and to get rid of Worker O. It's really too bad we can't just fire him, and instead have to sit here watching him cost us money because we have to wait for this dumb dialogue before we can replace him.
Company B: We have a Worker P who we no longer really need, and he is suitable for Job X.
Everyone: [no one needs Worker O]
Government: We'll take Worker O off your hands to sit around a government center doing work for the government to pay for the handout we're giving him to support him while we search for a new place of employment. Unfortunately, the basic labor he'll do as an unemployed civil-service-temp won't be worth his living costs, and the shortfall will be made up by the taxpaying employers who don't want or need him.
Worker P: [finds memo on desk one morning telling him to finish up all tasks and take his stuff out, because he'll be reporting to Cubicle Y and Job X in Company A's HQ tomorrow instead]
Worker O:
Government: Loses money.
Company A: Loses money.
Worker O: Loses autonomy.
Worker P: Has his lack of true autonomy displayed to him.
Company B: No change.

The deficits of this realistic situation are obvious, and have an interesting correlation to the paradigm under the USSR. But wait, you say, we wouldn't do any of this without the worker's consent. Think of it this way, though - if people can refuse, the system won't work for some cases and unemployment will exist, or companies will be forced to keep a useless worker paid for no benefit. In any case, either the system fails or someone has their rights violated. While it is conceivable that there will be some division between companies and the rest of society, I am arguing for there to be no division.
While it is true that the situation that you've described might be more likely, it is unacceptable and I don't support it. It is eerily similar to certain instances in capitalism, though.

It was attempted in the USSR, and it failed spectacularly in a characteristic pattern replicated in every other such attempt, which is absolutely relevant to the value, functionality, nature, and future/consequences of any collectivist system. Attempted? You mean the workers were able to decide how much to produce, and when, and at what rate?

[I]Transient unemployment. In such instances, they can still find a new job. How can you be so sure that in your perfect capitalist world, unemployment would only be transient?

Such is what little beauty there is in WalMart and McDonalds. If it was me, personally, I'd be all over the Geek Squad at Best Buy.The wages that WalMart and McDonald's pay aren't enough to live off of; I'm not sure what Best Buy pays the Geek Squad.

There's never been the confluence of necessity, opportunity, and resources to make a highly successful large-scale private charity possible, until recent decades, by which point Welfare dependence and government-centric complacency had already set it.You don't think conditions in Victorian England made private charity necessary? There were certainly people with the opportunity there. I'm not certain whether or not they had the resources, that part is debatable. Nonetheless, I don't see why there would be sufficient resources now.

Dig the mine, insert structural support and transportation infrastructure in and out of the mine, build adjunct facilities, build one or more modern roads, build a modern port and all of the associated facilities, build refineries or processing plants. Not cheap, and not going to happen without outside investment.They wouldn't necessarily need new refineries and processing plants; though if they wish to avoid paying a pollution tax in their host country they might want to do so.
Other than possible housing and cooking for the workers, what other adjunct facilities would they want?
Anyway, this could happen without outside investment; there's always aid, or tariffs.

But unfortunately for your vision, reality doesn't work that way. People have differing capacities for production, innovation, and administration; contrary to what the guidance counselor type would have you believe, some people are in fact better than others. How much of this is inherent, and how much of this is a result of education and upbringing?

You can't avoid differing abilities to contribute to the economy; you can only coercively restrict their rights to enforce false equality. Which rights am I restricting?

Outside of that, it's a form of payment or trust - risk goes hand in hand with benefit. A computer repairman can do a lot of good for your system, but you risk that he could fuck it up worse, too, or that he could be an identity thief looking to steal private info off of your hard drive.Certainly, I don't see how this contradicts what I'm saying.

The masses are replaced by nonhumans all the time: it's called automation. That's the practical case. The theoretical case, which displays the underlying inequality, is that the masses could, hypothetically, be totally replaced by automation. The gifted could not - a computer or robot that could be creative, have spontaneous ideas, flexibly solve complex problems in varied circumstance by itself, handle human issues, etc. must per definition be intelligent in its own right, and is thus just another gifted person.If you can create a computer or robot to be gifted, then in fact the gifted can be replaced.
On the other hand, it isn't possible to completely replace the masses; if someone wishes to reproduce, they need another person there.

What the majority of an average group thinks is the best risk is not a better risk - it's an average risk. And since you're replacing a group of above-average capability with the average of the masses, you're actually decreasing quality of risk and thus the benefit-loss ratio.I would say that decreasing losses is fine, even if it means that benefits must be decreased.

The fallacious assumption being that those other people have a right to their use.They do have a right to their use, whether or not the law recognizes it. You really can't expect the powers that be to be consistent when they make policy, though.

So your assumption here is that consumers are as a group stupid and credulous, and that companies are manipulating them into buying things they don't really want through evil advertising full of subliminal mind-control? :rolleyes: Please. It's called persuasion. I argue that my product is useful, and am required to use only factual information by a little thing called the prohibition against fraud. People evaluate my argument and choose to buy or not buy my product. They don't buy things if they don't, at that moment at least, want them for some reason. It's as simple as that.Really? So in the beer commercials where the guy buys the right brand of beer and gets the girl, a person who buys that brand of beer and doesn't get the girl can sue for fraud?
Nonetheless, in either case, the product isn't useful, while it might be nice, it isn't useful.

Can I get a hoo-rah! for more fallacious assumptions? Reality check: a bureaucrat deciding that something is necessary or unnecessary or is best produced in such-and-such number does not make it so. Do you mean like the fallacious assumption that there would be a bureaucrat in the first place?

Applying simplistic rules and heuristic judgments based on limited viewpoints does not result in a system that actually allocates resources where they are needed. Neither does capitalism.

Paid for by other people, of course. As is their cost-of-living while not employed. My question: where's the money coming from, and why can't that person do it themselves instead of relying on Nanny Government?Because, as I've explained, in capitalism all of the land has been claimed. A person isn't capable of subsistence farming for themselves unless they 'buy' or 'rent' the land from another person.

Why? Specialization of labor has direct correlation to efficiency, productivity, and standard of living. Theoretical economics and empirical history both show this with total consistency. There's no rational basis for blurring the lines - it only leads to retrogression. Maximizing efficiency and productivity aren't inherently good things.
As far as standard of living goes, I have to disagree; fortunately such a measure is subjective.

Says who? You? Why should your arbitrary judgements of deservingness be the standard by which others rise or fall, or allocate their resources and property? Why should yours?

The money a Board of Directors allocates to the salary of a CEO is not yours, a random worker's, a union's, or Karl Marx's. No, but the system that the money exists in isn't acceptable, either; it really doesn't matter whose money it is.

A person is exactly as deserving as the value he can produce. So then you believe in the Labor Theory of Value?

If what he does is worth enough or he is clever enough or whatever that people are willing to pay so much of their value for his products or services that he becomes megarich, he deserves it. Which is fine; he also deserves to be taxed.

Value is in the eye of the beholder, and the communicative consensus reality of all beholders, the market, derives deservingness from the interaction of one actor's capability and another's demand. The market doesn't involve all beholders, it only involves beholders with resources enough to participate in it. Additionally, some beholders have the ability to weight the market with their opinions by having more resources.
No, a system which is actually democratic involves all beholders. If I am outvoted when I say that someone doesn't deserve so much compensation, then this is fine. However, I don't accept that if 10,000 people say it shouldn't be, and one says should be, that that one should have their way.

Here we tread into the bounds of theoretical physics, which would really be off-topic. But I'm sure we can agree that regardless of the actual infinity or lack thereof of resources in the universe, multiverse, polyverse, whatever, they are effectively infinite for the purposes of any meaningful discussion of the present day, and many millions of teragoogols of days to come. I am fine with saying that we probably won't run out of resources...and yes, this is off topic, so I won't say more.

If you speak of the resources of space, how so? No actual resources have been claimed - they're sitting there, unused and unowned.No, in this specific instance I'm speaking of the resources of Earth; we've already gotten to where they've been claimed. We aren't yet at the point where the resources of space can be claimed.

Necromancy of the first order...wow, I thought this thread was dead.

Necromancy of the first order...wow, I thought this thread was dead.Heh. He didn't get a change to respond to me until...well, whenever he did.

Heh. He didn't get a change to respond to me until...well, whenever he did.
Indeedlyweedly :D

These are gigantic posts, it's like being in the redwood forest, or perhaps the Zion National Park in Utah, when you go way up the canyon...it's crazy man...crazy....

Certainly not - not in a society where people don't have equal rights, anyway. A person with a car has more rights than a person without one. It's up to you to argue whether or not different people deserve different standards of rights. As you said, a person with a car has the right to implement the capacity to drive one, a person without a car does not have that right.

No one has the right to implement a capacity; they do, on the other hand, have the right to pursue the implementation of a capacity insofar as they do not violate the rights of others in the process. Logically speaking, this is necessary because in conditions of scarcity, you can't fulfill the moral obligation someone else's right imposes on you (in real life, not stealing from them; in this thought experiment, giving them a car) without taking a car away from someone else and thus violating their right. Rights that are logically self-contradictory are not rights.

Your use of the word "right" is rather overbroad - there's a difference between rights, priveleges, capacities, actions, etc.

Owner? Who said anything about an owner. I'm arguing against ownership.

I thought that was a separate argument somewhere else along the trunk of these rhetorical redwoods, as Andaluciae termed them? Here we're arguing about whether a person has the right to properties that allow them to pursue a desired course of action, as opposed to a right to pursue the acquisition of such properties. That's what I thought we were arguing about, at least.

And who, exactly, is going to be able to afford spaceflight? It's not going to be made available to the rabble for a long time after the resources have been claimed.

What are the rabble going to do in space in the short to medium term anyway? The middle and upper classes will begin to move into space, one way or another. As tourists, as entrepreneurs, as employees, as residents, as engineers. The lower class will receive the economic benefits on Earth, (besides the obvious benefits of growth, nanofabrication for example may prove easier in space, leading to dramatic reductions in the cost of simple physical goods such as clothing, basic food, and basic shelter) and as the cost comes down and stuff like the service industry becomes necessary up there, some of them will move to.

But one thing has to be clear - there is little place for any real lower class in space or in the future at all. Manufacturing of almost all to all commodities is on the way to total automation, especially through nanofabrication. Unskilled agricultural labor has no use in space. Eventually, physical labor and any kind of unskilledness will be almost totally worthless. The future is a knowledge economy. If things are done right, education will continue to improve, massively aided by the rise of information technology, and nanofabrication will make the basic needs of survival a non-issue, allowing the former lower class to become something suited to the new economy and future world, but make no mistake: the writing is on the wall for the traditional pursuits of the lower class, and that means that in the short to medium term, what currently constitutes this class will not directly enter space and without radical turnaround in education will not succeed in the economy of the future.

Claiming the land (or buying it) and kicking the people off of it and telling them to work it is exploitative.

Of course. If people own the land, taking it from them is no less stealing than if it occurred in the United States. I see that mainly as a problem of the government, the "collective authority", though - they own most of the land, hypothetically in trust for the people of the country (sound like any oft-debated system?) and they sell it to foreign corporations, not recognizing the OWNERSHIP or PROPERTY RIGHTS of the citizens already making USE of the land.

If the products are useless to the populace, then they can be sold and the money returned to the populace, as opposed to taken away by some outside nation and the money going to someone in that outside nation.

That the majority of the wealth stays in the country where the resources are extracted from.

Why? This isn't even a collectivism-capitalism issue; this is just globalism. Why should there be artificial economic barriers preventing the free flow of value throughout the world? What purpose is there in insular tribalism and a world made up of chunky, poorly-interfaced 'puzzle pieces' that don't freely and normally interact?

I'm going to take a guess and say that you're suppoting this in the name of collective bargaining and economic action, the good of society as a whole, the importance of society, the collective, the group, etc. over the individual.

There were various communist uprisings in Europe then. I don't support violence, I support democracy, but those places weren't democratic then...

I think the French Revolution would have been interesting, if I could vacate as soon as it was over. The mass persecution, state killings, pseudofascist bureaucracies and committees and such making twisted decisions for the populace (hmm, all of this souds very similar to a later large nation created through revolution...) kind of turn me off. But the democratic revolution itself would have been fun.

Or the job he had could have been temporary, or it could be a new person entering the workforce, or it could be a job considered to be more important than the one being done currently.

In the first case, it's no different: all jobs are at base temporary. It falls into the same situation. In the second case, the process in your hypothetical system in which a new worker would enter the marketplace would be effectively identical to that of normal capitalism and in any case has nothing to do with unemployment, that person not ever having been an economic actor to be counted before anyway. In the third case, that's at least as fascist. Who considers it more important? The state central planning bureau? The government-society-megacorporation hybrid(s) that runs the economy?

While it is conceivable that there will be some division between companies and the rest of society, I am arguing for there to be no division.

Well, fundamentally, there is none. No organization has any separate existence in its own right - all such, from a neighborhood club up to society itself are a collection of individuals. Now, some of these make contract with each other to undertake cooperative actions and share the value produced - a.k.a. corporations, but they're not separate from the people in any meaningful way. Everyone (theoretically) is both a producer and a consumer; they have a job and they spend their wages/salary. They are "the people" and "the company"; there is no real separation between the two.

The only exception are those who spend money given to them by the government, the "collective", on their needs but have no actual job, thus being consumers but not producers, free riders who are the only individuals truly separate from the rest of the people. Very ironic.

While it is true that the situation that you've described might be more likely, it is unacceptable and I don't support it. It is eerily similar to certain instances in capitalism, though.

Such as? In capitalism, no one can be forced to take a particular job, or prevented from taking one, without his consent, which can't be said about centrally planned socialist systems. No one in capitalism is an economic ward of the state.

Attempted? You mean the workers were able to decide how much to produce, and when, and at what rate?

In the original soviets and some of the early collective farming attempts, this was true. But it failed spectacularly, so they switched to the centrally planned socialist model, believing that through using it they would gain the experience and infrastructure necessary to switch to the final step of true communism. Unfortunately (for them) this failed only slightly less spectacularly than true communism, eventually culminating in the total collapse of the USSR in 1990, after nearly a century of the workers socialists claimed to venerate suffering or dying in Stalinist Five Year Plans or being shipped off to Siberian gulags for the thoughtcrime of daring to want to start their own enterprises, make a profit, choose their own economic path, or indeed even gain the knowledge necessary to consider these heretical concepts.

How can you be so sure that in your perfect capitalist world, unemployment would only be transient?

That's one of the major ideal goals of the system: full employment. A fast-growing but still sufficiently stable market not warped by state manipulations of the economic playing board, with good education, free trade between countries, and an environment not distorted by major population imbalances caused by things like the baby boom generation would fluctuate around a point reasonably close to minimum nontransient unemployment.

The wages that WalMart and McDonald's pay aren't enough to live off of; I'm not sure what Best Buy pays the Geek Squad.

So live cheaply and work two jobs. It's not easy, but such is life for the time being. Sorry. Try shopping at WalMart in addition to working there; you'll benefit from the enormous boon to the poor that anti-WM opponents generally fail to mention.

You don't think conditions in Victorian England made private charity necessary? There were certainly people with the opportunity there. I'm not certain whether or not they had the resources, that part is debatable. Nonetheless, I don't see why there would be sufficient resources now.

The difference in capital available between Victorian and England and 2006 America is unimaginably huge. Such is the nature of growth. The rise of information technology, easy travel, communication, and movement of goods and capital between distant locations, etc. make private charity logistically speaking much more possible and opportune. Rising productivity and efficiency makes the cost of basic material necessities like food and water less and less. Superior free education and innovations like cheap online GEDs and community colleges make job training and retraining easier and cheaper.

They wouldn't necessarily need new refineries and processing plants; though if they wish to avoid paying a pollution tax in their host country they might want to do so.

This is under the assumption that there are no such plants, new or old, in the country, making their construction necessary in any case.

Other than possible housing and cooking for the workers, what other adjunct facilities would they want?

Personnel facilities as you mentioned, power generation or inflow of some kind, facilities for administration, engineering, and possible transportation of the product, depending on what exactly it is.

Anyway, this could happen without outside investment; there's always aid, or tariffs.

Aid is good is implemented properly, especially in tandem with foreign investment, but tariffs are bad. Distortions of the market that prevent maximization of utility, discourage investment, and artificially increase world prices. Abolish tariffs, reform the IMF to make it actually work, and combine that with foreign investment to bring new players into the world economy.

How much of this is inherent, and how much of this is a result of education and upbringing?

A mix. People have native intelligence; working memory capacity, analytical reasoning capability, rapid learning, etc. are to some degree just biological traits you're born with. On the other hand, such capabilities can be stunted by poor upbringing, and a person can be significantly enhanced by proper raising and education. Encouraging neuron growth and stimulating the developing brain are important, as is avoidance of blocks, missed opportunities, and emotional problems.

On the other hand, many great artists, though their creative potential may be inborn, had their creative...base? capacity? stock? built up by negative or ambiguous experiences, not good ones. Rare is a great musician who draws his ideas from happy memories of a good education and a solid upbringing. The major exception to that is the classical composers of piano, strings, etc. - that was without doubt native, inborn intelligence. Mozart, Chopin, etc. were simply prodigies with especially powerful abilities - the same goes for people like Euler, Newton, (who also had a very poor childhood) and Fermat.

Which rights am I restricting?

You tell me: how would you cause all people to be effectively equal as economic actors, regardless of their actual capacities?

Certainly, I don't see how this contradicts what I'm saying.

To continue the metaphor, you nonetheless have computer repairmen. The benefits make the risks worthwhile. By your rationale, no computer repairmen would be allowed, and everyone would have to have only an average knowledge of computer, so that no one could write viruses or commit identity theft, regardless of whether this also prevented innovations or production in computing from occurring.

If you can create a computer or robot to be gifted, then in fact the gifted can be replaced.

Untrue, because creating a gifted computer requires that the computer be sentient, and thus a person, fundamentally no different than a human gifted. A conscious entity does not have to be human to have the same rights and responsibilities. Basically, you've just brought another gifted person into the world. On the other hand, creating a subsentient automated machine to do the work does not bring another of the masses into the world, because the machines are not people or conscious entities.

On the other hand, it isn't possible to completely replace the masses; if someone wishes to reproduce, they need another person there.

Whoa, totally different issue. This is economics, not biological reproduction. Of course you need other members of the same species; we're talking about members of particular economic subgroups.

I would say that decreasing losses is fine, even if it means that benefits must be decreased.

An inherently conservative and cowardly viewpoint; it's the kind that drives a species to extinction through insufficient presence to chaos, growth, risk, and change. Unless the risks massively outweigh the benefits, a benefit is worth a risk; they're the only way anything gets better. The status quo is never acceptable.

They do have a right to their use, whether or not the law recognizes it. You really can't expect the powers that be to be consistent when they make policy, though.

Why? What logical basis is there for an absolute right to their use? Everyone can't have a right to everything when there is more of everybody than there is of everything. That kind of reasoning leads to one of "nobody can have anything", which is why everything sucks in socialist nations. No one can have something everyone else doesn't also have, and without incentive the whole system never advances, so the point where everyone can have it is never reached.

Really? So in the beer commercials where the guy buys the right brand of beer and gets the girl, a person who buys that brand of beer and doesn't get the girl can sue for fraud?

Anyone who actually believes that beer, an edible liquid intoxicant obviously not made for the attraction of the opposite sex, actually makes you more attractive is a dumbass who deserves what he gets. The company never claimed that the beer gets you the girl.

Nonetheless, in either case, the product isn't useful, while it might be nice, it isn't useful.

Useful how, and to whom? It certainly has a use: getting drunk. This in some cases makes some people, quite a lot actually, more happy then they might be otherwise. Ergo, it is useful.

Do you mean like the fallacious assumption that there would be a bureaucrat in the first place?

If it's a centrally planned socialist system, someone is doing the planning, either a bureaucrat or their equivalent. Some human is trying to make decisions about a vast, ultracomplex adaptive system and its emergent qualities from an extremely limited and simplistic viewpoint.

Neither does capitalism.

....but it does. That is its purpose, its entire raison de etre, and it has succeeded admirably well in the last few centuries. Standard of living, technological level, growth, productivity, average income, etc. etc. have all increased. There is no logical self-contradiction or flaw in the underlying theory. It logically and demonstrably works. How could it not? Every consequence, every aspect flows logically from every other: it's a self-organizing,infinitely flexible adaptive system that solves the problem of resource allocation.

Because, as I've explained, in capitalism all of the land has been claimed. A person isn't capable of subsistence farming for themselves unless they 'buy' or 'rent' the land from another person.

So they can go to sub-Saharan Africa if they want so desperately to be a subsistence farmer. There's still unclaimed land there. Elsewhere, it only makes sense: if you want what is not yours, you have to trade for it. Then, if you so desire, you can resign as an economic actor and become a hunter-gatherer on the property the market inherited from upstream when people first mixed their value with it. Why you would want to, I can't imagine.

Maximizing efficiency and productivity aren't inherently good things.
As far as standard of living goes, I have to disagree; fortunately such a measure is subjective.

Are you seriously proposing that standard of living was better for Neolithic hunter-gatherers than for modern economic actors, or that subsistence farmers have it better than participants in the capitalist market? Let me be the first to break it to you: low-income America has it GREAT compared to sub-Saharan African dirt farmers who haven't gotten the specialization of labor memo yet.

Also from a theoretical or logical stanpoint, the direct correlation between specialization of labor and standard of living makes perfect sense. It allows for maximization of value, the development of more complex industries and disciplines, innovation, meaningful increase in productivity, economic growth, etc. etc. It lets everyone do what they're most suited to and needed for, and maximizes everyone's gain. It simply makes sense.

Why should yours?

Mine doesn't. I pass no judgements on the income of CEOs, unless I'm a shareholder of the company they work for. Otherwise it has nothing to do with me and is not mine to decide on.

No, but the system that the money exists in isn't acceptable, either; it really doesn't matter whose money it is.

Sticking to the subargument at hand, and avoiding turning this too into the whether-anyone-is-allowed-to-have-anything-of-their-own-at-all argument, it certainly matters whose money it is. The only people with a right to decide what to do with it are those that have a right to [I]it.

So then you believe in the Labor Theory of Value?

More like the value theory of value. An individual creates value through whatever: labor, thought, innovation, creation; which is subjectively defined by those who consume that value, or by himself if it's not something he's selling. The value of a product incorporates both supply-side considerations like labor and cost and consumer-side considerations like demand and desire.

Which is fine; he also deserves to be taxed.

Why does he "deserve" to be taxed? As punishment for being so productive/useful/smart, and highly desired or demanded?

The market doesn't involve all beholders, it only involves beholders with resources enough to participate in it. Additionally, some beholders have the ability to weight the market with their opinions by having more resources.
No, a system which is actually democratic involves all beholders. If I am outvoted when I say that someone doesn't deserve so much compensation, then this is fine. However, I don't accept that if 10,000 people say it shouldn't be, and one says should be, that that one should have their way.

It depends. If there are 10,001 shareholders each with an equal number of shares, that doesn't happen. But if the people who sold the company only sold a small proportion of the shares, then the 10,000 still only have a small stake in the company and only contribute a small amount to it, and thus have less power in it than those with an enormous stake in, and contribution to, the corporation. Voting doesn't have to be 1-1; weighting, while more complex and less simplistic and romantic, is equally useful. It just depends on the context.

No, in this specific instance I'm speaking of the resources of Earth; we've already gotten to where they've been claimed. We aren't yet at the point where the resources of space can be claimed.

Not all resources have been claimed: most of the resources of the future are informatic, and there's still a vast sphere of ideas, innovations, and discoveries left to lay claim to, far more than have currently been claimed. In material terms, plenty of material resources and energy sources still lie unclaimed under a desert or a mountain somewhere. If there weren't new resources still entering the market, there would be no growth, and that is evidently not the truth. No, we're quite a ways from no unclaimed resources period left on Earth and the end of terrestrial economic growth.

(Note: I have rearranged the 'tree' a little bit for ease of answering.)

No one has the right to implement a capacity; they do, on the other hand, have the right to pursue the implementation of a capacity insofar as they do not violate the rights of others in the process. Logically speaking, this is necessary because in conditions of scarcity, you can't fulfill the moral obligation someone else's right imposes on you (in real life, not stealing from them; in this thought experiment, giving them a car) without taking a car away from someone else and thus violating their right. Rights that are logically self-contradictory are not rights.

Your use of the word "right" is rather overbroad - there's a difference between rights, priveleges, capacities, actions, etc.

I thought that was a separate argument somewhere else along the trunk of these rhetorical redwoods, as Andaluciae termed them? Here we're arguing about whether a person has the right to properties that allow them to pursue a desired course of action, as opposed to a right to pursue the acquisition of such properties. That's what I thought we were arguing about, at least. I agree that there is a difference between rights, and capacities and actions, but you cannot have rights without having capacities and the ability to act.
As far as scarcity goes, that's even more of a reason against one person not having the exclusive right to anything - things are scarce. Only where things are abundant should one person have the exclusive right to something.
In other words, having properties to pursue a desired course of action is impossible without the right to pursue the acquisition of such properties. While you can have the latter without the former, you can't have the former without the latter.

What are the rabble going to do in space in the short to medium term anyway? Claim resources; everyone has an equal right to do so.

The middle and upper classes will begin to move into space, one way or another. As tourists, as entrepreneurs, as employees, as residents, as engineers. The lower class will receive the economic benefits on Earth, (besides the obvious benefits of growth, nanofabrication for example may prove easier in space, leading to dramatic reductions in the cost of simple physical goods such as clothing, basic food, and basic shelter) and as the cost comes down and stuff like the service industry becomes necessary up there, some of them will move to.Trickle-down economics is bogus.

But one thing has to be clear - there is little place for any real lower class in space or in the future at all. Manufacturing of almost all to all commodities is on the way to total automation, especially through nanofabrication. Unskilled agricultural labor has no use in space. Eventually, physical labor and any kind of unskilledness will be almost totally worthless. The future is a knowledge economy. If things are done right, education will continue to improve, massively aided by the rise of information technology, and nanofabrication will make the basic needs of survival a non-issue, allowing the former lower class to become something suited to the new economy and future world, but make no mistake: the writing is on the wall for the traditional pursuits of the lower class, and that means that in the short to medium term, what currently constitutes this class will not directly enter space and without radical turnaround in education will not succeed in the economy of the future. I have little faith that the free market alone or with only a little bit of help can facilitate the radical turnaround in education necessary.

Of course. If people own the land, taking it from them is no less stealing than if it occurred in the United States. I see that mainly as a problem of the government, the "collective authority", though - they own most of the land, hypothetically in trust for the people of the country (sound like any oft-debated system?) Representative democracy?

and they sell it to foreign corporations, not recognizing the OWNERSHIP or PROPERTY RIGHTS of the citizens already making USE of the land.

Why? This isn't even a collectivism-capitalism issue; this is just globalism. Why should there be artificial economic barriers preventing the free flow of value throughout the world? What purpose is there in insular tribalism and a world made up of chunky, poorly-interfaced 'puzzle pieces' that don't freely and normally interact?

I'm going to take a guess and say that you're suppoting this in the name of collective bargaining and economic action, the good of society as a whole, the importance of society, the collective, the group, etc. over the individual.Thanks to technology, we can move capital around incredibly quickly. Labor, on the other hand, cannot move as quickly as capital. Therefore, there will always be 'puzzle pieces'. While the borders of these puzzle pieces would shift as people move around, we can't eliminate them entirely. Therefore, capital should stay within those puzzle pieces as much as possible, at least until people are able to teleport.

I think the French Revolution would have been interesting, if I could vacate as soon as it was over. The mass persecution, state killings, pseudofascist bureaucracies and committees and such making twisted decisions for the populace (hmm, all of this souds very similar to a later large nation created through revolution...) kind of turn me off. But the democratic revolution itself would have been fun. I can agree, the initial part would have been fun, but they went overboard.

In the first case, it's no different: all jobs are at base temporary. It falls into the same situation. In the second case, the process in your hypothetical system in which a new worker would enter the marketplace would be effectively identical to that of normal capitalism and in any case has nothing to do with unemployment, that person not ever having been an economic actor to be counted before anyway. In the third case, that's at least as fascist. Who considers it more important? The state central planning bureau? The government-society-megacorporation hybrid(s) that runs the economy?

Such as? In capitalism, no one can be forced to take a particular job, or prevented from taking one, without his consent, which can't be said about centrally planned socialist systems. No one in capitalism is an economic ward of the state. The system I propose is no more fascist than the structure of any corporation; if one wing of the corporation doesn't feel someone is cutting it, and another wing of the corporation has someone who might be good, they can transfer the person without his consent. Of course, the person can quit his job, but he can also leave a centrally planned socialist system.
I fail to see how being an economic ward of the state as being somehow worse than being the economic ward of any business; I would argue that it's better.

Well, fundamentally, there is none. No organization has any separate existence in its own right - all such, from a neighborhood club up to society itself are a collection of individuals. Now, some of these make contract with each other to undertake cooperative actions and share the value produced - a.k.a. corporations, but they're not separate from the people in any meaningful way. Everyone (theoretically) is both a producer and a consumer; they have a job and they spend their wages/salary. They are "the people" and "the company"; there is no real separation between the two.

The only exception are those who spend money given to them by the government, the "collective", on their needs but have no actual job, thus being consumers but not producers, free riders who are the only individuals truly separate from the rest of the people. Very ironic. The people who have no jobs are also theoretically both producers and consumers, the rest of the people simply haven't found a job for those people.

Incidentally, you touched upon an important point that I will explain later - that everyone is both a producer and a consumer.

In the original soviets and some of the early collective farming attempts, this was true. But it failed spectacularly, so they switched to the centrally planned socialist model, believing that through using it they would gain the experience and infrastructure necessary to switch to the final step of true communism. Unfortunately (for them) this failed only slightly less spectacularly than true communism, eventually culminating in the total collapse of the USSR in 1990, after nearly a century of the workers socialists claimed to venerate suffering or dying in Stalinist Five Year Plans or being shipped off to Siberian gulags for the thoughtcrime of daring to want to start their own enterprises, make a profit, choose their own economic path, or indeed even gain the knowledge necessary to consider these heretical concepts. If indeed it was as you said it was, then there are one of two possibilities: either the farms and the other businesses were separate, and there is no reason why the farms should have been forced to care for the rest of the businesses, or they agreed to a cooperative relationship, in which case the farmers who failed to cut the job should have been fired, kicked out of the system, and given only enough land that they can use. Since this didn't occur, the workers didn't have actual control of the means of production.

That's one of the major ideal goals of the system: full employment. A fast-growing but still sufficiently stable market not warped by state manipulations of the economic playing board, with good education, free trade between countries, and an environment not distorted by major population imbalances caused by things like the baby boom generation would fluctuate around a point reasonably close to minimum nontransient unemployment. How can capitalism has full employment without labor organizing the owners out of business?

So live cheaply and work two jobs. It's not easy, but such is life for the time being. Sorry. Try shopping at WalMart in addition to working there; you'll benefit from the enormous boon to the poor that anti-WM opponents generally fail to mention. Not really; anti-WM opponents usually argue that nobody should be so poor as to have to shop there in the first place.

The difference in capital available between Victorian and England and 2006 America is unimaginably huge. Such is the nature of growth. The rise of information technology, easy travel, communication, and movement of goods and capital between distant locations, etc. make private charity logistically speaking much more possible and opportune. Rising productivity and efficiency makes the cost of basic material necessities like food and water less and less. Superior free education and innovations like cheap online GEDs and community colleges make job training and retraining easier and cheaper. The difference in population between Victorian England and 2006 America is also quite large.

This is under the assumption that there are no such plants, new or old, in the country, making their construction necessary in any case. I don't see why the materials couldn't be shipped to an existing plant in a different country to be refined.

Personnel facilities as you mentioned, power generation or inflow of some kind, facilities for administration, engineering, and possible transportation of the product, depending on what exactly it is. These facilities are only useful to the country as a whole if they are made freely available to the country as a whole.

Aid is good is implemented properly, especially in tandem with foreign investment, but tariffs are bad. Distortions of the market that prevent maximization of utility, discourage investment, and artificially increase world prices. Abolish tariffs, reform the IMF to make it actually work, and combine that with foreign investment to bring new players into the world economy. I support aid if done properly. I'm not sure how you can argue that tariffs are bad, especially when nearly every country that has industrialized has done so behind a wall of protection.

A mix. People have native intelligence; working memory capacity, analytical reasoning capability, rapid learning, etc. are to some degree just biological traits you're born with. On the other hand, such capabilities can be stunted by poor upbringing, and a person can be significantly enhanced by proper raising and education. Encouraging neuron growth and stimulating the developing brain are important, as is avoidance of blocks, missed opportunities, and emotional problems. Therefore, intelligence that is not inherent can be increased with the aid of society; I see no reason why people should receive more resources from society for their natural traits.

On the other hand, many great artists, though their creative potential may be inborn, had their creative...base? capacity? stock? built up by negative or ambiguous experiences, not good ones. Rare is a great musician who draws his ideas from happy memories of a good education and a solid upbringing. The major exception to that is the classical composers of piano, strings, etc. - that was without doubt native, inborn intelligence. Mozart, Chopin, etc. were simply prodigies with especially powerful abilities - the same goes for people like Euler, Newton, (who also had a very poor childhood) and Fermat. I'm not certain that the classical composers had native, inborn intelligence, it seems to me that being upper class would have granted them a decent education.

You tell me: how would you cause all people to be effectively equal as economic actors, regardless of their actual capacities?There is no inherent right to differences in economic class based upon a person's capacities, only if the people agree to it should this be the case. Since I am arguing that the people aren't agreeing to it, I have not violated anyone's rights by making them economically equal.

To continue the metaphor, you nonetheless have computer repairmen. The benefits make the risks worthwhile. By your rationale, no computer repairmen would be allowed, and everyone would have to have only an average knowledge of computer, so that no one could write viruses or commit identity theft, regardless of whether this also prevented innovations or production in computing from occurring. Not necessarily; some of those people who are interested in computers could be repairmen, the ones who aren't repairmen would presumably want to learn more about them; these people could replace the repairmen should the repairmen not do their jobs properly.
People will want to increase their learning, whether or not they are being compensated for doing so.

Untrue, because creating a gifted computer requires that the computer be sentient, and thus a person, fundamentally no different than a human gifted. A conscious entity does not have to be human to have the same rights and responsibilities. Basically, you've just brought another gifted person into the world. On the other hand, creating a subsentient automated machine to do the work does not bring another of the masses into the world, because the machines are not people or conscious entities.In which case, you can create a new gifted individual, and fire the old one, thus replacing them. (I'm not getting into whether or not non-humans should enjoy human rights based upon sentience.)

Whoa, totally different issue. This is economics, not biological reproduction. Of course you need other members of the same species; we're talking about members of particular economic subgroups.

Why does he "deserve" to be taxed? As punishment for being so productive/useful/smart, and highly desired or demanded?Perhaps I didn't make myself clear; when I referred to the masses, I wasn't simply talking about the poor. I was talking about everyone else. Society provides the ability to specialize in labor, and it provides other things, such as the potential to socialize. Presumably the people in society want the potential to socialize, and therefore they deserve to pay for it.
Of course, society can choose to not make people pay for it, but that would be society choosing to not exercise its right to tax the people who live in it, not an admission that there is no such right.

An inherently conservative and cowardly viewpoint; it's the kind that drives a species to extinction through insufficient presence to chaos, growth, risk, and change. Unless the risks massively outweigh the benefits, a benefit is worth a risk; they're the only way anything gets better. The status quo is never acceptable. The status quo is more acceptable than something worse than the status quo.
I imagine that when the populace is deciding whether or not to take a risk, they might be willing to risk a huge loss for a huge gain; at least the loss and the gain benefits everyone.

Why? What logical basis is there for an absolute right to their use? Everyone can't have a right to everything when there is more of everybody than there is of everything. That kind of reasoning leads to one of "nobody can have anything", which is why everything sucks in socialist nations. No one can have something everyone else doesn't also have, and without incentive the whole system never advances, so the point where everyone can have it is never reached.If someone was living in the woods, they would have the right to use anything they wished to; I see no reason why this shouldn't be the default position. Of course, this isn't the best position, and I think that certain non-uses should be protected, such as the farmer who hoards food for the winter, even though ze isn't using it at the moment, the food should be protected. With that said, this is still different than the concept of ownership.
If there isn't enough of everything for everybody, then what there isn't enough of can be shared; if there aren't enough cars, make them into taxis. If there aren't enough computers, ration computer time.

Anyone who actually believes that beer, an edible liquid intoxicant obviously not made for the attraction of the opposite sex, actually makes you more attractive is a dumbass who deserves what he gets. The company never claimed that the beer gets you the girl. So then we agree that it's possible to mislead somebody without defrauding them.

Useful how, and to whom? It certainly has a use: getting drunk. This in some cases makes some people, quite a lot actually, more happy then they might be otherwise. Ergo, it is useful. I disagree, however, I will try a different tack. What if the beer company made beer than nobody wanted and it went out of business? Was the company's expenditure of resources useful?

If it's a centrally planned socialist system, someone is doing the planning, either a bureaucrat or their equivalent. Some human is trying to make decisions about a vast, ultracomplex adaptive system and its emergent qualities from an extremely limited and simplistic viewpoint. I see no reason why it must be one person. If you and four friends are trying to decide where to have lunch, how do you decide?


....but it does. That is its purpose, its entire raison de etre, and it has succeeded admirably well in the last few centuries. Standard of living, technological level, growth, productivity, average income, etc. etc. have all increased. There is no logical self-contradiction or flaw in the underlying theory. It logically and demonstrably works. How could it not? Every consequence, every aspect flows logically from every other: it's a self-organizing,infinitely flexible adaptive system that solves the problem of resource allocation. Tell that to the homeless. The homeless need resources that capitalism isn't allocating to them.

So they can go to sub-Saharan Africa if they want so desperately to be a subsistence farmer. There's still unclaimed land there. Elsewhere, it only makes sense: if you want what is not yours, you have to trade for it.Then, if you so desire, you can resign as an economic actor and become a hunter-gatherer on the property the market inherited from upstream when people first mixed their value with it. Why you would want to, I can't imagine. I'm fairly certain that the nomadic tribes that live there have claimed the land and are using it; if I could find a way to farm that doesn't interfere with their claim, that might be something, but I'm not sure that I could do so.

Are you seriously proposing that standard of living was better for Neolithic hunter-gatherers than for modern economic actors, or that subsistence farmers have it better than participants in the capitalist market? Let me be the first to break it to you: low-income America has it GREAT compared to sub-Saharan African dirt farmers who haven't gotten the specialization of labor memo yet. No, I'm not saying that their standard of living is better than what we have now...though there is a good argument for just that in the "What Kind of Anarchist are You?" thread, if you can make it through the quote trees. :)

Also from a theoretical or logical stanpoint, the direct correlation between specialization of labor and standard of living makes perfect sense. It allows for maximization of value, the development of more complex industries and disciplines, innovation, meaningful increase in productivity, economic growth, etc. etc. It lets everyone do what they're most suited to and needed for, and maximizes everyone's gain. It simply makes sense. Not necessarily; I would say that the standard of living of the African hunter-gatherer is better than that of a Jew in Nazi Germany. Such is the beauty of relativity.

Mine doesn't. I pass no judgements on the income of CEOs, unless I'm a shareholder of the company they work for. Otherwise it has nothing to do with me and is not mine to decide on.

Sticking to the subargument at hand, and avoiding turning this too into the whether-anyone-is-allowed-to-have-anything-of-their-own-at-all argument, it certainly matters whose money it is. The only people with a right to decide what to do with it are those that have a right to [I]it.And since everyone has a potential right to it, everyone has the right to decide what happens to it.

More like the value theory of value. An individual creates value through whatever: labor, thought, innovation, creation; which is subjectively defined by those who consume that value, or by himself if it's not something he's selling. The value of a product incorporates both supply-side considerations like labor and cost and consumer-side considerations like demand and desire.

It depends. If there are 10,001 shareholders each with an equal number of shares, that doesn't happen. But if the people who sold the company only sold a small proportion of the shares, then the 10,000 still only have a small stake in the company and only contribute a small amount to it, and thus have less power in it than those with an enormous stake in, and contribution to, the corporation. Voting doesn't have to be 1-1; weighting, while more complex and less simplistic and romantic, is equally useful. It just depends on the context. There are a couple of problems with this. Firstly, the nature of weighted voting could easily be used to justify the Divine Right of Kings - the king's vote outweighs everyone else's.
Secondly, this type of valuation doesn't allow for negative values. The lowest that something can be valued at is 0 - don't buy it. However, there are certainly things which I would value at below 0, things that make us worse off by their existence. The market system of valuation doesn't incorporate the negative values, and therefore, isn't democratic.

Not all resources have been claimed: most of the resources of the future are informatic, and there's still a vast sphere of ideas, innovations, and discoveries left to lay claim to, far more than have currently been claimed. In material terms, plenty of material resources and energy sources still lie unclaimed under a desert or a mountain somewhere. If there weren't new resources still entering the market, there would be no growth, and that is evidently not the truth. No, we're quite a ways from no unclaimed resources period left on Earth and the end of terrestrial economic growth.The natural resources have all been claimed by either governments or people, and it's impossible to increase intellectual resources without consuming natural resources.

I agree that there is a difference between rights, and capacities and actions, but you cannot have rights without having capacities and the ability to act.

That doesn't make any sense. A right to something can also be defined as a moral obligation on the part of others not to coerce or impede you in that area. For example: I have a right to my property. This is codefined as a moral obligation on the part of all others not to steal. On the other hand, though I have a right to pursue whatever non-coercive actions I please, that does not mean that others have the moral obligation to provide me with the means to accomplish the actions I desire to undertake - merely that they not coerce me into not performing those actions if I can, or impede my in my ethical pursuit of those means.

Right are separate from capacities, in that a right just means that you can't be stopped from doing it if you want to and are capable of it, whereas a capacity is the actual ability to do something. It's the difference between volition and implementation, pursuit and actuality. It's a fairly important differentiation.

As far as scarcity goes, that's even more of a reason against one person not having the exclusive right to anything - things are scarce. Only where things are abundant should one person have the exclusive right to something.

On the contrary, conditions of scarcity are when allocation of resources is at its most important. If things are abundant, it doesn't matter who owns what - if a guy steals yours, you can just get another one. There's enough for everyone. Issues of allocation and particular ownership are mostly meaningless.

On the other hand, during conditions of scarcity, the most important quality of the system is efficient allocation of resources, which is best accomplished by a property-based free market.

In other words, having properties to pursue a desired course of action is impossible without the right to pursue the acquisition of such properties. While you can have the latter without the former, you can't have the former without the latter.

...right. That's my proposition. Are you agreeing with me?! :eek:

Claim resources; everyone has an equal right to do so.

True, but you've got to get there in the first place, and that costs someone's money. Which is where the price of transportation comes in.

Trickle-down economics is bogus.

That's not really trickle-down economics, at least not as traditionally phrased involving tax cuts and investment. It's just basic economics. Costs go down, prices go down, savings for everyone. New opportunities and innovations generate broad increases in standard of living and average income.

I have little faith that the free market alone or with only a little bit of help can facilitate the radical turnaround in education necessary.

I don't think government is willing or able to do what needs to be done. They don't have the money, the willingness to take risks and innovate, the impetus for change. They lack the flexibility and the focus. While I think we agree that education needs to be available to the entire rising generation at minimal cost, I think implementing solutions that involve heavy inclusion of the free market or free-market-style adaptations, such as vouchers, charter schools, private schools, etc. would be a good way to advance education. Because in the end, it's a cooperative mechanism to make the next generation a powerful group of economic actors. In a knowledge/information economy, an educated, high-skills workforce is a valuable commodity for countries, sectors, and corporations.

Representative democracy?

....socialism. Democracy doesn't (or at least doesn't necessarily) include all land being owned by the state in trust for the people.

Thanks to technology, we can move capital around incredibly quickly. Labor, on the other hand, cannot move as quickly as capital. Therefore, there will always be 'puzzle pieces'. While the borders of these puzzle pieces would shift as people move around, we can't eliminate them entirely. Therefore, capital should stay within those puzzle pieces as much as possible, at least until people are able to teleport.

Labor isn't necessarily physically mobile, but it's definitely digitally mobile. Witness the call centers and cubicle farms of software engineers in India and China - they haven't moved in meatspace, but they "work" halfway across the globe.

I can agree, the initial part would have been fun, but they went overboard.

I really don't get what they were thinking. What happened to democracy? You'd think they would've gotten all the kill-them-all impulses out during the bloody revolution....

The system I propose is no more fascist than the structure of any corporation; if one wing of the corporation doesn't feel someone is cutting it, and another wing of the corporation has someone who might be good, they can transfer the person without his consent.

You're kind of misstating what actually, legitimately happens in a corporation. If an employee isn't cutting it, they can fire him, or they can offer to let him keep his job if he'll switch sections of the company; it's up to him. If anything, they're being nice, since they could've just fired him.

The centrally planned economy, on the other hand, doesn't allow you the option of quitting or seeking your own job of your own choice: they just move you. Period. And if you don't agree, off to the gulag. A centrally planned economy only works if people do what the apparatchiks say....

Of course, the person can quit his job, but he can also leave a centrally planned socialist system.

....and don't leave. If everyone can leave, then the majority probably will, and the whole thing falls flat on its face.

I fail to see how being an economic ward of the state as being somehow worse than being the economic ward of any business; I would argue that it's better.

You're never the economic ward of a business; they don't waste money on wards. You're their employee, or you're not associated with them. Being employed is a transaction: you do something for them, they give something to you. You do nothing for the state, have no other options on where to go, and can't "quit" that station in life if no one will agree to take you from the government in the planned economy.

The people who have no jobs are also theoretically both producers and consumers, the rest of the people simply haven't found a job for those people.

Why should anyone else have to? Someone else's welfare is not my responsibility. If they want a job, they can go out and find one. If a company needs an employee, they can go out and find one. The two run into each other, negotiations take place, and employment is born. No one else has any obligation or necessity to "find a job" for the unemployed.

And it hardly matters what they theoretically are - since we're speaking from the point of view of how their volitional actions or lack thereof affect the actual real-world functionality of the economy, what matters is what they do, not what they might in a different situation be able to do. They are consumers of value, but they do not produce. Simple as that.

If indeed it was as you said it was, then there are one of two possibilities: either the farms and the other businesses were separate, and there is no reason why the farms should have been forced to care for the rest of the businesses, or they agreed to a cooperative relationship, in which case the farmers who failed to cut the job should have been fired, kicked out of the system, and given only enough land that they can use. Since this didn't occur, the workers didn't have actual control of the means of production.

Sorry, but...what are you talking about? I'm not exactly sure how that relates to what I said that you're quoting.

How can capitalism has full employment without labor organizing the owners out of business?

...by achieving optimal balance in labor markets through the self-corrective adaptations of those markets?

Not really; anti-WM opponents usually argue that nobody should be so poor as to have to shop there in the first place.

That's a rather poor argument. Low prices benefit everyone and anyone: they naturally benefit those at the lowest end of the economy scale most, especially when the stuff for sale at WalMart is used-on-a-daily-basis stuff like food, clothing, furniture, supplies, hygiene stuff, etc. Someone is the lower class, regardless of their absolute income: it's all relative.

The difference in population between Victorian England and 2006 America is also quite large.

True, but I believe (but am not sure) that the percentage unemployment, poverty, etc. was much higher as well, meaning that there were fewer producers for the nonworkers to rely on for some hypothetical charity, whether private or public.

I don't see why the materials couldn't be shipped to an existing plant in a different country to be refined.

Using whose ships and packaging facilities? Who is going to absorb the extra cost when the optimum net transaction is to invest, build at home, produce, and pay back at a profit for the investor as expected incentive/reward?

These facilities are only useful to the country as a whole if they are made freely available to the country as a whole.

To people who didn't pay for them and aren't going to pay any of the money owed to the investors who financed the plant's construction?

Anyway, it's unnecessary. Employment at the plant is offered to as many people as it needs, the advanced incomes paid out flow through local purchases into the national economy, know-how procured through on-the-job training is reused by former employees in new jobs and businesses, foreign investment in other startups is attracted, infrastructure built for the original industry can be utilized by othe businesses or industries (real roads being a good example), etc. etc. etc.

I support aid if done properly. I'm not sure how you can argue that tariffs are bad, especially when nearly every country that has industrialized has done so behind a wall of protection.

[shrug] It was a different, systemically inferior economic paradigm: mercantilism. They industrialized as mercantilism was being outmoded by real capitalism. That doesn't mean that the superior model of true capitalism, as opposed to the mercantilist policy of protectionism, can't be applied to modern-day industrializing nations.

Therefore, intelligence that is not inherent can be increased with the aid of society; I see no reason why people should receive more resources from society for their natural traits.

They don't receive resources from society; society does not have any inherent power or rights, and owns nothing. People obtain their own resources non-coercively from each other in line with their individual capabilities. "Society" "gives" them nothing. The entire premise of a process where society doles out resources, with varying models of allocation just different standards by which the non-entity of society hands stuff out is a skewed beginning point created from a fundamentally command-economy-centric standpoint.

I'm not certain that the classical composers had native, inborn intelligence, it seems to me that being upper class would have granted them a decent education.

Education has nothing to do with it. They were simply savants. It takes frankly unimaginable talents to be able to do what they did. You can't train a person to be a musical prodigy, create great art, etc. Mozart was writing music when he was 5. You don't send a 4-year-old to school and have him come back "trained" to be able to hear new arias and sonatas in his head.

It's like the guy the Rain Man was based off of - you can't train someone to be able to memorize phonebooks by glancing at each page for a second or two and moving on. You can't train a guy to be able to instantly, intuitively identify massive prime numbers.

There is no inherent right to differences in economic class based upon a person's capacities, only if the people agree to it should this be the case.

There is a right to be able to exercise the capabilities one possesses freely, so long as one does not impinge upon the same right of others. Extrapolation of this principle to economic interactions among significant numbers of people over a period of time results in the complex spontaneous system called a market, in which people obtain resources based on their capabilities, because this is the natural result of the operation of the system, and because that arrangement is the most economically efficient.

Since I am arguing that the people aren't agreeing to it, I have not violated anyone's rights by making them economically equal.

People don't have to agree to it; they just do it. The thing you have to get people to agree to is coercive restriction of the free exercise of their capacities in interaction and/or cooperation with each other, the process which naturally gives rise to inequalities in resource allocation based on fitness.

Not necessarily; some of those people who are interested in computers could be repairmen, the ones who aren't repairmen would presumably want to learn more about them; these people could replace the repairmen should the repairmen not do their jobs properly.
People will want to increase their learning, whether or not they are being compensated for doing so.

I'm sorry, but once again I have to ask what exactly this is talking about in the context of the point I was making in the quoted text. with regards to the inevitability and desirability of entities or actions which incorporate both potential benefit and potential risk. You'll have to bear with me: it's 3 AM here.

In which case, you can create a new gifted individual, and fire the old one, thus replacing them. (I'm not getting into whether or not non-humans should enjoy human rights based upon sentience.)

But the necessity for there to be a gifted individual always remains. You can't replace a gifted individual with another mechanism that is not a gifted individual, but performs the same function.

Perhaps I didn't make myself clear; when I referred to the masses, I wasn't simply talking about the poor. I was talking about everyone else. Society provides the ability to specialize in labor, and it provides other things, such as the potential to socialize. Presumably the people in society want the potential to socialize, and therefore they deserve to pay for it.
Of course, society can choose to not make people pay for it, but that would be society choosing to not exercise its right to tax the people who live in it, not an admission that there is no such right.

Society is not an entity: it does not possess rights or give anyone anything. Individuals trade things and form contractual agreements, which allows for the specialization of labor to occur. It does occur because the individuals involved recognize that this increases everyone's utility. People socialize because they are in proximity and they want to. There is no coherent, volitional superentity called "society" which facilitates people socializing with each other, or makes specialization of labor possible, or possesses any rights at all. You're just trying to enslave people to an abstract machine called "society" which doesn't really exist, except as a collection of individuals. "Society" only has the power the individuals you attempt to enslave to it give it.

The utmost of ironies is the chains we create for ourselves.

The status quo is more acceptable than something worse than the status quo.

Why is progress and growth "worse" than a static and unadvancing state?

I imagine that when the populace is deciding whether or not to take a risk, they might be willing to risk a huge loss for a huge gain; at least the loss and the gain benefits everyone.

Perhaps; perhaps not. But in any case, the mediocre decision-making skills displayed by the averaged majority of the masses does not permit consistently good evaluations of risk v. benefit, and thus good investments.

If someone was living in the woods, they would have the right to use anything they wished to; I see no reason why this shouldn't be the default position.

That's true - if no one else owns the stuff in the forest. But should a group of people then be able to walk into a farmer's orchard and eat half the apples, depriving him of what was his?

Of course, this isn't the best position, and I think that certain non-uses should be protected, such as the farmer who hoards food for the winter, even though ze isn't using it at the moment, the food should be protected.

Why? What makes that any different? If people are wandering through his farm, and they feel hungry but don't have food, why shouldn't they be able to take that "hoarded" food, if no one owns anything? Food is a scarce resource; the farmer has to share, even if it means he'll run out in the winter and have to go "share" someone else's preparations without asking. Everyone "shares" with everyone else, and guess what happens: the amount of food never actually increases, and in fact decreases because no one feels it necessary to grow their own as long as they can loot and mooch.

With that said, this is still different than the concept of ownership.
If there isn't enough of everything for everybody, then what there isn't enough of can be shared; if there aren't enough cars, make them into taxis. If there aren't enough computers, ration computer time.

And you do all this by controlling and coercing people's actions and interactions. For example, if in this situation persons A and B decided to trade some particular service for an extra ration of something, or each gave a ration of something they wanted less for what the other guy had that they wanted more, that would be bad, because the people who couldn't offer a valuable service or product couldn't perform such trades, and inequality and so-called "hoarding" would result.

And that aside, you still have the problem of motivation. Under that system, why would I do much of anything? I still get my daily ration of everything; there's no need for me to work for what I have, much less work extra to improve the amount of a certain good, since I won't get the profits of that effort anyway. The amount of cars or computers or whatever never increases, and the quality of the status quo decreases because no one has any incentive to work.

So then we agree that it's possible to mislead somebody without defrauding them.

Yes.

I disagree, however, I will try a different tack. What if the beer company made beer than nobody wanted and it went out of business? Was the company's expenditure of resources useful?

To some degree. The advertising companies and ingredients companies for beer still got money they could expend usefully on wages or improvements. But you're right in that there was less than maximum efficiency. And I'll give it to you: the free market is not maximally efficient. It's more efficient than a centrally planned economy, but it is not the most efficient system possible. It includes waste. At some point, hopefully, we will run across a better system. The big problem is that resource allocation under conditions of scarcity is what computer science calls an NP-incomplete problem, which is a class of problems which are incredibly difficult to algorithmically solve, rather than just stumbling across the solution. So maybe at some point we'll work it out by accident, or some strongly superhuman AI will work out how to solve NP-incomplete problems and devise Economics 2.0 for us.

I see no reason why it must be one person. If you and four friends are trying to decide where to have lunch, how do you decide?

OK....four people. Can four people accurately model the running of the entire economy and make efficient decisions for every aspect of it? If the people who are involved in an economic interaction decide how it plays out, and that occurs for every such interaction....ta-da! you have capitalism. Each person has the viewpoint necessary to make a decision for the economic interactions that directly involve them. This occurs on a vast scale and you get the market system.

Tell that to the homeless. The homeless need resources that capitalism isn't allocating to them.

Because allocating it to them would result in an inefficiency and imbalance in the system whose net effect would be detrimental. Though I question that there is any significant percentage of homeless who absolutely have no other option but to be homeless. Being homeless because of a past and/or present drug habit doesn't count. If you could go to a job retraining center and successfully get some kind of job sufficient to rent some sort of small apartment, but don't, you don't count. If you're homeless because you fucked up and lost your job and went into a downward spiral you never attempted to kick out of and eventually lost everything through stupidity, when you in reality never had to lose your position in life in the first place, you don't count. If you have psychological issues that cause you to be homeless, you don't count.

I'm fairly certain that the nomadic tribes that live there have claimed the land and are using it; if I could find a way to farm that doesn't interfere with their claim, that might be something, but I'm not sure that I could do so.

I doubt they'd mind; ask to be inducted into the tribe or something.

No, I'm not saying that their standard of living is better than what we have now...though there is a good argument for just that in the "What Kind of Anarchist are You?" thread, if you can make it through the quote trees. :)

I think I'll pass - I'm having a hard enough time with this one. :)

Not necessarily; I would say that the standard of living of the African hunter-gatherer is better than that of a Jew in Nazi Germany. Such is the beauty of relativity.

:rolleyes: Hardly a fair or representative comparison, and moreover ironic since the condition of the Jews at that time was caused by the power and interference of heavy-handed government acting on the "will of society".

And since everyone has a potential right to it, everyone has the right to decide what happens to it.

No...not a potential right, a right. You have a right to it if you invest in it under contract. You don't have a right because you might've invested in it but didn't.

There are a couple of problems with this. Firstly, the nature of weighted voting could easily be used to justify the Divine Right of Kings - the king's vote outweighs everyone else's.

But the weighting of the king's vote is illegitimate - he has no right to control over the market or political process, doesn't legitimately own the entire country and all of its businesses and inhabitants, etc. etc. Plus, a weighted vote really only works in the context of meritocracy and purely economic organization.

Secondly, this type of valuation doesn't allow for negative values. The lowest that something can be valued at is 0 - don't buy it. However, there are certainly things which I would value at below 0, things that make us worse off by their existence. The market system of valuation doesn't incorporate the negative values, and therefore, isn't democratic.

[shrug] A negative can be restated as a positive - you pay a positive value to rid yourself of the negative.

The natural resources have all been claimed by either governments or people, and it's impossible to increase intellectual resources without consuming natural resources.

Undiscovered resources haven't been claimed, and claimed resources haven't been consumed. There's still everything from undiscovered fossil fuel reserves to intellectual resources based off material resources currently under consumption, that will themselve spawn new material resources, (e.g. nuclear energy) to the bioinformatic resources of the Earth's biosphere.

its fucked up australian jobs
jobs are going overseas as it cheap to make things
shops buy cheap food from overseas

That doesn't make any sense. A right to something can also be defined as a moral obligation on the part of others not to coerce or impede you in that area. For example: I have a right to my property. This is codefined as a moral obligation on the part of all others not to steal. On the other hand, though I have a right to pursue whatever non-coercive actions I please, that does not mean that others have the moral obligation to provide me with the means to accomplish the actions I desire to undertake - merely that they not coerce me into not performing those actions if I can, or impede my in my ethical pursuit of those means.

Right are separate from capacities, in that a right just means that you can't be stopped from doing it if you want to and are capable of it, whereas a capacity is the actual ability to do something. It's the difference between volition and implementation, pursuit and actuality. It's a fairly important differentiation. Firstly, I wouldn't say that there isn't a right to do X unless other people defend you in your undertaking of X from people who wish to stop you.
Secondly, while it is true that rights are separate from capacities, you cannot have rights without them. Would we say that somebody has freedom of movement without having the capacity to move?

On the contrary, conditions of scarcity are when allocation of resources is at its most important. If things are abundant, it doesn't matter who owns what - if a guy steals yours, you can just get another one. There's enough for everyone. Issues of allocation and particular ownership are mostly meaningless.

On the other hand, during conditions of scarcity, the most important quality of the system is efficient allocation of resources, which is best accomplished by a property-based free market.It's true that allocation of resources is important then, but in conditions of scarcity, resources should not be allocated for the exclusive use by an individual; only when they are highly abundant should this be the case.

True, but you've got to get there in the first place, and that costs someone's money. Which is where the price of transportation comes in.It needn't (and shouldn't) cost the money of an individual; resources should be claimed by societies.

That's not really trickle-down economics, at least not as traditionally phrased involving tax cuts and investment. It's just basic economics. Costs go down, prices go down, savings for everyone. New opportunities and innovations generate broad increases in standard of living and average income. ...for some people much more so than others.

I don't think government is willing or able to do what needs to be done. They don't have the money, the willingness to take risks and innovate, the impetus for change. They lack the flexibility and the focus. While I think we agree that education needs to be available to the entire rising generation at minimal cost, I think implementing solutions that involve heavy inclusion of the free market or free-market-style adaptations, such as vouchers, charter schools, private schools, etc. would be a good way to advance education. Because in the end, it's a cooperative mechanism to make the next generation a powerful group of economic actors. In a knowledge/information economy, an educated, high-skills workforce is a valuable commodity for countries, sectors, and corporations. Government has more money and resources than any individual does; I can agree that a one-size fits all approach to education wouldn't work.

....socialism. Democracy doesn't (or at least doesn't necessarily) include all land being owned by the state in trust for the people. Neither does socialism. Socialism is usually defined as a stateless, classless society where the workers control the means of production. I'm not aware of any socialist theoretician who uses a different definition.

Labor isn't necessarily physically mobile, but it's definitely digitally mobile. Witness the call centers and cubicle farms of software engineers in India and China - they haven't moved in meatspace, but they "work" halfway across the globe. There are certain types of labor where this can be true, but others where it isn't; manufacturing, for instance, must be done on site.

I really don't get what they were thinking. What happened to democracy? You'd think they would've gotten all the kill-them-all impulses out during the bloody revolution....I suppose it wasn't meant to establish power for the people, but rather to establish power for themselves...much like another revolution in the early 20th century.

You're kind of misstating what actually, legitimately happens in a corporation. If an employee isn't cutting it, they can fire him, or they can offer to let him keep his job if he'll switch sections of the company; it's up to him. If anything, they're being nice, since they could've just fired him.This is no different than a centrally planned economy.

The centrally planned economy, on the other hand, doesn't allow you the option of quitting or seeking your own job of your own choice: they just move you. Period. And if you don't agree, off to the gulag. A centrally planned economy only works if people do what the apparatchiks say.... Again, I think you're ignoring the free association aspect of it.


....and don't leave. If everyone can leave, then the majority probably will, and the whole thing falls flat on its face. I see no reason why the majority would leave a properly planned socialist economy, but if they do, it's their right, and they're welcome to.

You're never the economic ward of a business; they don't waste money on wards. You're their employee, or you're not associated with them. Being employed is a transaction: you do something for them, they give something to you. You do nothing for the state, have no other options on where to go, and can't "quit" that station in life if no one will agree to take you from the government in the planned economy.You can always subsistence farm outside of the planned economy, or move and join another economy.

Why should anyone else have to? Someone else's welfare is not my responsibility. If they want a job, they can go out and find one. If a company needs an employee, they can go out and find one. The two run into each other, negotiations take place, and employment is born. No one else has any obligation or necessity to "find a job" for the unemployed.No, they can't just find a job, not where there is unemployment. If you support a system that requires unemployment, you should be obligated to (help) take care of the basic necessities of the unemployed.

And it hardly matters what they theoretically are - since we're speaking from the point of view of how their volitional actions or lack thereof affect the actual real-world functionality of the economy, what matters is what they do, not what they might in a different situation be able to do. They are consumers of value, but they do not produce. Simple as that.Sure it matters where they theoretically are; a system which requires that people are unemployed can theoretically be changed.

Sorry, but...what are you talking about? I'm not exactly sure how that relates to what I said that you're quoting. The basic point is that the workers didn't control the means of production in Soviet Russia.

...by achieving optimal balance in labor markets through the self-corrective adaptations of those markets?But how would optimal balance be full employment? Wouldn't optimal balance (in capitalism) be maximum profit? The lower the unemployment rate, the more businesses have to pay their employees.

That's a rather poor argument. Low prices benefit everyone and anyone: they naturally benefit those at the lowest end of the economy scale most, especially when the stuff for sale at WalMart is used-on-a-daily-basis stuff like food, clothing, furniture, supplies, hygiene stuff, etc. Someone is the lower class, regardless of their absolute income: it's all relative. No one needs to be so poor that they have to shop at Wal-Mart.


True, but I believe (but am not sure) that the percentage unemployment, poverty, etc. was much higher as well, meaning that there were fewer producers for the nonworkers to rely on for some hypothetical charity, whether private or public. I would say that this was because the market was freer then.

Using whose ships and packaging facilities? Who is going to absorb the extra cost when the optimum net transaction is to invest, build at home, produce, and pay back at a profit for the investor as expected incentive/reward? Using their own ships and packaging facilities. The cost of building a new refinery in the new country needs to be taken into account; it may be cheaper to ship unrefined materials.

To people who didn't pay for them and aren't going to pay any of the money owed to the investors who financed the plant's construction?Yes, otherwise talking of building up the infrastructure of the country is meaningless.

Anyway, it's unnecessary. Employment at the plant is offered to as many people as it needs, the advanced incomes paid out flow through local purchases into the national economy, know-how procured through on-the-job training is reused by former employees in new jobs and businesses, foreign investment in other startups is attracted, infrastructure built for the original industry can be utilized by othe businesses or industries (real roads being a good example), etc. etc. etc.The latter three things are debatable, though I can admit that they're likely, but there is only going to be extra purchases into the national economy if the workers are making at least a subsistence wage, which isn't a given.

[shrug] It was a different, systemically inferior economic paradigm: mercantilism. They industrialized as mercantilism was being outmoded by real capitalism. That doesn't mean that the superior model of true capitalism, as opposed to the mercantilist policy of protectionism, can't be applied to modern-day industrializing nations.It doesn't mean that it can be, either; nonetheless, it is hypocritical for people from nations who've benefitted from protectionism to turn around and say that it's bad.

They don't receive resources from society; society does not have any inherent power or rights, and owns nothing. People obtain their own resources non-coercively from each other in line with their individual capabilities. "Society" "gives" them nothing. The entire premise of a process where society doles out resources, with varying models of allocation just different standards by which the non-entity of society hands stuff out is a skewed beginning point created from a fundamentally command-economy-centric standpoint.Society is merely a group of people; groups of people who have inherent power and rights, and own things.


Education has nothing to do with it. They were simply savants. It takes frankly unimaginable talents to be able to do what they did. You can't train a person to be a musical prodigy, create great art, etc. Mozart was writing music when he was 5. You don't send a 4-year-old to school and have him come back "trained" to be able to hear new arias and sonatas in his head.

It's like the guy the Rain Man was based off of - you can't train someone to be able to memorize phonebooks by glancing at each page for a second or two and moving on. You can't train a guy to be able to instantly, intuitively identify massive prime numbers. I'm not certain whether or not you can; nonetheless the ability to do these things doesn't necessitate higher material rewards for the people who can.

There is a right to be able to exercise the capabilities one possesses freely, so long as one does not impinge upon the same right of others. Extrapolation of this principle to economic interactions among significant numbers of people over a period of time results in the complex spontaneous system called a market, in which people obtain resources based on their capabilities, because this is the natural result of the operation of the system, and because that arrangement is the most economically efficient.Not all capabilities are able to be used justly.

People don't have to agree to it; they just do it. The thing you have to get people to agree to is coercive restriction of the free exercise of their capacities in interaction and/or cooperation with each other, the process which naturally gives rise to inequalities in resource allocation based on fitness. Of course people have to agree to it before they do it. I'm not the one suggesting that people should be coercively restricted in the free exercise of their capacities; I am suggesting that having a higher capacity does not mean that a person is entitled to more material benefits.

I'm sorry, but once again I have to ask what exactly this is talking about in the context of the point I was making in the quoted text. with regards to the inevitability and desirability of entities or actions which incorporate both potential benefit and potential risk. You'll have to bear with me: it's 3 AM here. Sorry, I thought you were referring more to the division of labor.

But the necessity for there to be a gifted individual always remains. You can't replace a gifted individual with another mechanism that is not a gifted individual, but performs the same function. So? You can still replace any gifted individual.

Society is not an entity: it does not possess rights or give anyone anything. Individuals trade things and form contractual agreements, which allows for the specialization of labor to occur. It does occur because the individuals involved recognize that this increases everyone's utility. People socialize because they are in proximity and they want to. There is no coherent, volitional superentity called "society" which facilitates people socializing with each other, or makes specialization of labor possible, or possesses any rights at all. You're just trying to enslave people to an abstract machine called "society" which doesn't really exist, except as a collection of individuals. "Society" only has the power the individuals you attempt to enslave to it give it.

The utmost of ironies is the chains we create for ourselves. There needn't be a "coherent, volitional superentity called society which facilitates people socializing with each other" in order for this to only be possible due to society. Since none of this is possible without people coming together in a society, it only makes sense that people pay money to maintain this function.
I'm not attempting to enslave anyone to society.

Why is progress and growth "worse" than a static and unadvancing state?No, I was saying that regression and loss was worse than a static and unadvancing state. Since those are real possibilities, they should be taken into account.

Perhaps; perhaps not. But in any case, the mediocre decision-making skills displayed by the averaged majority of the masses does not permit consistently good evaluations of risk v. benefit, and thus good investments.Even if this is the case, those people who have above average decision-making skills still make mistakes and cause loss; the losses they cause would be greater than the losses a group of people with average decision-making skills would cause.

That's true - if no one else owns the stuff in the forest. But should a group of people then be able to walk into a farmer's orchard and eat half the apples, depriving him of what was his?It depends on if he is occupying and using the orchard; if he merely "owns" the orchard, then it is perfectly acceptable to do so, but if he is occupying the orchard in a mutualist society, then it wouldn't be.

Why? What makes that any different? If people are wandering through his farm, and they feel hungry but don't have food, why shouldn't they be able to take that "hoarded" food, if no one owns anything? Food is a scarce resource; the farmer has to share, even if it means he'll run out in the winter and have to go "share" someone else's preparations without asking. Everyone "shares" with everyone else, and guess what happens: the amount of food never actually increases, and in fact decreases because no one feels it necessary to grow their own as long as they can loot and mooch.Simply because somebody doesn't own something doesn't mean they don't have the right to the future use of it.
Nonetheless, my ideal society is where the farmers and the manufacturers and the road builders operate in conjunction with each other so that 'looting' is unnecessary. If food is scarce then people will have to increase the supply of it or starve; this could be facilitated without the concept of ownership.

And you do all this by controlling and coercing people's actions and interactions. For example, if in this situation persons A and B decided to trade some particular service for an extra ration of something, or each gave a ration of something they wanted less for what the other guy had that they wanted more, that would be bad, because the people who couldn't offer a valuable service or product couldn't perform such trades, and inequality and so-called "hoarding" would result.Not necessarily, it may be perfectly acceptable for people to trade their rations, however since the rations were only made possible due to society, then society has a right to decide such rules.
I don't have a problem with the idea of people trading labor for labor.

And that aside, you still have the problem of motivation. Under that system, why would I do much of anything? I still get my daily ration of everything; there's no need for me to work for what I have, much less work extra to improve the amount of a certain good, since I won't get the profits of that effort anyway. The amount of cars or computers or whatever never increases, and the quality of the status quo decreases because no one has any incentive to work. Even the communists who believe that people who don't work should receive the essentials of life but no more don't believe that people who don't work would receive their rations of everything.

To some degree. The advertising companies and ingredients companies for beer still got money they could expend usefully on wages or improvements. But you're right in that there was less than maximum efficiency. And I'll give it to you: the free market is not maximally efficient. It's more efficient than a centrally planned economy, but it is not the most efficient system possible. It includes waste. At some point, hopefully, we will run across a better system. The big problem is that resource allocation under conditions of scarcity is what computer science calls an NP-incomplete problem, which is a class of problems which are incredibly difficult to algorithmically solve, rather than just stumbling across the solution. So maybe at some point we'll work it out by accident, or some strongly superhuman AI will work out how to solve NP-incomplete problems and devise Economics 2.0 for us. And if resources are scarce, they should be used in such a way that waste is minimized or eliminated. A centrally planned economy could have less waste than a free-market capitalist economy.

OK....four people. Can four people accurately model the running of the entire economy and make efficient decisions for every aspect of it? If the people who are involved in an economic interaction decide how it plays out, and that occurs for every such interaction....ta-da! you have capitalism. Each person has the viewpoint necessary to make a decision for the economic interactions that directly involve them. This occurs on a vast scale and you get the market system. No, I meant direct democracy. You all talk amongst yourselves about where you want to eat, and if somebody disagrees, they still may tag along because they value your company more than eating alone. The same principle can apply to the larger economy.

Because allocating it to them would result in an inefficiency and imbalance in the system whose net effect would be detrimental. Though I question that there is any significant percentage of homeless who absolutely have no other option but to be homeless. Being homeless because of a past and/or present drug habit doesn't count. If you could go to a job retraining center and successfully get some kind of job sufficient to rent some sort of small apartment, but don't, you don't count. If you're homeless because you fucked up and lost your job and went into a downward spiral you never attempted to kick out of and eventually lost everything through stupidity, when you in reality never had to lose your position in life in the first place, you don't count. If you have psychological issues that cause you to be homeless, you don't count. Nonetheless, capitalism doesn't end up giving resources to everyone who needs them. I would say that it would end up with a net benefit if a capitalist society allocated psychological resources to the homeless and other people who needed them.

I doubt they'd mind; ask to be inducted into the tribe or something.Heh.

I think I'll pass - I'm having a hard enough time with this one. :) Fair enough, though the discussion is interesting.

:rolleyes: Hardly a fair or representative comparison, and moreover ironic since the condition of the Jews at that time was caused by the power and interference of heavy-handed government acting on the "will of society".I simply meant to illustrate that the division of labor does not inherently mean a higher standard of living for everybody.

No...not a potential right, a right. You have a right to it if you invest in it under contract. You don't have a right because you might've invested in it but didn't.But the restriction of access to resources that capitalism requires eliminates much of the possibility for people to invest in it at all.

But the weighting of the king's vote is illegitimate - he has no right to control over the market or political process, doesn't legitimately own the entire country and all of its businesses and inhabitants, etc. etc. Plus, a weighted vote really only works in the context of meritocracy and purely economic organization.It could be argued that the king simply has more "merit" than other people.

[shrug] A negative can be restated as a positive - you pay a positive value to rid yourself of the negative. True, but I was thinking of the person who created the thing of negative value should pay to eliminate it. Toxic waste would fit this criterion, but it needn't be something that causes demonstrable harm.

Undiscovered resources haven't been claimed, and claimed resources haven't been consumed. There's still everything from undiscovered fossil fuel reserves to intellectual resources based off material resources currently under consumption, that will themselve spawn new material resources, (e.g. nuclear energy) to the bioinformatic resources of the Earth's biosphere.Aren't these fossil fuel reserves on land claimed by governments?