Census worker hanged; Libertarian suspected.

[IcarusAngel]

WASHINGTON — The FBI is investigating the hanging death of a U.S. Census worker near a Kentucky cemetery, and a law enforcement official told The Associated Press the word 'fed" was scrawled on the dead man's chest.


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/09/23/census-worker-hanged-with_n_297114.html

I don't get this. It's wrong for the government to count people; but for some reason it's OK for corporations to drug and piss test you, regulate your hours in order to ensure you have the lowest pay possible, overload you, and inundate with thousands of hours of propaganda from the day you were born.

I think corporations might end up getting more than they bargined for with these right-wing Libertarians when some people start standing up to them.

[danyboy27]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/09/23/census-worker-hanged-with_n_297114.html

I don't get this. It's wrong for the government to count people; but for some reason it's OK for corporations to drug and piss test you, regulate your hours in order to ensure you have the lowest pay possible, overload you, and inundate with thousands of hours of propaganda from the day you were born.

I think corporations might end up getting more than they bargined for with these right-wing Libertarians when some people start standing up to them.

the people who did this think this way:

the governement shouldnt control or restrain us.

buisness can exploit people, nobody force you to work for them.

basicly, they are against a direct coercion from the state but really dont care about what private buisness could do, no matter how horrible it is, beccause its up to you to work for thoses son of *****es.

not my words, but so far, that the way i understand the reasoning of those people.

[Kwisatz Haderach]

Remember when I said that libertarians are the new fascists (http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1551097&postcount=61)?

Let this be further evidence of it.

[spice756]

Well fassism is really .

-Militarism
-Fassism is anti-communism
-Fassism is anti-democracy and liberlism.
-Fassism is authoritarian
-Fassism are very religious
-Fassism is totalitarian
-Fassism uses news to deceive the people not tell the truth
-Fassism is anti-freedom of speech
-fassism is anti-democracy
-Fassism is capitalism gone bad
-Fassism is corporatism because it is a merger of state and corporate power
-Fassism are right-wing not left wing.

1 Fassism suport class and hierarchy
2.In Fassism businesses control the goverment not the goverment control businesses
3.Fassism come to power in economic crisis or depression
4.Pro- private property
5.maintain Warlife frame in people mind
6. support the wealthy class not the working class.
7.Pro-elite and businesses
8.Citizen feels mobilized against enemies with in or foreign foes
9.Newspapers,TV and communcation must be censored so the public will get the facts the leaders want known.
10.Freedom of speech is suppressed
11.To maintain order they must cut off people from information which might cause them doubt about the system
12.fasism resets in the group of the people not the person


.Some fasism cam be recial or religious
2.Other country or some group with in the country are picked on to look has enemy!! And are the cause of evils or misfortunes !!
Like jaws,communism or other country or group are picked on for evils or misfortunes
3.Very nationalistic
4.Any disagreements are treason
5.The principles are the contry not the person
6.Extreme Nationalism
7 NO opposition parties
8.all enemy or opposition is crush by the police
9.Fasism centers all power in a single party
10.Fasism has a dictator
11.The goverment controls religious,political ,social and econmic life.
12 Pro private ownership

1.police state
2.police spy on the people
3.saying any thing about the state even a remark is crush by the police and you are punishment
4.Ruthlessness police
5.No resitance to the state
6. jailed or killed the opponents


This is what fassism is and well I really have not look into that libertarians but I do know they are pro-free market and anti-goverment .

[Qayin]

fassism
Fascism*

Is Timothy McVeigh coming back? God damn fucking loons

[Rusty Shackleford]

hmm the date was 9/12. i bet it was glenn beck.

anyways. with the word FED on him, and it being a government worker. it is obviously the work of the far right. it may not be a libertarian though. but one of the "patriots" who are more violent than the average libertarian.

[Richard Nixon]

Execute the murderer by hanging also. He has murdered an employee of the government.

[Rusty Shackleford]

and then execute the executioner.

[scarletghoul]

And then execute the executioner of the executioner.

[Skooma Addict]

Attempting to link a crazy murder to the libertarian movement is pathetic. Also, on a side note, I really hope people here don't take the huffington post seriously.


Remember when I said that libertarians are the new fascists (http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1551097&postcount=61)?

Let this be further evidence of it.

Except this guy was obviously not a libertarian...Also, fascism has far more in common with communism than it does with libertarianism.


hmm the date was 9/12. i bet it was glenn beck.

anyways. with the word FED on him, and it being a government worker. it is obviously the work of the far right. it may not be a libertarian though. but one of the "patriots" who are more violent than the average libertarian.


Glenn beck is not a libertarian. Is Glenn beck a member of the far right? If so, members of the far right are not libertarians.

[Rusty Shackleford]

Glenn beck is not a libertarian. Is Glenn beck a member of the far right? If so, members of the far right are not libertarians.


i was making a glenn beck joke. i was serious about the patriots though.

[Skooma Addict]

i was making a glenn beck joke. i was serious about the patriots though.

Well I do enjoy Glenn Beck jokes.

[IcarusAngel]

I take Huffington Post more seriously than I do Mises forums, who are so cultish they have their own 'University.' And I, generally, don't care where it's from, as long as it makes sense. Something just didn't sit right with me about this story. Yes, this is a story that is circulating the liberal blogs; yes, I heard about it on NPR yesterday (it's in the wee morning hours here - I'm taking a break before I try and finish the video game Pikmin), so I debated about posting it here, but I thought I could make the point about libertarian extremism and how bizarely misdirected it is.

And this type of nuttiness absolutely is Libertarian influenced. No one else believes that the government should do nothing but protect corporations. Only Libertarians believe this. Look at the 'tea party Libertarians.' That's exactly where this nonsense comes from. God damn 'em anyway.

The census is fine, at worst, I'm indifferent to it. Who gives a shit. One of the developments of the modern computer came because of the census. So many great inventions have come because of community.

And fascism is closer to libertarianism; in leftism, if there were owners of the land, they would be beholden to the people, not the other way around.

[Tungsten]

Remember when I said that libertarians are the new fascists (http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1551097&postcount=61)?

Let this be further evidence of it.

Not really, but thanks for reminding me why I don't post here anymore.


Many libertarians are also gun nuts. There you have your militarism.
Many libertarians treat the US Constitution like a holy book and the "founding fathers" like god-men. There you have your nationalism.

You've got to be kidding. Talk about a contrived set of analogies.

Where are the "individual rights" in fascism? Where's the "non-initiation of force"? Nowhere. That's what's important - correction - it's what's essential in libertarianism.

Fascists don't believe in any of that, and neither, I suspect, do you.

----


1 Fassism suport class and hierarchy
2.In Fassism businesses control the goverment not the goverment control businesses

Fail. Under fascism (<<<< note correct spelling), the government has total control of everything. It can involve corporatism, in which business is effectively socialised and is just an extension of the government.



4.Pro- private property

When it suits it.



2.Other country or some group with in the country are picked on to look has enemy!! And are the cause of evils or misfortunes !! Like jaws,communism or other country or group are picked on for evils or misfortunes

Yes, I blame Jaws for all our misfortunes too. That last movie was terrible.

[Skooma Addict]

I take Huffington Post more seriously than I do Mises forums, who are so cultish they have their own 'University.' And I, generally, don't care where it's from, as long as it makes sense. Something just didn't sit right with me about this story. Yes, this is a story that is circulating the liberal blogs; yes, I heard about it on NPR yesterday (it's in the wee morning hours here - I'm taking a break before I try and finish the video game Pikmin), so I debated about posting it here, but I thought I could make the point about libertarian extremism and how bizarely misdirected it is.


I guess you simply don't know what A libertarian is. Just because a person opposes he FED, that doesn't make him a libertarian. If anything, this guy appeared to be a member of the far right. But I hesitate to say that because I don't want to be unfair to members of the far right.


And this type of nuttiness absolutely is Libertarian influenced. No one else believes that the government should do nothing but protect corporations.

I see your problem. You do not know what a libertarian is.


Only Libertarians believe this. Look at the 'tea party Libertarians.' That's exactly where this nonsense comes from. God damn 'em anyway.

Those people were not libertarians. But I don't think this had much to do with the tea parties anyways. I think you just want to believe this can be connected to libertarianism.



The census is fine, at worst, I'm indifferent to it. Who gives a shit. One of the developments of the modern computer came because of the census. So many great inventions have come because of community.

Broken Window fallacy.


And fascism is closer to libertarianism; in leftism, if there were owners of the land, they would be beholden to the people, not the other way around.

Nope. Fascism and libertarianism are nothing alike whatsoever. However fascism and communism are both authoritarian. Both fascism and communism advocate a massive government that necessarily violates property rights.

[IcarusAngel]

I guess you simply don't know what A libertarian is. Just because a person opposes he FED, that doesn't make him a libertarian. If anything, this guy appeared to be a member of the far right. But I hesitate to say that because I don't want to be unfair to members of the far right.

Libertarians are a member of the far right. If his ideology wasn't Libertarian, then what was it? Only Libertarians want the government to be doing nothing but protecting business interests. Name another ideology that does this. Not even fascism is like this.


I see your problem. You do not know what a libertarian is.

If you're not going to defend your positions with reason and logic, and explain the 'true libertarianism,' you shjould just take it to Mises forums.




Broken Window fallacy.

How is it the 'broken window fallacy.' When you claim something is a fallacy, you're generally supposed to give an example of why it is a fallacy.

I was merely stating a fact. For an argument to be a fallacy, it has to be in reply to an argument itself. Stating a fact is never a fallacy.


Nope. Fascism and libertarianism are nothing alike whatsoever. However fascism and communism are both authoritarian. Both fascism and communism advocate a massive government that necessarily violates property rights.

In both fascism and Libertarianism, there is an emphasis on property owners, who derive power from their ownership of property. This is in contrast to democracy, socialism, etc., where everybody is automatically ensured some land, thus preventing any such power of 'business interests.' Fascism and American Libertarianism are very much alike, some libertarians being indistinguishable from fascism. However, original libertarianism was much closer to socialism.

[JimmyJazz]

Some redneck in Bumfuck, Kentucky killing a census worker (who for all we know may have stumbled upon his growhouse) discredits libertarianism?

....Really?

There are lots of ways to discredit it; this is not one of them. At least wait till the damn facts of the story are in.

[IcarusAngel]

No one said it 'discredits libertarianism.' However, I think it does show the problems of right-wing, 'Don't tread on me' type of thinking. They think they're being oppressed only by the federal government, when in reality the census is conducted to see how much resources are needed to help determine government expenditures and so on, and, in fact, corporations have, by far, a larger precense in most people's lives than the federal government does.

[Skooma Addict]

Libertarians are a member of the far right. If his ideology wasn't Libertarian, then what was it? Only Libertarians want the government to be doing nothing but protecting business interests. Name another ideology that does this. Not even fascism is like this.

If that is what libertarianism was, then I would hate libertarianism as well. There are different types of libertarianism, but basically it a belief in the right to private property and Liberty. Also, many libertarians adhere to to the non-aggression principle.


If you're not going to defend your positions with reason and logic, and explain the 'true libertarianism,' you should just take it to Mises forums.

This discussion was about the apparent connection between a crazy lunatic and the libertarian movement. I can discuss libertarianism further if you want me to. But that would be going off topic...


How is it the 'broken window fallacy.' When you claim something is a fallacy, you're generally supposed to give an example of why it is a fallacy.

I was merely stating a fact. For an argument to be a fallacy, it has to be in reply to an argument itself. Stating a fact is never a fallacy.

You claimed that the Census developed a great invention, so it is therefore an acceptable institution. You said at worst your indifferent to it, and you cited an invention that the census supposedly developed. However the resources that went to the census could have been used in better ways elsewhere. It would be like me claiming "government funded program X" is good because it spent 5 million taxpayer dollars to develop the worlds best toilet.


In both fascism and Libertarianism, there is an emphasis on property owners, who derive power from their ownership of property. This is in contrast to democracy, socialism, etc., where everybody is automatically ensured some land, thus preventing any such power of 'business interests.' Fascism and American Libertarianism are very much alike, some libertarians being indistinguishable from fascism. However, original libertarianism was much closer to socialism.

Fascism implies a massive government, and many government backed monopolies. Both of these violate property rights. Fascism and Commumism are both anti-market, anti-liberty, anti-freedom, and therefore anti-libertarian and authoritarian. Now, if people voluntarily chose to live in a communist community of some sort, that is a different story.

[JimmyJazz]

No one said it 'discredits libertarianism.' However, I think it does show the problems of right-wing, 'Don't tread on me' type of thinking. They think they're being oppressed only by the federal government, when in reality the census is conducted to see how much resources are needed to help determine government expenditures and so on, and, in fact, corporations have, by far, a larger precense in most people's lives than the federal government does.

There is a loose correlation at best between those who are against government spending on social programs, and those who are carve "Fed" into census workers' chests. The former hold a repugnant ideology (often favoring massive war spending that far outstrips any proposal for spending on programs of social uplift), but that doesn't make them a bunch of little Norman Bateses. There are just some crazy, hillbilly mofos out there, and it says little about any mainstream or semi-mainstream ideology like conservatism or libertarianism. I think it does more harm than good to paint with such absurdly large brushstrokes. In fact, I think it does no good at all.

[IcarusAngel]

If that is what libertarianism was, then I would hate libertarianism as well. There are different types of libertarianism, but basically it a belief in the right to private property and Liberty. Also, many libertarians adhere to to the non-aggression principle.

This is the fundamental flaw of Libertarianism. You, personally, may believe that corporations declaring their property theirs by homesteading it is NON-AGRESSION, but it simply does not follow that everybody else agrees with the NAP as well. For example, I believe that such a society allows big corporations and/or other insitutions (since we're now accounting for an 'unverified' version of Libertarianism now) to dominate the resources. History has proven me correct here: when we've had freer-markets, there was a greater consolidation of power, to the point where it was instable. While there was a rising tide in the Reagan years, the averages family's income either barely rose or actually declined (depending on whose statistics you use), so that they were actually making less inflation adjusted than they were before.

Even most economists agree with me on this and do not advocate classical-economics anymore (hence, why it is called classical economics).

As my evidence I cite the history of capitalism; Miseans, on the other hand, are ENTIRELY theoretical. They believe, that even though social scientists and political scientists have shown numerous correlations between the markets and ineffiency, and the need for regulation, that somehow there is some hidden factor that discredits these theories and proves the Misean logic that is inherent in their own theories. This gives the Miseans the credibility of a crackpot.

Libertarians are simply defining what is and what isn't aggression, which is an act of aggression itself, and statism itself, since the purpose of the state is to define such things for the populus. So, Libertarians don't oppose aggress, they just oppose it when it doesn't suit their purposes.


You claimed that the Census developed a great invention...

I said it developed as a result of the census.


so it is therefore an acceptable institution.

That's not what I said. I never said the census was justified, I said I was generally indifferent to it, although I could see how it would be useful to count the population.

I also noted that many great inventions were done in the interests of serving the community, or rather because there was a void in the community and someone stepped in to fill it. Libertarians interpret these facts in their own way.


You said at worst your indifferent to it, and you cited an invention that the census supposedly developed. However the resources that went to the census could have been used in better ways elsewhere.

Now this is a fallacy. Some of the greatest inventions have been done by the government and government research. There is no way you can 'prove' that they would have led to even greater inventions had they been in the hands of businesses - in fact, businesses had their chance to establish a functional society during the 20s and it led into the Great Depression.

Furthermore, what resources were actually denied to the business class as a result of the US census that prevented them from developing these great inventions?

A lot of great ideas come from Universities. Are you saying that by the existence of such public institutions like Universities (all universities in the US are basically publicly and federally funded, some, i.e., 'private' universties, who often take in more money than public ones, are just more elitist), where a lot of ideas are developed, are actually preventing businesses from coming up with ideas of their own?

In my area, everybody makes money off of ideas and tools that were created and released for free to the public, so I guess I'm one who's likely to respect the public as a whole. I can certainly see why Miseans don't respect the public though, and I can also see why there has never been a Misean who's ever done anything useful for society.


It would be like me claiming "government funded program X" is good because it spent 5 million taxpayer dollars to develop the worlds best toilet.

Logical fallacy (false analogy)

First of all, I'm talking about technology that actully improved efficiency.

Second, if the government did have to get involved and funded the world's best toilet, I would assume that the market was failing in this industry and apparently the government easily surpassed them.

Third, citing an example of government inefficiency does not prove that the government is ineffective anymore than citing a market failure proves that the market is ineffective.

Fourth, this generally isn't what the government does. They are big picture guys. The only place where you'll find the government spending tens of millions of dollars on toilets is in the pentagon and the military.


Fascism implies a massive government, and many government backed monopolies. Both of these violate property rights. Fascism and Commumism are both anti-market, anti-liberty, anti-freedom, and therefore anti-libertarian and authoritarian. Now, if people voluntarily chose to live in a communist community of some sort, that is a different story.


Actually, fascism preserves private property rights:

"An extreme right‐wing nationalist ideology, revolutionary political movement, and type of authoritarian regime that developed in Europe between the two world wars....

While fascism increases the power and role of the state in society and suppresses free trade unions and political opposition, it preserves private ownership and private property. "

(Online dictionary of the social sciences; Parkinson (Ph.D) and Drislane (PH.d))

So, while Fascists OPPOSE leftists and unionists, they still PRESERVE private property.

Communism, on the other hand, is a left-wing (a political science way of noting a distinction betwen philosophies, by actually noting its the opposite) philosophy, as compared to a right-wing one.

In communism, there is no property and no government. Any 'communist society' that proclaims to have a government, a class, and so on, as Stalin did, is not the same thing as Marxian communism. And even under Stalinism, they worked as collective units whose goal was to improve the collective (the state interestingly enough) as a whole. The Stalinists increased production in nearly every industry, but they did it by means different from the fascist (still totalitarian, but so is Libertarianism).

Fascists do a better job of preserving private property and maintaining society than Libertarians. Libertarian societies collapsed very quickly, like pre-industrial attempts of the American framers. This failure was so bad that the founders were quick to establish a type of system that is despised by many Libertarians, i.e., what Hamilton established.

Where fascists went wrong, by measurements only of success, was in imperialism. Once they combined imperialism with their economic philosophy of rigid capitalism, they started to crumble rather quickly, proving once again that warfare is actually ineffective for any society to engage it, feudal or nation state.

I, for one, would rather live in an economic fascist society (i.e. reaganism) than a brutal, dictatorial Libertarian society because, in Libertarianism, there is no interest in doing any thing to solve problems, like in India where 40+ million died as a result of lack of basic health care and disease, other than 'leave it up to the market.' "Leave it up to the market" is not an effective solution when no two Libertarians can even clarify what that means in the same way.

Bottom line: corporatism/fascism works, and democratic capitalism (i.e. Europe) is even better. Libertarianism does not work, and why it is only popular in low-density, low-income areas like the south rather than the more prosperous liberal states (which is ironic because the South is in shambles because of market reforms, and few great inventions come from there excluding Texas).

[Luís Henrique]

Fascism implies a massive government, and many government backed monopolies.

So how does a fascist party manage to exist before it takes power?

The similarity between "libertarianism" and fascism is not that their political programs are similar, but that both of them are potentially useful for the ruling class as instruments of repression against the working class that are not part of the State, and, as such, do not need to abide by law.

In the United States, which is the only place that I know that "libertarians" have any political significance, however, the ruling class doesn't seem, at this moment, to feel any need of repressing the working class in illegal ways. So they cannot function in a way similar to fascism as of now.

Luís Henrique

[IcarusAngel]

There is a loose correlation at best between those who are against government spending on social programs, and those who are carve "Fed" into census workers' chests. The former hold a repugnant ideology (often favoring massive war spending that far outstrips any proposal for spending on programs of social uplift), but that doesn't make them a bunch of little Norman Bateses. There are just some crazy, hillbilly mofos out there, and it says little about any mainstream or semi-mainstream ideology like conservatism or libertarianism. I think it does more harm than good to paint with such absurdly large brushstrokes. In fact, I think it does no good at all.

Why shouldn't Libertarians be equated with Operation Rescue or any other extreme end of a philosophy or movement?

Their approach to politics is to deny any and all metaphysical realities, epistimologies, polotical theories and empricial evidence in favor of some rather bizarre slogans and opinion (just as Operation Rescue or the Army of God do).

The difference between conservatives and even fundamentalist anti-abortionists is that these guys don't call out their crazies, but rather feature them predominantly on Lew Rockwell and the Mises institute and other far right websites. They even have their own schools and Universities and training camps.

Talking to Libertarians on other forums(the internet being their prime hang out) they come off about as reasonable as Alex Jones. The right-wing populism of economic royalists, black helicopter theorists, anti-vaccination activists, and so on, are really all connected, and feed off of each other. The funny thing is I would consider these extremists more reasonable than say, the Mises institute. To hold onto self-contradicting axioms and recursive definitions is not rational politics, but is instead irrational politics.

Bottom line: I think Objectivists are capitalits (at least they try and be ratioanl); I think liberals are capitalists; I think the 'Libertarian group' described above is a cult - it really isn't politics per se.

[JimmyJazz]

Why shouldn't Libertarians be equated with Operation Rescue or any other extreme end of a philosophy or movement?

For the same reason that all leftists (you) shouldn't be associated with these?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/09/11/anti-abortion-activist-ki_n_283486.html

http://blogs.abcnews.com/george/2009/09/bomb-threat-forces-evacuation-of-dc-tea-party-planners.html

[IcarusAngel]

There is a big difference between a group of people who hold onto a theory for their own rational reasons, and someone who commits a crime in association with that group, and a group like operation rescue that promotes insanity from the beginning. There are probably even leftist cults, like the cult of the environmental movement and the maoists.

I think the general difference is that you think American libertarianism is a somewhat rational philosophy whereas I disagree. Many Libertarians like Block have openly advocated shooting people if they so much as fall onto your property.

That's normal thinking for a right-Libertarian if you take their premises to the obvious conclusion: that people own property irrespective of everybody else in the world.

[Skooma Addict]

This is the fundamental flaw of Libertarianism. You, personally, may believe that corporations declaring their property theirs by homesteading it is NON-AGRESSION, but it simply does not follow that everybody else agrees with the NAP as well.

You think I assume that all people adhere to the NAP? I wouldn't even obey the NAP in many cases. But the success of a libertarian community does not require the entire society to be comprised of angels. So your "fundamental flaw" is really no flaw at all.


believe that such a society allows big corporations and/or other insitutions (since we're now accounting for an 'unverified' version of Libertarianism now) to dominate the resources. History has proven me correct here: when we've had freer-markets, there was a greater consolidation of power, to the point where it was instable.

This is 100% wrong. First of all it makes no sense that when markets are free, and anyone can enter into any business that there will be a consolidation of power. Also, history shows just the opposite. Look at Mao, Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, FDR, Bismarck, Mussolini, ect. All of these people were the head pf countries with very regulated markets.


While there was a rising tide in the Reagan years, the averages family's income either barely rose or actually declined (depending on whose statistics you use), so that they were actually making less inflation adjusted than they were before.

Please don't tell me you consider America under the Reagan administration anything close to resembling a free market.


Even most economists agree with me on this and do not advocate classical-economics anymore (hence, why it is called classical economics).

Most Economists are neoclassical economists.


As my evidence I cite the history of capitalism; Miseans, on the other hand, are ENTIRELY theoretical. They believe, that even though social scientists and political scientists have shown numerous correlations between the markets and ineffiency, and the need for regulation, that somehow there is some hidden factor that discredits these theories and proves the Misean logic that is inherent in their own theories. This gives the Miseans the credibility of a crackpot.

Social scientists and political scientists often know nothing about economics. I often want to tear my eyes out when I read the garbage that these people write. Also, I do not think a political scientist has shown a correlation between free markets and inefficiency. The hidden factor that discredits the theories is that they are false...Almost all the cases where political scientists claim the market has failed were actually instances of government intervention.


Now this is a fallacy. Some of the greatest inventions have been done by the government and government research. There is no way you can 'prove' that they would have led to even greater inventions had they been in the hands of businesses - in fact, businesses had their chance to establish a functional society during the 20s and it led into the Great Depression.

I committed no fallacy. The money that went to government would have gone to private businesses. Since the government cannot rationally allocate resources, the money would have been better spent elsewhere. Also, like most political scientists, you have no idea what causes a depression. During the 20's, the FED lowered the interest rate below the markets rate of interest. This caused massive investments in higher order goods (which is why it was called the roaring 20's). These investments were not backed by real savings, so many of the investments could not be completed. Instead of allowing the malinvestments to be liquidated, FDR propped them up and presented his "New Deal". So again, no market failure.


Furthermore, what resources were actually denied to the business class as a result of the US census that prevented them from developing these great inventions?

Businesses do other things with money besides inventing things. Also there is no reason to assume that a business would have invented the same exact product.


A lot of great ideas come from Universities. Are you saying that by the existence of such public institutions like Universities (all universities in the US are basically publicly and federally funded, some, i.e., 'private' universties, who often take in more money than public ones, are just more elitist), where a lot of ideas are developed, are actually preventing businesses from coming up with ideas of their own?

Yes. I am also saying many of the "inventions" made by Universities are a complete waste. Some may be useful, but that doesn't mean the money would have been better spent elsewhere.


Logical fallacy (false analogy)

First of all, I'm talking about technology that actully improved efficiency.

So am I. A high tech very efficient 5 million dollar toilet. So there is no false analogy.



Second, if the government did have to get involved and funded the world's best toilet, I would assume that the market was failing in this industry and apparently the government easily surpassed them.

Lol. Yea, the market was failing at producing a 5 million dollar toilet. As if that's a bad thing...


Third, citing an example of government inefficiency does not prove that the government is ineffective anymore than citing a market failure proves that the market is ineffective.


What is market failure? Can you cite an example? Maybe something from one of these very knowledgeable political scientists?


Fourth, this generally isn't what the government does. They are big picture guys. The only place where you'll find the government spending tens of millions of dollars on toilets is in the pentagon and the military.

The pentagon and the military are part of the government. Also, the government constantly wastes taxpayers money.


Actually, fascism preserves private property rights:

"An extreme right‐wing nationalist ideology, revolutionary political movement, and type of authoritarian regime that developed in Europe between the two world wars....

While fascism increases the power and role of the state in society and suppresses free trade unions and political opposition, it preserves private ownership and private property. "

(Online dictionary of the social sciences; Parkinson (Ph.D) and Drislane (PH.d))

All you did was repeat yourself. But fascism does not completely destroy the right to private property like communism does. However, property rights under fascism are practically nonexistent.



In communism, there is no property and no government. Any 'communist society' that proclaims to have a government, a class, and so on, as Stalin did, is not the same thing as Marxian communism. And even under Stalinism, they worked as collective units whose goal was to improve the collective (the state interestingly enough) as a whole. The Stalinists increased production in nearly every industry, but they did it by means different from the fascist (still totalitarian, but so is Libertarianism).

Communism requires a government of some kind in order to work properly. How would A communist society without a state work? What if people don't want to join? What if a worker in a communist society wants to work for a capitalist?


Fascists do a better job of preserving private property and maintaining society than Libertarians.

You are so confused.



Fascists do a better job of preserving private property and maintaining society than Libertarians. Libertarian societies collapsed very quickly, like pre-industrial attempts of the American framers. This failure was so bad that the founders were quick to establish a type of system that is despised by many Libertarians, i.e., what Hamilton established.

Don't know what your talking about.



I, for one, would rather live in an economic fascist society (i.e. reaganism) than a brutal, dictatorial Libertarian society because, in Libertarianism, there is no interest in doing any thing to solve problems, like in India where 40+ million died as a result of lack of basic health care and disease, other than 'leave it up to the market.' "Leave it up to the market" is not an effective solution when no two Libertarians can even clarify what that means in the same way.

Don't use India as an example of Libertarianism.


Bottom line: corporatism/fascism works, and democratic capitalism (i.e. Europe) is even better. Libertarianism does not work, and why it is only popular in low-density, low-income areas like the south rather than the more prosperous liberal states (which is ironic because the South is in shambles because of market reforms, and few great inventions come from there excluding Texas).

You have completely failed to explain why Libertarianism does not work.

[Skooma Addict]

So how does a fascist party manage to exist before it takes power?

Often times, the government will ruin a nations economy, and the desperate people will turn to fascism for help. This is what happened in Germany.



The similarity between "libertarianism" and fascism is not that their political programs are similar, but that both of them are potentially useful for the ruling class as instruments of repression against the working class that are not part of the State, and, as such, do not need to abide by law.


There is no ruling class in a libertarian society. I do not accept capitalists as being members of a ruling class.

[IcarusAngel]

You think I assume that all people adhere to the NAP? I wouldn't even obey the NAP in many cases.

So you think that society should be run by a principle you don't even agree with? You want to force people to accept a principle you don't agree with. Whatever.

The NAP is the pro business aggression principle. It says, businesses are free to do what they want, regardless of the outcomes to the population. If it creates another Gilded Age, or mass starvation like neo-liberal economics do in the third world, so be it.


Most Economists are neoclassical economists.[/quo9te]

Evidence? And neo-classical economics is not at all pure free-market economics. It has ideas in it that come from socialists and marginalists as well. It is not Austrian economics at all.

[QUOTE=Olaf;1555635]Social scientists and political scientists often know nothing about economics. I often want to tear my eyes out when I read the garbage that these people write. Also, I do not think a political scientist has shown a correlation between free markets and inefficiency. The hidden factor that discredits the theories is that they are false...Almost all the cases where political scientists claim the market has failed were actually instances of government intervention.

What they document are the basic facts of society altogether and where resources are going, and to whom they are going. A lot of what is known about the collusion of government and business and the inefficiences of markets and the rising inequality in them is because of their work.



I committed no fallacy.

You certainly did commit a fallacy. You used a non-existent example as being analogous to the government essentially creating and jump starting an entire industry - that has been maintained by the government ever since.


Since the government cannot rationally allocate resources...

Evidence? I would say the research that has come from the government has been far more beneficial than the continued reinventions of the same ideas that have come from the market. Compare microsoft's 'inventions' to that of the research that came out of the government in computing.



the money would have been better spent elsewhere.

Where is your evidence for any of this? What is your definition of 'better spent'? You're assuming that the market evaporated when the government started funding research. But the market did not evaporate and the market was not harmed in anyway.

The only thing the market did was take other people's ideas - ideas that were developed in the public trust, and make profits off them. This often leads to stagnation, as corporations only have an interest in going with a formula that works, rather than creating new ideas. That's why markets are inefficient.

Funding the computing industries and also getting involved in the automobile industry was one of the smartest things the government ever did. Had it been left to the market it would have stagnated. Of course, the market is so inefficient the government has to involve itself in nearly every single large industry, otherwise they start to collapse.


Also, like most political scientists, you have no idea what causes a depression. During the 20's, the FED lowered the interest rate below the markets rate of interest. This caused massive investments in higher order goods (which is why it was called the roaring 20's).

The Great Depression was not caused by lowered interest rates. It was caused primarily by freeing up the markets, few regulations on banks, a widening inequality of wealth (no purchasing power for the middle class), and so on. Thousands of banks during the great depression because of bad investments.

It was not caused entirely by the federal reserve. Before the Fed markets were even more boom and bust and unstable.



These investments were not backed by real savings, so many of the investments could not be completed. Instead of allowing the malinvestments to be liquidated, FDR propped them up and presented his "New Deal". So again, no market failure.

The New Deal came after the Great Depression and every single year following the New Deal the economy grew at a steady rate. It was one of the fastest recoveries in history and the average growth rate was higher than Reagan's supposedly prosperous 80s.

The factual evidence clearly contradicts your statements.


What is market failure? Can you cite an example? Maybe something from one of these very knowledgeable political scientists?

There are many examples of market failures. The coal industry combining with one another to artificially limit the supply of coal is one example. Since it was chaper and more profitable to fire workers and artificially limit supply than it was to provide more people with coal to heat their homes the companies combined to fix prices. That's an example of a market failure and an inefficient use of resources. The car industry took years to implement seat belts and other safety standards that were actually preferred by consumers but were more costly to car companies, so the government stepped in to federally regulate them. The aeronautical industry also was 'boom and bust' before the government got involved and started regulating air traffic and to this day is largely involved in aviation. The agricultural industry is another example of markets preferring cheap processed food at the expense of healthy food.

So, there are endless examples of market failures many of them documented by economists themselves.

The government had absolutely nothing to do with it. Had corporations not been inefficient and corrupt, there would have been no reason to get the government involved, as the government certainly doesn't like trying to manage the failures of capitalism.


The pentagon and the military are part of the government. Also, the government constantly wastes taxpayers money.

You've failed to name what exactly you think is a 'waste' - you've only made up an example.

Business executives waste money and resources on stupid ideas and inventions all the time. They also make bad decisions that weaken the economy and destroy their businesses. Enron failed AFTER negotiating with the government to deregulate the suppliers of energy, companies starting charging astronomical amounts for energy and got away with it because there was no regulation, leading to rolling blackouts. In contrast, the public utilities were fine.

Time and time again, deregulation is harmful to the public and society as a whole. I would consider capitalism itself to be a 'market failure,' one that can be solved by eliminating it.


However, property rights under fascism are practically nonexistent.

Property rights were the basis of the German and Italian economies. Corporations were given exclusive control over their property. In Germany, it was outlined in the charter of labor that the CEOs or the heads of corporations were allowed to have complete control over their companies. The economy was also capitalistic; there was no 'socialism' or 'communism' in Fascism at all.


Communism requires a government of some kind in order to work properly. How would A communist society without a state work? What if people don't want to join? What if a worker in a communist society wants to work for a capitalist?



You are so confused.

Communism does not require a government. There would be no 'capitalists' in a communist society because there would be no government to protect his property rights in such a way, so your questions do not even make any sense.

[IcarusAngel]

Often times, the government will ruin a nations economy, and the desperate people will turn to fascism for help. This is what happened in Germany.

No. Capitalists ruin their own economy. This is what happened in both Germany and Italy. They then turn to the government for help - as they did in both Germany and Italy - and often have the support of an ignorant populus who actually belives in the rhetoric propgated by corporations and state.

[QUOTE=Olaf;1555639There is no ruling class in a libertarian society. I do not accept capitalists as being members of a ruling class.[/QUOTE]

Of course capitalists are a ruling class. They are a small minority of the population and yet they control a majority of the wealth. They are thus able to gain a massive amount of power from their ownership of property to the point where they can have as much as, if not more, power than most governments. Corporations often bargin with governments of the the third world to gain access to their resources, which has driven the third world further into poverty.

We see the results of capitalism in the third world. They will only be able to build themselvs up when they start to have governments that are powerful enough to combat the capitalist class and provide stability in the economy, as the United States, Britain, Germany, and every other industrialized country has done.

[Lumpen Bourgeois]

Please don't tell me you consider America under the Reagan administration anything close to resembling a free market.

"Freer" markets, relative to the previous years, would probably be a better description of the Reagan era.


Social scientists and political scientists often know nothing about economics. I often want to tear my eyes out when I read the garbage that these people write. Also, I do not think a political scientist has shown a correlation between free markets and inefficiency. The hidden factor that discredits the theories is that they are false...Almost all the cases where political scientists claim the market has failed were actually instances of government intervention.

Maybe it's not necessarily the case that social scientists(do not economists fall into this category?) are completely ignorant of economics. Most probably just adhere to economic schools of thought that conflict with your free market Austrian perspective. Also you say in "almost all the cases where political scientists claim the market has failed were actually instances of government intervention". This implies that there are at least some cases or perhaps just one case in which the market actually does fail, according to that one statement. Can you name those instances or that one instance, please?



Since the government cannot rationally allocate resources, the money would have been better spent elsewhere.

Please explain further if you will? What's your definition of rationality and why do private firms and businesses necessarily always allocate goods rationally?



Businesses do other things with money besides inventing things. Also there is no reason to assume that a business would have invented the same exact product.

I think you meant to say that "there is no reason to assume that a business wouldn't have invented the same exact product." Again, could you expound here?



Yes. I am also saying many of the "inventions" made by Universities are a complete waste. Some may be useful, but that doesn't mean the money would have been better spent elsewhere.

So pretty much all publically funded scientific discoveries and inventions are complete wastes and it is only reasonable to believe that the infallible market would have invented them anyway. Am I understanding you correctly? By the way, are taxes so incredibly burdensome to private firms that they preclude them from conducting R&D that would have yielded similar discoveries and inventions? Your answer will be "yes", no doubt, but I need further explanation and perhaps evidence if you can marshal any.


What is market failure? Can you cite an example? Maybe something from one of these very knowledgeable political scientists?

Most market failures are discovered by economists, not political scientists the last time I checked. They just happen to be economists who have yet to be "enlightened" by the wisdom of the all knowledgeable austrian school, I suppose.

[Skooma Addict]

So you think that society should be run by a principle you don't even agree with? You want to force people to accept a principle you don't agree with. Whatever.

I realize that a libertarian society is not going to be comprised of angels who never violate each others rights. But the institutions which would deal with criminals would be far better than what we have now. I don't think I could force people to obey the NAP at all times even if I wanted to.


The NAP is the pro business aggression principle. It says, businesses are free to do what they want, regardless of the outcomes to the population. If it creates another Gilded Age, or mass starvation like neo-liberal economics do in the third world, so be it.

You do realize many government backed businesses violate the NAP all the time, right? Without government subsidies and privileges, businesses would not be able to get away with lots of the stuff they do now.


Evidence? And neo-classical economics is not at all pure free-market economics. It has ideas in it that come from socialists and marginalists as well. It is not Austrian economics at all.

I never said it was. But most mainstream economists are neoclassicals.



What they document are the basic facts of society altogether and where resources are going, and to whom they are going. A lot of what is known about the collusion of government and business and the inefficiences of markets and the rising inequality in them is because of their work.

No, their work is often wrong, and they often times have a political agenda. There is some good work by political scientists, but by and large the profession is a joke.


You certainly did commit a fallacy. You used a non-existent example as being analogous to the government essentially creating and jump starting an entire industry - that has been maintained by the government ever since.

I committed no fallacy. What fallacy do you think I committed?


Evidence? I would say the research that has come from the government has been far more beneficial than the continued reinventions of the same ideas that have come from the market. Compare microsoft's 'inventions' to that of the research that came out of the government in computing.

Either read about Hayeks Knowledge problem or Mises' Calculation problem, I just had a long discussion about this, and I don't feel lke having another one.

http://www.virtualschool.edu/mon/Economics/HayekUseOfKnowledge.html

http://mises.org/books/socialism/contents.aspx


Where is your evidence for any of this? What is your definition of 'better spent'? You're assuming that the market evaporated when the government started funding research. But the market did not evaporate and the market was not harmed in anyway.

It is not that difficult to understand. There is a limited supply of resources at any given time. Any resources that the government uses come at the private businesses expense. Read what I posted above for an in depth explanation of why the government is inefficient.



The only thing the market did was take other people's ideas - ideas that were developed in the public trust, and make profits off them. This often leads to stagnation, as corporations only have an interest in going with a formula that works, rather than creating new ideas. That's why markets are inefficient.

Corporations will do what is profitable. Sometimes it is good to create new inventions, and sometimes it is not. We don't need A rocket ship that can go to Mars.


Funding the computing industries and also getting involved in the automobile industry was one of the smartest things the government ever did. Had it been left to the market it would have stagnated. Of course, the market is so inefficient the government has to involve itself in nearly every single large industry, otherwise they start to collapse

You do realize that the entire reason the auto industry failed was because the government got involved in it, right? Also, many industries need to fail. It is good that there are no companies producing products that nobody wants or needs.


The Great Depression was not caused by lowered interest rates. It was caused primarily by freeing up the markets, few regulations on banks, a widening inequality of wealth (no purchasing power for the middle class), and so on. Thousands of banks during the great depression because of bad investments.

Explain how freeing up markets and widening inequality of wealth lead to malinvestments in higher order capital goods. Also, the entire reason why banks made bad investments was because the interest rate was artaficially lowered.


It was not caused entirely by the federal reserve. Before the Fed markets were even more boom and bust and unstable.


False.


The New Deal came after the Great Depression and every single year following the New Deal the economy grew at a steady rate. It was one of the fastest recoveries in history and the average growth rate was higher than Reagan's supposedly prosperous 80s.

The factual evidence clearly contradicts your statements.

The New deal came after the great depression, but the new deal only worsened the Depression. But I have no idea what you are talking about when you say that it was one of the fastest recoveries in history. We got out of the depression in 1946. Have you heard of the 1920 depression? It lasted only one year, and it started out worse than the great depression. But it only lasted one your because the government did absolutely nothing to try to combat the depression. The free market took care of itself.



There are many examples of market failures. The coal industry combining with one another to artificially limit the supply of coal is one example. Since it was chaper and more profitable to fire workers and artificially limit supply than it was to provide more people with coal to heat their homes the companies combined to fix prices. That's an example of a market failure and an inefficient use of resources. The car industry took years to implement seat belts and other safety standards that were actually preferred by consumers but were more costly to car companies, so the government stepped in to federally regulate them. The aeronautical industry also was 'boom and bust' before the government got involved and started regulating air traffic and to this day is largely involved in aviation. The agricultural industry is another example of markets preferring cheap processed food at the expense of healthy food.

The coal industry is heavily subsidized and there are only a few companies that are allowed to mine coal. Also, if the coal company limits supply, that means it is expending less resources, meaning other companies now have more resources to expend. So no market failure there. As for seat belts, if consumers preferred them, then they would have bought cars with seat belts. But they didn't. Maybe consumers didn't want to pay the extra cost for seat belts? No Market failure. The air tracking industry has always been heavily regulated. Also, booms and busts alone does not mean market failure. Markets provide cheap food because it is what consumers want. Nothing you listed is an example of market failure.


You've failed to name what exactly you think is a 'waste' - you've only made up an example.

Government spending.



Business executives waste money and resources on stupid ideas and inventions all the time. They also make bad decisions that weaken the economy and destroy their businesses. Enron failed AFTER negotiating with the government to deregulate the suppliers of energy, companies starting charging astronomical amounts for energy and got away with it because there was no regulation, leading to rolling blackouts. In contrast, the public utilities were fine.

The price of energy has to go up to its equilibrium level. Otherwise, you will have shortages. There are also many instances where public utilities have failed. Look at Water for example. In Texas, there are certain days where you cannot even water your own lawn. On A side note, ENRON is a quasi-monopoly.



Property rights were the basis of the German and Italian economies. Corporations were given exclusive control over their property. In Germany, it was outlined in the charter of labor that the CEOs or the heads of corporations were allowed to have complete control over their companies. The economy was also capitalistic; there was no 'socialism' or 'communism' in Fascism at all.

Are you referring to Germany under Hitler, and Italy under Mussolini?


Communism does not require a government. There would be no 'capitalists' in a communist society because there would be no government to protect his property rights in such a way, so your questions do not even make any sense.

Government is by definition a violation of property rights.

[Skooma Addict]

No. Capitalists ruin their own economy. This is what happened in both Germany and Italy.

No. In Germany, there was a huge debt tht had to be paid thanks to the traty of Versailles. The german Governemnt could not tax the citizens anymore than it already was because the population would rebel. So the German government inflated the money supply extensively in order to pay back the debt and get the economy rolling. There was an inflationary depression. People had to rush to buy things with wheelbarrows full of money becsaue the value of the German Marc was plummeting. So again, it was the governments fault. Just like most political scientists, you do not know what your talking about.


Of course capitalists are a ruling class. They are a small minority of the population and yet they control a majority of the wealth. They are thus able to gain a massive amount of power from their ownership of property to the point where they can have as much as, if not more, power than most governments. Corporations often bargin with governments of the the third world to gain access to their resources, which has driven the third world further into poverty.

We see the results of capitalism in the third world. They will only be able to build themselvs up when they start to have governments that are powerful enough to combat the capitalist class and provide stability in the economy, as the United States, Britain, Germany, and every other industrialized country has done.

Who do capitalists rule? Who is forced to obey the commands of a capitalist?


"Freer" markets, relative to the previous years, would probably be a better description of the Reagan era.

Well that isn't really saying much. Besides the national debt increased by over 30% under the Reagan administration. Why so many conservatives love this guy is beyond me.



Maybe it's not necessarily the case that social scientists(do not economists fall into this category?) are completely ignorant of economics. Most probably just adhere to economic schools of thought that conflict with your free market Austrian perspective. Also you say in "almost all the cases where political scientists claim the market has failed were actually instances of government intervention". This implies that there are at least some cases or perhaps just one case in which the market actually does fail, according to that one statement. Can you name those instances or that one instance, please?

In some cases, a political scientist will claim there was market failure when there was really no failure at all. There was no government intervention to cause a failure, but there was also no market failure. A "market failure" would be some kind of service that the market could not provide. But I think the market can provide all services effectively.


Please explain further if you will? What's your definition of rationality and why do private firms and businesses necessarily always allocate goods rationally?

Private businesses will allocate resources rationally because they operate under the markets price system. Lets say a tin mine collapses, and there is a reduced supply of tin. The price of tin will go up even though most producers and most consumers of tin do not know why. The fact that this occurs is a good thing. The price system will naturally help businesses decide where resources should be allocated. The government does not operate under the markets price system, so it cannot measure costs and therefore cannot rationally allocate resources.



I think you meant to say that "there is no reason to assume that a business wouldn't have invented the same exact product." Again, could you expound here?


That is not what I meant to say, lol. All I was doing was pointing out the obvious. But now that I look back on it, the sentence was pretty pointless.


So pretty much all publically funded scientific discoveries and inventions are complete wastes and it is only reasonable to believe that the infallible market would have invented them anyway. Am I understanding you correctly? By the way, are taxes so incredibly burdensome to private firms that they preclude them from conducting R&D that would have yielded similar discoveries and inventions? Your answer will be "yes", no doubt, but I need further explanation and perhaps evidence if you can marshal any.


I think we might misunderstand each other a little bit. I am not going to deny that some publicly funded discoveries can be beneficial. But I think the resources that went into these discoveries would have been better spent elsewhere. I do not know if the market would have yielded similar discoveries. All I know is that the resources would have gone to where there was a demand for them. As Hazlitt said, you have to look at the seen and the unseen.


Most market failures are discovered by economists, not political scientists the last time I checked. They just happen to be economists who have yet to be "enlightened" by the wisdom of the all knowledgeable austrian school, I suppose.

Austrians and mainstream economists do agree on many points. But most Austrians do not believe in market failure. There mainstream economists who write some really good stuff. Also, on a side note, many Austrians disagree over many issues.

[Skooma Addict]

I also apologize for any spelling mistakes. I had to type very fast because I am about to go eat. So I don't have time to proof read.

[IcarusAngel]

No, their work is often wrong, and they often times have a political agenda. There is some good work by political scientists, but by and large the profession is a joke.

The only profession that is a joke is the 'profession' of Austrian economics. They do not submit their writings to peer review, except to the peer review of one another. Political scientists often deal in cold, hard facts, like the facts of who is controlling the sources. Whereas you, on the other hand, are unable to provide even the most basic sources for anything you're talking. You only provide links to crackpots.


Either read about Hayeks Knowledge problem or Mises' Calculation problem, I just had a long discussion about this, and I don't feel lke having another one.

http://www.virtualschool.edu/mon/Economics/HayekUseOfKnowledge.html

http://mises.org/books/socialism/contents.aspx

So the only evidence you have are links to the Mises website and the theories of crackpots?

That is not 'evidence.' There is no difference in the government investing in the computing industry and markets investing in it in terms of what the ultimate value of the idea itself is. The value, of, say, computer programming languages is actually subjective. The government was able to pick up the slack in this case due to the inability of the corporations to pay for research into serious matters. Thus, they benefitted society greatly.

The market could easily compete with the government - but they know they cannot do things as efficiently as the government. This is why capitalists are so fearful of the public option, because they know that it will FORCE prices to come down in order for the corporations to remain competitive at all. This is yet ANOTHER market failure - the failure of corporations to provide everybody with reasonable health care.

So market failures are apparent in every industry, and in some cases, the the government practically has to take over an industry in order to fix it, as in health care, as well as in the aeronautical industry etc. (this was also government run for a while).

This is why capitalism is inherently statist. It requires the government to keep it moving a long, and why capitalists should be considered fascists or corporatists, considering where your ideology leads.


It is not that difficult to understand. There is a limited supply of resources at any given time. Any resources that the government uses come at the private businesses expense. Read what I posted above for an in depth explanation of why the government is inefficient.

And since businesses were sitting on their hands it was actually BETTER for the government to get involved to stimulate capitalism. That has always been a feature historical to capitalism, and always will be.


Corporations will do what is profitable. Sometimes it is good to create new inventions, and sometimes it is not. We don't need A rocket ship that can go to Mars.

You may not THINK we need a rocket ship that can go to Mars, but we may actually need it one day, and so it helps to begin research now. Many ideas in science have no apparent benefit to the public but as they are further and further developed, they have an enormous benefit.

This proves that the market is short-sighted, and thus the only 'calculation problem' is the inability of markets to plan ahead.



You do realize that the entire reason the auto industry failed was because the government got involved in it, right? Also, many industries need to fail. It is good that there are no companies producing products that nobody wants or needs.

The reason they failed was because of markets; not because of governments. The corporations lobbied the government to develop cars that were not fuel efficient and would lead to a quicker profit. The result was that they were out competed by foreign car companies.

That's another market failure - and these market failures have enormous costs because it's hard to restart such large industries.





The coal industry is heavily subsidized and there are only a few companies that are allowed to mine coal.

That has nothing to do with the fact that coal companies artificially limited supply. Prove that they only limited supply because of subsidization.


Also, if the coal company limits supply, that means it is expending less resources, meaning other companies now have more resources to expend.

No. It simply means they are artificially limiting supply, as Adam Smith predicted. They COMBINED that means they worked together to limit supply. That is absolutely a market failure and an inefficient method of using resources, which harms the public.


So no market failure there. As for seat belts, if consumers preferred them, then they would have bought cars with seat belts. But they didn't.

Actually, they did prefer cars with seatbelts and safety standards. Corporations simply didn't want to add them to all their cars as it would have costed a couple bucks more for their production costs. This is another example of a market failure because the corporations is not giving the consumer what he ultimately wants if he had choice between a car with seatbelts versus a car without one.



Maybe consumers didn't want to pay the extra cost for seat belts? No Market failure. The air tracking industry has always been heavily regulated. Also, booms and busts alone does not mean market failure. Markets provide cheap food because it is what consumers want. Nothing you listed is an example of market failure.

This is not the case. They actually favored the cars with seat belts. When corporations came out with the electric car, they sold rather well even though the corporation didn't market them effectively at all. They were pulled off the market not because of a lack of demand but because corporations felt they couldn't make enough profit off of them. However, had all cars gone electric the US could have vastly cut down on the amount of global warming pollutants put out by cars, which benefits everyone.

So that is another failure of markets: to get better standards of cars even though they are already availablee.


Government is by definition a violation of property rights.

Government is required to enforce property rights and especially the Misean principles you supposedly uphold.


No. In Germany, there was a huge debt tht had to be paid thanks to the traty of Versailles. The german Governemnt could not tax the citizens anymore than it already was because the population would rebel.

You're talking about wars and treaties that capitalist countries got themselves into over resources. That doesn't change the fact that Germany was in a depression and its economy was not 'socialist' or 'communist' but capitalistic.

You've already proven you have an inability to distinguish between things as basic as a capitalist economy versus a socialist one.


In some cases, a political scientist will claim there was market failure when there was really no failure at all. There was no government intervention to cause a failure, but there was also no market failure. A "market failure" would be some kind of service that the market could not provide. But I think the market can provide all services effectively.

No, a market failure occurs when the market is holding back technology, using inefficient production methods, not providing consumers with what they want, causing numerous externalities that it doesn't account for, and so on. These are all failures of capitalism - and that is why the government steps in as often as it does to correct it.

The 'markets' you're referring to also simply do not exist, because they are inherently unstable, unapplicable to the real world.

This is why you have no real sources, you can only cite Mises forums. But if you have no sources other than Mises forums, you might as well just admit your a kook.

[Skooma Addict]

The only profession that is a joke is the 'profession' of Austrian economics. They do not submit their writings to peer review, except to the peer review of one another.

Many Austrians are published in mainstream journals. True there are some Austrians who only peer review one another, but the same can be said for every other school of economics.


Political scientists often deal in cold, hard facts, like the facts of who is controlling the sources. Whereas you, on the other hand, are unable to provide even the most basic sources for anything you're talking. You only provide links to crackpots.

Political scientists have practically no knowledge in the fields they discuss. They have knowledge in politics, not in economics. They do not understand philosophy at all, and they take many institutions for granted.


So the only evidence you have are links to the Mises website and the theories of crackpots?

Is my first link from the Mises website? No. Also, you have an obsessive hatred of anything related to the Mises website.



The market could easily compete with the government - but they know they cannot do things as efficiently as the government. This is why capitalists are so fearful of the public option, because they know that it will FORCE prices to come down in order for the corporations to remain competitive at all. This is yet ANOTHER market failure - the failure of corporations to provide everybody with reasonable health care.

All your examples are flawed. You are using the most regulated industry (besides housing) as an example of market failure. Also, even if the market didn't provide everyone with "reasonable" (who decides whats reasonable?) health care, that would not be an example of market failure. Do you even know what market failure means?


And since businesses were sitting on their hands it was actually BETTER for the government to get involved to stimulate capitalism. That has always been a feature historical to capitalism, and always will be.

Still clinging to the myths you learned in high school?


You may not THINK we need a rocket ship that can go to Mars, but we may actually need it one day, and so it helps to begin research now. Many ideas in science have no apparent benefit to the public but as they are further and further developed, they have an enormous benefit.

Now, think of all the resources that went into making a rocket ship that can go to Mars...those resources would have been spent elsewhere. What a pathetic waste of time and resources.


This proves that the market is short-sighted, and thus the only 'calculation problem' is the inability of markets to plan ahead.

Markets do plan ahead. Unlike government officials who plan for the next 4 to 6 years.



The reason they failed was because of markets; not because of governments. The corporations lobbied the government to develop cars that were not fuel efficient and would lead to a quicker profit. The result was that they were out competed by foreign car companies.

Are you just making this stuff up? The reason the Auto industries failed was because they could not hire cheaper labor.


That's another market failure - and these market failures have enormous costs because it's hard to restart such large industries.


A failing company is not an example of market failure.


That has nothing to do with the fact that coal companies artificially limited supply. Prove that they only limited supply because of subsidization.

If there were more coal companies, then it would be more difficult to limit supply. But anyways, limiting supply is not necessarily a bad thing.


No. It simply means they are artificially limiting supply, as Adam Smith predicted. They COMBINED that means they worked together to limit supply. That is absolutely a market failure and an inefficient method of using resources, which harms the public.


Yes. If they are limiting supply, then they are expending less resources. So these resources are now free to be allocated to other projects.


Actually, they did prefer cars with seatbelts and safety standards. Corporations simply didn't want to add them to all their cars as it would have costed a couple bucks more for their production costs. This is another example of a market failure because the corporations is not giving the consumer what he ultimately wants if he had choice between a car with seatbelts versus a car without one.

If consumers want cars with seat belts, then they also have to pay for the addition of these seat belts. Sure, people would have liked free seat belts, but the fact that they did not get any is an example of market failure. If people really wanted seat belts, and they were willing to pay for them, then companies would have provided them.


This is not the case. They actually favored the cars with seat belts. When corporations came out with the electric car, they sold rather well even though the corporation didn't market them effectively at all. They were pulled off the market not because of a lack of demand but because corporations felt they couldn't make enough profit off of them.

Good. We don't want money being spent on products that waste resources. If the company didn't profit, that means the costs were too great, which means the company was wasting resources.


So that is another failure of markets: to get better standards of cars even though they are already availablee.


Not an example of market failure. There are always better standards available. You want the market to start building 2 billion dollar cars? Because I am sure the highst standard possible would be very expensive.



Government is required to enforce property rights and especially the Misean principles you supposedly uphold.

False.



You're talking about wars and treaties that capitalist countries got themselves into over resources. That doesn't change the fact that Germany was in a depression and its economy was not 'socialist' or 'communist' but capitalistic.

You've already proven you have an inability to distinguish between things as basic as a capitalist economy versus a socialist one.

Did I say Germany was a communist country? No. I said its depression was the result of government intervention in the economy. What I said was true.


No, a market failure occurs when the market is holding back technology, using inefficient production methods, not providing consumers with what they want, causing numerous externalities that it doesn't account for, and so on.

That is the worst definition of a market failure I have ever read in my life. There are always some companies using inefficient production methods, and consumers are never provided with everything they want. A market failure is some existing service that the market cannot provide.


This is why you have no real sources, you can only cite Mises forums. But if you have no sources other than Mises forums, you might as well just admit your a kook.

Well, unless your blind, you would have known one of my sources was not from the Mises website. Also, Hayek won the Nobel prize in economics, so there are thousands of sources I could use for him.

[spice756]

Fail. Under fascism (<<<< note correct spelling), the government has total control of everything. It can involve corporatism, in which business is effectively socialised and is just an extension of the government.



I thought fascism is pro-free market and private ownership? They pro- rich and class sytem?

[Skooma Addict]

I thought fascism is pro-free market and private ownership?

No, people who tell you this are either lying or they honestly don't know any better. Fascism is anti-free market. Many businesses are nationalized under fascism, and the right to private property is violated. Although property rights may not be completely destroyed, fascism is still a huge violation of property rights.

[IcarusAngel]

Many Austrians are published in mainstream journals. True there are some Austrians who only peer review one another, but the same can be said for every other school of economics.

The vast majority of what is the articles and PDFs on Mises forums are not published in mainstream journals. There are very few Austrians in mainstream economics.


Political scientists have practically no knowledge in the fields they discuss.

Right. They have no knowledge of politics. Your bizarre opinions on political science are irrelevant to this topic.


Is my first link from the Mises website? No. Also, you have an obsessive hatred of anything related to the Mises website.

I don't like crackpots or fase 'axiomatic' systems that are roads to no where.


All your examples are flawed. You are using the most regulated industry (besides housing) as an example of market failure. Also, even if the market didn't provide everyone with "reasonable" (who decides whats reasonable?) health care, that would not be an example of market failure. Do you even know what market failure means?

It would be an example of a market failure because it's an example of something that a market COULD do and maintain high profitability, perhaps even higher profitability, but chooses an inefficient, ineffective system anyway. That is the exact definition of a market failure: that it is failing the public largely due to economics.


Still clinging to the myths you learned in high school?

There are no myths here. I also don't even know if you went to high school considering they do not teach political science in high school in America. You're from another county?


Now, think of all the resources that went into making a rocket ship that can go to Mars...those resources would have been spent elsewhere. What a pathetic waste of time and resources.

I would rather have the resources and money to a rocket ship to mars than sitting in the vaults of the Waltons or being used to maintain uninnovative corporate industry.



Are you just making this stuff up? The reason the Auto industries failed was because they could not hire cheaper labor.

You are a troll. They have decent wages in other countries like Japan and they did not fail. Furthermore, the car industry WAS able to exploit cheap labor in Mexico.

GM even sent dozens of its plants down there to build cars. This is internal trade between the corporation. But it did NOT improve the lives of the Mexicans, in fact they went into one of the worst recessions in their history AFTER neo-liberal trade was implemented.



A failing company is not an example of market failure.

I agree market failure doesn't mean a company failes: it could fail for a lot of reasons. But it is a market failure if the company wasn't using their resources efficiently and thus they are allowing a huge industry to fail in which they have virtually no competition in the case of some industries.

Trained monkeys could do better jobs than corporations.


Ultimately, you want power in the hands of incompetent and idiotic CEOs, most of which do not even invent the very products and resources that they're selling, but rather are the inventions of other people.

Furthermore, the only 'democracy' you want is the democracy of rich people buying and trading with each other, which means primarily participation by the top 20% even though the decisions they make affects everybody.

Real democracy - in political science theory - means participation by everybody in an economy, which would include democratic participation in the work place and in the production place.

Now, there are areas of society that have this freedom, ironically, they are government funded industries like the sciences and so on - people do democratically participate and learn from each other. There are also things like the GNU operating system, which would take a corporation over a billion dollars to develop (talk about market inefficiency).

So even in our society there have been ways to escape capitalist tyranny. But what you advocate is corporatism or plutocracy. How's that for political science? Be sure to look up what the terms mean.




That is the worst definition of a market failure I have ever read in my life. There are always some companies using inefficient production methods, and consumers are never provided with everything they want. A market failure is some existing service that the market cannot provide.


No, a market failure is when the market is inefficiently using resources in such a way that the entire public is affected. It is indeed a mix of political-economic theory:

"In economics, a market failure exists when the production (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufacturing) or use of goods and services (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goods_and_services) by the market (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market) is not efficient (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Efficiency_(economics))."

It has nothing to do with market not being able to provide the service, but rather that it is inefficient.

Did you ask a Misean to give you a definition of market failure and that's what he said?

Here are some free-market failures:


Automobile Safety: The auto industry fought for decades to prevent mandatory seat-belts, air-bags and other critical safety features. Why? Because adding such life-saving devices cut into profits.

Auto Mechanics: It's almost a certainty: the final bill will exceed the original estimate. Even worse: mechanics who make unnecessary repairs.

The Battle of the Taxi-Cabs: You want the lowest fare possible, but your cabbie wants the highest. As a result, the shortest distance between two points is often a crooked line.

The Cable Industry: After deregulation in 1984, cable prices soared, quality of programming plummeted, and service providers began selling their channels in indivisible blocs to prevent subscribers from voting with their dollars. From 1986 to 1990, the cost of basic service rose 56 percent -- twice the rate of inflation.

The Corporate Special Interest System: So who's bribing our Congress? In 1992, corporations formed 67 percent of all PACs, and they donated 79 percent of all contributions to political parties. This poses a dilemma to believers in the invisible hand: how do you condemn today's government without condemning the free market that controls it? A better alternative: democracy.

Corporate Welfare: Private enterprise is quite adept at feeding at the public trough, despite its professed antagonism for government. One of the most famous examples is the Wool and Mohair Lobby, which receives $100 million a year for a product the Pentagon no longer needs. Estimates of corporate welfare run from $85 billion to $800 billion a year.

The Cuyahoga River: This Ohio river was so polluted by industrial waste that it caught fire three times. Government stepped in and ordered a $1.5 billion cleanup. Today, the river is clean.

The Drug Industry: According to Dr. George Silver, a professor at the Yale University School of Medicine, about 22 percent of the 6 billion doses of antibiotic medicine each year are overprescribed, resulting in 2,000 to 10,000 unnecessary deaths annually.

The Exploding Ford Pinto: Ford knew for years that it would cost only $11 per Pinto to correct defective gas tanks that exploded upon impact. The company decided it was cheaper to let its customers burn and pay out damages to victims or their families instead. (More (http://www.aliveness.com/kangaroo/Pinto.htm))

The Exxon-Valdez Oil Spill: The oil industry has long fought to defeat laws requiring double-hulled oil tankers. And what few oil-spill cleanup measures existed at Prince William Sound were ones that legislators had mandated. These measures failed miserably when the single-hulled Exxon Valdez ran aground and spilled 11 million gallons of oil into Alaska's most scenic waters.

Global Warming: Despite the fact that the National Academy of Sciences is "90 percent sure" that global warming is occurring, the fossil fuel industry is resisting all change. It has even formed the "Global Climate Coalition," a public relations group that attempts to convince the public that global warming is a myth.

Insurance Companies: This industry is famous for battling its own customers in court to avoid paying awards. It has shut out patients with pre-existing conditions, allowing them to die to preserve profits. It has reduced hospital stays for mothers giving birth to 24 hours ("drive-by deliveries") to cut coverage costs.

Jack-in-the-Box: In 1993, E. coli poisoning from undercooked hamburgers killed three Seattle children and sickened hundreds of others. It is estimated that foodborne illness affects anywhere from 6.5 million up to 81 million people a year. About 9,000 die from E. coli and salmonella alone. Yet the food industry has heavily lobbied Congress to deregulate and relax federal food inspection standards.

Love Canal: Between 1942 and 1954, the Hooker Chemical and Plastics Corporation dumped 22,000 tons of 248 assorted chemicals in and around Love Canal. Despite claims to the contrary, Hooker neither adequately disposed of the chemicals nor fully warned property buyers of the risks. After a sharp rise in cancer rates and birth deformities, President Carter declared Love Canal a federal disaster area and over 1,000 households were permanently evacuated from their homes. (More (http://www.aliveness.com/kangaroo/Lovecanal.htm))

McDonald's: For years, London Greenpeace distributed a brochure criticizing McDonald's role in rainforest destruction, labor exploitation, animal abuses, unhealthy food and child manipulation. McDonald's first infiltrated the group with spies, then attempted to censor the protesters by suing them in court for libel. The case became the longest in British libel history when the defendents put up a surprisingly strong defense. The case received international attention and became a major public relations disaster for McDonald's when their own witnesses actually confirmed the brochure's criticisms. (See McSpotlight (http://www.mcspotlight.org/home.html))

The Media (Part 1): The primary goal of the media is to make money, not educate. Thus, news programs attempt to attract viewers by titillating them with controversy, scandal, sensationalism, sex, violence and demagoguery. The trend towards "punch" journalism has reduced the average sound bite from 42 seconds in 1968 to 8 seconds in 1992.

The Media (Part 2): The media is being increasingly monopolized by corporate owners, and they depend on corporations for their advertising dollars. Not surprisingly, the media is virtually uncritical of corporate America. In 1989, the three major networks devoted only 2.3 percent of the news to worker's issues -- like workplace safety, child care and income disparity -- despite the fact that workers constitute the largest share of their audience.

The Minimum Wage: Business owners say market forces should determine entry-level wages, not the government. But the job market does not operate by the usual laws of supply and demand. The economy is kept at a 6 percent unemployment rate (the "natural rate of unemployment") for reasons beneficial to business. Because there are more workers than jobs, it's an employer's market, and employers can therefore force entry-level wages below the poverty level. (More (http://www.aliveness.com/kangaroo/Minimumwage.htm))

Monopolies: In unregulated economies, relentless competition first leads to a wave of business failures, followed by the rise of monopolies. Economists condemn monopolies for their price-gouging, low-quality products, inefficiency and abuses of power.

New Coke: Everyone remembers Coca-Cola's disastrous experiment with New Coke, and it's hasty return to "Coke Classic." What most people don't know is that the outraged public got another poke in the eye by a recalcitrant Coke management, in that they actually gave so-called "Coke Classic" a higher fructose content. Truly, the customer is king…

Ozone Depletion: It took growing scientific warnings from 1975 to 1986 before Dupont even conceded that CFCs were responsible for destroying the ozone layer. Since then, it has dragged its feet coming to a full ban on ozone-depleting chemicals.

Path Dependency: Economists have chronicled hundreds of examples where an accident of history put the economy on a path from which it is almost impossible to diverge, even though better paths show up. Example include the inferior QWERTY typewriter keyboard, the gasoline engine and the VHS video system. (More (http://www.aliveness.com/kangaroo/Pathdependency.htm))

Planned Obsolescence: Lifetime light bulbs, run-free nylons, durable heels for tennis shoes and long-life answering machines were all invented a long time ago. Businesses do not market them because they would go out of business after the initial flurry of sales. Even small-time entrepreneurs willing to make money for a short time find it difficult to break into these markets, because the majors can force them out with lawsuits, market-manipulations, artificially low prices, lobbying, etc.

Pollution: This is probably the most famous example of free market failure. Usually, dumping pollution is cheaper than treating it. But businesses conduct slick advertising campaigns to convince the public that they are stalwart defenders of the environment. Environmentalists call these P.R. efforts "ecopornography."

The Prisoner's Dilemma: This is an irony that occurs frequently in life. Two individuals are faced with the opportunity to cooperate to acheive a good result. However, following their own self-interest with impeccable logic, they shun cooperation and come to a worse result. A strong refutation to the invisible hand. For details, see More (http://www.aliveness.com/kangaroo/Prisonerdilemma.htm).

Recessions and Depressions: Recessions have been a recurring feature of the American economy for centuries, even during the era of laissez-faire, when government left the economy almost entirely alone. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, eight American recessions worsened into depressions. (For the cure to this free-market malady, see "Government Success Stories.")

The San Francisco Bay Bridge: This is a well-known failure of the invisible hand. Commuters, following their own individual best interests, contribute to a traffic jam that is far worse than if they followed a group-based solution. The details can be found in More (http://www.aliveness.com/kangaroo/Baybridge.htm).

Savings and Loan Bail-Out: After the Savings & Loan industry was deregulated in 1982, fraud and abuse quickly ran rampant. After 650 S&Ls went under, taxpayers discovered they were left holding a $500 billion bill.

Silicon Breast Implants: Dow Corning and other corporations knew that silicon breast implants were leaky when they marketed them. In 1994, these manufacturers agreed to pay $4.75 billion to 60,000 stricken women - although that sum may rise pending further court action.

The Superfund: After the Love Canal disaster, Congress created the Superfund program to clean up the nation's thousands of toxic dump sites. The polluters responsible are supposed to defray the costs, but corporations sue in court to minimize their liability. Between 1986 and 1989, insurers spent $1.3 billion on Superfund clean-up and litigation -- with $1.2 billion of that going to their lawyers alone!

Three-Mile Island: Improperly trained crews were mostly to blame for the partial meltdown of one of the reactors, which released radiation into the air and water before it was contained. Gordon MacLeod, the Pennsylvania Secretary of Health, was fired after voicing his concern that both the industry's and the state's nuclear accident response plans were grossly inadequate.

The Tobacco Industry: Despite the fact that tobacco kills 420,000 people a year directly, and another 50,000 by second-hand smoke, tobacco companies still spike their cigarettes with nicotine to make them more addictive. Advertising campaigns specifically target teenagers to replace older, dying smokers.

The Toy Industry: American toys are generally manufactured in China, whose workforce includes slave labor. Many of these prisoners are political dissidents under a regime that slaughtered hundreds of democratic protesters at Tianenmen Square. Toy manufacturers think their profits are more important than sanctioning China for its abusive human rights record.

Unnecessary Surgery: Many studies have determined that about 2 to 3 million unnecessary operations are performed each year, resulting in 12,000 to 16,000 deaths. These figures are determined by comparing the surgery rates of doctors who have a profit incentive in recommending surgery to those who do not

http://www.aliveness.com/kangaroo/Marketfailures.htm




Well, unless your blind, you would have known one of my sources was not from the Mises website. Also, Hayek won the Nobel prize in economics, so there are thousands of sources I could use for him.


People win Nobel prizes all the time for idiotic theories. This is evidenced by the very fact that they even give a nobel prize in economics. It's like giving a nobel prize in weather forcasting - economics is a very error prone field. What matters is that economics has moved beyond Hayek though, and he isn't coming back.


You are just trolling at this point, you have no defense for libertarian economics.

[IcarusAngel]

I thought fascism is pro-free market and private ownership? They pro- rich and class sytem?


It is. This is how all fascist systems were structured. I recommend the Anatomy of Fascism - which as the end notes some similarities between fascism and Western capitalism - or really almost all of the political literature out there on fascism will explain that it has capitalism as its backbone. The Nazi charter of labor, for example, gave corporations and capitalists the exclusive right to do what they want with their land.

This is the problem with capitalism, it always leads into the class system and corporate strcuture. It can be semi-democratic, but a Reagan or a Thatcher, or a Pinochet etc., and you begin to see a shift away from democracy into pure capitalism where the government only 'manages the affairs of the capitalist class' so to speak.

If you read a lot of political science you'll see that sometimes the conclusions they draw are almost identical to the ones Marx made - like the Golden theory of politics and so on.

Olaf has no formal training in political science or social science in general. Given his poor arguments I would be surprised if he even has any training from Mises University.

[Skooma Addict]

The vast majority of what is the articles and PDFs on Mises forums are not published in mainstream journals. There are very few Austrians in mainstream economics.

Hutt, White, Bottke, Yeaker, Selgin, and Horwitz are some. But anyways, it is not like only god economists are published in mainstream journals.


Right. They have no knowledge of politics. Your bizarre opinions on political science are irrelevant to this topic.

I wish political scientists would stick to politics.


It would be an example of a market failure because it's an example of something that a market COULD do and maintain high profitability, perhaps even higher profitability, but chooses an inefficient, ineffective system anyway. That is the exact definition of a market failure: that it is failing the public largely due to economics.

Americas health care system is not a free market health care system.


There are no myths here. I also don't even know if you went to high school considering they do not teach political science in high school in America. You're from another county?

I'm from America. I'm taking a political science course in college and it is a joke.


I would rather have the resources and money to a rocket ship to mars than sitting in the vaults of the Waltons or being used to maintain uninnovative corporate industry.


But that's not where the resources would go. The resources would go to the highest bidder.


You are a troll. They have decent wages in other countries like Japan and they did not fail. Furthermore, the car industry WAS able to exploit cheap labor in Mexico.

I am a troll? I believe this is the opposing ideologies forum. Also, you tried to connect a crazy lunatic to the libertarian movement. Also, it is a well known fact that Unions were able to prevent wages from falling.


GM even sent dozens of its plants down there to build cars. This is internal trade between the corporation. But it did NOT improve the lives of the Mexicans, in fact they went into one of the worst recessions in their history AFTER neo-liberal trade was implemented.

Correlation does not imply causation.


So even in our society there have been ways to escape capitalist tyranny. But what you advocate is corporatism or plutocracy. How's that for political science? Be sure to look up what the terms mean.

Well you do sound like a typical political scientist....Ill give you that.


No, a market failure is when the market is inefficiently using resources in such a way that the entire public is affected. It is indeed a mix of political-economic theory:

"In economics, a market failure exists when the production (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manufacturing) or use of goods and services (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goods_and_services) by the market (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market) is not efficient (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Efficiency_%28economics%29)."

It has nothing to do with market not being able to provide the service, but rather that it is inefficient.

Did you ask a Misean to give you a definition of market failure and that's what he said?

What a terrible definition of market failure. So I invent a new product and then I produce it inefficiently. According to your definition, this is an example of market failure.



You are just trolling at this point, you have no defense for libertarian economics.

Well I can't let you get away with spreading lies and slandering libertarianism.

[Skooma Addict]

Don't listen to IcarusAngel, he is disingenuous and he tries to link crazy lunatics with the libertarian movement. Maybe he realizes his socialist arguments cannot stand up to libertarian critiques? Although there are some decent political scientists, I would not recommend reading much from them.


Olaf has no formal training in political science or social science in general. Given his poor arguments I would be surprised if he even has any training from Mises University.


Do you have formal training in political science? I also have never been to the Mises institute in my life. But It doesn't take a genius to realize the flaws in socialism. Look at the laughably pathetic LTV for example.

[IcarusAngel]

Hutt, White, Bottke, Yeaker, Selgin, and Horwitz are some. But anyways, it is not like only god economists are published in mainstream journals.

And where are their articles?

Actually, Miseans have their own periodicals that they publish in:



Seven Periodicals

Our monthly The Free Market (http://mises.org/periodical.aspx?Id=1) examines the economic and political scene from a classical-liberal viewpoint. The Austrian Economics Newsletter (http://mises.org/periodical.aspx?Id=6) links our academic network with in-depth interviews. The Mises Review (http://mises.org/periodical.aspx?Id=2) surveys new books. The Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics (http://www.qjae.org/) (the successor journal to the Review of Austrian Economics (http://www.qjae.org/roae.asp)), is the premier setting for new research and ideas in economics. The Journal of Libertarian Studies (http://mises.org/periodical.aspx?Id=3), the scholarly venue for political theory and applications from 1997-2008, has been succeeded by Libertarian Papers (http://libertarianpapers.org/), established in 2009.


http://mises.org/about.aspx


What's interesting is that they say seven periodicals but they really only list five of them.



I wish political scientists would stick to politics.

Well, at one time politics and economics were interconnected. They used to call it political-economy, for example.




Americas health care system is not a free market health care system.

Which can't exist.


I'm from America. I'm taking a political science course in college and it is a joke.

Fair enough. Some people enjoy political science. I'm not even in political science by the way and have only taken two, maybe three polisci classes in my life.

However, since I have access to political science journals I enjoy reading them.


What a terrible definition of market failure. So I invent a new product and then I produce it inefficiently. According to your definition, this is an example of market failure.


IT IS A MARKET FAILURE. Because you're not using the most efficient means to produce, society will start to lag. You seem to think that there are unlimited resources even though economics the study of limited resources. So if markets are inefficient, everybody is harmed.

Marxists reply by claiming that markets should be eliminated altogether as the fundamental problem is private property. I disagree, I think the fundamental problem is Libertairan thinking.


Well I can't let you get away with spreading lies and slandering libertarianism.


I'm a libertarian in the sense that I oppose corporations and government and am for free-speech and all negative liberties, but I simply have a different definition of property than the ones libertarians use.

[Skooma Addict]

And where are their articles?

google.


Fair enough. Some people enjoy political science. I'm not even in political science by the way and have only taken two, maybe three polisci classes in my life.

However, since I have access to political science journals I enjoy reading them.

Well its better than most stuff people read I guess. There is good stuff out there, it's just hard to find.


IT IS A MARKET FAILURE. Because you're not using the most efficient means to produce, society will start to lag. You seem to think that there are unlimited resources even though economics the study of limited resources. So if markets are inefficient, everybody is harmed.

Well, we just have different definitions of market failure. I also don't think there are unlimited resources. But your definition of market failure is very odd. So A company that invents a cure for cancer and then produces that cure inefficiently is an example of a market failure? Odd....



I'm a libertarian in the sense that I oppose corporations and government and am for free-speech and all negative liberties, but I simply have a different definition of property than the ones libertarians use.

Wait, so your not a communist? That would have been nice to know....

[IcarusAngel]

New info on this case:

The guy who was lynched had been bound with duck tape and gagged, and was naked, according to the person who found him.

So, apparently he stripped himself naked, gagged himself, then put duck tape over his eyes, then hanged himself from a true where his feet where his feet were touching the ground?

To a normal person this has homicide written all over I'm not sure what they're waiting for (they still refuse to classify it as a homicide).

They're already bringing on the right wing milita experts, who say it could be the following:

Right wing militias (duh)

Drug growers and dealers.

Someone who knew the guy and was smart enough to make it look like a political ploy.

One and two are the most reasonable, and I doubt a drug dealer would be smart enough to think of making it look like a political stunt, but you would imagine they'd be smart enough to avoid hanging a census worker.

I think people are mad about this because the reasoning behind is so asinine and there is concern that something like this could happen again.

Keep in mind right-wingers have come up with new conspiracy theories about the 'census' being a spy agency, or some other incoherent rhetoric. (Michelle Bachman, a congresswoman, refused to fill out a census. Americans have allowed kooky right-wing conspiracy theorists into our own government.)

The good thing that can possibly come from this is that the right-wing militia movement will be so embarrassed by it that maybe they'll think twice before they blow up a federal building full of children in it again.

[Tungsten]

The only profession that is a joke is the 'profession' of Austrian economics. They do not submit their writings to peer review, except to the peer review of one another.

How many opinions on here have been peer reviewed and where will I find the papers?


The market could easily compete with the government - but they know they cannot do things as efficiently as the government.


I find opinions like this amusing coming from people whose aleged goal is a "stateless society". Not very convincing.


You may not THINK we need a rocket ship that can go to Mars, but we may actually need it one day, and so it helps to begin research now. Many ideas in science have no apparent benefit to the public but as they are further and further developed, they have an enormous benefit.

This proves that the market is short-sighted, and thus the only 'calculation problem' is the inability of markets to plan ahead.


One person gives an opinion, and you consider it proof that the market in general is short-sighted?

In reality, we don't need a manned mission to mars. Especially not when sending robots is a hundredfold cheaper.


Actually, they did prefer cars with seatbelts and safety standards. Corporations simply didn't want to add them to all their cars as it would have costed a couple bucks more for their production costs.

The car companies that did add seatbelts would have had greater appeal to safety-minded consumers and given them an advantage; there's a reason many people buy volvos and suvs.


When corporations came out with the electric car, they sold rather well even though the corporation didn't market them effectively at all.

No they didn't sell rather well. There was a large initial interest, which quickly faded when people saw the price (rare earth metals don't come cheap) and the range (and the recharge time).

Most people didn't see the point in paying more for less.


So that is another failure of markets: to get better standards of cars even though they are already availablee.

A car that takes 8 hours to re-fuel and has quarter of the range of a conventional one isn't "better". The technology doesn't yet exist to make it worthwhile.


You're talking about wars and treaties that capitalist countries got themselves into over resources.

What resources was it over?

[Bud Struggle]

It's drug dealers--nothing political. They guy either saw something or the paranoid a-hole dealers thought he saw something.

The dealers are looking to have someone else take the fall.

That's it.

[IcarusAngel]

It's drug dealers--nothing political. They guy either saw something or the paranoid a-hole dealers thought he saw something.

This has come out in the news?



The dealers are looking to have someone else take the fall.

That's it.


You seriously think drug dealers are smart enough to divert attention away from themselves by blaming some obscure political group (libertarians)? Apparently, the area where the body is found has a long history of anti-federal government, pro states rights nonsense. Perhaps the drug dealers themselves are the Libertarians.

What's interesting is that the FBI is so recluctant to classify this as any kind of political crime at all, or even a homicide. Probably because they are afraid of stirring up any kind of hostility that might come as a result of this political crime.

The chickens are coming home to roost. It was only a matter of time before we saw violence not only from the Army of God and Operation Rescule, but these states rights, far right goons as well. And really, it all fits into the domain of 'ultra-rightism.'

[IcarusAngel]

How many opinions on here have been peer reviewed and where will I find the papers?

No one said Revleft was 'peer reviewed.'


I find opinions like this amusing coming from people whose aleged goal is a "stateless society". Not very convincing.

The 'market' in America is the result of state protected resources and trade regulations. You can only participate in it if you agree with capitalist property rights. If I developed a computer program in America that violated Microsoft's patents, I would be sued.

These 'markets' that we have are government backed, but they approximate the type of society that Libertarians advocate - one in where corporations are given free reign and corporations can own property.

That they can't even compete with the government - which protects them and gives them millions of dollars - shows how ultimately inefficient and uselss they are.


The car companies that did add seatbelts would have had greater appeal to safety-minded consumers and given them an advantage; there's a reason many people buy volvos and suvs.

Where is your evidence for this. The car companies did add seat belts on certain cars bu tthey took them out again. It wasn't until the government stepped in that all cars got necessary safety features.

And SUVs aren't inherently safer. They're safer when two cars collide into one another and the other car is the SUV. However, there are many problems with SUVs like the railings on roads and highways not being high enough to prevent SUVs from going over them.

Furthermore, SUVs are more likely to hit pedistrians and so on, and since SUVs have been on the market the deaths per 100,000 from automobile accidents has actually gone up.

The reason the rates were going down is because compact cars with their safety features prevented the impact from affecting the drivers and the passengers as much. SUVs have actually reversed that trent.

No they didn't sell rather well. There was a large initial interest, which quickly faded when people saw the price (rare earth metals don't come cheap) and the range (and the recharge time).

You're making crap up again. First of all they were never actually sold to anybody, they were leased on 2 year periods I believe as trial cars.

Second, their waiting lists were huge. this PROVES a demand for the cars. And most people don't need a car that will take them across the state. I, for one, would have preferred an electric car although I never even had a chance to voice my opinion for one.

Third, these cars could have cut Global Warming pollutants by as much as 70 percent:

"Notably, even if BEVs are recharged with electricity from power plants that use fossil fuels, they are up to 99 percent cleaner than conventional vehicles and can cut global warming emissions by as much as 70 percent. "

http://www.ucsusa.org/clean_vehicles/technologies_and_fuels/hybrid_fuelcell_and_electric_vehicles/battery-electric-vehicles.html

This should also be taken into account, since when you drive a car it affects everybody, namely their air quality.

So, indeed, the failure to protect the public would indeed be another 'market failure.'

[Tungsten]

No one said Revleft was 'peer reviewed.'

So on what grounds do you dismiss Austrian economics? You don't believe it has been peer reviewed. I guess yours can therefore be dismissed similarly.


Blah blah blah

Yes, I know the "market" is protected by the government. It neednt be, as the market, as well as property is generally emergent concept. I don't support the existence of corprations so you can pack that in.


Where is your evidence for this.

Use some common sense. If some people are safety minded, it follows that they're going to buy a car that is highly rated, or at least appears to be highly rated on safety.


The car companies did add seat belts on certain cars bu tthey took them out again. It wasn't until the government stepped in that all cars got necessary safety features.

"Pray to the government and it will solve all our problems" again. Would anyone today buy a car without seatbelts even if one was available? I doubt it.


And SUVs aren't inherently safer...straw man...another straw man etc.

I didn't say they were. People's perception of them is that they are safe to drive. That's the reason for people buy them. That's what I said, nothing more.


You're making crap up again. First of all they were never actually sold to anybody, they were leased on 2 year periods I believe as trial cars.

Second, their waiting lists were huge. this PROVES a demand for the cars.

And as I said, the waiting lists shrunk significantly when they realised the limitations. I watched the movie "Who killed the electric car?" some prick appeared on their claiming that it was unfair that people were told about the limitations.


And most people don't need a car that will take them across the state. I, for one, would have preferred an electric car although I never even had a chance to voice my opinion for one.

They're pretty much screwed if they do.

"BEVs have range limitations of 50-100 miles per charge depending on battery type and driving conditions."

"Depending on driving conditions" is salespeak. It translates as follows: In optimum conditions (you knew that cold weather reduced the range considerably, right?) on a billiard-ball surface without putting the lights, radio or air condioning on, you'd be lucky to get 50 miles before a recharge.



Third, these cars could have cut Global Warming pollutants by as much as 70 percent:

"Notably, even if BEVs are recharged with electricity from power plants that use fossil fuels, they are up to 99 percent cleaner than conventional vehicles and can cut global warming emissions by as much as 70 percent. "


There's a sucker born every minute. You need to read up on basic science. What does it mean by "cleaner"? Does it mean 99% more efficient? Not likely. A car engine is about 30% efficient. How can a power plant is 99% more efficient than that? Do the math. Also, does that include the losses via getting it to the recharging point in the first place? And you're forgetting something else; the extra power plants that would need to be built in order to meet the significant increase in demand.

[Demogorgon]

So on what grounds do you dismiss Austrian economics? You don't believe it has been peer reviewed. I guess yours can therefore be dismissed similarly.

Notice he said RevLeft is not peer-reviewed. The opinions we site here have been however. Very extensively in fact owing to them being very controversial. Check economic journals. Austrian "economists" can hardly ever get published because they separate themselves from the discipline by ignoring empirical evidence and refusing to use mathematical proofs, Marxian economists on the other hand use acceptable methodology and can get published and regularly are.

The only real exception is Hayek who was able to achieve a lot of attention owing to his backing by a number of right wing Elements, particularly in the Bank of Sweden's nomination committee for the Nobel memorial prize and also down to the fact that he wasn't really an Austrian at all (most Austrians won't have anything to do with him), however even at that his views were fairly rubbished, though to his credit he at least made a genuine attempt to back them up.

He was very much the exception though.

[Rusty Shackleford]

Ok i know this thread is old... but it was apparently suicide (http://voices.washingtonpost.com/federal-eye/2009/11/census_worker_killing_probe_ne.html)


The Census Bureau employee found dead in September killed himself and staged his death to look like a homicide, state and federal law enforcement officials said Tuesday.
William E. Sparkman Jr. died of asphyxiation and was found with hands, feet and mouth bound with duct tape, a rope around his neck and the word "FED" written on his chest, investigators concluded.

[gorillafuck]

It's so stupid to try to link libertarianism to one murder as a way to make the ideology seem bad. I mean, seriously?

And why would he fake his own death that way?

[Dimentio]

Libertarianism have partially the same kind of supporters who in other countries would be labelled fascism. Also, US fascism is generally different to European fascism. US fascism is decentralist and opposed to a strong central state.

That is because the small-town petite-bourgeoisie and lumpen proletarians in the USA are generally identifying themselves with local elites on the state level. A strengthening of the states at the expense of the federal level would reduce the political weight of urban centres which are more dominated by ethnic minorities and return political power to reactionary political establishments in largely rural territories.

[IcarusAngel]

Umm... Nobody said that the 'death' (which looked like a murder; without knowing the guy was suicidal it seemed obvious) discredits Libertarianism. The fact is that due to the dogmatism of the right-wingers and the conditions of the death it looked like it had links to far-right, dogmatic 'anti-fed' (Libertarian ideology).

And the right has been killing in the US recently: the guy who shot up the church ( a supposedly 'liberal' church) said he was attacking 'liberals,' another prominent abortion doctor in the US was murdered, the guy who shot up the holocaust museum had ties with far right type of thinking, the guy who shot the black police officers was a white supremacist who listened to Alex Jones, Ron Paul rhetoric. And one of the worst attacks of terrorism in the US was committed by a Lib.

The only evidence you need that Libertarianism is dogmatic is to go to a tea party. There is only a SLIGHT difference between dems and reps and now these 'anti-fed' types are ready to kill because McCain did not get elected.

All the evidence shows that right-wing crimes, and right-wing hate groups are making a big come back in the US.

As for the death perhaps the guy did it because of the anti-fed sentiment that existed, and he wanted to try and put some heat on them. A very interesting way to commit a suicide.

Another interesting issue is that there has been dozens of work place homicides in the past few months, and even a few school shootings again. I would probably chalk this guy's suicide up to that same kind of hopelessness many people are feeling in today's America, with the US spending billions to rebuild foreign countries they wrecked and billions of dollars on bailing out corporations that failed due to greed.

Many federal agencies, like the post office, now basically a corporation, and public transit systems, have also started failing and are deeply in debt since they decided they could make a 'profit' instead of trying to break even. Greed is the cause of these failings which actually leads to poor management decisions, in any industry.

If you want to discredit Libertarianism you can look at the Latin American experiments and the US in the 1890s, 1920s, and 1980s, and 2000s.

[IcarusAngel]

Going Postal: From Reagan's Work Places to Clinton's Columbine and Beyond (http://www.amazon.com/Going-Postal-Rebellion-Workplaces-Columbine/dp/1932360824).

interestingly these type of crimes have been prominent in the US for decades in the ghettos and black communites. They didn't start making national attention until they hit white suburbia in the 1990s. The US has the highest gun homicide rate of any country. I think our economic system is partly to blame, which tends to make many people bonkers, in the sense that you commit theft and murders when you're poor and have 'no way out.'

[IcarusAngel]

Libertarianism have partially the same kind of supporters who in other countries would be labelled fascism. Also, US fascism is generally different to European fascism. US fascism is decentralist and opposed to a strong central state.

That is because the small-town petite-bourgeoisie and lumpen proletarians in the USA are generally identifying themselves with local elites on the state level. A strengthening of the states at the expense of the federal level would reduce the political weight of urban centres which are more dominated by ethnic minorities and return political power to reactionary political establishments in largely rural territories.


Yes. Corporatism (where Libertarianism leads) and fascism are basically the same thing.

Also, the Libertarian ideology has a weird rejection of social science and logic that is prominently displayed by Mises supporters, etc.

Here is a guy punking the Libertarian and Constitutional parties:

Rry_SlPW7oU


THIS IS WHAT THE LEFT SHOULD BE DOING. Finding fun, creative ways to mock Libertarianism and fascism (while taking the necessary precausions to protect ourselves from fascism), while at the same time making a powerful point about where that type of ideology can lead to and informing people about it.

[Skooma Addict]

Also, the Libertarian ideology has a weird rejection of social science and logic that is prominently displayed by Mises supporters, etc.



Miseseans do not reject social science. Economics is a social science. Also, Miseseans do not reject logic. Most just reject logical positivism.

[Tungsten]

(The usual libertarianism = fascism rubbish.)

More BS as usual. It’s not even worth commenting on.

Listen, I don’t know if self-delusion is the reason behind these contrived attempts to conflate libertarianism with fascism, or if it’s just plain ignorance. Either way, I’m not bothered. The idea that fascist countries like the third reich sucked because they allowed little freedom and committed acts of aggression against their own people and other countries sounds about right, although some (if not most) of you don’t seem to see anything wrong with aggression, which suggests to me that you’re no better. The idea that the third reich sucked was because it was "too liberal", or that Hitler was some sort of anarchist is good for a laugh, but of no value otherwise. It’s obvious, both from observation and from documented history that total power lay with the government (which is little more than a giant corporation in the first place), not businesses. Businesses were, in effect, being run by the government for the benefit of the state i.e. nationalised. Things would have been no different under communism. And don’t give me any excuses about not wanting a state; read your own posts in other threads – you praise the superiority of the government-run industry over the market at every opportunity.

I don’t know why you continue doing this, or who you’re trying to convince. I suspect you’re just doing it to convince yourself. Anyway, get on with it. Talk to the hand etc. If Olaf and others want to carry on pretending that they’re having a meaningful debate with you, then that’s up to them. As for me, topics and BS like this were the reason I stopped posting here in the first place.

I come back after many months and all I see is more of the same.

[Havet]

Rry_SlPW7oU


This is actually a hilarious video. Good find.

[Bud Struggle]

This is actually a hilarious video. Good find.

OK, some of these people are A-holes. But that's the kind of thing that makes America work. Say what you want.

[RGacky3]

OK, some of these people are A-holes. But that's the kind of thing that makes America work. Say what you want.

Corporate funded racist "protests"?