Topic: Solution to poverty - Socialism or Capitalism? - page 29. (Read 30791 times)

Here is an example:

No women are allowed to operate pubs and sell alcohol = not free market
Anyone is allowed to operate a pub and sell alcohol BUT it requires an alcohol license = free market & regulated

Utilities are an exception because the govt considers it a public necessity.  The regulations are meant to the protect the public from price gouging.  When regulations were lifted the prices for energy went up.  So you may be theoretically correct that the govt controlled prices.  But it was for the good of the consumer

Actually the energy shortage didn't come from govt control.  It came from market manipulations after deregulation.  You heard of Enron, no?

You are right in what I think, a regulated market is not free. Either it is controlled by coercion, either it is not. The line is clear.

I did not know about the California electricity crisis, and I think your premise is that private companies did it on purpose or was provoked by speculation, and that state saved the citizen of such greedy bastard.
But the question to ask is why a private company would act against the interest of its customers, and thus loosing profit on purpose ? This is not a natural course of action of a market.

Let's talk about the "Megawatt laundering" problem of your link.
Cause : Effect :
My question is : who decided to control the price for electricity at the first place ?
My response is : government by coercion on prices... So how can you call this a market free ? It was not.

When gov imposes prices, there is 2 possibility.
Either the imposed price is lower than the natural price (the one without regulation), and in this case you provoke a shortage. (Because production go down)
This is what happened in this case.

I'll quote Milton Friedman :

Or, the imposed price is higher than the natural price.
This is what happens in some market like cabs, or even, minimal wages (that is regulation on labor's price).
And in this case, the demand drop, for minimal wages, you get more unemployment, and increased need in welfare.
In the case of Taxi, very few people are using cabs and preferring public transportation, and in the case of Ubber, lots of problem with legislation because it bypasses the imposed rate of taxi for the same service, which provoke injustice and stifle competition.

Let's talk about the "Overscheduling" problem.
Why does the state accepted at all of paying such fees ?
Are the congestion fees payed by power providers or state ? With those two sentences, if I understand correctly, it means that the state acted as a power provider in charge on power line.
So my question is : why the power line is handled by the state and not private companies ?
A private companies would have acted against such scam by making economically costly to reserve a line, preventing spam. But maybe law prevented that ?
If the cost of reservation would be too high, then another company, with its own power line would compete with it.

But no... the state, instead of acting as a rational economical agent, resort to MORE coercion of the kind that provoked the shortage in the first place. (price control)

Then one will say : what does prevent electrical companies to charge high price because of our dependence on energy ?
My response is: Competition by having multiple power providers. And if all abuse, the high price of energy would quickly fire economical forces to switch to alternative and less centralized source of energy.
Solar panel would become economically profitable and would spread very quickly.

This market was not free, and the failure of regulation, ironically provoked more regulation.
This is like the 1940 crisis... the fed created it with bad monetary policies, but instead of collapsing for its fault, it gained even more power by allowing to break the link with gold. (The failure of FED in 1940 was admitted by Bernake)
But during all this time, in all the school we were brainwashed to believe that greed of capitalism provoked the crisis, when it was not. There was no such thing as a free market when a central authority control the supply of money.

Solution to poverty - Socialism or Capitalism?

There is none, what a stupid question that is. And giving such options as socialism or capitalism kills it even further.

Even if you destroy the whole system and step back to living on trees, even then, there are still
those who f**k and those who work their back (doing some shit "essential" to their and species survival).

You should check how animal kingdom works from time to time; apply money and hatred in place of basic physical features, and you have humanity in general.

"Socialism or Capitalism?"

Not a lot of difference between the two in reality. Both rife with corruption and greed. Money is always funnelled to the already rich and powerful in both cases. The poor stay poor.

I think you are confusing "free market" and "unregulated market"

Theres a lot of recent examples in USA where de-regulation caused more harm then good.  Sorry I don't much about France

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_electricity_crisis

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gramm%E2%80%93Leach%E2%80%93Bliley_Act

RBU is the way to go

I am not against law, since I believe in private property as fundamental, and that can't be enforced without violence without law. (and thus not a punk)
Government is the only one with the monopole of coercion on a territory, such thing is necessary to enforce law and thus protect private property.

What I am against is any government intervention in the market, since there is nothing to fix. I'll be glad you can point me out example of why it is necessary to have regulation of the market.

I am against any direct or indirect licensing meant to protect a small group of people from competition, (As the taxi example, and some other that are hidden behind the "public good" incantation)
And against any subsidize for dying industries,

Any compromise is not free market.

I don't really understand what you want.  No regulations?

That's gonna be like 3rd world countries.  A free market requires regulations to make it free.  Sounds like a paradox,  but that's how it is.  Look at historical examples as well as current

I am not against any law. As long as it protects private property of individuals and companies.
I will never make a compromise on what I judge (not law), is a violation of my property. (be it physical, material, or intellectual)
Law is a tool we can use to protect against such violation. The definition of violation is in each of us, and not written in law, law is only a tool.

Law is not here to protect people, but to protect property from looter.

If you agree we judge any law against this criteria, let's make make a reality check.

I agree with the goal of trying to protect an intellectual property, here is my problems.

As an entrepreneur, how do you know you have not violated one of the 9999999 patents in existence ?
As an entrepreneur, if you protect yourself with a patent, you can't enforce it without having a team of lawyers that check violations full time.
And if you find a violation, you'll have to fight for it financially.

So, finally, where is the benefit of such patents ? Response : Big companies, Patent trolls, Lawyers.
As I said, law does not protect people but property violation. The patent does not protect the inventor but intellectual property.
A small entrepreneur can't afford it, this is one barrier of competition.

Now let's talk about Taxi,
Law, again, is protecting property. A material property called "taxi license".
Uber driver, for the taxi drivers of my country, is a violation of property. And they are right.
The effect ? Uber Taxi, and all car sharing services is regulated in my country. To the point of making them impossible to very difficult to operate.
So you want to be a taxi ? Give 200K and you can compete.
At whose fault ? It is not the taxi driver's fault. It is normal that their property is protected, they paid 200K for it after all.

The response is the sole existence of such license. It is interesting that in my country, the regional part is distributing it for free... to who ? To big taxi companies that then resell them 200K to taxis.
But hey, initially, the law was to "protect taxi drivers" whose margin would have suffered from the over supply of a job that does not require any qualification would induce.
The result is barrier of competition, again.

For the generic medecine, you are again citing Wallmart and CVS, and I was not speaking about the reseller.
I was talking about the manufacturer "Licensing of Drug Packaging Manufacturers".
They are the one that buy from china, remove the drug repackage them, apply 10x the price and resell it to wallmart, cvs etc...

The interesting thing, in France, is that the "social security" pay for the drugs "to protect the consumer" which become totally insensible to price.
Well... that mean that if you want to repackage your own as the big are doing, you'll need to get the approval which close competition again.

Without the social security, you would pay say 1$ for your medecine.
But luckily, now you are protected... The medecine cost 10$ but 9$ is refunded by the social security, paid by the tax payer... Where does these 9$ go ? Hint : Pharmaceutical industry.

Anti-Trust law ?
Come on, do you really think the entrepreneur can enforce it ? For whose is this tool ? Responses : big business, or a government weapon to put pressure on a company a little too big.
Go and fight, with 10K$ for the enforcement of this law, I'm waiting.

I refuse to call such system capitalism, and certainly not a free market.
Some market are free, software industry is relatively free, despite of patents. But we have skill related barrier of entrance, and thus do not suffer from oversupply.

Q: What is the transition from Socialism to Communism?
A. Alcoholism

Freedom and Capitalism go hand in hand. There is no silver spoon for most people and there is not supposed to be. Look at Gates, Buffett and the other smart people around the free world. They all worked very hard and built great companies and societes.

They were free to succeed or fail.

The smartest people in Communist societies try hard to take their wealth, and their families away from oppression to a more free society. They leave the less fortunate, stuck in stagnate government controlled societies.

Those who learn will thrive, and those who do not will suffer.

China will thrive because it will embrace Capitalism, with some state controls.

Russia, North Korea and Cuba are doomed.

The real utility of Bitcoin is to help oppressed people flee oppression. To get their wealth, and their families to Freedom.

The border guards can strip you of everything they can find, but they can not get your Bitcoins that were created specifically for that purpose.

That is very powerful, and a direct threat to Communism, and all other oppressive regimes.

Bitcoin is one on the Free Worlds most powerful tools to fight against oppression!

You can re-sell generic drugs but good luck in trying to get it to market.  You are talking about generic over the counter where the patents have expired?  Walgreens or CVS does this

You can create your own stock.  Just incorporate and issue shares.  To start fund you need to gather investor money and get yourself accredited

You can be an Uber driver.  In NYC the yellow cab licenses are restricted though

IDK, I think you are just trying to be anti-regualtion for the sake of being punk.  Just think about why these regulations arise in the first place. 

So ones again, why can't I buy the same medicine from China they are doing, and sell it myself ?
The FDA can test them right ? Why don't they allow any business to re package trusted generic medicine from china, but allow the one with pockets deep enough, to buy the right to do it ?

Why is there such a price different just for a repackaging of medicine ? If not because the legislation keep out any new comer that would lower the margin.

There is countless law "for consumer protection" that are backed by nothing, but are just barrier of entry to protect against new comers.

Why can't I create my own money or own stock without buying the financial license that cost 200K to do so ?
Why only big business can get access to these funds ?

Try to build your own company, and you'll see all the pain in the ass they make. And if you succeed, you have to face the patent trolls.

Why do you need to pay a licence of 200K to drive a Taxi ? You named it to keep competition out.

If you area  scientist and invent a life saving drug you start company.  Raise investment money and go through the same approval process as anyone else.  There's tons of biotech companies out there.  Look on the stock market and you will see

If you are talking about FDA regulations, thats for consumer protection.

If you are talking about patents, those are to protect the inventor.

Ok, so tell me why I can't open my own pharmaceutical business and buying medicine that cost 5% the price of here from china, changing the packaging to sell it 10x that, exactly as the pharmaceutical industry is doing.

The anti trust law are only for big companies. If you have 5 big companies, they will use on anti trust law to attack the best one.
It is not meant to be used by the small entrepreneurs. It is used by the big one that help building the wall of legislation designed to prevent small one from coming.

You don't see laws that prevent competition as such, such laws will be publicly called "for the public good", they would not call them "Barrier of entrance" or "big business protection" laws.

In USA regulations prevent monopolies.   Anti trust laws

Technology and resources are not here to end poverty. Proof is that the poor today has more technology and resources than a king. (That depends on the country for sure)
Poverty is a moving line.

And yes, oil cartel can hold innovation for their own profit. But what prevent competitor to come, make the innovation, and kick their ass in this competitive game ? Not capital, not intelligence, but regulation.

People are pointing finger at big companies for holding the human advancement for their own profit and blame capitalism for that.
Forgetting that such monopoly and cartel is made possible by regulation keeping any competition out, backed by our governments. This is not capitalism.

The technology and resources are there, objectively speaking, to end poverty. The problem is private property and people hoarding shit tons for their personal enjoyment. Why aren't we seeing non-polluting cars of higher efficiency? because the oil cartel is not interested in pushing the new technologies into the mainstream, and so on and so on.

Freedom doesn't exist, we live in a deterministic reality so free market, freedom... all these terms are laughable. What we need is a Resource Based Economy where everyone has basic needs meet since day 1, to avoid robbery, depravation, and other bad behaviours triggered by bad enviornment which at the same time are triggered in bigger or small degree via genetics. Capitalism and communism are old as fuck and do not meet the realities of life. Struggling and failing and winning is just a chain of physical events given your genetics and your enviorment, no one has control of themselves at any degree. Because of this, it's the objectively correct thing to do that assumes this cold hard fact of life is to provide all human beings with their needs meet (see Maslow's pyramid). Other than that will lead us to chaos.

PD: Lol at freedom in China.

And the Commie Bastige regime there will collapse as the result but it ain't going to be pretty when it happens.