Free Market Capitalism Inevitably Leads to Corruption

As this is the last round, I am electing to rebut anything new you've added, point out which of my arguments I don't feel you've addressed, and write my conclusion. You are welcome, though not required to do the same in your finale. Thanks for a terrific debate!- You need to do more research. Think BP oil spill, when the government levied that fine what was it 400bn... who do you think paid it? The CEO? the Board? .... ... those with no actual management of the situation.We can both absolutely agree that both Fascism and Corporatism is the worst that both Private Enterprise and Government can offer, you will get no disagreement from me. However, it does nothing to address the overall point of *this* argument that corruption inevitably rises out of unrestrained capitalism. When government is weak and markets unregulated, what, pray tell, is to keep massive private entities themselves from using their clout to influence and ultimately increase the role of government towards favoritism?I perfectly understand what you're saying in terms of government being the machine that big business may use to oppress or cheat, but what you fail to substantiate is what keeps business itself from creating that machinery in the absence of strong government? Why do you assume big government comes first in the equation?We're going to get back to this after the rebuttals, so stick around.- Do Tell. Okay, I'm telling. You've made it very plain in both previous rounds that yes, business with the aid of government is capable of achieving the status "too big to fail". I do not disagree there. To counter this I've mentioned other companies that were "too big to fail" in the absence of big government or really ANY regulation.Standard Oil.Dole Fruit.Carnegie Steel.The Salt Commission.Da Beers.Dutch East India Company.HBCjust to name a few. All of these companies stand or stood without any risk of failure in their time, and some were even able to leverage their weak overseeing governments into serving them. They were unregulated, yet still took advantage of military resources for their profit needs and wants. This is the result of both a completely free market, and a military.And before you jump in say that this is still somehow a government problem since militaries were engaged, I would remind you that at least half of the names on this list employ their own personal militias totally absent government. And that's really my point: Whether we're talking a corporatist state (something we both abhor) or a totally free-market approach, the end result is the same: Small groups of people with way more power and leverage that they are ultimately able to use with impunity. Only people, i.e. government, has any hope of checking that power.The sentiments behind this sentence have just a hint of paranoia behind themNo business is to big to lose,except those who are in bed with regulatorsSee my above examples of companies that attain total control despite not having the backing of strong government. The fact that McDonald's may see diminishing profits for a quarter or two is not actually the same as failing, and without government involvement (say those which ban them in greater numbers in some countries and cities) it's unclear how exactly these numbers would lead to a collapse of the McDonald's corporation.Government is an Entrenched, slow moving force... it may even seem humorous to read about like requiring 400 hours of state classes to be a Interior designer in Florida. Far more than the 40 hours it takes to get a Class A Drivers licence needed to operate a 10's of tons 18 wheeler. But given your responses so far I am concerned that you may look at that graphic and conclude that truck drivers need more training. Not off the cuff, no, I don't think that. But the occasional government oversight that results (generally temporarily before the matter is re-examined and re-legislated) isn't an issue of corruption, just poor policy. The fact that the process of rectifying this may take longer than a business *may* choose to "self-correct" doesn't make it inherently more corrupt or more likely to lead to corruption, only, as you point out, ultimately more stable.And this is to say nothing of how often business doesn't self-correct. When government officials learn that a given policy may be causing more harm than good, that, coupled with the threat of being voted out, tends to result in positive change. A company on the other hand, if its policies are hurting a small number of people, they have literally no incentive to stop that harm, because the only motive is profit. All of the market's efficient little self-corrections are only made in response to data coming out of the next fiscal quarter. Does Monsanto give a *&^% that people are generally pretty pissed off about a lot of what they do? Absolutely not, and even if they were not bolstered by corporatism as they are, they would still have no reason to care. Limiting regulatory power does nothing to address harm.- You defeated your point in the same breath you made it. Once again the entrenched nature of Government means it is liable to exploitation and the more power the government has the more business will seek to use that power to their benefit. In the Absence of that power, there is nothing for businesses which betray their products and customers to cling on to after they go bust. This gets into a fairly major point you've utterly failed to address: Why are you starting from the assumption that government was strong, and then corporations somehow came along and exploited it? The worst exploitations of our day didn't emerge from a strong government, but rather one that conservative elements in the country sought to hack to pieces for the last 5 decades. Government was weak, and that was what allowed business, (because it is a power struggle, as you say) to move in and take advantage of that weakened government. A strong, well-funded, government backed by the votes of the majority has the capacity to hold rampant corporatism at bay.In conclusion, I think you've done two things just magnificently in this debate:1. You've demonstrated the much greater harms that come from corporatist favoritism.2. You've illustrated the qualities of both business and free enterprise in a way that I think is largely accurate.But here are the things you have failed to address, prove, or really support:1. You've given no answer to the unchecked corporate powers of the past, those that existed before strong government regulation came into play. I've brought them up at least twice and you haven't acknowledged or addressed this. I hope you will use your last round to.2. You've argued that Government is both slower to corrupt, and that business is unstable. While I don't want to narrow this debate merely to the initial terms (because I like debates that range and actually get interesting instead of turning into semantic wankery) it is still worth mentioning that even as we agree corporatism and fascism are the worst evils at either end of the spectrum (or circle if you like) the base point I raised was about corruption, and you've largely supported that.3. The concept of "Too big to fail" as defined narrowly by "receives government bailouts" which you seem to bring up as the big problem I think gets much bigger. Take mining towns in which a given business owns the mine, effectively creates and maintains the legislatures, and, in the absence of government involvement, forces its workers to simply buy things back from the company with the wages they pay. I would argue that is "too big to fail" in the sense that business has grown to encompass all essential parts of life. To me that's a lot scarier than bailouts, and it doesn't take government for it to happen.