From: viking@iastate.edu (Dan Sorenson)
Subject: Re: Misguided Economics
Organization: Iowa State University, Ames IA
Date: Thu, 20 Aug 1992 06:47:12 GMT

perez@mgr.hjf.org (Charles Perez) writes:


viking@iastate.edu (Dan Sorenson) writes:


>>	It does point out that lowest cost is not always the way things
>>should be run to best benefit the consumer.  A constant supply for the long
>>term might be better than a small cost for the short term.

>A constant demand in the free market will encourage a constant supply
>without the government's thumb-fingered help, and a non-constant
>demand is best served by either anticipatory or adapting supply, so
>forcing a constant supply is not in anyone's best interests (assuming
>they're productive members of society - parasites are an exception,
>but in an ideal world, their interests don't count at all).

	In an ideal world the government wouldn't be helping us, would it?
With a vital resource, is the free market sufficient control?  How about
with a vital *strategic* resource?  Somebody thinks elswise, and can back
their decision with government clout.  I don't claim you are wrong, only
that others with considerable pull think you (and I) wrong, and I am
prepared to accept that they know more than we do on this issue.

>So, the individual can't weigh a low price vs. availability of parts
>for himself, eh? Let's treat everybody like children! (Except, of
>course, for the people in charge - they know what's best for *all* of
>us ;-> )

	Of course they do.  Now bend over, this won't hurt a bit ;-)


>The university format was not *started* by government, just usurped
>by it. One problem with governmental services is that people forget
>how private enterprise supplied them before *government* got into the
>act.

	It was supplied if you could pay, and if you couldn't you did
not go to school.  Since both education and corn are now considered
strategic resources, we have government "helping" with both.  This may
not be ideal, but it is reality.  I just signed away my first-born today
when I recieved a GSL check.  Perhaps I should be made to pay my way
through school without government help?  I did it for four years, and I
can do it for another four, but what about those with the qualifications
and nothing to help them based on need?

>>	I never said the economy had to be state-run, but you'll note that
>>the USSR had the lowest food prices of any nation on Earth.

>Assuming you know what you are talking about, this is blatant
>dishonesty. The average Soviet citizen could NOT buy food with rubles!
>He needed ration stamps. He had to stand in line for hours. There was,
>furthermore, NO guarantee that there *would* be food waiting for him
>at the end of the line *after* he had "paid" for it.

	But, the ration stamps were free!  That there was little to buy
with them or rubles, only underscores my point.

>I'm not talking about the black market. I don't know how many people
>did not starve because of the black market.

	And I don;t know how many people get guns via a black market.
Does this not mean that a black markey will fall outside government
control, and that people who cannot get items from government-approved
shops will do so otherwise, perhaps at a different cost?

>If economic disparity is evil, remember that socialist states have it
>in spades, and it's harder for anything to chip away at it, as this
>disparity is politcally enforced. Quite different from "3 generations
>from shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves", eh?

	Quite different indeed, and this needs to be looked at before
we start comparing three generations of farmers to three generations
of welfare recipients.  Each recieves help from the government, but
the real price is in what the government recieves from them in turn.
Apples and oranges, to use a quite over-worked phrase.  The social
status is not gpvernment enforced, else why did I leave the farm?

>>and if we're going to give food
>>stamps so the poor don't starve we should also give guarenteed payments
>>to the people who grow that food so they don't quit growing it altogether?
>>I can't see doing one without considering the other to be just as fair.

>Who said all free-market advocates think there should be food stamps?

	the first poster on this thread, which I did not bother to save.
You can look it up yourself.

<Dan Sorenson, DoD #1066 |"There'll be angels on Ariels in leather>
<z1dan@exnet.iastate.edu | and chrome, Ridin' down from heaven    >
<viking@iastate.edu      | just to carry me home." -- R. Thompson >
< ISU thinks I need more education, which they provide for a fee. >