From: mwilson@ncratl.AtlantaGA.NCR.COM (Mark Wilson)
Newsgroups: alt.politics.libertarian
Subject: Re: Questions about the TEN POINT PARTY PROGRAM.
Date: 5 Oct 92 16:54:01 GMT
Organization: NCR Engineering and Manufacturing Atlanta -- Atlanta, GA

In <ISBELL.92Oct2200542@panther.ai.mit.edu> isbell@ai.mit.edu (Charles L Isbell) writes:

>mwilson@ncratl.AtlantaGA.NCR.COM (Mark Wilson) writes:

>|If inner city supermarkets were charging usurious rates as you charge, then

>If I could?  I can.  Anyone watching Peter Jennings earlier this week
>knows that.  So, I guess I've managed to mean something, haven't I?  

I didn't please post.

>|>As to where you get the students, I'll provide the stock Lib answer:
>|>"if there are no customers, then the business (by definintion) doesn't
>|>deserve to survive.  Such is the Free Market(tm)."

>There is no such thing as a free market if there is any government
>making any decisions that affect it.  I don't recall difficulty of
>doing something ever stopping a Libertarian from suggesting it.

The ease or difficulty of opening a new school is not the issue here.
The issue is finding enough students to stay open.  With vouchers any
student can afford to try the new schools.  Under the current system
unless you are rich, or have a mother that works three jobs, you can
not afford it.  If there is a demand, someone will fill the demand.
Greed tends to work that way.

As I see our disagreement, I have been saying that new schools will appear
and you have responding, what if they don't.

I claim that history of other markets makes me believe that the market in
schooling will behave the same way.  If you do not believe it will please
state your reasons.

>|Since you like analogies how about this one.
>|There are fifty people in the water, unless they are rescued they will
>|drown.  Now I come by in a boat.  Due to weight constraints I can only
>|take on 45 people.  If I follow your logic I should conclude that I
>|should not stop since I would be unable to save all of them.

>You are asserting my logic.  You infer what I do not imply.  Hence
>this argument is silly.

So far your only response to my assertions is to question whether
vouchers will be able to help everybody.  You specifically brought
up rural and inner city situations.  I assumed you were talking about
the old, if we can't help everybody, we shouldn't help anybody argument.

If you do not agree with my inference, please state why and what the
correct inference should have been.  Merely stating that I am wrong is
not sufficient for me.

>Look, this whole thing started from a claim that vouchers would
>improve education.  I'm just asking who it will help, if at all and
>who it won't help and why not.  There is no leap from there to "if we
>can't help everyone, we shouldn't help anyone."

I have already answered that elsewhere.  (I can do this to.)

You have done more than just ask the question.  You have charged that
vouchers will be unable to help certain people.  I have attempted to
refute the charge.  So far you have not answered as to why you
disagree with my refutations.

>|People who choose to live in rural areas also choose to except certain
>|limitations, one of these being the lack of competition.  Their choice,
>|their problem.

>Arrrrrgggghhh.  I'll remember this next time someone says "you can
>just leave the country and start your own Libertarian country" and
>this net jumps all over him/her.

You infer what I did not imply.  (I can pull this one too.)
Why do you infer that if I say that someone who chooses to live in a rural
area has voluntarily accepted the problems of the rural area as love it or
leave it.  I never said that our rural person does not have the priveledge
of trying to fix the problems of rural life.  I was trying to imply that it
is not incumbent upon the rest of us to solve those problems for him.

Again.  If he voluntarily takes on a set of problems, then those problems
are his to solve, not mine.

>|We have told you before, and I will tell you again.  Because of the high
>|concentration of people (and therefore also children), the inner cities
>|will be one of the easiest places to start new schools.  They are only
>|trapped by your lack of imagination.

>Actually, it's my imagination that's causing the problem.  I forsee
>all kinds of ways that this won't happen.  Can you not?  Surely *your*
>imagination is richer than that.

None that do not involve government interference, which is what I am
trying to get rid of.  If you see problems please state them so that
we can argue them.  Please, I really want to know what you think the
problems will be.

>|If you could improve the system, that would definitely lessen the need
>|for an alternative system, but it wouldn't eliminate it.  I would

>That isn't the question.  If I could, would you still want vouchers?

As a someone with a libertarian bent, I feel that choice is always the
preferable system.  Even if you could demonstrate that the public
schools were perfect, I would still favor choice.

>Of ocurse I could turn this around:  prove to me that vouchers will
>improve the system.  Clearly you can't or else you would have inserted
>more words between "if we go to a voucher system" and "the schools
>will improve."

Of course it can't be proven.  Only a demonstration system of sufficient
magnitued would be able to do this.

I'll turn this around again.  I don't need to prove that the current
system is abysmal and getting worse.  That is self evident from the
results that we have been getting.  Recent efforts to improve the
current system have failed.  The system cannot be saved.  So what
do we do now?

>I don't expect a proof.  But I do expect a bit more... imagination.

Then why do you ask for one?

>|>I'm asking this because I'm curious about the real motivations here
>|>(someone in emailed asked about the motivation for an opposition to
>|>choice).

>|OK, I'll bite.  I favor choice because I belive that it will lead to
>|a vastly improved system of education.
>|Now, why do you oppose it?

>I never said I opposed it.  I just questioned the claim that it will
>magically lead to improvement.  Why can't you "imaginative" people
>with such a "grasp of economics" see the difference?

I and others have stated the means and the mechanisims by which we feel
choice will improve education.  And as near as I can tell, all you keep
saying is, What if it doesn't?

>I'll try this slowly:

>I am for choice/vouchers, in general.

>I do not consider it even close to a panacea and I can see several
>problems with it.  I am trying to see how some its more outspoken
>supporters see the problems and their proposed solutions.

How can we propose solutions until you tell us what you think the problems
are?

>So far, as I've been called a statist, a defender of the system and
>someone in opposition to choice, I've been quite unimpressed with the
>responses.

When you give so little to go on, we have to guess.

-- 
Mark
My opinions are mine, all mine.  Unless someone else claims them first.
Mark.Wilson@AtlantaGA.NCR.com

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