From: perez@mgr (Charles Perez)
Newsgroups: alt.activism,talk.politics.misc,alt.individualism
Subject: Re: Wages (was Re: Libertarian history
Date: 21 Jul 92 20:01:48 GMT
Organization: HJF AIDS Research Project, Washington DC

In article <1992Jul16.020601.24401@mcshub.dcss.mcmaster.ca> bunker@physun.physics.mcmaster.ca (Alex Bunker) writes:
>In article <1992Jul15.162044.28197@nocusuhs.nnmc.navy.mil> perez@mgr.uucp (Charles Perez) writes:
>>In article <1992Jul11.165504.23573@mcshub.dcss.mcmaster.ca> bunker@physun.physics.mcmaster.ca (Alex Bunker) writes:
>>>In article <1992Jul11.040220.544@NOC.Vitalink.COM> rbuchanan@vitalink.com (Rick Buchanan) writes:
[stuff about minimum wage deleted]
>>>>
>>>>Does anybody here think it's worth the effort of referring Alex to
>>>>Hazlett's "Economics in One Lesson"?
>>>
>>>What you call "ignorance in Economics" really means "failure to 
>>>believe the capitalist interpretation of economics" I am not ignorant
>>>merely I am not a capitalist. I believe that as long as the incentive barrier
>>>is of a minimum steepness (relative wage levels for jobs of different
>>>strain,difficulty,need of expertise) then people will have the incentive
>>>they need to work hard,and the economy will prosper. There is nothing to be
>>>gained by allowing this barrier to become steeper than needed by so called
>>>"market forces", this is merely the result of an entrenched ruling class
>>>using their money to make power which they use to gear the system to be
>>>even more in their favor. Thus the result of your market forces is the
>>>rich getting more powerful and the poor becoming disenfranchised and
>>>desperate thus turning to crime drugs violence and all the other outlets
>>>of hopeless frustration.
>>
>>Demonstrate this, please! Show how pure capitalism makes things worse
>>and how pure statism makes things better. Show why market forces are
>>in fact arbitrary, and why they are not the sum of individual people
>>dealing with each other.
>
>Pure capitalism is as nonexistant and silly and idealistic and untenable
>and simply impossible as Marxist communism. I never have proposed
>pure statism just a controlled market economy.

Arguing that the pure form of either capitalism or statism is bad but
that a mix of the two is good is more complicated than arguing for one
or the other. What are we that we need both? You have not answered that.

>As it is worded in the
>German constitution a "social market economy" as opposed to a free market
>economy like in the US.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^???????????
The US is *not* a free-market economy, it is a mixed economy.

>Market forces are NOT arbitrary. but neither
>does government have to give everything up to the whims of the rich
>elite playing money flipping games.

So, everything I do with my own money makes me the victim or perpetrator
of "rich elite's money flipping games"?

>A balnced combination of state
>and private enterprise simply works best. As I have said time and
>time again my views are completely pragmatic and come from the political
>systems operating in countries which I see as being the happiest.
>I have seen these to be social democracies with social market economies.

Like the USA?

>
>>>For an economy to prosper NOONE needs to go
>>>without the basic necessities of equal access to heath care,the law,
>>>education,a clean safe sanitary place to live, and enough healthy food.
>>>Those on state welfare should recieve ALL of these necessities.
>>
>>Yeah, sure, and *I* believe that everyone who dies accidentally should
>>be resurrected. That doesn't make it possible. Indeed, it would be good
>>for everyone to receive the necessities at all times, but not at the
>>price of the state having first claim on everyone's lives. What's
>>worse than not being guaranteed a living is not having a chance to
>>make your own living, holding your life at the sufferance of the
>>almighty State, which is what statism amounts to.
>
>this is empty Ideology and as I often encounter from american neo-conservative
>you prefer to debate in a vaccumn than take off the blinkers and look at the
>way things are done in societies which are more sociologically
>successful than your own.

Such as the old Soviet Union? Ask any non-Party member of that former
"republic" whether he held *his* life at the sufferance of the almighty
Soviet State.

>There are many countries without poverty and 
>desperation where the people are in many ways more free than in the USA

Name these countries. Then say what you mean by freedom.

>I absolutely have no understanding of parenoia about the "evil 
>domineering state"

See the Bolshevik revolution for how such a state might be brought about.

>In a democracy the state is US you and me! I believe in 
>economic as well as political democracy. what do you mean by "Holding your life
>at the sufference of the almighty state" If it actually means something and 
>is not simply empty retoric (as it sounds) please explain.

See above for a (very recent) historical example.

>
>>>In order for
>>>people to have an incentive to work the minimum wage must be ABOVE this
>>>minimum. while 60% of the mean income is not a magic number it seems to have
>>>a general concensus of social democrats like myself of being roughly 
>>>appropriate. While a market economy is a necessity for a functioning 
>>>economy (no alternative has worked at all, sorry socialists) the gulf 
>>>between rich and poor can be controlled to a necessary minimum by
>>>a progressive income tax system.
>>
>>How do the rich get that way?!! Either they earn their money, are
>>given that money (inherited or otherwise granted to them) or they
>>expropriate it from those who *did* earn it. Those who earn the money
>>have hurt no one but the envious. Those who are given money have it
>>because its earner wanted them to have it, and again, no one is
>>hurt. Those who take it against their victims' will should be stopped
>>anyway. So, where do you justify "redistributing" it? You say that
>>no rich man earns his money? You earn wealth by creating it yourself.
>>Wealth doesn't come from nowhere, it has to be created. There is
>>no moral principle that gives those who do not create wealth any 
>>claim on the lives of those who do.
>
>this is hard to argue because here my values are totally different from yours
>I feel a society is judged on how well it cares for its poor, its sick,
>how well it educates its children and helps them all to be all they can be,
>how safe it makes the streets, and how it keeps the cultural traditions
>of its people alive. NOT how many sheisters get to be MEGARICH!

I wasn't talking about values, I was talking about rights. I defied
you to come up with a justification for "redistributing" the property
of the productive rich. You didn't even try to contradict me. As for
how well a society cares for its needy members, see for yourself what
the Industrial Revolution did for people's life expectancies,
particularly poor people's. Then tell me that statism was responsible
for it.

>
>>>So there you have it Capitalism and
>>>Socialism are not the only two alternatives for economic policy
>>>they are merely the two which have been proven to be the wrong path
>>>through the bad examples of the USSR and the USA. what I propose is
>>>the third path of social democracy and is at present working very
>>>nicely in a large number of happy prosperous democratic nations.
>>
>>The third path *exists* and has always existed in various mixtures in
>>the USA. Pure laizzes-faire capitalism HAS NEVER EXISTED. The state
>>has always interfered. So, capitalism has not failed because it
>>HAS NEVER BEEN TRIED in its pure form. Do you say that the poor person
>
>Replace the word capitalism for socialism and it sounds exactly like
>the many communists I have argued with talking about the exUSSR
>how ironic!

No, it doesn't. Pure socialism has been tried more than once (see USSR
& Red China for two examples). It keeps getting corrupted, because
people can't practice it in its pure form (and live). Totally free
markets, in contrast, never exist because governments always want to
stick their nose in. They don't ever *try* laizzes faire capitalism.
The statist elements are *official*, not a result of corruption.

> 
>>hasn't got a chance? Why is that? Maybe it's 'cause of the obscene
>>amounts of government paperwork and other controls that all parties
>>have to wade through just so he can have some paying work? Just tell
>>me that government doesn't hamper anyone's attempts to earn a living,
>>then hear me guffaw.
>
>SAME as above "SOCIALISM has never worked because never applied right"
>PMPH! chuckle chuckle!

Actually, it doesn't work because the more you impose, the worse things
get (see old Soviet Union). No one ever *tries* to apply free-market
capitalism right (meaning *no* controls, simply protection against
violence and treachery).

>of course the government "gets in your way occasionally" what would you
>prefer having to look out for highwaymen on your way to work each morning?

If government is getting in your way, that should mean that the
government is being of *service*. Ask any small business person
about her paperwork burden, then track down what each piece of paper
does in service to the country (meaning its citizens) besides provide
bureaucrats with jobs.

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