Debate: Free-Market Police: Better or Worse?
Side: Much, much better...

If there is no objective moral code then when it comes to big decisions over resources and land, fighting will happen, because of moral differences.There is no "objective" moral code NOW. Laws are constantly changing.You own something to the extent that you can keep it. Only humans feel entitled to things they can't handle. Most of the U.S. is empty, yet the state feels entitled to every square inch of it. When one government tries to take another governments land, it becomes a war. When two persons do the same, it's not nearly such a big deal. It can be solved via free market courts, but most of the time such things wouldn't happen as seen in the anarchic west.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5ENtG3B8CQIt gives the picture of Somalia that you were ignoring: war and strife.When did I ignore this? I used this very fact as an example! I said "Somalia still got better despite all of the Islamist and U.N. invaders attempting to re-establish a state" (paraphrasing). Somalia got better after the fall of Siad Barre's government. If there was an outbreak of civil war and strife, then civil war and strife are better for an economy than one large government. Anarchy is defined as a lack of government, laws, and authorities.We may casually use anarchy to refer to lack of order and violence in an area.You are using the casual definition. Somalia isn't an anarchy.Also, having a couple extra doctors and televisions doesn't make a region better. The chief thing that makes an area good, and indeed better, is stability as in a lack of civil war.Look, I've told you what I mean when I say "anarchism". If you just can't get over that, replace the word "anarchy" in your mind with "anti-statism" whenever it comes up. =/You say "a couple extra" As though it was a small gain and as though they were the only improvements. It wasn't and they weren't. Go back and check the link if you still don't get why. Also, I'm not saying televisions increased in Somalia as though having a television is the be all and end all of a successful economy. I said it to express the gain in wealth and the vast spread in media that occurred without a state to subsidies poverty. Define "chief thing". =/http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occupied_Japan You're just... such an idiot. This is an example of an already existing state with an already existing tax base occupying a country. This has nothing to do with what I was talking about. An already existing state occupying a country =/= a new state emerging and it especially =/= a new state emerging in a nation of anti-statists. You're a fool.It's no surprise that you posted no arguments along with your link... again. I'm beginning to think you know what your saying doesn't make sense and you're just hoping I don't notice it either.Without a state you buy favours from the head gang in your district, or the local chieftain, or the council elders.Well , you clearly didn't even skim the e-book I linked you as it deals with this exact point... First of all, understand that gangs still exist now despite the state and in fact is a problem aggravated by the state through its subsidies over violence and it's repression on certain market demands. So a state is not the solution to gangs. Second of all, the state is a gang. The gang that "won" so to speak as it achieved the most power. So, to be against gangs is to be against the state, less you be a hypocrite. And finally, anarchic Iceland was known for it's constant feuding. This is because, without a state, chieftains couldn't conscript large numbers of unwilling men, so quarrels had to be settled between the quarrelers themselves. This as opposed to most of Europe at the time where kings settled disputes by men dying for them in oaths of fealty and holy pomp and regalia best described as gang-like and psychotic. You've never heard of leapfrogging, have you? This means, you jump from one generation to two or more ahead of it because others have cleared the path for you first.This means nothing. First of all, there's just no way to know we jumped "two or more generations" thanks to the state without being able to see what would have happened had the state not existed. Second, this in no way shows that sweatshops where not a step up from what preceded it. No, I am saying that persons of their own charitable nature will tend to supply less money, and in a less accountable way, than other persons who use mandatory contributions as a source with oversight to prevent abuses.I've decided I want mandatory bone marrow donations from every American whom falls within certain bone density bracket. Sure, this means more persons will need bone marrow transplants and everyone in the country will generally have less bone marrow because of this... and now there's less motive to get the proper calcium intake as everyone is forced to give bone marrow anyway; but it's the right thing to do. After all, the demand for bone marrow is greater than the supply, so we need a group to violently force the extraction of every one's bone marrow to ensure that everyone has just enough. ;)Civil war. Civil war. Civil war. Islamic courts union. Islamic courts union. Islamic courts union. Suicide bombings. Suicide bombings. Suicide bombings.TRUMPSBetter infant mortality rates, more TV and radio, internet access, and more doctors.The thing is, avesk, you haven't actually shown that more violence happened after the collapse of the Somali government (stats)... you've just asserted it. It doesn't matter though, because:1. These violent groups are just mini-states... which explains why they are violently trying to establish power.and 2. Even with all these states rushing to establish power, Somalia still saw growth in life expectancy, doctors, wealth etc. etc. etc.You're just being willfully ignorant at this point. =/Ad hoc explanations aside, public education made illiteracy virtually nonexistent.No, the demand for literacy made illiteracy non-existent. The state merely monopolized the supply. There was a government back in the middle ages too and they did everything possible to ensure the surfs couldn't read. The only reason why the current state ensured everyone could read was because the promise of ending illiteracy was a way to expand their power over us and our dependency on them. If ending illiteracy didn't expand the power of the state, you can bet your ass politicians would be doing everything they could to suppress literacy. It's all about standards really. If I want roads in Wisconsin to all be made the same, then I need government for that.And the persons of Wisconsin don't want good roads???Right, but the point was that it wasn't a result due to market preference for a super-grain like you supposed. How could farmers 6000 years ago know that a grass would turn into corn?Are you saying that government invented the demand for better foods? that persons don't want better food without a government to subsidies it for them?Anarchy: lawless region where there is no ruler.Ireland (historical): informal government.There are so many definitions for this word, it would just be foolish to cling to one as the "true" definition. You know what I mean when I say anarchism, so again, if you can't handle that then replace the word in your head with whatever non-anarchic word you don't have this hang-up over whenever you come across the word in my posts. No, they own a portion of your income. You own yourself and your property.... What? Perhaps you just haven't been told, but everything that falls within the U.S. border is U.S. property. The property is taxed as your "rent" for living. You only "own" your property to the extent that they don't take it from you.Economy =/= SocietyExpand your horizons. Society is more than the pursuit of most profit.BTW, lack of regulations gave us the great depression and modern financial crisis. So much for free market or even unregulated market productivity.The market also refers to social relations, just so you know....The great depression was caused by a massive expansion in credit without the expansion of any real differed consumption. Without a federal government to monopolize currency, this isn't possible. Besides, the great depression was actually a rather small crash relatively speaking. http://mises.org/daily/3446Larger crashes had happened and were absorbed in a matter of weeks, not years. The reason why the "great" depression lasted so long was because of state intervention such as the NRA (National Relief Association). What the NRA did was artificially keep prices for goods low, as they were before the crash. This was in hope that by simulating the costs in the market as they were when the market was flourishing, it would cause the market to "re-bound" and be prosperous again.The problem with this is that since prices for goods were kept low, there was little incentive to enter these businesses as the cost was too great in comparison to the pay off. If the prices were allowed to be as they otherwise would have been, then businessmen would have seen that there's great potential for profit in these areas of the market. With this flood of production, the cost of the product would inevitably drop as the supply increased.Leaving the market to its own regulation was the only way to correct the mistakes of the federal government.I didn't say hold back, I said allowed to amass wealth.Besides we are discussing taxes.That's what I meant by "hold back". Holding back persons from amassing wealth. Taxes don't stop the wealthy from anything. Taxes work better at stopping entrepreneurs from becoming wealthy. Taxes are included in barriers to entry, I guess you just didn't know that either. ;)Except they didn't, and when they were needed most. That's why welfare was created in the first place. Ever heard of the New Deal?Welfare exists as a means to expand the states market influence by appealing to the demand of a nation. Welfare exists because there is demand for it to. Besides, welfare is a horrible system. I can't believe I actually have to explain this to you. I mean, you're literally the first statist I've ever debated stupid enough to think it is. And that includes communists. =/The problem with welfare is that it allows politicians to more or less buy votes at the promise of increasing the general welfare of the area and "solving" poverty.This is a system where you have the poor paying the poor(er). The cut of line for social taxes is $106,000 per year. If you make more than that, you don't have to pay. Also, deficit spending leads to inflation, which disproportionately hurts the poor. Prices rise before wages catch up when there is inflation and the persons who get the money first (the politically connected) benefit at the expense of everyone else, and everyone else tends to be poorer. Without a state, things become incredibly cheap. Nominal wages typically don't raise as much as the price of everything else falls, which makes sense given that firms become more productive as a result of competition and general hyper-sensitization. So, on a free market a poor person can live on less, which means there's less need for welfare, which means it won't matter if a few Scrooges hoard there cash away from the charities. http://mises.org/daily/2225http://mises.org/daily/4655See:http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/162/3859/1243A.K.A. Tragedy of the CommonsEssentially, allowing people to hoard puts a majority at a disadvantage for the benefit of a small party.Hmm, well since you've brought this up here as well and I've since finished the article, I'll respond to it here. First of all, you're not bringing up anything new. Tragedy of the commons has been done to death.See: http://austrianeco.blogspot.com/2009/12/ tragedy-of-commons.html Short answer: Tragedy of the commons refers to common land, not privately owned land. This is a phenomenon seen with public property (i.e. government property i.e. commons) NOT private property.It's really much more accurate to call this the tragedy of the state. =/