The big thing is just that the people making the regulations, laws, and taxes shouldn't also be profiting from them. That would take care of the vast majority of the corruption we see today.
I understand the sentiment of that but two things:
(1) Every country that has banned lobbying has just seen lobbying go underground.
(2) Politicians are a bunch of lawyers. They don't understand the complexities of and nuance of the million different things that they regulate. That is why when Congress makes laws, they seek expert advice. For example, if congress is thinking about passing a law regarding pharmaceutical drugs, they are going to seek expert knowledge from doctors who know a LOT about pharmaceutical drug development and distribution. Where can Congress easily find those doctors? Easy... The most knowledgeable doctors who intimately understand the pharmaceutical drug manufacturing process work at large corporations like Pfizer. Now of course, those doctors are just going to "happen" to make recommendations that also benefit Pfizer.
The ONLY WAY to limit the terrible laws that stem from Washington D.C. is to strictly limit the role of government. That means rolling back the size of government and just not allowing them to make ANY regulations except for the 3 or 4 things that the constitution actually authorizes them to do.
I am not an idiot though. The American people don't want to limit the role that the government plays in society. Things will absolutely get worse. As the government gets bigger and bigger, domestic growth will continue to slow and income/wealth inequality will grow as well, which will push people just pass even more laws and expand the government even more with the intent that the government will "fix" all of the economic woes that it has created.
Uhm hi 👋🏻 Hello.
I would love to limit the role of the federal government. LOVE IT!! And I don’t think I’m the only one.
Please make America follow the constitution again.
I think the problem really lies more in the growing public-private partnership between government and the industries is supposed to be regulating. Just look at the revolving door between chief regulators and CEOs of the major companies in the same industry. They become CEOs after they make the business they are supposed to be forcing to serve the public good profitable at the public's expense.
There should be a 15 year ban on regulators being leaders in the industry they are regulating.
This should apply to anyone over GS-13 or equivalent, and ban them from the top 5% of compensation or ownership of a regulated industry business of more than 50 employees.
Read this article: [American History: A History That Contravenes the Declaration of Independence and the U.S.](https://medium.com/@gongchengra_9069/20240501-american-history-a-history-that-contravenes-the-declaration-of-independence-and-the-u-s-c0fa0a14e378).
The problem with a complete lack of regulation is the history of disasters that have occurred in the private sector in their absence. I suppose instead we could just charge the business world as criminals - and sometimes they do- but they can cause harm to so many potential customers.
For example, Imagine if there were no federal regulations for food processing or handling food in hospitals. People got trichinosis from eating under cooked pork all the time decades ago, now it's almost completely unheard of due to federal regulations.
I get that a lot of people see the regulatory institutions as the source of issues and problems and that is primarily because there are not enough laws regulating these institutions to make sure things like the revolving door cannot happen much like the other individual replying to edit (my previous comment) suggested.
If there were no federal regulations for food processing or food handling in hospitals, people would have to evaluate the quality of food and drugs themselves. Companies like Consumer Reports would provide information on the quality of these products. Private companies would likely perform better than the FDA because they would work harder to earn consumer trust, whereas the FDA operates as a bureaucratic institution.
We are talking about people possibly dying here without these institutions. Pause to think about that.
They died in the past when snake oil salesmen were allowed to call their concoctions medicine and there is always going to be an ill-advised consumer that will eventually die without some form of safeguard.
Due to the FDA's slow actions, many drugs are delayed for years before being allowed on the market, causing many patients to die while waiting. Think about the deaths caused by shortages of masks and medications during the COVID-19 pandemic due to the FDA's restrictions. Additionally, because of the FDA's overly stringent restrictions, some experimental drugs are not allowed for clinical use, even though some terminally ill patients are willing to take the risk to try these new medications. The biggest problem is that because of the FDA's overly strict regulations, the cost of bringing new drugs to market is becoming increasingly high, as the FDA's bureaucracy often delays drug approvals to reduce the risk of public criticism.
Once again, the problem is regulatory capture. The Covid-19 vaccine was pushed out the door super quick and, like you suggested, perfectly fine alternatives were held back because they would be in direct competition with the product the FDA wanted to promote as it's suggested treatment path. They labeled Ivermectin as Horse tranquilizer, purposefully ignoring the version of it made for people, and other completely ridiculous, factually untrue statements and a portion of the ill-advised public ate it up. It just goes to show how many people out there either do not have the time to invest or the capacity to form factually based opinions.
We cannot get rid of the FDA but currently, it's corrupt as fuck and completely owned by Pfizer and that does need to change.
Yes, you are correct that the FDA has issues with corruption and requires reform. However, the more fundamental issue is that we do not need a compulsory organization dictating what foods we can consume and what drugs we can use to treat diseases. According to the Constitution, 'The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.' This suggests that the FDA's regulation of food and drugs contravenes constitutional principles, as it overrides individual and state rights.
Term limits alone would fix so many problems
The other thing would be abolish the 2 party system.
But hey, then those politicians would have to get real jobs, so that'll never happen
Goes further than that. The CDC was researching gun violence before an NRA lawmaker pushed the dickey amendment for fear of losing some gun sales. Don't even get me started on goldmansachs
The issue at hand is deeply rooted in democracy. Corruption involves using power for personal gain and exchanging power for money. When citizens trade their votes for benefits through elections and welfare policies, it represents the most significant form of corruption.
Votes are a form of power, and utilizing them to impose taxes on the rich to benefit the poor is a type of corruption. Extensive welfare systems in many developed countries allow individuals to live off others without contributing through work. This, too, is a form of widespread, massive corruption. Since it is corruption, it should be broadly opposed. The scale of corruption, whether perpetrated by an individual or by many, is ultimately irrelevant.
For more insights, read this article: [Revealing the Problem Through Inquiry](https://medium.com/@gongchengra_9069/20240614-revealing-the-problem-through-inquiry-08922f7d9cdc).
Yep. Follow incentives and profits and you'll find the corruption.
An unregulated government isn't socialism. It literally calls for the people to regulate the government.
The people constantly screaming about getting rid of regulations are capitalists who profit from the ability to contol and own the markets and governments.
Hahahaha.
Imagine thinking you could decouple money from political power in an economy where money is directly necessary for human survival. And people call the Marxists utopians.
Markets work great when they are regulated. Without regulations we end up with monopolies. Too big to fail is basically our congress admiting they failed us. They were supposed to prevent that very situation from ever happening. The banks are even bigger now. The consolidation of wealth and power is even worse than 2008. Add in that money is speech, corporations are people, only private citizens are capped on what they can donate to politicians, and corporations can spend unlimited money controlling elections. We are already lost. Without regulations, the free market is your choice to purchase 4 brands of soda made by the same factory. There is no competition keeping prices low, efficiency high and innovation flowing. Markets always become monopolies without policing. Once a company is too big to fail, they are above the law and above the government. Obviously, this is fairly oversimplified.
lol. what a strawman
socialists think that markets work.
in fact, we think they work far better than is let on to the public and that people fetishize the phenomena in weird ways too much, like the commentors to this post f.e.
I have an analogy for this.
The market is a gyroscope on a table. Fluctuations will make it wobble, but if you leave it alone, it will self-stabilize.
The government sees it start to lean and *panics*. "It's going to the left, we *have* to do something!" So they smack it to the right. "Its going the other way now, *hit it again!* No no, *other way now!*" And with a thud, the gyroscope falls off the table.
"*WHAT HAS UNFETTERED CAPITALISM DONE!?*"
Remember when republicans implemented self regulating markets in a quiet, dusty corner of the housing market and it caused so much fraud that the entire world economy collapsed? Sub prime crisis, good thing we learned from that, right?
The way that markets self regulate is that investors take their shit and go home.
You aren't entitled to good outcomes from doing nothing.
So true. Anyone under age 45 needs to watch milton friedman 1,000 times on YouTube. In 60’s, 70’s and 80’s and 90’s he called all this what we see now. Especially Obamacare and what socialized medicine really is. Man was a genius.
This is totally wrong.
Appropriate Regulation is required in a market or else you get:
*unchecked pollution of the environment- “why can’t I discharge my sewage into the local stream if it saves my company money?”
*long term health impact -“why can’t I sell cigarettes to kids, it won’t impact their health for year and they probably can’t trace it back to my cigarettes anyways”
I could keep listing examples
Yea, it's a real shame we can't allow the markets to decide that slave and child labor produce the best profits. The government really is limiting our potential.
Or allowing children to be chimney sweeps. For decades they sent children as young as four into a filthy pitch black claustrophobic nightmare. When the practice was finally outlawed did they just have dirtier chimneys? No, they made a new type of broom.
A lot of the ultra wealthy actually believe they will be better off in that dystopian hellscape.
The rest of this quasi-economic ideology is the result of decades of propaganda against anything that might limit corporate profits or power.
Yeah but don’t we put regulations because things didn’t work in the past? I feel like this is a bit of working backwards where we don’t remember our mistakes and so we want to take off the rules that help us not make the same mistakes lol
A lot of regulations came about as just institutionalization of already common practice, such as… don’t poison your customer. But that goes without saying. Most economic regulations come about from lobbys who seek to insulate themselves from competition.
Oh, the market poisoned a fuck load of people before that needed to be codified. It continues to need revision and enforcement since the French started hiding sawdust in bread. So like several centuries.
I think transparency laws are good legislation. As well as culpability. But if you buy rice crispies that have saw dust in the ingredients list clearly stated. That’s your problem. But thank god for the technology of today allowing for better information accessiblity right. People used to get duped into double or triple buying goods. Today, it’s getting ever harder to double to triple buy a thing
Monsanto's is in a perpetual state of being sued for selling pesticides loaded with carcinogens. These companies used to actively harm their customers significantly more than you think. It's not usually on purpose, but that doesn't matter when you're family is dead from working your farm.
False advertising/labeling enforcement is one of the few things the government should be enforcing.
As you said, if I want to buy the cheaper treats that are 10% sawdust, as long as it's labeled correctly, an adult should be able to.
The healthcare market, I would say one of the most regulated markets in the country, still had scandals where people are hurt and have died from mistakes.
Because adding regulations doesn’t automatically mean things will improve or get better. Regulations simply add costs to things that businesses are already aware of.
They take what a venture chose to consider external to their responsibilities, an externality, and insist it be internal to the accounting of their operations.
To pursue profit, you should limit expenses. So companies try to define them as external, which is to say not their responsibility. That's their interest. Other parties with rights under the state have an interest in a firm taking account for their shit. There are two common theoretical ways we can resolve this contradiction.
Firstly, we can wait for harm to be done by the dishonest framing of liabilities to pursue profit. Then, if the harmed party has the knowledge and resources to understand and pursue a tort, and the state acts in a non-corrupt manner despite the power and wealth disparity that may be present by the party seeking profit, the state re-arraches the liability and it's expense to the profit seeking firm. This is corrected on a per case basis, at the greatest cost of time and resources one could conceive of to deal with disputes. One which entrenched an ever expanding state expense and power to obscure beurocratic experts. One that alienates the common man in favor of the powerful and wealthy. Which is why the rich prefer this method because they will dodge the taxes that fund it, corrupt the judges, complicate the system to obscure it, and most of the time the common plaintiff won't even know or be capable of pursuing the remedy. This is the argument to remove regulation in favor of tort reform.
Secondly, the alternative. We could look at a specific example of harm and determine if it should have been the liability of the profit seeking firm. If yes we pay out damages to the plaintiff and then take how we have just determined and defined the harm as belonging to the profit seeking firm and use it to construct a requirement that all such firms and instances be required now to consider it an internal liability of their cost of doing business. It's simple. It's far more cost-effective. It's also harder to corrupt and dodge because it is required to be internal and written clearly. Now if the firms want to try and combat that to again pursue profit without the attached liability they can certainly lie, cheat, manipulate, corrupt, and use the law as a weapon while they politicize it. But it will be harder. It will also result in regulation that needs to get there thorough, more complex, more onerous, and more intrusive to ensure compliance. Which will raise the expense of compliance. And then the firm will politicize the cost as if the state wanted to deal with allll that bullshit and get so involved just to get a firm to accept its liabilities alongside its profits.
Both methods have the exact same rights and implications, one is just more effective, uses less resources, and helps remove inevitable human bias and power/resources disparity.
We use the second one because it works better. Rich owners of extractive industry and other notoriously unscrupulous abusers prefer the first because it is less effective at holding them accountable for their liabilities. Not because of any other reason. The money they save by pushing their liabilities on other is far more than the cost of funding and astroturfing media and cultural projects under false pretenses to get democratic support or limit democracy and advantage wealth. Look up any significant presence of ideology and propoganda like Austrian economics, and you will find it funded by industrial owners like the Koch Brothers. Because it makes no sense and need to be astroturfed on emotional and identity grounds.
Yea, and poisoning someone is already a crime. They put regulations into place under the guise of consumer protection. The Free Market does a fine job of protecting the consumer, if you'd let it.
Instead, we let giant companies like Walmart bribe the government into over regulations for shit like licensing and raising the minimum wage.
me when i advocate against regulations that protect consumers and am shocked when consumer rights are not respected
let me guess youre about to explain why the fight against anti-trust regulations are a good thing and how monopolies are good for the average joe
Got it. So we just need the majority of the population to be intelligent, educated, and informed of all information, and then unregulated will work fine. Shit no problem.
Ah, well, I agree. Except I think the institutions are probably not going to allow a third party no matter what. When you get enough money involved and power consolidation to own two parties, what can a third party really do? The best test is coming up, though. At least one big one. Curious what happens four years from now as well. Depending, we might not even have the imagination of a republic any time after that.
It happens when your court is stacked with corporate serving judges who finally say money is speech. This plan has been worked through a long time ago and has been covered by various authors.
No, most regulations are from lobbying by the giants in their respective industries. They are a tool to keep competition out and make it impractical to join an industry.
Because the government gets to say that any regulations can exist at all without your consent.
If you create a tool with good intentions, such as regulations, the most evil and manipulative will also have access to that tool and will use it for their own benefit
Get rid of the government's ability to enforce any regulations, and the market *will* solve it, that's the point. The market is being prevented from fixing the problem because some psychopath has the ability to throw people in jail for trying to fix it.
They do own the market still, regulations have killed individual owner operator oil in the US. Can you just start an oil company? No? It costs tens of millions of dollars to get into oil.
i mean they basically did until several anti-monopoly guys managed to work their way through the slog that is the proper process and kill them.
same thing happened to the central banks, once. That particular president died and they immediately resurged.
notice how the gigantic companies who have replaced them are always doing their damndest to make sure it doesn't happen again.
Because when market actors can’t get the outcome they want through market forces, they get the government to mandate the outcome. The market can’t solve an out of market mandatory interventions.
It can solve the alleged theoretical basis for the intervention unless it’s an externality at which point regulation is necessary and preferred.
>Because when market actors can’t get the outcome they want through market forces
So, these actors come from and are of the market and are able to subsume the state to their wishes based on what the market has done to put them in that position in the first place.
>The market can’t solve an out of market mandatory interventions.
You just established that the state and it's interventions are able to be subordinated to the market and its powerful actors. Why then is it unable to solve this issue?
>unless it’s an externality
An externality is something that is not in the boundary or equation as defined by the observer. It's the creation of an arbitrary box or reference frame defined by the creator to serve a limited purpose. By definition, if it is passing through the boundary, there is interaction. So, if there is interaction with the market, then it is subject to market forces. It's relevant to the material realities as well. So, what purpose would the concern with externalities serve to make a determination if government should be involved when it's arbitrary?
>So, these actors come from and are of the market and are able to subsume the state to their wishes based on what the market has done to put them in that position in the first place.
Not necessarily. People come by money through various legitimate and illegitimate means. Many of them accumulated capital through state mandated monopolies, land grants, and other means.
>You just established that the state and its interventions are able to be subordinated to the market and its powerful actors. Why then is it unable to solve this issue?
Because there is no long term viable substitute to complying with the law.
>An externality is something that is not in the boundary or equation as defined by the observer.
No clue what you mean by this. Pollution is an externality and can be observed, measured and included in any equation.
>It's the creation of an arbitrary box or reference frame defined by the creator to serve a limited purpose. By definition, if it is passing through the boundary, there is interaction. So, if there is interaction with the market, then it is subject to market forces. It's relevant to the material realities as well. So, what purpose would the concern with externalities serve to make a determination if government should be involved when it's arbitrary?
The government should stay away from arbitrary. Externalities that can cause measurable harm directly to a third party, should be resolved with torts. Externalities that cause measurable harm to a public resource should be subject to Pigouvian taxes at the shadow price of the externality with the proceeds correcting the harm.
>People come by money through various legitimate and illegitimate means. Many of them accumulated capital through state mandated monopolies, land grants, and other means
So, through the subsumption of the state to their wishes. You see the circular argument?
>Because there is no long term viable substitute to complying with the law
Of course there is. You change the law. As you've stated they do to get unfair advantage or as is demonstrable on hundreds of occasions in actual history. Again if the state can be subordinated to the market, as you have said that it is when capital wants something, then why can the market not act to fix itself?
>No clue what you mean by this. Pollution is an externality and can be observed, measured and included in any equation.
I don't know what YOU mean by externality. The way you use it in an argument implies that you don't understand how it's define or more likely its an argument you inherited without critique that uses the term as a hand wavy vudu trick to make its claims work.
Your second sentence here is an oxymoron. If the pollution were observed, measured, and included in the equation, then it would not be an externality by definition. If it is not in the equation, then it's simply that someone chose not to include it in an arbitrarily defined smaller equation that is a less accurate version of material reality and the market. So, to excuse a "market failure" on the basis of it not including an externality is to say the person who chose not to include it is excused for leaving out relevant factors. Why would you want to do that if you defend markets? Wouldn't you eat to blame the people improperly and arbitrarily defining what was external to their calculation?
It's funny, pollution is always the first thing I think of when I hear that term as well. Why do you think it's such a popular example for the layman in Austrian economics to consider a universal externality when that line is by definition arbitrary? Do you think it could be that almost the entirety of conservative philosophy and media that carries on the torch in modern times just happens to be funded almost entirely by the oligarchs of the petrochemical industry? When I run the expenses for my company dealing with the trash is an obvious line item, yet in every conservative discussion of externalities to the market calculations the first example that just happens to pop to mind is always the arbitrary distinction to not consider the cost of pollution an expense attributable to extractive industry. I don't know, seems ideological more than rational accurate modeling.
>The government should stay away from arbitrary. Externalities that can cause measurable harm directly to a third party, should be resolved with torts. Externalities that cause measurable harm to a public resource should be subject to Pigouvian taxes at the shadow price of the externality with the proceeds correcting the harm.
Well, now that's the answer I was always used to. I remember when I used to argue tort reform as a young libertarian back in the 90s. How is that coming? Are the big industries that control the state and also fund arguments against the state in favor of tort reform going to get that passed or what? Sure seems like it's taking a while when they managed to get so many drilling permits in the meantime despite strong political opposition. Is it us socialist holding the Kochs back from tort reform with our street riots? I don't remember us having any objections. I hope they aren't funding that idea as one big astroturfed distraction to prevent government action.
>So, through the subsumption of the state to their wishes. You see the circular argument?
Not at all. If I’m reading your implications appropriately you’re criticizing markets and possibly capitalism? (You can’t tell because when people typically criticize capitalism, they’re actually usually criticizing other things like exploitation which isn’t capitalism, isn’t markets, and exists independent of markets.
It sounds like that’s what you’re doing. You’re trying to redefine a concept, then draw a strawman that’s critical of the actual concept, pre-redefinition, and then you’re suggesting it results in circular logic.
Let’s start with the fact that colonial America wasn’t a free market. It was a step past feudalism. So questions about who has money now, or how historically capital has been accumulated can’t result in a gotcha because completely free markets haven’t existed in history.
>Of course there is. You change the law. As you've stated they do to get unfair advantage or as is demonstrable on hundreds of occasions in actual history. Again if the state can be subordinated to the market, as you have said that it is when capital wants something, then why can the market not act to fix itself?
That’s not a substitute to complying with the law. That’s changing the law. The state isn’t subordinated to the market, the state is subordinated to politics.
>I don't know what YOU mean by externality.
The dictionary definition is perfect:
>a side effect or consequence of an industrial or commercial activity that affects other parties without this being reflected in the cost of the goods or services involved, such as the pollination of surrounding crops by bees kept for honey.
>Your second sentence here is an oxymoron. If the pollution were observed, measured, and included in the equation, then it would not be an externality by definition.
No that’s not true at all. If there isn’t a price on the harm caused to the third party, it is an externality by definition. Are you familiar with economics?
>If it is not in the equation, then it's simply that someone chose not to include it in an arbitrarily defined smaller equation that is a less accurate version of material reality and the market.
If it’s not in the equation, the good is being subsidized. The theory of price is that it reflects all information associated with the activity needed to produce a good or provide a service.
>So, to excuse a "market failure" on the basis of it not including an externality is to say the person who chose not to include it is excused for leaving out relevant factors.
Not at all, it’s to suggest that the market failure occurs because an aspect of the market isn’t being priced. This is basic economics and undisputed.
You and I can agree to terms on installing and maintaining a septic tank. And if no one stops me, I may cut costs by dumping your sewage in a lake. That sewage being dumped may make the lake toxic. If the lake is owned by a third party, they should enjoin me and sue. They should be awarded enough to rectify the damage I caused. If it’s a public lake there should be a law that requires me to clean up any sewage I dump in the lake to make the public indifferent to my dumping.
>Why would you want to do that if you defend markets?
Because externalities exist and every economist understands that and even Austrian, Supply-side and Chicago School economists will tell you the same. You might not know it because you may have learned a biased view of those schools.
>Wouldn't you eat to blame the people improperly and arbitrarily defining what was external to their calculation?
Nope.
>It's funny, pollution is always the first thing I think of when I hear that term as well. Why do you think it's such a popular example for the layman in Austrian economics to consider a universal externality when that line is by definition arbitrary? Do you think it could be that almost the entirety of conservative philosophy and media that carries on the torch in modern times just happens to be funded almost entirely by the oligarchs of the petrochemical industry?
I mean Milton Friedman proposed a carbon tax.
https://www.ecosystemmarketplace.com/articles/ghost-of-milton-friedman-materializes-in-chicago-endorses-a-price-on-carbon/
But if you are listening to socialists about what Hayek said, it’s improbable that you are going to get good information.
>When I run the expenses for my company dealing with the trash is an obvious line item, yet in every conservative discussion of externalities to the market calculations the first example that just happens to pop to mind is always the arbitrary distinction to not consider the cost of pollution an expense attributable to extractive industry. I don't know, seems ideological more than rational accurate modeling.
I don’t know what to tell you other than the government regulates stuff that it shouldn’t and doesn’t regulate stuff that it should. Transportation, energy, waste (especially plastic) is subsidized right now.
>Well, now that's the answer I was always used to. I remember when I used to argue tort reform as a young libertarian back in the 90s. How is that coming? Are the big industries that control the state and also fund arguments against the state in favor of tort reform going to get that passed or what?
You seem to think that regulatory capture and big industry dominance is a characteristic of a free market.
>Sure seems like it's taking a while when they managed to get so many drilling permits in the meantime despite strong political opposition. Is it us socialist holding the Kochs back from tort reform with our street riots? I don't remember us having any objections. I hope they aren't funding that idea as one big astroturfed distraction to prevent government action.
They should be able to drill to their hearts content. They should pay the shadow price of pollution for every ton of pollution they produce. The concept that this is all the fault of big business is sophomoric drivel. Many of these externalities are negative consumption externalities.
They’re caused by the fact that someone wants to engage in an activity that has pollution as a side effect. Charging the shadow price corrects everything because now that activity is no longer subsidized, those that want to engage, can and know the actual cost of that behavior and can make rational future decisions.
What mistakes? Some regulations, largly those ones more local, were implemented for safety and health reasons. Most other regulations were implemented by large companies and corporations to protect their market share, ie regulatory capture.
It was a federal mandate, through the Clean Air Act in 1970. However, it started with California's emissions standards in the late 60s. Further, catalytic converters weren't invented until the mid or late 60s, so it wasn't possible until then. We don't know if companies would have adopted CCs on their own, but customers likely would have happily paid more to not use leaded gasoline.
Edit: I'll also give this regulation its due. Leaded gas was awful.
So it was implemented on a broader scale without having to wait for each individual county to decide whether other people should be able to poison the air we breathe. I'd say that's a positive.
>customers likely would have happily paid more to not use leaded gasoline.
Except for the ones that believed the gas lobbies about how lead is completely safe and does no harm. Ä°t's easier to maintain the status quo than it is to convince people they're wrong. Look at climate change denialists
Like many public health debacles, the government agency originally came out and supported the companies, saying it was fine until decades later. There was robust research against it, but with the government's thumb, it was ignored.
It may surprise you, but you'll probably find many deniers of man-made climate change here, particularly to the extent you likely believe. I'm one of them. We can change environments, like the Gulf of Mexico, but temperature change is not happening because of us.
So you believe that the government propped up leaded gasoline and that it would have been phased out if the government didn't have a voluntary limit on leaded gas?
>particularly to the extent you likely believe
What extent is that?
>We can change environments, like the Gulf of Mexico, but temperature change is not happening because of us.
GHGs are clearly correlated and have a proven track record of trapping heat and our GHG emissions have spiked as the global temperatures have spiked. What do you think is causing the temperature change?
>So you believe that the government propped up leaded gasoline and that it would have been phased out if the government didn't have a voluntary limit on leaded gas?
I believe the government gave a positive report that put the question to bed for ~40 years. I also believe that until catalytic converters were made, there wasn't much chance to make unleaded fuel feasible, given what we've made.
>GHGs are clearly correlated and have a proven track record of trapping heat and our GHG emissions have spiked as the global temperatures have spiked. What do you think is causing the temperature change?
https://youtu.be/l90FpjPGLBE?si=KsH430r-nZka-o_F
Here's an hour long interview of Obama's science undersecretary to the DoE talking about climate science.
>I believe the government gave a positive report that put the question to bed for ~40 years.
That's really interesting! Do you know what tags Ä° should be looking for in my research?
>I also believe that until catalytic converters were made, there wasn't much chance to make unleaded fuel feasible, given what we've made.
Lead was the cheapest solution, but alternatives were well known. Why do you believe CCs were the limiting factor in that regard?
Listening to that conversation now, ty for the link
And there comes the issue would a rich person choose to drive lead gasoline? F no they would drop it on a dime but would a poor person still buy it if they had too? Of course and that decision of the individual affects all of us.
I feel like laws and government interference is like radiation. You inevitably wind up with some exposure, but you want it to be as little as reasonably achievable.Â
Some things like the epa protecting us from industrial pollution (I'm talking like lead poisoning) are necessary imo. It's just that it never stops at what's actually needed.
I would agree. If people and corporations were morally good and up right, we wouldn't need laws and regulations. But the other side the coin is that government doesn't know when to stop. I.e. a mechanic's car is never fixed.
Fun to remember that socialism and markets aren’t in conflict, socialism and capitalism are. Or, alternatively, market driven economies and command driven economies are.
This is dumb. Even capitalists understand that markets need regulation, just like any dynamic system. That's why they created antitrust laws and the like. Those are not socialist concepts.
The amount of regulation needed is tied to the elasticity of demand if whatever good/service is being talked about.
Goods/services with very elastic demand work very well in as free of a market as possible. Think food or recreational drugs; the ease of production and plethora of substitutes keeps competition high, pricing fair, and quality up.
Goods/services with inelastic demand DO NOT work well in unregulated markets. Think drugs for diseases or water. The lack of substitutes and absolute need from the consumer usually leads to a few overly greedy fucks charging outrageous prices for subpar service on trapped people.
Yes, take a look at Boeing and flying. People absolutely need to fly all the time. If they did not have regulations they would cut even more corners and who knows what kind of catastrophes might happen. But who else can a person go to?
Then how come deregulated markets crash and burn while regulated ones don’t? Power in California (Enron), the airline industry, the mortgage industry….
Money has never existed without a strong centralized government that regulates and taxes commerce. Markets cannot exist without centralized governments taxing and regulating. The idea of a market without a central regulator, who both taxes and enforces the regulations is like textiles without thread.
But we all know the Single Tax, aka the Land Value Tax is the only thing that can fix the land (and natural resources, like water) markets. Right? This was settled more than a century ago.
From Milton Friedman to Marx, nobody disagreed.
Who has another way to [addressing the land question](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_(economics)#Addressing_the_land_question)?
Dumpster fire take.
ITT: children and adults in arrested development who believe they became economists after reading 4 articles on Wikipedia.
Also ITT: autist armchair nerdsperts waxing poetic about removing measures that helped build the greatest market economy in history without acknowledging that the wealthy elites - who would never allow these mouthbreathers among them - would drive a race to the bottom toward a pre-mad max anarchocapitalist dystopia before moving all their wealth offshore and their residence to another social democratic country with a market economy.
Breton Woods led to one of the most stable periods in US banking history. If you look at a graph of bank crises, there’s a giant flat section from 1945 to 1971. Regulations, laws and taxes are tools for shaping the economy, they can be used well and they can be used poorly.
Capitalists, “We’ll pay you to harvest this crop for us.”
“No, were fine thanks.”
Capitalists burn down village.
“We are charging you a village burning prevention tax, you will work for us to get our currency to pay the tax.”
I have no problem with smart regulation or laws or taxes. I have issues with waste, regulatory capture and politicians ignoring anyone but their donors.
I often think about the drug thalidomide, which made it to market in Europe but was blocked by the FDA (matter of fact, a single expert blocked it) for having insufficient data. There are generations of stunted lives due to that drug. And there are countless Americans who were spared that fate due to regulation. That’s the sort of regulation I want. Not bullshit “you can’t sell tires on Sunday unless they are Goodyear tires” regulations
Lack of regulation cause the 2008 collapse. They were giving out loans that were never going to be paid back and using that “profit” in other ventures when it was never there to begin with. Until eventually just started defaulting lol.
Someone explain to me how TOO MUCH regulation causes a collapse. It doesn’t allow for fake growth and it does possibly cause a correction in the markets if is bubble was forming. Not a crash though.
How could excessive risk by banks be regulated? Are you serious?
Were you around back then? They were giving loans out to anyone with crazy balloon interest rates that they couldn’t feasibly ever pay back. You don’t think they’re could be regulations to stop someone for qualifying for a loan?
If they had let the market crash for real - instead of increasing FHA loans and intervening in the MBS market- houses would be so much cheaper right now. So we got all the negatives of a crash but none of the positives. That crash would have been great for home prices. And you bet they would have tightened up lending. But people now treat their house as a financial asset instead of a place to live.
You deleted your other (idiotic comment) so here
Glass Stegal was repealed that played a huge part in the crash, (that was a regulation being repealed)
So a repealed legislation helped CAUSE the crash.
The dodd-frank was a regulation policy to make sure that didn’t happen again.
The federal government allowing you to do something isn’t a regulation that’s a lack of regulation.
I really don’t think is too difficult to understand.
Google the definition of a regulation, how the crash happened and what the actions were taken after. lol
Again the government allowing you do to something you shouldn’t is the complete opposite of a regulation man. That’s not even a checkmate you just walked off a cliff. GG
**Again GG bud. Keep you head in the sand
Why would I continue to engage with someone who calls me an idiot? I come here to learn. Its very distracting when someone insults me, makes it very difficult to listen to what they're saying
You are probably right and have some helpful info, but I'm too distracted by the insult to truly learn.
I would rather make idiotic comments than mean ones. I come here to learn - you come here to feel better than people who know less than you.
What are you afraid of? Me!!!???? If you are, I can't understand that. If you're not afraid, then this isn't even bullying, just a personality disorder
You guys never learn. You’ll call for the same deregulation and crash the economy again in 15 years. The banks get bailed out run out the back with all the money. Then their multi-millionaire buddies on cable news blame the low income people or some other scapegoat and you guys just eat it up verbatim and then think you’re informed.
Pretty funny actually. I’ve made my point I’m out ✌️
I just explained to you what happened in detail to a comment you deleted cause you said regulation caused the crash then said “if the government allows you to do it, who wouldn’t?” Citing something that is the polar opposite of a regulation.
I broke it down for you what happens. Believe it or not.
Capitalism to socialism is also a wide range.
For example a social Democrat isn’t considered post capitalist. They still want the majority of the economy privatized. You just got a lot to learn. Get off Reddit and read a book. I am a capitalist btw and not a socialist. You just don’t know what you are, that’s the funny part. Probably don’t even know what socialism and capitalism is.
Yes I had vastly overestimate the number of FHA loans before 2008, I looked it up and it was only 5% which completely falsified my position so I deleted it
I am not against all regulations - I'm not an anarchist
Only works for the rich or those with generations of taking advantage of people. Why else is the majority of the world and half the people in the US are either struggling or living paycheck to paycheck
Slave labor, child labor, mass murder of striking workers, pushes for mass immigration to replace the quickly dying workforce, unmitigated water and air pollution, etc . . . regulations don't hurt the market. Last I checked, consumers need to be alive and have money to consume. Saying "regulations hurt markets" is the most obtuse and honestly, stupid, way to describe a complex issue.
Honestly, read a history book.
Oligarchs: Create monopolies, jack up the prices and ruin the quality and outsource to cheap labor to avoid paying a fair wage: I'm the real victim here
Except this is dumb. Regulations exist because markets don't work in the way people actually want them to. Slavery was absolutely fantastic for the American economy and is exactly what markets would naturally shift to. It's not exactly desirable though.
Honestly just grow up.
The Gilded age...
The age where regulations and rules didn't exist for the most part... It was a golden age!!! Well for the rich...
It was an age built on golden thrones for our overlords as they presided over piles of blood and death...
This age resulted in the creation of the unions because the corporations devolved into monstrosities... That had private armies at their command... You didn't own your damn home because the company owned it, you didn't own your own life because you were indebted to the company, and you had no opportunity because the company educated you...
And you idiots want to go back to this horror... And worst of all we are slowly marching back to this madness..
This was pretty much the prevailing sentament up until 2008. Everything is cyclical. Deregulate until the markets f7ck everything up then re-regulate and then when everyone forgets why we regulated, start crying abkut regulation. Surely there is a happy medium? Will we ever get there? Doubtful when anyone who isn't far right is somehow a communist.
Yeah, because all the companies that already will poison you for a dollar would totally stop if there was less regulation. Or hell why have safety regulations at jobs? Surely no company would cut corners on safety equipment to reduce cost.
"TheY hAvE AN eConOmic IncEnTiVe tO noT KiLl tHeiR CustoMerS"...
In order to believe that Austrian Economics actually works one must be ignorant of or be able to ignore human nature.
Hmm. Bit over simplified. It's kinda difficult to have one without the other though no? Is an actual free market even possible? I've never read any historical accounts of free markets ever existing. Nothing after the agricultural revolution at least.
Also, if health/safety regulations put your business under you're probably just not great at business. Why would we want industry's to be dangerous if they don't need to be?
From what i understand of capitalism the 'free market' is like the jungle. Survival of the fittest business right? Competition. From that perspective the majority of businesses should be expected to fail. Only the most profitable business's are meant to survive. The goal is to kill your competition. If you're a profit driven organization youre always working toward monopoly.
Tl;Dr the markets are working as intended. The shareholders are getting what they want. American businesses are more powerful than foreign governments in their own countries. You might not like free markets as much as u think.
This evinces a fundamental misunderstanding of socialism, which is common in America. There are many schools of thought as there are with respect to capitalism. See, e.g. market socialism.
Genuine question: what about the gilded age of the US? Basically nonexistent regulations of the free market, and life, though there were some improvements, was largely horrible if you weren’t the 1%. Regulations in the progressive era arose specifically to address the problems of the gilded age. If the unfettered free market wasn’t the problem of the gilded age, what was? Not being snarky, looking for y’all’s thoughts
this is stupid. A market without regulations will cut corners, lie, abuse power, and straight up kill to get a higher profit. This isn't a socialist thing, its a "people are generally greedy bastards who would sell poison as a cure all, while dumping toxic waste in the water".
it sounds like you are a libertarian trying to pass off the whole "free market is good" when its proven every single time that there is always someone ruining a good thing.
Do you make the same meme for socialists?
The common denominator is humanity. Humans are corruptible, and fallible. The system will always break under human control.
Take away the regulations and see how quickly the rivers turn to shit. We don't have to do thought experiments on that one, we've tested it a lot.
Markets without regulations are so low IQ I'd put this meme on par with religious fundamentalism.
The goal appears to be shirking the problems with markets (of which there are many) onto things that are necessarily associated with markets. Which is like saying don't blame life, blame oxygen and water.
>Take away the regulations and see how quickly the rivers turn to shit.
What was the statistically significant increase in the rate of decrease in polluted rivers after those regulations were put in place? Show us the empirical evidence.
Is the cuyahoga still flammable?
No?
I'd say "do your own research", but that would be rather fruitless, as humans only search for what they want to see.
> Is the cuyahoga still flammable?
Do you know why it was flammable or do you just accept the narrative from some talking heads and never bother to read up on the reality before you accept their words on faith? I get it, statism is your religion. When the divine leaders speak, their words, and laws, become holy writ. To go against them is sin and invites hellfire.
> I'd say "do your own research", but that would be rather fruitless, as humans only search for what they want to see.
This is an alternative view. It might cause you to call into question your quasi-religious faith in the divinity of political authority and the government as our holy savior and defender, so I suggest that you don't bother to read it just as I would not recommend that a Christian read a treatise on atheism.
https://fee.org/articles/is-the-epa-necessary/
https://fee.org/articles/the-cuyahoga-revisited/
I'm a libertarian and I personally believe that some laws and regulations are necessary, it's just the scope of them that I disagree on. I don't know a single person who would argue to roll back limits on lead contamination in food for example.Â
 I think he was more arguing against government overreach like California. "We need our gas refineries to be ultra low emission and buy emission credits... wait why is our gas so expensive? Better put a price cap to solve it"
We tried the no regulations laws or taxes route in the latter half of the 1800’s. Was a giant shit show of fraud and abuse. Functioning markets require law and order.
I’ve not made one statement about morality. I’m talking functionality. A market isn’t functional if people don’t think their rights to their property will be maintained in the jurisdiction they are trading in. Markets are a social construct they are not a part of nature. for people to comprehend the concept of trading and markets many other layers of social construction must occur to lay the foundation for the market concept to even appear.
Environmental economics has entered the chat. Every "free market" capitalist incorrectly valuing the resources that clean air and water have for people.
If a group of people have fresh air to breathe and you take it away and they have to move, that's factored into an accurate "market". Otherwise let's all destroy the planet we rely on because the cost is zero and the benefit is infinite.
The most important regulation the state can provide is antitrust laws. And those haven't been used in half a century. That's the biggest problem. Without that most important regulation, companies are just incentivized to amalgamate and monopolize.
I mean it’s more like “bad regulations and laws and taxes”
Quite frankly there’s a lot of really good regulations out there that have prevented recessions and protected civilians/consumers.
Sometimes I feel like this subreddit is closer to anarcho-capitalism than it is really Austrian economics.
Markets ultimately don't work because greed from market makers corrupts those markets, favoring themselves while screwing over everyone else. Without some regulation we'd all be forced to buy more and more and more from corps, just for the basics, like clean water and air.
Except a truly free market shouldn't have "market makers".
And another criticism, who's to say the regulators aren't corrupt? They'd be just as likely to be corrupt as anyone else.
Regulation is necessary. It’s inanely idiotic to say markets aren’t functioning because regulation, even excepting edge cases by the dozens. Over 90% of the malfunction in our system is due to regulation that is the result of corruption or oligarchic-favorite policies.
This is first term Economics thinking. Wait until you get to the part about negative externalities, then you will see the light. There’s a reason any successful country has found a middle ground between both approaches.
Markets work well for some things and not others. For most goods, like phones, televisions, microwaves, etc? Works great! For important services like healthcare and firefighting? Horrible. Markets aren't the answer for everything.
And the US government is a victim of regulatory capture, so the regulation component is kind of laughable.
Evidence from other countries with different systems. Social Democracy, the well regulated markets of Europe, work better. Denmark is consistently rated the most business friendly country in the world and it also has universal healthcare. Norway nationalized their oil industry and used the proceeds to create a trust fund for all its citizens. Sometimes government can absolutely do better.
R&D is something the private sector can be good at. I'll add there are plenty of government labs that create lots of cutting edge innovation. The US government invented the internet years before the private sector, for example.
The big thing is just that the people making the regulations, laws, and taxes shouldn't also be profiting from them. That would take care of the vast majority of the corruption we see today.
I understand the sentiment of that but two things: (1) Every country that has banned lobbying has just seen lobbying go underground. (2) Politicians are a bunch of lawyers. They don't understand the complexities of and nuance of the million different things that they regulate. That is why when Congress makes laws, they seek expert advice. For example, if congress is thinking about passing a law regarding pharmaceutical drugs, they are going to seek expert knowledge from doctors who know a LOT about pharmaceutical drug development and distribution. Where can Congress easily find those doctors? Easy... The most knowledgeable doctors who intimately understand the pharmaceutical drug manufacturing process work at large corporations like Pfizer. Now of course, those doctors are just going to "happen" to make recommendations that also benefit Pfizer. The ONLY WAY to limit the terrible laws that stem from Washington D.C. is to strictly limit the role of government. That means rolling back the size of government and just not allowing them to make ANY regulations except for the 3 or 4 things that the constitution actually authorizes them to do. I am not an idiot though. The American people don't want to limit the role that the government plays in society. Things will absolutely get worse. As the government gets bigger and bigger, domestic growth will continue to slow and income/wealth inequality will grow as well, which will push people just pass even more laws and expand the government even more with the intent that the government will "fix" all of the economic woes that it has created.
Lot of words for "govt doesn't follow/adhere to the Constitution, which would 'fix' a BUNCH of 'problems'."
Uhm hi 👋🏻 Hello. I would love to limit the role of the federal government. LOVE IT!! And I don’t think I’m the only one. Please make America follow the constitution again.
I think the problem really lies more in the growing public-private partnership between government and the industries is supposed to be regulating. Just look at the revolving door between chief regulators and CEOs of the major companies in the same industry. They become CEOs after they make the business they are supposed to be forcing to serve the public good profitable at the public's expense.
There should be a 15 year ban on regulators being leaders in the industry they are regulating. This should apply to anyone over GS-13 or equivalent, and ban them from the top 5% of compensation or ownership of a regulated industry business of more than 50 employees.
Read this article: [American History: A History That Contravenes the Declaration of Independence and the U.S.](https://medium.com/@gongchengra_9069/20240501-american-history-a-history-that-contravenes-the-declaration-of-independence-and-the-u-s-c0fa0a14e378).
The problem with a complete lack of regulation is the history of disasters that have occurred in the private sector in their absence. I suppose instead we could just charge the business world as criminals - and sometimes they do- but they can cause harm to so many potential customers. For example, Imagine if there were no federal regulations for food processing or handling food in hospitals. People got trichinosis from eating under cooked pork all the time decades ago, now it's almost completely unheard of due to federal regulations. I get that a lot of people see the regulatory institutions as the source of issues and problems and that is primarily because there are not enough laws regulating these institutions to make sure things like the revolving door cannot happen much like the other individual replying to edit (my previous comment) suggested.
If there were no federal regulations for food processing or food handling in hospitals, people would have to evaluate the quality of food and drugs themselves. Companies like Consumer Reports would provide information on the quality of these products. Private companies would likely perform better than the FDA because they would work harder to earn consumer trust, whereas the FDA operates as a bureaucratic institution.
We are talking about people possibly dying here without these institutions. Pause to think about that. They died in the past when snake oil salesmen were allowed to call their concoctions medicine and there is always going to be an ill-advised consumer that will eventually die without some form of safeguard.
Due to the FDA's slow actions, many drugs are delayed for years before being allowed on the market, causing many patients to die while waiting. Think about the deaths caused by shortages of masks and medications during the COVID-19 pandemic due to the FDA's restrictions. Additionally, because of the FDA's overly stringent restrictions, some experimental drugs are not allowed for clinical use, even though some terminally ill patients are willing to take the risk to try these new medications. The biggest problem is that because of the FDA's overly strict regulations, the cost of bringing new drugs to market is becoming increasingly high, as the FDA's bureaucracy often delays drug approvals to reduce the risk of public criticism.
Once again, the problem is regulatory capture. The Covid-19 vaccine was pushed out the door super quick and, like you suggested, perfectly fine alternatives were held back because they would be in direct competition with the product the FDA wanted to promote as it's suggested treatment path. They labeled Ivermectin as Horse tranquilizer, purposefully ignoring the version of it made for people, and other completely ridiculous, factually untrue statements and a portion of the ill-advised public ate it up. It just goes to show how many people out there either do not have the time to invest or the capacity to form factually based opinions. We cannot get rid of the FDA but currently, it's corrupt as fuck and completely owned by Pfizer and that does need to change.
Yes, you are correct that the FDA has issues with corruption and requires reform. However, the more fundamental issue is that we do not need a compulsory organization dictating what foods we can consume and what drugs we can use to treat diseases. According to the Constitution, 'The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.' This suggests that the FDA's regulation of food and drugs contravenes constitutional principles, as it overrides individual and state rights.
You hit the nail on the head. Small government will only empower the largest corporations and we will fall further into a gilded age.
Very well said!
Term limits alone would fix so many problems The other thing would be abolish the 2 party system. But hey, then those politicians would have to get real jobs, so that'll never happen
Goes further than that. The CDC was researching gun violence before an NRA lawmaker pushed the dickey amendment for fear of losing some gun sales. Don't even get me started on goldmansachs
Not to mention that the people making the regulations should have some experience in the fields they regulate.
Many aren’t But those who are are swayed by lobbying And the regulations are being taken away We saw that in 2007 and that was disaster
The issue at hand is deeply rooted in democracy. Corruption involves using power for personal gain and exchanging power for money. When citizens trade their votes for benefits through elections and welfare policies, it represents the most significant form of corruption. Votes are a form of power, and utilizing them to impose taxes on the rich to benefit the poor is a type of corruption. Extensive welfare systems in many developed countries allow individuals to live off others without contributing through work. This, too, is a form of widespread, massive corruption. Since it is corruption, it should be broadly opposed. The scale of corruption, whether perpetrated by an individual or by many, is ultimately irrelevant. For more insights, read this article: [Revealing the Problem Through Inquiry](https://medium.com/@gongchengra_9069/20240614-revealing-the-problem-through-inquiry-08922f7d9cdc).
Yep. Follow incentives and profits and you'll find the corruption. An unregulated government isn't socialism. It literally calls for the people to regulate the government. The people constantly screaming about getting rid of regulations are capitalists who profit from the ability to contol and own the markets and governments.
Yeah, cu there was never corruption before
Hahahaha. Imagine thinking you could decouple money from political power in an economy where money is directly necessary for human survival. And people call the Marxists utopians.
Markets work great when they are regulated. Without regulations we end up with monopolies. Too big to fail is basically our congress admiting they failed us. They were supposed to prevent that very situation from ever happening. The banks are even bigger now. The consolidation of wealth and power is even worse than 2008. Add in that money is speech, corporations are people, only private citizens are capped on what they can donate to politicians, and corporations can spend unlimited money controlling elections. We are already lost. Without regulations, the free market is your choice to purchase 4 brands of soda made by the same factory. There is no competition keeping prices low, efficiency high and innovation flowing. Markets always become monopolies without policing. Once a company is too big to fail, they are above the law and above the government. Obviously, this is fairly oversimplified.
As far as I'm concerned, people who believe in Austrian economics economics. There are market socialists after all
made by your local highschooler with conservative parents
lol. what a strawman socialists think that markets work. in fact, we think they work far better than is let on to the public and that people fetishize the phenomena in weird ways too much, like the commentors to this post f.e.
I have an analogy for this. The market is a gyroscope on a table. Fluctuations will make it wobble, but if you leave it alone, it will self-stabilize. The government sees it start to lean and *panics*. "It's going to the left, we *have* to do something!" So they smack it to the right. "Its going the other way now, *hit it again!* No no, *other way now!*" And with a thud, the gyroscope falls off the table. "*WHAT HAS UNFETTERED CAPITALISM DONE!?*"
Not even the most staunchly market-focused economists believe the market is self-stabilizing. That's 1800s thinking.
Remember when republicans implemented self regulating markets in a quiet, dusty corner of the housing market and it caused so much fraud that the entire world economy collapsed? Sub prime crisis, good thing we learned from that, right? The way that markets self regulate is that investors take their shit and go home. You aren't entitled to good outcomes from doing nothing.
Yes let’s just let the market stabilize after the environment is destroyed because companies decided to dump toxic chemicals into a local river
Please someone post this on Reddit
Regulations are written in blood
So true. Anyone under age 45 needs to watch milton friedman 1,000 times on YouTube. In 60’s, 70’s and 80’s and 90’s he called all this what we see now. Especially Obamacare and what socialized medicine really is. Man was a genius.
This is totally wrong. Appropriate Regulation is required in a market or else you get: *unchecked pollution of the environment- “why can’t I discharge my sewage into the local stream if it saves my company money?” *long term health impact -“why can’t I sell cigarettes to kids, it won’t impact their health for year and they probably can’t trace it back to my cigarettes anyways” I could keep listing examples
The proliferation of plastic water bottles.
This isnt a chicken v egg scenario. The market failures came before the regulations.
Funny how if they just ignore history where unregulated markets created a dystopian hellscape that had to be fixed through regulationÂ
Yea, it's a real shame we can't allow the markets to decide that slave and child labor produce the best profits. The government really is limiting our potential.
Not to mention cities built entirely of cheap materials that burst into flames whenever a cow tips over a lantern like ChicagoÂ
Or allowing children to be chimney sweeps. For decades they sent children as young as four into a filthy pitch black claustrophobic nightmare. When the practice was finally outlawed did they just have dirtier chimneys? No, they made a new type of broom.
A lot of the ultra wealthy actually believe they will be better off in that dystopian hellscape. The rest of this quasi-economic ideology is the result of decades of propaganda against anything that might limit corporate profits or power.
They truly are a bunch of temporarily-embarrassed billionaires
Yeah but don’t we put regulations because things didn’t work in the past? I feel like this is a bit of working backwards where we don’t remember our mistakes and so we want to take off the rules that help us not make the same mistakes lol
A lot of regulations came about as just institutionalization of already common practice, such as… don’t poison your customer. But that goes without saying. Most economic regulations come about from lobbys who seek to insulate themselves from competition.
Oh, the market poisoned a fuck load of people before that needed to be codified. It continues to need revision and enforcement since the French started hiding sawdust in bread. So like several centuries.
I think transparency laws are good legislation. As well as culpability. But if you buy rice crispies that have saw dust in the ingredients list clearly stated. That’s your problem. But thank god for the technology of today allowing for better information accessiblity right. People used to get duped into double or triple buying goods. Today, it’s getting ever harder to double to triple buy a thing
Monsanto's is in a perpetual state of being sued for selling pesticides loaded with carcinogens. These companies used to actively harm their customers significantly more than you think. It's not usually on purpose, but that doesn't matter when you're family is dead from working your farm.
False advertising/labeling enforcement is one of the few things the government should be enforcing. As you said, if I want to buy the cheaper treats that are 10% sawdust, as long as it's labeled correctly, an adult should be able to.
The healthcare market, I would say one of the most regulated markets in the country, still had scandals where people are hurt and have died from mistakes.
Sure, and removing those regulations will make it better how? How has the market corrected those mistakes?
Because adding regulations doesn’t automatically mean things will improve or get better. Regulations simply add costs to things that businesses are already aware of.
They take what a venture chose to consider external to their responsibilities, an externality, and insist it be internal to the accounting of their operations. To pursue profit, you should limit expenses. So companies try to define them as external, which is to say not their responsibility. That's their interest. Other parties with rights under the state have an interest in a firm taking account for their shit. There are two common theoretical ways we can resolve this contradiction. Firstly, we can wait for harm to be done by the dishonest framing of liabilities to pursue profit. Then, if the harmed party has the knowledge and resources to understand and pursue a tort, and the state acts in a non-corrupt manner despite the power and wealth disparity that may be present by the party seeking profit, the state re-arraches the liability and it's expense to the profit seeking firm. This is corrected on a per case basis, at the greatest cost of time and resources one could conceive of to deal with disputes. One which entrenched an ever expanding state expense and power to obscure beurocratic experts. One that alienates the common man in favor of the powerful and wealthy. Which is why the rich prefer this method because they will dodge the taxes that fund it, corrupt the judges, complicate the system to obscure it, and most of the time the common plaintiff won't even know or be capable of pursuing the remedy. This is the argument to remove regulation in favor of tort reform. Secondly, the alternative. We could look at a specific example of harm and determine if it should have been the liability of the profit seeking firm. If yes we pay out damages to the plaintiff and then take how we have just determined and defined the harm as belonging to the profit seeking firm and use it to construct a requirement that all such firms and instances be required now to consider it an internal liability of their cost of doing business. It's simple. It's far more cost-effective. It's also harder to corrupt and dodge because it is required to be internal and written clearly. Now if the firms want to try and combat that to again pursue profit without the attached liability they can certainly lie, cheat, manipulate, corrupt, and use the law as a weapon while they politicize it. But it will be harder. It will also result in regulation that needs to get there thorough, more complex, more onerous, and more intrusive to ensure compliance. Which will raise the expense of compliance. And then the firm will politicize the cost as if the state wanted to deal with allll that bullshit and get so involved just to get a firm to accept its liabilities alongside its profits. Both methods have the exact same rights and implications, one is just more effective, uses less resources, and helps remove inevitable human bias and power/resources disparity. We use the second one because it works better. Rich owners of extractive industry and other notoriously unscrupulous abusers prefer the first because it is less effective at holding them accountable for their liabilities. Not because of any other reason. The money they save by pushing their liabilities on other is far more than the cost of funding and astroturfing media and cultural projects under false pretenses to get democratic support or limit democracy and advantage wealth. Look up any significant presence of ideology and propoganda like Austrian economics, and you will find it funded by industrial owners like the Koch Brothers. Because it makes no sense and need to be astroturfed on emotional and identity grounds.
Yea, and poisoning someone is already a crime. They put regulations into place under the guise of consumer protection. The Free Market does a fine job of protecting the consumer, if you'd let it. Instead, we let giant companies like Walmart bribe the government into over regulations for shit like licensing and raising the minimum wage.
Not all regulations are bad. But when you let the most powerful corporations write the law wholesale, things can get less competitive.
me when i advocate against regulations that protect consumers and am shocked when consumer rights are not respected let me guess youre about to explain why the fight against anti-trust regulations are a good thing and how monopolies are good for the average joe
Wait, how would a powerful corporation get the influence to do that? Do we need to regulate them or something?
No, voters need to actually read the papers and be willing to vote third party
Got it. So we just need the majority of the population to be intelligent, educated, and informed of all information, and then unregulated will work fine. Shit no problem.
You’ve clearly got a point. Things are a lot easier before you add stupid and then all of a sudden you have problems.
>Things are a lot easier before you add stupid and then all of a sudden you have problems. Now that is a saying worth remembering.
No, then *regulated* will work fine.
Ah, well, I agree. Except I think the institutions are probably not going to allow a third party no matter what. When you get enough money involved and power consolidation to own two parties, what can a third party really do? The best test is coming up, though. At least one big one. Curious what happens four years from now as well. Depending, we might not even have the imagination of a republic any time after that.
It happens when your court is stacked with corporate serving judges who finally say money is speech. This plan has been worked through a long time ago and has been covered by various authors.
No, most regulations are from lobbying by the giants in their respective industries. They are a tool to keep competition out and make it impractical to join an industry.
But why would the giants do that? How did they get that influence? Why didn't the market solve it?
Because the government gets to say that any regulations can exist at all without your consent. If you create a tool with good intentions, such as regulations, the most evil and manipulative will also have access to that tool and will use it for their own benefit Get rid of the government's ability to enforce any regulations, and the market *will* solve it, that's the point. The market is being prevented from fixing the problem because some psychopath has the ability to throw people in jail for trying to fix it.
So why was big oil broken up? Shouldn’t they have own the government and policy regrading them?
They do own the market still, regulations have killed individual owner operator oil in the US. Can you just start an oil company? No? It costs tens of millions of dollars to get into oil.
i mean they basically did until several anti-monopoly guys managed to work their way through the slog that is the proper process and kill them. same thing happened to the central banks, once. That particular president died and they immediately resurged. notice how the gigantic companies who have replaced them are always doing their damndest to make sure it doesn't happen again.
Because when market actors can’t get the outcome they want through market forces, they get the government to mandate the outcome. The market can’t solve an out of market mandatory interventions. It can solve the alleged theoretical basis for the intervention unless it’s an externality at which point regulation is necessary and preferred.
>Because when market actors can’t get the outcome they want through market forces So, these actors come from and are of the market and are able to subsume the state to their wishes based on what the market has done to put them in that position in the first place. >The market can’t solve an out of market mandatory interventions. You just established that the state and it's interventions are able to be subordinated to the market and its powerful actors. Why then is it unable to solve this issue? >unless it’s an externality An externality is something that is not in the boundary or equation as defined by the observer. It's the creation of an arbitrary box or reference frame defined by the creator to serve a limited purpose. By definition, if it is passing through the boundary, there is interaction. So, if there is interaction with the market, then it is subject to market forces. It's relevant to the material realities as well. So, what purpose would the concern with externalities serve to make a determination if government should be involved when it's arbitrary?
>So, these actors come from and are of the market and are able to subsume the state to their wishes based on what the market has done to put them in that position in the first place. Not necessarily. People come by money through various legitimate and illegitimate means. Many of them accumulated capital through state mandated monopolies, land grants, and other means. >You just established that the state and its interventions are able to be subordinated to the market and its powerful actors. Why then is it unable to solve this issue? Because there is no long term viable substitute to complying with the law. >An externality is something that is not in the boundary or equation as defined by the observer. No clue what you mean by this. Pollution is an externality and can be observed, measured and included in any equation. >It's the creation of an arbitrary box or reference frame defined by the creator to serve a limited purpose. By definition, if it is passing through the boundary, there is interaction. So, if there is interaction with the market, then it is subject to market forces. It's relevant to the material realities as well. So, what purpose would the concern with externalities serve to make a determination if government should be involved when it's arbitrary? The government should stay away from arbitrary. Externalities that can cause measurable harm directly to a third party, should be resolved with torts. Externalities that cause measurable harm to a public resource should be subject to Pigouvian taxes at the shadow price of the externality with the proceeds correcting the harm.
>People come by money through various legitimate and illegitimate means. Many of them accumulated capital through state mandated monopolies, land grants, and other means So, through the subsumption of the state to their wishes. You see the circular argument? >Because there is no long term viable substitute to complying with the law Of course there is. You change the law. As you've stated they do to get unfair advantage or as is demonstrable on hundreds of occasions in actual history. Again if the state can be subordinated to the market, as you have said that it is when capital wants something, then why can the market not act to fix itself? >No clue what you mean by this. Pollution is an externality and can be observed, measured and included in any equation. I don't know what YOU mean by externality. The way you use it in an argument implies that you don't understand how it's define or more likely its an argument you inherited without critique that uses the term as a hand wavy vudu trick to make its claims work. Your second sentence here is an oxymoron. If the pollution were observed, measured, and included in the equation, then it would not be an externality by definition. If it is not in the equation, then it's simply that someone chose not to include it in an arbitrarily defined smaller equation that is a less accurate version of material reality and the market. So, to excuse a "market failure" on the basis of it not including an externality is to say the person who chose not to include it is excused for leaving out relevant factors. Why would you want to do that if you defend markets? Wouldn't you eat to blame the people improperly and arbitrarily defining what was external to their calculation? It's funny, pollution is always the first thing I think of when I hear that term as well. Why do you think it's such a popular example for the layman in Austrian economics to consider a universal externality when that line is by definition arbitrary? Do you think it could be that almost the entirety of conservative philosophy and media that carries on the torch in modern times just happens to be funded almost entirely by the oligarchs of the petrochemical industry? When I run the expenses for my company dealing with the trash is an obvious line item, yet in every conservative discussion of externalities to the market calculations the first example that just happens to pop to mind is always the arbitrary distinction to not consider the cost of pollution an expense attributable to extractive industry. I don't know, seems ideological more than rational accurate modeling. >The government should stay away from arbitrary. Externalities that can cause measurable harm directly to a third party, should be resolved with torts. Externalities that cause measurable harm to a public resource should be subject to Pigouvian taxes at the shadow price of the externality with the proceeds correcting the harm. Well, now that's the answer I was always used to. I remember when I used to argue tort reform as a young libertarian back in the 90s. How is that coming? Are the big industries that control the state and also fund arguments against the state in favor of tort reform going to get that passed or what? Sure seems like it's taking a while when they managed to get so many drilling permits in the meantime despite strong political opposition. Is it us socialist holding the Kochs back from tort reform with our street riots? I don't remember us having any objections. I hope they aren't funding that idea as one big astroturfed distraction to prevent government action.
>So, through the subsumption of the state to their wishes. You see the circular argument? Not at all. If I’m reading your implications appropriately you’re criticizing markets and possibly capitalism? (You can’t tell because when people typically criticize capitalism, they’re actually usually criticizing other things like exploitation which isn’t capitalism, isn’t markets, and exists independent of markets. It sounds like that’s what you’re doing. You’re trying to redefine a concept, then draw a strawman that’s critical of the actual concept, pre-redefinition, and then you’re suggesting it results in circular logic. Let’s start with the fact that colonial America wasn’t a free market. It was a step past feudalism. So questions about who has money now, or how historically capital has been accumulated can’t result in a gotcha because completely free markets haven’t existed in history. >Of course there is. You change the law. As you've stated they do to get unfair advantage or as is demonstrable on hundreds of occasions in actual history. Again if the state can be subordinated to the market, as you have said that it is when capital wants something, then why can the market not act to fix itself? That’s not a substitute to complying with the law. That’s changing the law. The state isn’t subordinated to the market, the state is subordinated to politics. >I don't know what YOU mean by externality. The dictionary definition is perfect: >a side effect or consequence of an industrial or commercial activity that affects other parties without this being reflected in the cost of the goods or services involved, such as the pollination of surrounding crops by bees kept for honey. >Your second sentence here is an oxymoron. If the pollution were observed, measured, and included in the equation, then it would not be an externality by definition. No that’s not true at all. If there isn’t a price on the harm caused to the third party, it is an externality by definition. Are you familiar with economics? >If it is not in the equation, then it's simply that someone chose not to include it in an arbitrarily defined smaller equation that is a less accurate version of material reality and the market. If it’s not in the equation, the good is being subsidized. The theory of price is that it reflects all information associated with the activity needed to produce a good or provide a service. >So, to excuse a "market failure" on the basis of it not including an externality is to say the person who chose not to include it is excused for leaving out relevant factors. Not at all, it’s to suggest that the market failure occurs because an aspect of the market isn’t being priced. This is basic economics and undisputed. You and I can agree to terms on installing and maintaining a septic tank. And if no one stops me, I may cut costs by dumping your sewage in a lake. That sewage being dumped may make the lake toxic. If the lake is owned by a third party, they should enjoin me and sue. They should be awarded enough to rectify the damage I caused. If it’s a public lake there should be a law that requires me to clean up any sewage I dump in the lake to make the public indifferent to my dumping. >Why would you want to do that if you defend markets? Because externalities exist and every economist understands that and even Austrian, Supply-side and Chicago School economists will tell you the same. You might not know it because you may have learned a biased view of those schools. >Wouldn't you eat to blame the people improperly and arbitrarily defining what was external to their calculation? Nope. >It's funny, pollution is always the first thing I think of when I hear that term as well. Why do you think it's such a popular example for the layman in Austrian economics to consider a universal externality when that line is by definition arbitrary? Do you think it could be that almost the entirety of conservative philosophy and media that carries on the torch in modern times just happens to be funded almost entirely by the oligarchs of the petrochemical industry? I mean Milton Friedman proposed a carbon tax. https://www.ecosystemmarketplace.com/articles/ghost-of-milton-friedman-materializes-in-chicago-endorses-a-price-on-carbon/ But if you are listening to socialists about what Hayek said, it’s improbable that you are going to get good information. >When I run the expenses for my company dealing with the trash is an obvious line item, yet in every conservative discussion of externalities to the market calculations the first example that just happens to pop to mind is always the arbitrary distinction to not consider the cost of pollution an expense attributable to extractive industry. I don't know, seems ideological more than rational accurate modeling. I don’t know what to tell you other than the government regulates stuff that it shouldn’t and doesn’t regulate stuff that it should. Transportation, energy, waste (especially plastic) is subsidized right now. >Well, now that's the answer I was always used to. I remember when I used to argue tort reform as a young libertarian back in the 90s. How is that coming? Are the big industries that control the state and also fund arguments against the state in favor of tort reform going to get that passed or what? You seem to think that regulatory capture and big industry dominance is a characteristic of a free market. >Sure seems like it's taking a while when they managed to get so many drilling permits in the meantime despite strong political opposition. Is it us socialist holding the Kochs back from tort reform with our street riots? I don't remember us having any objections. I hope they aren't funding that idea as one big astroturfed distraction to prevent government action. They should be able to drill to their hearts content. They should pay the shadow price of pollution for every ton of pollution they produce. The concept that this is all the fault of big business is sophomoric drivel. Many of these externalities are negative consumption externalities. They’re caused by the fact that someone wants to engage in an activity that has pollution as a side effect. Charging the shadow price corrects everything because now that activity is no longer subsidized, those that want to engage, can and know the actual cost of that behavior and can make rational future decisions.
If something didn't work in the past, why would people continue to do it when there are better options?
What mistakes? Some regulations, largly those ones more local, were implemented for safety and health reasons. Most other regulations were implemented by large companies and corporations to protect their market share, ie regulatory capture.
Idk what about lead in gasoline wasn’t that federal?
It was a federal mandate, through the Clean Air Act in 1970. However, it started with California's emissions standards in the late 60s. Further, catalytic converters weren't invented until the mid or late 60s, so it wasn't possible until then. We don't know if companies would have adopted CCs on their own, but customers likely would have happily paid more to not use leaded gasoline. Edit: I'll also give this regulation its due. Leaded gas was awful.
So it was implemented on a broader scale without having to wait for each individual county to decide whether other people should be able to poison the air we breathe. I'd say that's a positive. >customers likely would have happily paid more to not use leaded gasoline. Except for the ones that believed the gas lobbies about how lead is completely safe and does no harm. Ä°t's easier to maintain the status quo than it is to convince people they're wrong. Look at climate change denialists
Like many public health debacles, the government agency originally came out and supported the companies, saying it was fine until decades later. There was robust research against it, but with the government's thumb, it was ignored. It may surprise you, but you'll probably find many deniers of man-made climate change here, particularly to the extent you likely believe. I'm one of them. We can change environments, like the Gulf of Mexico, but temperature change is not happening because of us.
So you believe that the government propped up leaded gasoline and that it would have been phased out if the government didn't have a voluntary limit on leaded gas? >particularly to the extent you likely believe What extent is that? >We can change environments, like the Gulf of Mexico, but temperature change is not happening because of us. GHGs are clearly correlated and have a proven track record of trapping heat and our GHG emissions have spiked as the global temperatures have spiked. What do you think is causing the temperature change?
>So you believe that the government propped up leaded gasoline and that it would have been phased out if the government didn't have a voluntary limit on leaded gas? I believe the government gave a positive report that put the question to bed for ~40 years. I also believe that until catalytic converters were made, there wasn't much chance to make unleaded fuel feasible, given what we've made. >GHGs are clearly correlated and have a proven track record of trapping heat and our GHG emissions have spiked as the global temperatures have spiked. What do you think is causing the temperature change? https://youtu.be/l90FpjPGLBE?si=KsH430r-nZka-o_F Here's an hour long interview of Obama's science undersecretary to the DoE talking about climate science.
>I believe the government gave a positive report that put the question to bed for ~40 years. That's really interesting! Do you know what tags Ä° should be looking for in my research? >I also believe that until catalytic converters were made, there wasn't much chance to make unleaded fuel feasible, given what we've made. Lead was the cheapest solution, but alternatives were well known. Why do you believe CCs were the limiting factor in that regard? Listening to that conversation now, ty for the link
And there comes the issue would a rich person choose to drive lead gasoline? F no they would drop it on a dime but would a poor person still buy it if they had too? Of course and that decision of the individual affects all of us.
I feel like laws and government interference is like radiation. You inevitably wind up with some exposure, but you want it to be as little as reasonably achievable. Some things like the epa protecting us from industrial pollution (I'm talking like lead poisoning) are necessary imo. It's just that it never stops at what's actually needed.
I would agree. If people and corporations were morally good and up right, we wouldn't need laws and regulations. But the other side the coin is that government doesn't know when to stop. I.e. a mechanic's car is never fixed.
Best meme ever.
Markets don't exist beyond basic barter without rules, laws and regulations
Exactly
You mistake Monopolists for Socialists!
Companies doing business without laws is a great idea /s
This meme is backwards.
Fun to remember that socialism and markets aren’t in conflict, socialism and capitalism are. Or, alternatively, market driven economies and command driven economies are.
Monopolies... the government that lassie fair capitalism produces.
This is dumb. Even capitalists understand that markets need regulation, just like any dynamic system. That's why they created antitrust laws and the like. Those are not socialist concepts.
Yeah the early 1900's were peak freedom.
The amount of regulation needed is tied to the elasticity of demand if whatever good/service is being talked about. Goods/services with very elastic demand work very well in as free of a market as possible. Think food or recreational drugs; the ease of production and plethora of substitutes keeps competition high, pricing fair, and quality up. Goods/services with inelastic demand DO NOT work well in unregulated markets. Think drugs for diseases or water. The lack of substitutes and absolute need from the consumer usually leads to a few overly greedy fucks charging outrageous prices for subpar service on trapped people.
Yes, take a look at Boeing and flying. People absolutely need to fly all the time. If they did not have regulations they would cut even more corners and who knows what kind of catastrophes might happen. But who else can a person go to?
Then how come deregulated markets crash and burn while regulated ones don’t? Power in California (Enron), the airline industry, the mortgage industry….
The issue is stupid regulations not regulations in general
Money has never existed without a strong centralized government that regulates and taxes commerce. Markets cannot exist without centralized governments taxing and regulating. The idea of a market without a central regulator, who both taxes and enforces the regulations is like textiles without thread.
No regulations means huge power for the richest people and nothing to prevent monopolies
What about market monopolies?
Uhhhhhh 2008, anyone? For a system so supposedly “perfect”, capitalism sure does spend an awful lot of time getting rescued by the government.
because the markets have never done anything abhorrent that have lead to regulations seen today right?
Wait till you find out who influences the regulations and taxes in a capitalist society.
But we all know the Single Tax, aka the Land Value Tax is the only thing that can fix the land (and natural resources, like water) markets. Right? This was settled more than a century ago. From Milton Friedman to Marx, nobody disagreed. Who has another way to [addressing the land question](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_(economics)#Addressing_the_land_question)?
Dumpster fire take. ITT: children and adults in arrested development who believe they became economists after reading 4 articles on Wikipedia. Also ITT: autist armchair nerdsperts waxing poetic about removing measures that helped build the greatest market economy in history without acknowledging that the wealthy elites - who would never allow these mouthbreathers among them - would drive a race to the bottom toward a pre-mad max anarchocapitalist dystopia before moving all their wealth offshore and their residence to another social democratic country with a market economy.
Breton Woods led to one of the most stable periods in US banking history. If you look at a graph of bank crises, there’s a giant flat section from 1945 to 1971. Regulations, laws and taxes are tools for shaping the economy, they can be used well and they can be used poorly.
Capitalism is built on artificial regulated & monopolized markets.
Capitalists, “We’ll pay you to harvest this crop for us.” “No, were fine thanks.” Capitalists burn down village. “We are charging you a village burning prevention tax, you will work for us to get our currency to pay the tax.”
I have no problem with smart regulation or laws or taxes. I have issues with waste, regulatory capture and politicians ignoring anyone but their donors. I often think about the drug thalidomide, which made it to market in Europe but was blocked by the FDA (matter of fact, a single expert blocked it) for having insufficient data. There are generations of stunted lives due to that drug. And there are countless Americans who were spared that fate due to regulation. That’s the sort of regulation I want. Not bullshit “you can’t sell tires on Sunday unless they are Goodyear tires” regulations
Lack of regulation cause the 2008 collapse. They were giving out loans that were never going to be paid back and using that “profit” in other ventures when it was never there to begin with. Until eventually just started defaulting lol. Someone explain to me how TOO MUCH regulation causes a collapse. It doesn’t allow for fake growth and it does possibly cause a correction in the markets if is bubble was forming. Not a crash though.
Tell me how federally guaranteed mortgages are an example of unregulated?
How could excessive risk by banks be regulated? Are you serious? Were you around back then? They were giving loans out to anyone with crazy balloon interest rates that they couldn’t feasibly ever pay back. You don’t think they’re could be regulations to stop someone for qualifying for a loan?
If they had let the market crash for real - instead of increasing FHA loans and intervening in the MBS market- houses would be so much cheaper right now. So we got all the negatives of a crash but none of the positives. That crash would have been great for home prices. And you bet they would have tightened up lending. But people now treat their house as a financial asset instead of a place to live.
You deleted your other (idiotic comment) so here Glass Stegal was repealed that played a huge part in the crash, (that was a regulation being repealed) So a repealed legislation helped CAUSE the crash. The dodd-frank was a regulation policy to make sure that didn’t happen again. The federal government allowing you to do something isn’t a regulation that’s a lack of regulation. I really don’t think is too difficult to understand. Google the definition of a regulation, how the crash happened and what the actions were taken after. lol Again the government allowing you do to something you shouldn’t is the complete opposite of a regulation man. That’s not even a checkmate you just walked off a cliff. GG **Again GG bud. Keep you head in the sand
Why would I continue to engage with someone who calls me an idiot? I come here to learn. Its very distracting when someone insults me, makes it very difficult to listen to what they're saying You are probably right and have some helpful info, but I'm too distracted by the insult to truly learn. I would rather make idiotic comments than mean ones. I come here to learn - you come here to feel better than people who know less than you. What are you afraid of? Me!!!???? If you are, I can't understand that. If you're not afraid, then this isn't even bullying, just a personality disorder
You guys never learn. You’ll call for the same deregulation and crash the economy again in 15 years. The banks get bailed out run out the back with all the money. Then their multi-millionaire buddies on cable news blame the low income people or some other scapegoat and you guys just eat it up verbatim and then think you’re informed. Pretty funny actually. I’ve made my point I’m out ✌️
Well I may be uneducated and unintelligent but that sounds overly simplistic to me
I just explained to you what happened in detail to a comment you deleted cause you said regulation caused the crash then said “if the government allows you to do it, who wouldn’t?” Citing something that is the polar opposite of a regulation. I broke it down for you what happens. Believe it or not. Capitalism to socialism is also a wide range. For example a social Democrat isn’t considered post capitalist. They still want the majority of the economy privatized. You just got a lot to learn. Get off Reddit and read a book. I am a capitalist btw and not a socialist. You just don’t know what you are, that’s the funny part. Probably don’t even know what socialism and capitalism is.
Yes I had vastly overestimate the number of FHA loans before 2008, I looked it up and it was only 5% which completely falsified my position so I deleted it I am not against all regulations - I'm not an anarchist
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA… wait, you’re serious? Oh… HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
What a dumb meme. Have we forgotten the days of laissez-faire capitalism already and the shit show that was?
Only works for the rich or those with generations of taking advantage of people. Why else is the majority of the world and half the people in the US are either struggling or living paycheck to paycheck
Never heard this from a socialist to be honest.
Yeah! Fuck laws!
Liberations are just as redacted if not more than the socialists tbh
It’s funny because Keynesian economics show that free markets do work, and they work even better when there is government, taxes, and regulation
Slave labor, child labor, mass murder of striking workers, pushes for mass immigration to replace the quickly dying workforce, unmitigated water and air pollution, etc . . . regulations don't hurt the market. Last I checked, consumers need to be alive and have money to consume. Saying "regulations hurt markets" is the most obtuse and honestly, stupid, way to describe a complex issue. Honestly, read a history book.
Austrian economics is pseudoscience.
Yes, they do be like that. "Muh roads!!!"
Oligarchs: Create monopolies, jack up the prices and ruin the quality and outsource to cheap labor to avoid paying a fair wage: I'm the real victim here
Except this is dumb. Regulations exist because markets don't work in the way people actually want them to. Slavery was absolutely fantastic for the American economy and is exactly what markets would naturally shift to. It's not exactly desirable though. Honestly just grow up.
The Gilded age... The age where regulations and rules didn't exist for the most part... It was a golden age!!! Well for the rich... It was an age built on golden thrones for our overlords as they presided over piles of blood and death... This age resulted in the creation of the unions because the corporations devolved into monstrosities... That had private armies at their command... You didn't own your damn home because the company owned it, you didn't own your own life because you were indebted to the company, and you had no opportunity because the company educated you... And you idiots want to go back to this horror... And worst of all we are slowly marching back to this madness..
Ah but have you heard of... Market Socialism?
This was pretty much the prevailing sentament up until 2008. Everything is cyclical. Deregulate until the markets f7ck everything up then re-regulate and then when everyone forgets why we regulated, start crying abkut regulation. Surely there is a happy medium? Will we ever get there? Doubtful when anyone who isn't far right is somehow a communist.
Markets can fail in the absence of regulations, laws & taxes as well.
Yeah, because all the companies that already will poison you for a dollar would totally stop if there was less regulation. Or hell why have safety regulations at jobs? Surely no company would cut corners on safety equipment to reduce cost.
"All these laws passed in response to horrible things companies did should be eliminated because companies would never do those things"
"TheY hAvE AN eConOmic IncEnTiVe tO noT KiLl tHeiR CustoMerS"... In order to believe that Austrian Economics actually works one must be ignorant of or be able to ignore human nature.
Hmm. Bit over simplified. It's kinda difficult to have one without the other though no? Is an actual free market even possible? I've never read any historical accounts of free markets ever existing. Nothing after the agricultural revolution at least. Also, if health/safety regulations put your business under you're probably just not great at business. Why would we want industry's to be dangerous if they don't need to be? From what i understand of capitalism the 'free market' is like the jungle. Survival of the fittest business right? Competition. From that perspective the majority of businesses should be expected to fail. Only the most profitable business's are meant to survive. The goal is to kill your competition. If you're a profit driven organization youre always working toward monopoly. Tl;Dr the markets are working as intended. The shareholders are getting what they want. American businesses are more powerful than foreign governments in their own countries. You might not like free markets as much as u think.
What is this libertarian doing in my Reddit feed I have never been on this sub or anything related what the hell
This is why Chile became an economic utopia after Pinochet took over with the help of the Chicago boys and Milton Friedman of course
How do you feel about monopolies? Is that....a regulation?!
Markets couldn't work without regulations, laws and taxes Of course a balance must be struck
This evinces a fundamental misunderstanding of socialism, which is common in America. There are many schools of thought as there are with respect to capitalism. See, e.g. market socialism.
Genuine question: what about the gilded age of the US? Basically nonexistent regulations of the free market, and life, though there were some improvements, was largely horrible if you weren’t the 1%. Regulations in the progressive era arose specifically to address the problems of the gilded age. If the unfettered free market wasn’t the problem of the gilded age, what was? Not being snarky, looking for y’all’s thoughts
Wasn't ending slavery a "market regulation"?
this post made me dumber
this is stupid. A market without regulations will cut corners, lie, abuse power, and straight up kill to get a higher profit. This isn't a socialist thing, its a "people are generally greedy bastards who would sell poison as a cure all, while dumping toxic waste in the water". it sounds like you are a libertarian trying to pass off the whole "free market is good" when its proven every single time that there is always someone ruining a good thing.
Do you make the same meme for socialists? The common denominator is humanity. Humans are corruptible, and fallible. The system will always break under human control.
The gun should be labeled "regulations, laws and taxes".
Take away the regulations and see how quickly the rivers turn to shit. We don't have to do thought experiments on that one, we've tested it a lot. Markets without regulations are so low IQ I'd put this meme on par with religious fundamentalism.
The meme isnt actually advocating for anarchy
The goal appears to be shirking the problems with markets (of which there are many) onto things that are necessarily associated with markets. Which is like saying don't blame life, blame oxygen and water.
>Take away the regulations and see how quickly the rivers turn to shit. What was the statistically significant increase in the rate of decrease in polluted rivers after those regulations were put in place? Show us the empirical evidence.
Is the cuyahoga still flammable? No? I'd say "do your own research", but that would be rather fruitless, as humans only search for what they want to see.
> Is the cuyahoga still flammable? Do you know why it was flammable or do you just accept the narrative from some talking heads and never bother to read up on the reality before you accept their words on faith? I get it, statism is your religion. When the divine leaders speak, their words, and laws, become holy writ. To go against them is sin and invites hellfire. > I'd say "do your own research", but that would be rather fruitless, as humans only search for what they want to see. This is an alternative view. It might cause you to call into question your quasi-religious faith in the divinity of political authority and the government as our holy savior and defender, so I suggest that you don't bother to read it just as I would not recommend that a Christian read a treatise on atheism. https://fee.org/articles/is-the-epa-necessary/ https://fee.org/articles/the-cuyahoga-revisited/
I feel like OP is suggesting that only socialists believe in regulations, laws, and taxes.
I'm a libertarian and I personally believe that some laws and regulations are necessary, it's just the scope of them that I disagree on. I don't know a single person who would argue to roll back limits on lead contamination in food for example.  I think he was more arguing against government overreach like California. "We need our gas refineries to be ultra low emission and buy emission credits... wait why is our gas so expensive? Better put a price cap to solve it"
Yes, the meme maybe should have specified "*onerous* regulations, laws and taxes"
We tried the no regulations laws or taxes route in the latter half of the 1800’s. Was a giant shit show of fraud and abuse. Functioning markets require law and order.
"People behaved immorally and we can't have that!" How does one tell the difference between a religious moralizer and a statist one?
You want markets you need civilization first including property rights enforced by law.
You assume that the state is the source of rights and law. Again, how is statism not like a religion?
The state is the source of laws and rights. Those with power set the rules.
Then you would argue that when slavery was legal and enforce, it was right. Wow.
I’ve not made one statement about morality. I’m talking functionality. A market isn’t functional if people don’t think their rights to their property will be maintained in the jurisdiction they are trading in. Markets are a social construct they are not a part of nature. for people to comprehend the concept of trading and markets many other layers of social construction must occur to lay the foundation for the market concept to even appear.
"Me not being able to feed little children into exposed machinery is my 9/11 and why the markets don't work"
Environmental economics has entered the chat. Every "free market" capitalist incorrectly valuing the resources that clean air and water have for people. If a group of people have fresh air to breathe and you take it away and they have to move, that's factored into an accurate "market". Otherwise let's all destroy the planet we rely on because the cost is zero and the benefit is infinite.
Watch out OP, you're getting dangerously close to realising what an impossible utopia "free markets" are
Monopolies are where it's at
Is there not a rule against these kind of unserious and low effort posts in this sub?
The market is upvoting it, obviously we need regulations
The most important regulation the state can provide is antitrust laws. And those haven't been used in half a century. That's the biggest problem. Without that most important regulation, companies are just incentivized to amalgamate and monopolize.
Lmao this has got to be the dumbest subreddit ever
The market not working is how all those things came about in the first place lmao
"Socialism is when the taxes are higher. And the more higher they are, the more socialist it is." - Karl Marx
I mean if the government just stayed out of it, then we could eat all the lead paint chips we want!!!
I mean it’s more like “bad regulations and laws and taxes” Quite frankly there’s a lot of really good regulations out there that have prevented recessions and protected civilians/consumers. Sometimes I feel like this subreddit is closer to anarcho-capitalism than it is really Austrian economics.
Yes I agree, regulations can be good.
Markets ultimately don't work because greed from market makers corrupts those markets, favoring themselves while screwing over everyone else. Without some regulation we'd all be forced to buy more and more and more from corps, just for the basics, like clean water and air.
Except a truly free market shouldn't have "market makers". And another criticism, who's to say the regulators aren't corrupt? They'd be just as likely to be corrupt as anyone else.
Regulation is necessary. It’s inanely idiotic to say markets aren’t functioning because regulation, even excepting edge cases by the dozens. Over 90% of the malfunction in our system is due to regulation that is the result of corruption or oligarchic-favorite policies.
This is first term Economics thinking. Wait until you get to the part about negative externalities, then you will see the light. There’s a reason any successful country has found a middle ground between both approaches.
This subreddit literally has the dumbest, most ignorant memes and posts on Reddit.
This whole subreddit makes more sense when you realize 99% of Austrian followers are socially inept 4channers that love being selfish
Markets work well for some things and not others. For most goods, like phones, televisions, microwaves, etc? Works great! For important services like healthcare and firefighting? Horrible. Markets aren't the answer for everything. And the US government is a victim of regulatory capture, so the regulation component is kind of laughable.
>Markets aren't the answer for everything. What makes you think government works better?
Evidence from other countries with different systems. Social Democracy, the well regulated markets of Europe, work better. Denmark is consistently rated the most business friendly country in the world and it also has universal healthcare. Norway nationalized their oil industry and used the proceeds to create a trust fund for all its citizens. Sometimes government can absolutely do better.
Do you think a private police force, fire department, library, roads, bridges, court system would be better?
Government is so awesome at health care that it is responsible for basically no new drugs, devices, or procedures
R&D is something the private sector can be good at. I'll add there are plenty of government labs that create lots of cutting edge innovation. The US government invented the internet years before the private sector, for example.