Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site kontron.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!mhuxt!houxm!mtuxo!mtunh!mtung!mtunf!ariel!vax135!cornell!uw-beaver!tektronix!hplabs!pesnta!pertec!kontron!cramer From: cramer@kontron.UUCP (Clayton Cramer) Newsgroups: net.politics.theory Subject: Re: Libertarians in Space Message-ID: <352@kontron.UUCP> Date: Mon, 8-Jul-85 20:11:27 EDT Article-I.D.: kontron.352 Posted: Mon Jul 8 20:11:27 1985 Date-Received: Sat, 13-Jul-85 11:20:16 EDT References: <446@qantel.UUCP> <454@qantel.UUCP> <293@kontron.UUCP> <377@spar.UUCP><1620@dciem.UUCP> Organization: Kontron Electronics, Irvine, CA Lines: 85 > > >a living. The example of history demonstrates that while free markets > >don't guarantee that everyone will be well off, few people have starved > >to death in free markets. > > You can't have it both ways. Lots of posters have argued that there > never has been such a thing as a free market, so how can history say > anything about whether people would or would not starve under them? > But there have been millions of people starve under non-socialist regimes. > This goes for both industrialized and non-industrialized countries. > On balance (setting aside deliberate genocide, like Stalin's Ukraine > and Pol Pot's Kampuchea), I would guess that there is less chance of > starving in a Communist country than in an equivalently endowed free- > enterprise one, and far less chance still in a Socialist one. Some > real statistics might be more useful than appeals to mental models of > idealized history, whether they be mine or anyone else's. > 1. We have had, at least in the United States, a *relatively* free market for most of the time since the Revolution. (This does not mean that there have been no subsidies, and no regulation.) 2. A lot non-socialist countries have had famine, but they have been countries where the free market wasn't even a goal, much less an imperfectly attained reality. 3. Setting aside deliberate genocide is incorrect, because one of the strengths of a free market is that is impossible to create this sort of madness (genocide) if the government doesn't regulate food sales. (Hungry people will mortgage their future, and their kid's future, if necessary, to eat. Where the government controls food, this option can be made unavailable in a way that cannot happen in a free market.) 4. I invite statistics on famines throughout history. There has never been one in *this* country, and I don't believe there has ever been one in Canada. The Soviet Union is not intrinsically worse off in its steppes than North Americans are in the Great Plains. (In fact, the similarities in weather and geography are startling.) > >The non-competitive environment of a socialist system creates tremendous > >opportunities for fraud and corruption, since a state-owned enterprise > >is in no danger of going bankrupt. Socialists have long assumed that > >under the influence of socialism, man will become less corrupt. The > > Why is the "enterprise" necessarily the appropriate unit for discussion? > The unit of discussion of competition is whatever suits the structure > in which competition is going on. The "enterprise" is suitable only > where relatively independent enterprises exist. > If I understand you correctly, "enterprise" is only important if there are separate state-owned companies. I disagree strongly --- if all companies are owned by the state, there is no difference from all economic organization being one state-owned company. > Individuals may be even more competitive in a Socialist system than in > a free-market system. They must compete *within* an organization, > with few modes of possible difference from their competition. In a > free-enterprise economy, an individual can prosper because the company > prospers, without necessarily damaging any *identifiable* other person. > In a large organization, individuals can prosper only at the expense of > their colleagues, and only by finding ways in which they can outperform > their colleagues. Not everyone can be the best at a particular job, > and those that are not best are tempted to win by unethical means. It > isn't a phenomenon restricted to socialism, but a function of large > organizations that resist change. > Martin Taylor By "unethical means" might you mean socialism? :-) I would agree that bigness has great potential for problems, regardless of the economic organization, but bigness is an intrinsic characteristic of centralized socialist systems, and decentralized socialist systems suffer from economy of scale problems (not to mention the political advantages of centralized control). Free enterprise is likely to produce a mix of large (and therefore less efficient) and small companies. The mix is dependent on the relative value of economies of scale and individual initiative for a particular industry and market. However, economy of scale stops at a certain point (below most current big corporations), and individual initiative becomes very important. In a *totally* free market, it is most unlikely that many companies would be as large as the current giants, many of whom owe their size to regulatory advantage or their ability to lobby for government contracts. (Example: part of IBM's bigness stems from its ability to get government contracts during the Great Depression, when the government's desire (not need) for tabulating equipment increased because of the regulatory activities.)