Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version nyu B notes v1.5 12/10/84; site acf4.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!mhuxt!houxm!mtuxo!mtunh!mtung!mtunf!ariel!vax135!cornell!uw-beaver!tektronix!hplabs!pesnta!greipa!decwrl!decvax!genrad!panda!talcott!harvard!seismo!cmcl2!acf4!mms1646
From: mms1646@acf4.UUCP (Michael M. Sykora)
Newsgroups: net.politics.theory
Subject: Re: Hunger and the Free Market: re to Cramer
Message-ID: <2380088@acf4.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 8-Jul-85 04:53:00 EDT
Article-I.D.: acf4.2380088
Posted: Mon Jul  8 04:53:00 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 12-Jul-85 04:55:33 EDT
References: <677@whuxl.UUCP>
Organization: New York University
Lines: 41

>/* orb@whuxl.UUCP (SEVENER) /  9:07 am  Jul  5, 1985 */

>You have got to be *kidding* Mr. Cramer!  Go to Third World countries
>throughout the world and see how many poor people are *starving* while
>a landed aristocracy controls the vast majority of the land.

STRAWMAN!  He said FREE markets.  Such markets are not free.

>The Brazilian government has
>decided to redistribute such unused land to the peasants in return for
>compensation to its present owners.

It is not clear that they should even be compensated.  How did they
acquire this land?  The question of what exactly constitutes
"justly-acquired" property is a complicated one, but in many third
world countries the land has been acquired unjustly, and should therefore
be open to anyone who wants to work it.
 
>I had meant to present this case previously for those Libertarians who
>support the "ownership by use" approach.  It would seem to me that
>this is an excellent example of unjust *and* unproductive ownership of
>wealth.

The "ownership by use" approach may be problematic, but it is not
clear that it even applies here.  Mush of the land may have been
acquired coercively and would, according to libertarian principles,
therefore not be considered the legitimate property of these aristocratic
owners.

>The basic point of this example is simply to point out that *there is
>no guarantee* that people will *not* starve in a free market.  In order
>for a "free market" to prevent starvation then there must some reasonable
>distribution of wealth in that free market.

There is no guarantee that people won't starve (PERIOD).  Provided
there is no shortage of land, the free market can't prevent people
from stopping themselves from starving.  Statist systems can and do.

>     tim sevener whuxl!orb

					Mike Sykora