Gotta love capitalism!

Post Reply New Topic

socialist!! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !! !!!1111111111112

excellent list, btw.

No. What's happening has nothing to do with facts. There is a clash of values.

Most people generally would like to live in a society that is considered "just". Living in a capricious and unjust society makes people uncomfortable. This is because they can envision the condition of injustice having an adverse effect on them, even if they aren't literally affected in any negative way in the moment.

Details can also be used as a tool for obfuscation.

Are you really so dense that you yourself cannot conceive of something that fall in the realm of 'public good'. How about sewer systems in cities? Or do you think dumping a bucket of feces out your window is a better option?

I am actually unsure that these are public goods so much as network goods though. This is a questionable line, but some of the same arguments could likely be used for telecommunications.(what use is a phone without a phone network?) And so on, even though these are usually considered private goods in practice.

Even further, I am even LESS sure that education and health-care really fit into that picture. Economic growth depends on creativity and capital acquirement. There is no reason to think that going to public school actually improves creativity. Even further, a lot of education isn't really human capital development anyway. As for health-care, I don't see how your point actually says anything about a public good at all. You seem to assume your conclusion, in that investors are really going to care more about the stability of demand, and the stability of the labor force. The former won't be terribly distorted by lack of access to healthcare, as unless there is a plague(which you have a public good case for), the issues will tend towards a stable population. Employers themselves can guarantee the health of their workforce though to some degree. (so really, all you'd argue is just cost distribution, and I am not sure that this is really as huge of an issue as you want to make it at all. Rather, you probably stole this entire argument from a liberal playbook, rather than an economics text)

There is really no good way to even label an "unjust" society, or even to demarcate the limits of society. You buy things from China. What makes them so separate from you? The cartographers??

As it stands, we live in a somewhat capricious and unjust world, and where we live is a relatively just bubble. But really, it isn't as if the distribution of wealth is the only issue of justice awry. Really, I'd think that our legal system has enough problems to be an issue here, particularly with things such as popular but illegal drug use(which allows for ad hoc enforcement and thus unjust enforcement). Heck, just the fact that our legal system is so full of obscurity is enough of a problem.

I really see the large problem being that the firemen wouldn't take the man's money later. That's my biggest issue, but he chose not to pay when he probably could have done so. I don't like the outcome, but procedurally, it is relatively just.

This is an interesting point. Where does one draw the line? And should that line be a populous consensus?




Define what aspect of creativity you're talking about. How specific do you mean? Are you just going to cite the largest figures who haven't completed college or are you going to include all of the mid and upper management level positions who maintain and grow successful businesses?

I think it has to do with proximity, living under the same culture, laws, etc...


Hardly anyone feels that they are entitled to an equal distribution of wealth. However, a lot of people do feel entitled to some basic security and protection from a capricious world that is often far beyond their immediate control. Disparity of wealth only comes into the picture when you consider that fact that it's always the people with the least to begin with who are the most vulnerable to finding themselves in desperate circumstances.


I agree with that.


The problem here is that there are many many more people "under the protection of" the fire department than people who end up actually needing the service. An insurance-type system can't work if people only ever pay once an emergency occurs.

The issue is whether he signed up to be covered and merely forgot to pay the fee, or whether he refused to pay the fee to try and cheat the system. Letting the house burn to the ground sounds like a harsh penalty for forgetfulness, but it seems more likely to me that he deliberately chose not to pay thinking that if he had a fire they would put it out anyways. Either that, or he was just assuming there wouldn't ever be a fire. But in either case it was be a serious error of judgement on his part. If he merely forgot to pay then that's a different story, but then there's the whole conundrum of proving that he merely forgot. So even if he forgot there's really no way of proving that he is being sincere and he still has to be held responsible even if it seems harsh.

I wouldn't say equal but I would say reasonable given the state of inflation and the fact that I've never used government money or took unemployment from any of my previous employers. I'm not particularly a leech on society, you know? I just understand that the distribution isn't exactly "fair" and creates large gaps in services that I do need and should be able to afford given my fairly pedestrian lifestyle choices and unwillingness to spend more money than I currently have. The only incomes that actually follow inflation tend to be the incomes that have seven or more digits...six if they're in a federal public office.

A common language for use in the public domain is a public good. And we don't need government to have a common language.

Governments are better at creating public burdens and impediments than they are at creating public goods.

I have a riddle for you: What is a camel? Answer: A horse designed by the government.

ruveyn

I dunno, but I do think that it is relevant. I also think that efficiency either way can be an open question.


I just mean that I don't believe sitting behind a desk all day actually makes you a creative person. If you really want to believe that this is the reason why those people are so successful, then go right ahead. I would really guess that these skills are most improved by the things people do outside of their classes though. This is not to say that public schools are evil, but I do think that they do less than people think.

The basic point I was getting at is that these lines are not as clear-cut as often perceived.


I never said equality. Even further, a problem is that risk protection itself is just a value of higher wealth. So, the big question is the grounds for separating risk protection, as a good, from other goods.


I don't mean paying $75. The fact of the matter is that while fire fighting is both an insurance service, it is also a service that a person cannot attain on their own. The big question is what kind of pricing system could be used, but I would really bet that a pricing service can be made. The real issue is making the emergency service high enough that most people recognize the importance of insurance, while still paying the fireman. Given that houses cost thousands of dollars, a price between those thousands and 75 could easily be made the price of emergency service, while still likely maintaining the insurance service.

I suppose the big issue there would just be a contract, and I guess there is an issue on whether oral contracts would have been acceptable.

Eh, anyway.....

Changing the subject to the effectiveness of government? So you admit that 'public good' is a valid concept?




Yeah. What does a Bedouin call a horse in the desert?

Dead.

I may be misinterpreting you, but I think you are confusing "the public good" with the commercial concept of "goods." Government is obliged to provide for the public good precisely because there is no commercial interest in providing for it.

I decided not to include "infrastructure" on my list of public goods, because there is no consistency of treatment. Roads, railroads and airports clearly fall within the public good conception. If they are not directly publicly funded, then they are funded through public sector debt (e.g. bond issues) which amount to the same thing. However, recent experience has demonstrated that there is a commercial interest in creating a telecommunications network, and we are content to have our service providers buy bandwidth from commercial owners without public sector involvement.



An illiterate worker has, perforce, less capacity than a literate worker. I have never suggested that compulsory public schooling creates a population of innovators. But it does create a population of workers that are better capable of adjusting to innovation. Now, there is a viable argument that our economy does not require all workers to have a secondary school graduation. But that is a question of scope, not of reach.



Stable population is not, in and of itself, sufficient, because every worker that a producer loses to a medical cause is a worker that must be replaced, imposing a transition burden. This is one of the reasons that health care indicators are economic indicators. Consider two potential investments, one in Haiti and the other in the Dominican Republic. One of the factors that will affect the viability of the investment is the health and stability of the work force.



Employers guaranteeing their workforce is not a public good, though, it is a club good, because it is excludable (the "company store"). What I a speaking to is not the issue of who picks up which costs in the marketplace, but rather the public good of ensuring that every consumer has an opportunity to participate in the marketplace, and ensuring that there is a counterforce to the inequality of information, and a maintenance of moral hazard. It is well demonstrated that insurance drives up the price of health care delivery. Because consumers do not face direct cost, and because they have unequal information with the seller, there is no incentive to "shop around." Government regulation in the health industry allows for these imparities to the mitigated.

I suggest you pick up, Health Economics: The Cheerful Face of a Dismal Science, Allan Williams (1987). You can then move on to almost any issue of The Journal of Political Economy and the Journal of Health Economics.

I'd say he was verging on socialism by merely postulating a system of public law! Why can't we privatize the courts (i.e., arbitration), the police (i.e., security guards except with more "enforceability"), the military (i.e., gangs and mercenary armies), and money (e.g., Banana Bux!)? It would be an anarcho-capitalist paradise! I can imagine each would abide by the legal system that works best for them, and if they have enough wealth to hire goons, they'll be able to enforce it (or some other standard) on others too! It would be like feudalism all over again except it's libertarian anarcho-capitalism!

Well, no, I instead confused the term "the public good" with the economics term "public good". Public goods are goods that are non-excludable and non-rivalrous, and generally they are described as things without "commercial interest in providing for it" for those reasons.

The reason I did this is because the economics term "public goods" is more clearly defined, while the term "the public good" is so vacuous, that I could insert anything.


1) I find it unlikely that the bare minimum for literacy would require public education at this point in time.
2) Most public schooling would not really make students more capable of adjusting to innovation. Most classes taken are not even relevant to any innovation.
3) If the matter were important, then I do not see why commercial interest would be lacking.


visagrunt, I already addressed your concern, you just broke up what I said. I don't need to address you twice.
"Employers themselves can guarantee the health of their workforce"

As for the "viability of the investment", honestly, I don't really have much concern for that metric. It will tend to correspond to economic efficiency. Your only case is that the distribution of costs is more efficient under one system than another. If it isn't, then you don't have a point, and I would think you would need to make a case. It really seems to me that following from Coase's theorem http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coase_theorem , (assuming that we could even label this health-care issue an externalityh in in general, distribution of resources won't matter so long as transaction costs are low enough. (and transaction costs are totally beside your point)


Yes, employers guaranteeing their workforce is a club good. That's kind of the point. Health care is both excludable and rivalrous, so it isn't a public good. Talking about "ensuring that every consumer has an opportunity to participate in the marketplace" is a moral cause, not really a good, unless you are willing to admit to the "abolition of homosexuality from the public square" as also a public good. If we say that, then ANYTHING can be labeled a public good, making the issue less relevant, as the real concern is items or services that are non-rivalrous and non-excludable.

You surely don't mean "maintenance of moral hazard". If you do, then you need to be the one reading the book, not me. Moral hazard is a negative thing. Even further, the issue is that "inequality of information" also is something you'll have to put more effort in defending. While there is a vague notion of what you might be talking about, there are a lot of different possible directions you can go with this, and some of them are more or less valid. That being said, I am really unsure that the inequality of information problem is as big as you are trying to sell it as, as inequality of information exists in every single freaking field, but the case for nationalization on that ground is not considered relevant.

visagrunt, that's nice of you to recommend a book and readings. But frankly, it makes you look like an arrogant a**. Even further, I really just don't think you see much past your ideological preconceptions and framings of reality that you impose.