What is the proper scope of government?

Post Reply New Topic

I'm a minarchist- I say government should be limited to defense, maintaining law and order, and some basic public works like maintaining our highway infrastructure. Otherwise, I'd rather they stayed out of things. Each poll option adds government functions to the one above.

Please explain why you picked the level you picked, or any in-between you feel would be better.

Where I do agree with you 99.9%, in a purely capitalist system in this day and age, greedy and powerhungry corporations will seize too much power imho, so corporations should be -moderately- regulated to prevent such things as monopolies.

From what I understand, there are differing definitions of monopoly, and there is not really unanimity on whether they should be avoided- is not government a monopoly? Some things lend themselves to economies of scale, so the market is better served by a single provider than by many. I personally am rather skeptical about the government's ability to make any meaningful anti-monopolistic actions in any case; after all, government and large corporations tend to be controlled by the same people, or at least our political leaders are often close friends with bug business executives.

Even so, what specific actions would the government take to limit greedy corporations? Would companies that gained too large a percentage of the market share be penalized? Would you require full disclosure in order to prevent collusion or cartels?

I picked defense justice and police. For beyond that it requires the use of physical coercion of the government over the populace. And I am very much of the opinion that the initiation of force should be banished from human existence.

Hmm I don't really know how to answer the poll question. I'm extremely against any "affirmative action" type of things.

For healthcare, I don't trust corporations with mine. They don't want what's best for you, but what's best for their wallet. Free-market healthcare, for the most part, gives bad incentives: Keep you ill and drugged up so you have to keep spending money. With healthcare's relatively inelastic demand, it's a very easy industry to exploit. Some might say "competition will take care of it." But then you have to ask "Would health insurance companies make more money if they decided to pay more of your bills?"
Then socialized medicine would be likely to wind up as an ineffective bureaucratic nightmare. The only 2 solutions I could see to healthcare would be a) socialized medicine, but with decentralized leadership or b) free-market, but with elimination of the middle man (health insurance companies).
Wages are an even trickier issue...

justice would include policing criminal corporations and labor racketeers, screw the nany state crap down to a personal level, want unemployment insurance, buy it ot create your own fund.

Voting on here was a little tricky I admit, but I find the third option from the top suitable. Economically, private businesses don't regulate common resources and public goods that well since a business looks out for its own profitability and won't serve well as a neutral third party. For the spots where private businesses can't do the trick, I'd consider governmental intervention. That, and I believe laws are absolutely necessary for stable functionality.

I dithered between options 5 and 6. I think that universal healthcare should come before the help with employment etc.

But one thing your poll misses/doesn't cover is the huge difference it makes if this is national or local govt action. I think that some of the options can be better managed at local level.

I'm with you. The government has metaphorically become America's severely-disabled child, which requires more and more and more money to sustain it. Those who know me know I'm all for supporting severly-disabled children, but the government is not a needy person -- quite the contrary, and in the extreme. It is a burgeoning monolith, which has completely grown out of touch with the everyday struggles of the individuals who fund it with their taxes. The government is the most wasteful financial institution in America, and it's time we shrunk it, as is our right in a voting democracy, and chopped off the near-endless list of extraneous programs it funds, and put the focus back on individualism. It's high time it re-became what it originally was: "a government of the people, by the people, for the people."

Good point. I could support public education kept at local levels, but not from the federal government.