Economic Hypocrisy

[joejitsu]

Originally Posted by Ever Adrift

I rest my case

You proved your point. Notice how most people weren't smart enough to comment.

[dorock99]

Originally Posted by Ever Adrift

I'm interested in discussing a relatively common phenomenon I've noticed in this forum; that of inconsistent, contradictory economic views. I tend to see this a little more among the more conservative posters, though quite a few liberals are also guilty (though, of course, there are posters on all sides of the political spectrum who do not do this!). I myself may, at times, be guilty.

The contradictions of which I speak stem from those individuals who profess a strong belief in, and support for, the private sector, a lack of government intervention and, most importantly, the free market while simultaneously decrying outsourcing and trade with countries like China. You can't have it both ways; if you support the free market then you, by default, have to be ok with outsourcing and trade.

Additionally, many people seem to have a very simplistic view of what the 'free market' is which is rather surprising given how much faith they place in it. They don't seem to understand that this is really just economic theory, that the free market isn't some magical genie that can cure the world's ails if only the government's of the world would leave it be. The idea of the free market is dependent upon a number of assumptions (such as perfect information, fully rational actors and perfectly competitive markets) that actually rarely hold in the real world. Free markets, in reality, are often subject to market failures and market distortions which can only be dealt with by, you guessed it, government intervention. Most any economist will tell you this; governments are required to ensure the proper, or at least better, functioning of the market. Of course, economists disagree on which policies are best and on how much governments should intervene, but almost none will tell you that governments should never get involved.

Furthermore, people often don't seem to understand the importance of economic externalities; costs and benefits that accrue to groups outside of the market proper and/or outside of a particular transaction. Such externalities are extremely common and since they are not captured by the market they are not factored into prices set by supply, demand and trade. Taxes and other market and trade policies are necessary to correct externalities to better reach pareto optimality; free market capitalism actually requires some government intervention and, yes, taxes in order to actually work!

I'm not entirely sure why this phenomenon is so common, though I suspect it is, at least partially, due to people just not knowing enough about economic theory and not having fully formed ideological positions. Thoughts?

I agree with most of what you said, but attempting to use economics jargon, is not how you effective convey this message to the masses.

Legislation in my opinion is a form of planning the economy (which can bring incentives to get the economy to go in the direction of the planners)

Legislation is used in business, colleges, primary schools, and etc to move the economy in the direction the planners would like to go.

Beyond Legislation control of the money supply is the other added measure that needs to be fulfilled by an agency working with the central government to control growth.

We don't have capitalism here at all. We are not even remotely close and we will never be remotely close.


To run a planned economy you need control of the following (and really all of this comes down to supply and demand at its most basic core)



1. Control of Legislation to (influence division and create barriers to entry to different occupations. Legislation is the most effective way to maintain a perceived supply and demand. Legislation helps to either increase the competition or keep the competition out in the three listed below tools for use in a planned economy.)

2. Control of the Education System and collusion at all levels of government (meaning the state and local government need to be involved. To create high paying and low paying jobs, there needs to be differences in the level of human capital each individual receives. In plain speech not everyone can go to harvard. Access to equal quality education for all individuals in a planned economy can never ever happen.)

3. Control of Propaganda (Media, History, Books, and etc). All decisions are made with the use of anecdotal evidence presented as fact, such as the concept of scarcity, global warming, shortages of oil, an anecdotal belief shared by the masses with no empirical evidence of these findings. The burden of proof rest on all of the have nots (Bill Gates is a Have not sorry to tell you. This is done on a global scale.)

With control of these three areas of the economy any government can effective legislate any outcome it so desires, with almost precise and extreme accuracy. They have in many respects a mastery of human behavior when certain legislation passes, which they use as incentives to get the economy where they desire. These guys are brilliant.

Now, this is where labeling becomes beneficial for a planned economy. It helps those planning the economy figure out where to create high paying and low paying jobs, who to offer quality education and health too, and how to maintain a perfect balance. Just for review to control a planned economy you need to control legislation, control human capital production, and Control Propaganda.

This all hit me when i was thinking of creating an online video game revolving around this concept of creating a nation and i realized it needs to have a structure and a plan. Also to make the economy function at various rates you need to have a scarce supply of natural resources and not an abundance. You can have an abundance, but no one would get rich. The markets would all be perfectly competitive. It can still have the appearance and allure of "free-market" capitalism, but in reality, those individuals running their country would be in charge of planning their economies. This is what happens today and has been going on for a long time in real-life.