Yellow Dog [Part 23]

Donn,

So, let me get this straight, YOUR method of divorcing politicians from corporations is to DEREGULATE them? Now, you MUST realize how ludicrous that sounds.

Marx

Marx,

No. It makes perfect sense to me. Reality is the best arbiter. Government force in the market place changes that reality irrevocably, extending the life of bad players who happen to have buddies in Washington, among other things.

In a laissez-faire capitalist system bad players are weeded out by their better, more efficient competitors. Consumers benefit as the best products win and prices drop. If the economy is free and there is money to be made in any industry, fast food, for example, the original “monopolist,” McDonalds, will soon have no choice but to compete with the new players. Prices will drop [“buy one, get one free”], choices will multiply, quality will improve across the board as McDs, BK, Wendys, Checkers, Jack-in-the-Box, etc. all compete for your burger-buying dollar. Each would grow its menu to serve their diverse clientele and try to capitalize on some new niche in the market...adding breakfast, baked potatoes, chili, salads. Product safety is first and foremost in the mind of the producer in any food-producing industry. If people get sick eating at Burger King, Burger King won’t last long. They will rightly fail...go out of business. In a free market bad players don’t last long.

[Remember poisoned Tylenol? Their excellent product was nearly destroyed by a terrorist act. They responded by inventing product safety seals. You have to penetrate layers of security before you can actually take a Tylenol pill. That security was not mandated by government! It was invented by the capitalist producers of the product for a very rational, selfish reason: to protect their own livelihood. If people die taking your medicine, you won’t be in business long.]

Cost cutting is absolutely necessary if you want to survive the challenges presented by your competitors, but not at the expense of the business. If you cut cost where consumer safety is at issue, you won’t be in business for long.

Because the fast food industry was left alone free from interference by the politicians, others discovered unique opportunities to make money using the idea of the original “monopolist.” Eventually, consumers are able to purchase Mexican food, Chinese food, Cuban food, Health food—FAST, without even having to get out of their cars!

All of the health and diversity, efficiency and safety, of the fast food industry could be true of every industry in existence—including health care and energy—if the politicians were disarmed, forbidden from manipulating free markets.

Finally, politicians would have no corruption to peddle to the lobbyists in Washington if they were powerless to screw with just, free markets.

The only legitimate functions of government with regards to the economy are 1. the enforcement of lawful contracts and the settling of contractual disputes; and 2. to punish criminal behavior, like fraud, criminal negligence, libel, etc.

Donn

Donn,

Dude, you keep saying that but it just hasn’t worked out that way. White is black, black is white. In order to regulate we must deregulate. I’m sorry, that’s sheer insanity. Deregulation NEVER works out to be the best for society. I'll give you the latest example here in Florida. Used to be, when you wanted a motorcycle endorsement for your license, you went down to the DMV, plopped down 20 bucks, took the written test, then the driving test and you got it. Seems that JEB passed a law to take that AWAY from the DMV and give it to private, independent contractors. They said it would make cheaper and more efficient. Guess what it cost me? $265.00 PLUS I had to STILL give the 20 dollars to the DMV to issue me a replacement license. AND, I had to sit there and listen to a forced sales pitch from Harley Davidson for credit. I called ALL the competitors and, somehow, that’s the price they arrived at, the SAME price, what a remarkable coincidence, huh? THAT’S called collusion an THATS what you get when you deregulate. Why aren’t there gas companies out there selling gas for a significant cheaper price? Because first, they got to be too big, drove the smaller companies out of business and then the 3 or 4 more remaining colluded together to arrive at THAT price. Do you know what gas costs in China? About 1.50 a gallon, because Sinopec is ONLY allowed to make a certain amount of profit. You have two choices here, either government controls and regulates industry or industry buys and sells government. Seems to me, as China reaps TRILLIONS and TRILIONS in debt that we owe THEM, that maybe we'd better start getting our own house in order first. Finally, you keep saying bad business forces out bad competitors, not so, in fact, BIG bad business leads to corporations buying media outlets, bribing reporters to hide facts, buying scientists to say what they want them to say and WE never know any better and keep doing the same bad behaviors because we don’t have a clue. Your facts, your opinions are based, entirely on what someone said to you, or what you read but there haven’t been any examples where it seems to work that way or none that you can see for yourself. Tylenol? Really, how do YOU know that’s what happened? Did YOU perform the scientific tests or did some government scientists? Maybe Tylenol did it themselves, maybe it was simply a bad batch but they were big enough to buy the media outlets. Maybe they DESERVED to go out of business but didn’t because they were big enough. Who does total laissez faire policies help? No one but the corporate giants, the big wigs with hundreds of million dollar bonuses. Everybody else gets screwed.

Marx