Would you vote for Dr. Paul?

[useless]

Blame the free market that doesn't actually exist, gin up some outrage, and push the state to control even more of our lives and make the problem worse. When it gets worse, repeat the process.

Alternatively Blame the Democrats for Republican actions.

 

[Cutlass]

Prime-pumper Cutlass comes back to save the day and lecture us all on "responsibility," like bailing out bad banks, bad car companies, bad mortgages. Throw the good money at the bad, make all of us poorer, wag your finger and talk down to us, and repeat The Big Lie about how "deregulation" caused the crisis.

All I can do is hope the electorate is smarter than to buy that!

The Big Lie is that the government is responsible for what people who fought to get laws relaxed and broke other laws did.

You can pretend all you want the the people who did it are not responsible. But if it was left up to you the unemployment rate would be 20% now.

Your way is proven to fail at all times. Your way is proven to make everyone poorer at all times.

Maybe the electorate is actually so fundamentally stupid as to think another Bush or Reagan is the answer. But that just makes the whole country poorer until conservatism and "libertarianism" gets the disgrace it deserves.

Capitalism cannot stand doing it your way. You make communism look good in comparison.

 

[amadeus]

Maybe the electorate is actually so fundamentally stupid as to think another Bush or Reagan is the answer.

They did when they voted for Obama! Heck, Obama is conservative compared to Reagan; by this time in Reagan's presidency, he'd already hiked taxes thrice.

Your way is proven to fail at all times. Your way is proven to make everyone poorer at all times.

Hong Kong - poorer now than ever in its history.

 

[Cryptic_Snow]

The Big Lie is that the government is responsible for what people who fought to get laws relaxed and broke other laws did.

You can pretend all you want the the people who did it are not responsible. But if it was left up to you the unemployment rate would be 20% now.

Your way is proven to fail at all times. Your way is proven to make everyone poorer at all times.

Maybe the electorate is actually so fundamentally stupid as to think another Bush or Reagan is the answer. But that just makes the whole country poorer until conservatism and "libertarianism" gets the disgrace it deserves.

Capitalism cannot stand doing it your way. You make communism look good in comparison.

We don't have capitalism, true capitalism is self correcting. What we have today, regardless of what political party is in charge, is in fact crony capitalism; corporatism. In real capitalism people are allowed to fail and aren't given incentive to take risk, why? Because nobody will be there to bail them out.

How in the world are we trying to deflect responsibility? We're placing it on the true source; namely the Federal Reserve and their cronies. It's ironic that the people I support politically would've let the people that you claim, bare the most responsibility; they would've allowed them to fail and go out of business. The people you support politically, bail those irresponsible people out and prop them up. You're really your own worst enemy, and you don't even realize it.

 

[Traitorfish]

We don't have capitalism, true capitalism is self correcting. What we have today, regardless of what political party is in charge, is in fact crony capitalism; corporatism. In real capitalism people are allowed to fail and aren't given incentive to take risk, why? Because nobody will be there to bail them out.

I really don't know where this concept of "real capitalism" came from. I've read a bit of Marx, who as you may be aware was the first scholar to interrogate capitalism as a discrete economic formation (Smith, Ricardo, etc. simply percieved themselves to be concerned with the universal nature of production and exchange), and neither this distinction nor the capacity for this distinction appear anywhere in his work. I've be very interested in knowing how you reached this conclusion.

 

[Cutlass]

We don't have capitalism, true capitalism is self correcting. What we have today, regardless of what political party is in charge, is in fact crony capitalism; corporatism. In real capitalism people are allowed to fail and aren't given incentive to take risk, why? Because nobody will be there to bail them out.

How in the world are we trying to deflect responsibility? We're placing it on the true source; namely the Federal Reserve and their cronies. It's ironic that the people I support politically would've let the people that you claim, bare the most responsibility; they would've allowed them to fail and go out of business. The people you support politically, bail those irresponsible people out and prop them up. You're really your own worst enemy, and you don't even realize it.

See that part in bold? That is the point at which you fundamentally fail to get the concept of economics. Capitalism is fundamentally a rollercoaster. It soars and it crashes, it soars and it crashes, it soars and it crashes.

And each crash is worse than the one before it. And then you get the Great Depression and the future of capitalism itself is fundamentally at risk of being thrown out by revolution.

And that's the point: People cannot tolerate unregulated capitalism. People cannot tolerate having everything they have worked for destroyed by the recklessness of others every 10-20 years. People needed that to stop.

And not only can it be stopped, but it's actually fairly easy to do it. Or at least a 90% reduction in the magnitude of the rollercoaster is easy to do.

And that brings us to the real irony here. Because you are the worst enemy of capitalism. And you don't even realize it. You are arguing to end capitalism and replace it with socialism. Because you are arguing to make capitalism so terrible for people that even communism is paradise in comparison. Let's face it, even Stalinism is paradise for the average person compared to your "free markets". By choosing to make capitalism intolerable the way you want to, you destroy the willingness of people to put up with it.

And by pretending that the Fed is the cause of the whole problem, you ignore the agency of everyone else. Greenspan, being the libertarian/objectivist that he is, mismanaged all aspects of the Fed. Fair enough.

But none of that compelled the actions of the private sector. This was a "festival seating" disaster. Greenspan threw open the doors, but the mob stampeded on its own. Because, you know, the mob really wanted to stampede.

The most stable era capitalism has experienced was when government was actively working to bring about stability. What we are experiencing now is the effect of dismantling that work for stability.

 

[civver_764]

I'd like to see a real explanation for how capitalism is "self-correcting."

 

[Cutlass]

I'd like to see a real explanation for how capitalism is "self-correcting."

After the inevitable, and frequent, depression, years later it corrects and starts to grow again.

 

[Tani Coyote]

I'd like to see a real explanation for how capitalism is "self-correcting."

The idea is that inefficient, undesirable businesses go bankrupt, whereas effecient, desirable businesses prosper.

To an extent this would work, but then you have bailouts, as well as unregulated industries soon fusing under one or two titans.

The free market requires a few freedoms to be taken away to stay mostly free. Same goes for society at large.

 

[Camikaze]

Moderator Action:

The economic ignorance on this forum is astounding, perhaps I overrated how well-read Civs fans truly are. The good news is that we can remedy this. Start your economics education here: Thomas Woods speaks about his book Meltdown: A Free-Market Look at Why the Stock Market Collapsed, the Economy Tanked, and Government Bailouts Will Make Things Worse

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=541bajR4k8g

Welcome to the forums, but please in future phrase your point in a less confrontational manner. There's no need to imply people are ignorant. Name-calling is superfluous to your argument.

Blame the free market that doesn't actually exist, gin up some outrage, and push the state to control even more of our lives and make the problem worse. When it gets worse, repeat the process.

And yet you still kick and scream and hiss in defence of giving that class exorbitant tax breaks. Weird, huh?

Two examples of posts that aren't up to RD standard. And the discussion it's started isn't exactly nice either. Comments such as, "All I can do is hope the electorate is smarter than to buy that!" and, "Maybe the electorate is actually so fundamentally stupid as to think another Bush or Reagan is the answer," are not at all conducive to civil and productive discussion.

Alternatively Blame the Democrats for Republican actions.

This doesn't add anything at all. It's just mud-slinging.

All of you, particularly Cutlass and amadeus, please cut out the bickering. Return to the topic.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

Crony Capitalism is very much real Capitalism, but it is not Free Enterprise. We really should be focused on defending the ideology of economic freedom for all rather than the power those who own or control the means of production.

 

[Traitorfish]

Crony Capitalism is very much real Capitalism, but it is not Free Enterprise. We really should be focused on defending the ideology of economic freedom for all rather than the power those who own or control the means of production.

Doesn't "economic freedom for all", in the sense of freedoms with a market economy, inevitably manifest itself as power for the economic elite? Or are you suggesting that "economic freedom for all" would be best embodied in some sort of social democratic system?

 

[Cryptic_Snow]

I really don't know where this concept of "real capitalism" came from. I've read a bit of Marx, who as you may be aware was the first scholar to interrogate capitalism as a discrete economic formation (Smith, Ricardo, etc. simply percieved themselves to be concerned with the universal nature of production and exchange), and neither this distinction nor the capacity for this distinction appear anywhere in his work. I've be very interested in knowing how you reached this conclusion.

I'll just point out that having a central bank is a plank of the Communist Manifesto.

I will defer to Dr. Thomas Woods on the concept of "real capitalism", he explains it much more brilliantly and succinctly than I. Please do watch the video, its not your typical boring lecture, he's a very entertaining and substantive speaker.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=541bajR4k8g

 

[Cutlass]

Funny. The Federal Reserve was the creation of capitalists. JP Morgan was the driving force behind it. He did it to protect capitalism. I'm sure Mr Morgan is spinning in his grave at how people now think he's a communist.

 

[Tahuti]

Capitalism ought to be called free enterprise because it covers what it stands for: Free Enterprise. Economic Freedom should then be defined as the ease of establishing a new business, in the sense that taxes aren't too high as too bankrupt newly formed businesses and there aren't any legal or bureaucratic encumberments on the formation of new businesses (like in India during the license Raj era).

The USA would be a free enterprise system, as anyone can start a new business without legal barriers or being practically doomed to bankruptcy by taxation. Pretty much the entire developed does have such a free enterprise system, and most of the developing world does not (which is the main reason why the developing world lags behind).

I don't think less capital requirements for big banks would be economic freedom; maybe for them, but not in general. True economic freedom would better be defined as being able to start new businesses; such definition of free enterprise and economic freedom would not necessarily contradict the existence of a welfare state.

 

[sophie]

I'll just point out that having a central bank is a plank of the Communist Manifesto.

Yeah, I definitely don't remember Marx saying anything about that in that book. Have you even read the Communist Manifesto, because I don't think it's about what you think it's about.

 

[useless]

Yeah, I definitely don't remember Marx saying anything about that in that book. Have you even read the Communist Manifesto, because I don't think it's about what you think it's about.

It's not even really that long of a book, AFAIK, it's quite short, more of an expanded pamphlet, than anything else.

 

[TopGearFanatic]

In a word, no.

 

[Cutlass]

Did Marx oppose money altogether? Or is it other communists who believe in that? Kinda pointless to have a central bank without money.

 

[sophie]

It's not even really that long of a book, AFAIK, it's quite short, more of an expanded pamphlet, than anything else.

Yeah, it's about 50 pages long. You can read it in an afternoon.