Occupy Wall Street

[Gez]

Not just that, but they're efficient at making money on the short to medium term. Nations have to think about the long term as well. There's no money in public education -- it's a long term investment that assumes that a high level of education across the entire population is good for the interests of the country, but it will never bring direct financial benefits to the school themselves.

Another example: certain infrastructures, such as water distribution networks, are expensive to install and maintain. If they leak, it's not in the financial interests of a private enterprise to spend money so as to bill their customers less. But it is in the long term interests -- not just financial ones -- of the nation to avoid wasting a valuable resource such as potable water.

Private companies are experts at a practice known as "privatizing profits while socializing debts". Example: your factory pollutes. The bill for enduring or cleaning up this pollution? It's paid by society at large. And I'm not talking only in financial terms, the impact on the ecosystem or on people's health is not directly money. Heck, if you also own a medical corporation, it's in your interest to pollute more, so that more people get sick and need the medicine you sell. This becomes an extremely efficient scheme. You reap the rewards, and other people have to deal with the losses.

A government with democratic legitimacy (that is to say, "by the people, for the people") cannot access such efficiency because it would be entirely opposite its role and mandate.

If I need protection from criminals, I'm not interested in whether the cops have managed to maximalize how much money they get from crimefighting. To the contrary, I would have a rather dim opinion of a police force that rackets me for protection money and seizes all the assets of the people they arrest. But damn, as a private enterprise, that would be the most efficient police ever! What I'm interested instead is in that they catch the bad guys quickly, don't catch innocents by mistake or "mistake", and behave ethically without asking for bribes before they do their job.

If my home is on fire, I'm not swayed by the efficiency of firefighters who will bill me by the gallon for the water they hosed on the flames, plus a percent of the worth of the belongings of mine that they have saved. I'm sure they'd be very profitable and successful, but I don't want them to work like this.

If I go to a school, I'm interested in their ability to teach me quickly what I want to learn, not in how they spend only 3% of their budget on the teachers (a bunch of illegal migrants working overtime, payed below minimal wages and kept quiet through blackmail) and 47% on marketing campaigns aimed at making me believe they're a good school.

If I have to be hospitalized, I want the treatment to work on the first try and not to produce complications. The financially efficient way to conduct clinical businesses is to make sure the patient will need as many interventions as you can bill before his bank account runs out, and then you can let him die because he's unsolvable.

In short, there are a ton of things that are more important than money for people and their governments. But nothing is more important than money for an entity whose entire purpose is the making of money. It's their job to think about nothing else.

It's not that businesses are evil and that everything should be government-run or whatever. It's really not. There's a place for businesses, a large place indeed, and they are indeed efficient at what they do. It's just that they're not a panacea. They have drawbacks and limitations. Going 100% all corporation is as stupid and dimwitted as the reverse.

[AndrewB]

Wagi said:

Private companies are efficient at making money.

Money represents wealth. Private companies are efficient at creating wealth. Wealth creation is a positive-sum game for the economy. That's where our standard of living comes from.

Don't think for a second that they won't purposely skimp on their job if it makes them a quick buck.

I'm trying to understand what you mean by "skimping on their job". It sounds like you mean "doing a lazy job" but that doesn't make any sense. By definition, doing a lazy job will yield a lower expected profit than doing a good job.

[Technician]

I wouldn't put it past some CEOs to sink there own company to line their pockets.

[AndrewB]

Gez said:

There's no money in public education

Imagine if education had the same government involvement as the computer industry. We'd all be taking university classes over the internet while paying 90% less than we paid decades ago.

it's a long term investment that assumes that a high level of education across the entire population is good for the interests of the country, but it will never bring direct financial benefits to the school themselves.

The US government is extremely involved in education, and it's the world's worst nightmare. Students are going $200k into debt for a 4-year degree that doesn't qualify or train them for a damned thing.

Another example: certain infrastructures, such as water distribution networks, are expensive to install and maintain. If they leak, it's not in the financial interests of a private enterprise to spend money so as to bill their customers less. But it is in the long term interests -- not just financial ones -- of the nation to avoid wasting a valuable resource such as potable water.

You just identified one of the few things that the government SHOULD be involved in. Congrats.

Private companies are experts at a practice known as "privatizing profits while socializing debts".

That's what the government does through QE programs and TARP.

Example: your factory pollutes. The bill for enduring or cleaning up this pollution? It's paid by society at large. And I'm not talking only in financial terms, the impact on the ecosystem or on people's health is not directly money. Heck, if you also own a medical corporation, it's in your interest to pollute more, so that more people get sick and need the medicine you sell. This becomes an extremely efficient scheme. You reap the rewards, and other people have to deal with the losses.

This is what tort laws are for.

If I need protection from criminals, I'm not interested in whether the cops have managed to maximalize how much money they get from crimefighting. To the contrary, I would have a rather dim opinion of a police force that rackets me for protection money and seizes all the assets of the people they arrest. But damn, as a private enterprise, that would be the most efficient police ever!

I'm not American, but you need to understand that the constitution was founded under the principles of government enforcing rule of law and respecting private property. Capitalism is not anarchy. Not even close.

What I'm interested instead is in that they catch the bad guys quickly, don't catch innocents by mistake or "mistake", and behave ethically without asking for bribes before they do their job.

Law enforcement is that one annoying part of a society that will have major flaws no matter what you do. If it's privately run, you end up with a mafia type situation. If it's government run, you get inefficiencies. I'm probably with you in that I'd have to accept the latter.

If my home is on fire, I'm not swayed by the efficiency of firefighters who will bill me by the gallon for the water they hosed on the flames, plus a percent of the worth of the belongings of mine that they have saved. I'm sure they'd be very profitable and successful, but I don't want them to work like this.

Firefighters actually do bill people in many parts of the world.

If I go to a school, I'm interested in their ability to teach me quickly what I want to learn, not in how they spend only 3% of their budget on the teachers (a bunch of illegal migrants working overtime, payed below minimal wages and kept quiet through blackmail) and 47% on marketing campaigns aimed at making me believe they're a good school.

Now we're back in the realm where privatization would be infinitely better than what we have now. If colleges were forced into a "sink or swim" type capitalist system, they wouldn't have the luxury of making obscene profits because they'd be fighting tooth and nail with other colleges to attract students and avoid losing them. Tenured professors that show up late for class, barely speak English, teach 300 students in a theater and refuse to clarify anything or help students... these professors would be making the slave wages that they truly deserve.

If I have to be hospitalized, I want the treatment to work on the first try and not to produce complications.

I live in a country with socialized medicine, and believe me, this is NOT how it works here.

The financially efficient way to conduct clinical businesses is to make sure the patient will need as many interventions as you can bill before his bank account runs out, and then you can let him die because he's unsolvable.

Try running a computer company or car company like that and see how long it takes you to lose all your customers.

In short, there are a ton of things that are more important than money for people and their governments.

Yes, like the things that we buy with our money.

But nothing is more important than money for an entity whose entire purpose is the making of money. It's their job to think about nothing else.

Except that the majority of businesses can't make money unless they're creating something that benefits others in some way. Apple wasn't able to make all it's money until Steve Jobs came along and invented these things that we ejaculate all over ourselves wanting.

It's not that businesses are evil and that everything should be government-run or whatever. It's really not. There's a place for businesses, a large place indeed, and they are indeed efficient at what they do. It's just that they're not a panacea. They have drawbacks and limitations. Going 100% all corporation is as stupid and dimwitted as the reverse.

"Going 100% all corporation"? What the fuck are you talking about?

[AndrewB]

Technician said:

I wouldn't put it past some CEOs to sink there own company to line their pockets.

If your business becomes unprofitable and has no realistic hope of becoming profitable again, then shutting down the business is the correct thing to do. Yes, even if the owner has plenty of capital.

For example, if I became a billionaire running a newspaper empire, and I then realized that it was no longer possible to make a profit because newspapers are shitty and obsolete, should I keep the businesses running until my billions dwindled away to zero? Of course not.

[Blastfrog]

Gez said:

It's not that businesses are evil and that everything should be government-run or whatever. It's really not. There's a place for businesses, a large place indeed, and they are indeed efficient at what they do. It's just that they're not a panacea. They have drawbacks and limitations. Going 100% all corporation is as stupid and dimwitted as the reverse.

You're right. As much as I hate corporations as they currently are in America, they're really not all that bad, as long as they're kept in check. But, at the same time, there shouldn't be such a tight leash that it stifles innovation and progress. Which is basically what you're saying, that free reign capitalism is destructive, and equally as bad to be stagnant with the government assuming full control.

I wonder if we'll ever see more regulation against corporations having such huge influence in both governments and other things in our lifetimes.

--------

Also, off-topic, but how's my avatar at this speed, is it more tolerable now?

[AndrewB]

Sodaholic said:

I wonder if we'll ever see more regulation against corporations having such huge influence in both governments and other things in our lifetimes.

Do you really believe that simply making it illegal for corporations to lobby and control the government would have any effect at all? Do you really believe the laws would be enforced or followed in any way?

If your answer is "no", then you should believe that the only way to solve the problem of corporations controlling the government is to castrate the government and make it not worth controlling.

[Belial]

AndrewB said:

Try running a computer company or car company like that and see how long it takes you to lose all your customers.

Except your life doesn't depend on owning a car or computer, so that analogy is meaningless.

[Scripten]

AndrewB said:

Do you really believe that simply making it illegal for corporations to lobby and control the government would have any effect at all? Do you really believe the laws would be enforced or followed in any way?

If your answer is "no", then you should believe that the only way to solve the problem of corporations controlling the government is to castrate the government and make it not worth controlling.

How is that ANY different from giving corporations free reign? And the problem with students going into debt is because of a lack of government assistance, not because of it.

[AndrewB]

Belial said:

Except your life doesn't depend on owning a car or computer, so that analogy is meaningless.

No, my analogy is even more applicable to the healthcare example than the computer example because "not dying" is a lot more important to people than "being able to run Crysis 2 smoothly at 1920x1080 high detail".

[AndrewB]

Membrain said:

How is that ANY different from giving corporations free reign?

The problem isn't corporations having free reign in a free economy. That's the solution. The problem is corporations wielding immense government power. Remember, corporations in a free market are only able to wield whatever power they earn through traditional means. Corporations in bed with government can control taxes, laws, printing presses, etc. There's just no comparison at all.

And the problem with students going into debt is because of a lack of government assistance, not because of it.

Uh, I don't know what to say about this except you're 100% wrong. Students are going into debt precisely because government is willing to loan them obscene amounts of money. This enables colleges to jack up tuition to levels that are just sickening and not justifiable in any conceivable way. I can't even comprehend how you could believe otherwise.

[Blastfrog]

Membrain said:

And the problem with students going into debt is because of a lack of government assistance, not because of it.

AndrewB said:

Uh, I don't know what to say about this except you're 100% wrong. Students are going into debt precisely because government is willing to loan them obscene amounts of money. This enables colleges to jack up tuition to levels that are just sickening and not justifiable in any conceivable way. I can't even comprehend how you could believe otherwise.

So what is this, a chicken or the egg problem?

[AndrewB]

Sodaholic said:

So what is this, a chicken or the egg problem?

It's not a chicken and egg problem. Tuition is high because of government guaranteed student loans. Without those loans being available, tuition would be much lower. To take it a step further, without government subsidies of any kind, colleges would actually have to, you know, educate their students in order to compete in the market.

[Belial]

AndrewB said:

"not dying" is a lot more important to people than "being able to run Crysis 2 smoothly at 1920x1080 high detail"

Precisely the reason why I see the analogy as meaningless. Bleeding a person that's lacking medical expertise dry by convincing them their life is in danger would be easy for privatized healthcare.

[Scripten]

AndrewB said:

The problem isn't corporations having free reign in a free economy. That's the solution. The problem is corporations wielding immense government power. Remember, corporations in a free market are only able to wield whatever power they earn through traditional means. Corporations in bed with government can control taxes, laws, printing presses, etc. There's just no comparison at all.

They're free to implement whatever equivalents they want. And they will. All you would see is corporations doing what the government isn't, rather than running it from behind the scenes. I don't think you fully understand what you're suggesting. If you want to reduce the amount of power corporations control, I can't see how freeing up space for them to move in comfortably is a good choice.

Keep in mind that I'm not suggesting that nothing be done, but I can hardly see your propositions working at all. A "free" market just lets the biggest predator grow even larger.

AndrewB said:

Uh, I don't know what to say about this except you're 100% wrong. Students are going into debt precisely because government is willing to loan them obscene amounts of money. This enables colleges to jack up tuition to levels that are just sickening and not justifiable in any conceivable way. I can't even comprehend how you could believe otherwise.

Except that that's not true. Subsiding just on government loans (Such as what I am able to take out, due to my particular situation), a student is only JUST able to afford the cheapest of schools to attend. However, any student that is able to utilise corporate loans, through their parents or other supporting party, can afford the schools that do end up costing hundreds of thousands of dollars. (Until they get out of school and find out that those private lenders are out for blood.) Federal loans are the ONLY reason much of our generation is even able to attend college. If you want to put some plan into effect that eliminates lenders and ultimately reduces tuition prices, then go for corporate interests first. They are the ones fucking over every college student out there, and I can't fathom how you can believe otherwise.

Subsidies, of course, are another story, but I can't see any situation where removing government intervention would change the system other than letting state schools (the only ones many of us are able to attend) die off.

[GreyGhost]

AndrewB said:

Money represents wealth. Private companies are efficient at creating wealth.

Isn't that forgery?

Try running a computer company or car company like that and see how long it takes you to lose all your customers.

So long as the procedures are clinically justifiable, private hospitals can (and probably do) treat their terminally ill patients like cash cows.

If your business becomes unprofitable and has no realistic hope of becoming profitable again, then shutting down the business is the correct thing to do.

Sometimes a business is worth more dead than alive

[Gez]

AndrewB said:

That's what the government does through QE programs and TARP.

Yeah, when the politicians are bought by corporations, they eagerly participate in such schemes. Basically, they're traitors to the nation. See also: revolving door.

AndrewB said:

This is what tort laws are for.

And precisely why Dick Cheney exempted oil and gas companies from the Clean Air/Water/etc. Acts. See Gasland. Drillers get rich from shale gas, other people get sick, their cattle die, and so on but who cares because the gas company isn't legally responsible.

AndrewB said:

Capitalism is not anarchy. Not even close.

It can be if there aren't checks and balances on it. Unmitigated, capitalism results in an ever-greater concentration of capital until all the wealth ends up in a financial black hole. Money attracts money. Money is power. That's why there are wealth redistribution mechanisms -- the various forms of taxes, minimum wages, and all other things that those who wish they could get all the money of the world in their own pocket without sharing any penny say are evil.

AndrewB said:

Now we're back in the realm where privatization would be infinitely better than what we have now.

Sure, if what you want is a discriminating system where the privileged elite can give their children an education while the underclass cannot afford it at all... In my country (not the USA), school is free, as in, no tuition at all, until you reach University level. And university tuitions are still quite affordable -- it depends on the classes you take (humanities and pure mathematics are cheap, compsci, physics, chemistry, medicine are more expensive given the cost of the equipment) but even the highest I've seen was still less than insurance for the year. If you've got about $1000 ready, you can afford anything.

Private schools for university levels, on the other hand, are easily $10 000 a year and more.

The problem with American public schools isn't that they're public. It's that they are incredibly ill-managed. As if the people in charge didn't believe in public service and deliberately sabotaged them.

AndrewB said:

I live in a country with socialized medicine, and believe me, this is NOT how it works here.

I live in a country with socialized medicine, and believe me, this IS how it works here. (Though the right-wing government we've had for the last nearly-twenty years has managed to degrade it a lot with a series of dim-witted reforms that made it more costly and less efficient, but has hugely benefited a few large insurance and pharmaceutical companies.)

AndrewB said:

Try running a computer company or car company like that and see how long it takes you to lose all your customers.

With a large enough marketing budget for constant brainwashing-through-advertising, proprietary standards for hardware so that they can be repaired only in your shops, and some attractive features to seduce the unwary, I bet it could last a long while.

AndrewB said:

Yes, like the things that we buy with our money.

Okay, but a lack of cancer with your money. Buy a beautiful landscape view with your money. Buy a future for your children with your money.

Unless you really a lot more money than the average person, that's not going to happen.

AndrewB said:

Except that the majority of businesses can't make money unless they're creating something that benefits others in some way. Apple wasn't able to make all it's money until Steve Jobs came along and invented these things that we ejaculate all over ourselves wanting.

Feh, Apple crap is not something I want. It's all in the advertising. For all his deification as a genius innovator, Steve Jobs didn't create shit but sleek designs and good marketing. I had a small portable MP3 player before the iPod was launched as a revolutionary thing that never existed before in the history of stuff...

AndrewB said:

"Going 100% all corporation"? What the fuck are you talking about?

Corporate medicine and corporate school, as you seem to be wanting.

[Fulgrim]

Public schools are mismanaged by the fed govnt and state/local govmnt's have, a. Long history of taking funds from public edu to use elseware. Hell the gov of N.J. is a great example of this.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/25/nyregion/new-jersey-is-ordered-to-increase-aid-to-schools.html?pagewanted=all

[Csonicgo]

Satyr000 said:

Public schools are mismanaged by the fed govnt and state/local govmnt's have, a. Long history of taking funds from public edu to use elseware. Hell the gov of N.J. is a great example of this.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/25/nyregion/new-jersey-is-ordered-to-increase-aid-to-schools.html?pagewanted=all

The sad part is that the teachers are the victims as much as the students. I know this personally. There's so much wrong with the school systems up at the top that it would take years to clean up the mess they've made.

[AndrewB]

I'm tired of this conversation. I'm having to explain too many things repeatedly, and many of those things are just going over people's heads, like how removing government subsidies for education would deflate the huge tuition bubble that expanded over the decades and therefore make education more accessible to the poor, not less. I'm trying to participate in a debate, but others are trying to defend their fortress of opinion from being impregnated. If some of my ideas were interesting to others, great. If not, oh well.

[Blastfrog]

Bawwwing because people don't agree with you? They understand what you're saying, it's not "going over their heads", they just don't agree with your position.

Seriously though, if the government stopped providing funds for education, that is no guarantee that they'll lower tuition prices. They don't give a shit how many people get in their college, they just want money, there will always be someone rich enough to pay on their own, and it won't make a difference either way.

The real solution is to cap tuition prices, in my opinion.

[Fulgrim]

Sodaholic said:

Bawwwing because people don't agree with you? They understand what you're saying, it's not "going over their heads", they just don't agree with your position.

Seriously though, if the government stopped providing funds for education, that is no guarantee that they'll lower tuition prices. They don't give a shit how many people get in their college, they just want money, there will always be someone rich enough to pay on their own, and it won't make a difference either way.

The real solution is to cap tuition prices, in my opinion.

Its not even the teachers that see the benefits of increased tuition. Most collage football coaches get a million dollar or more contracts. Much like a Board of Directors a Board of Trustees tend to give them self's a raise at the expense of every one else. In order to truly stop rising tuition you need to look at where the money is going also.

As for you AndrewB. I think I should have been more clear. When I say public education I mean k-12. Schools are underfunded and there are so many that need major repairs its not even funny.

[Wagi]

AndrewB said:

I'm trying to understand what you mean by "skimping on their job". It sounds like you mean "doing a lazy job" but that doesn't make any sense. By definition, doing a lazy job will yield a lower expected profit than doing a good job.

When you run a car company, your "job" is to make the best cars ever, your ultimate goal is to make more money. Making a car with a great deal of fuel efficiency is good for the customers, is it not? But what if oil companies, seeking to avoid a decrease in demand on their own end, offers you much more money than what you could make by selling better cars? In the end you make more profit by skimping on the job, as I just said.

Those in control of business have always used "cost cutting measures" that improve profit margins, even if their actions are unsafe or unethical. Look at the BP oil spill. Was it more profitable to skimp on safety? Hell yes. Did it increase our standard of living when the whole situation literally exploded in the middle of the ocean? Can you guess?

[doomedout]

AndrewB said:

I'm tired of this conversation. I'm having to explain too many things repeatedly, and many of those things are just going over people's heads, like how removing government subsidies for education would deflate the huge tuition bubble that expanded over the decades and therefore make education more accessible to the poor, not less. I'm trying to participate in a debate, but others are trying to defend their fortress of opinion from being impregnated. If some of my ideas were interesting to others, great. If not, oh well.

You were right 90% of the time; not worth arguing here, people won't or can't understand.

[myk]

AndrewB said:
Nothing about this paragraph deserves a response, and it's shameful coming from a super mod.

That is a response. My point was noting how people feel you may be trolling, which you can't seem to grasp when the (posting) evidence for the suspicion is there for all people with enough posting history or searching abilities.

This reinforces my point that minimum wages are toxic in a depressed economy with high unemployment. Sure, higher wages are good, just like exercise is good. But if someone is sick with the flu, you don't force them to run five miles. Just like when an economy is sick, you shouldn't tell businesses to maintain higher wages and don't lay anyone off while their revenues are falling. That's a perfect recipe for widespread bankruptcy, and that's pretty much where America is now.

"The economy" there can only mean a certain sector of the economy because the benefit or cost of higher salaries is not generic. The higher salaries allow people to spend the money and that money goes to businesses. Without considering the direct social damage from generally low salaries, these stagnate the economy, exacerbating the differences in wealth even more. Minimum salaries don't come arbitrarily, they are the result of populations demanding them due to social needs. Though you do need solid unionized support to make these demands fair and generalized, which is a problem in the US, where for decades unions have been polarized and restricted.

They already have that power, dorkus. They can simply lay people off, shut down their businesses, and move their businesses overseas. Again, that's exactly what's happening.

Sure they're doing it, that's the 1%/99% issue right there. And you're suggesting they should have a free hand to do so even further. The more they do it, the more people need to be employed or employed in a sustainable way. Enter government plans hiring people directly or through incentives. The more they do it, the more the mechanisms you denounce (minimum salaries and work insurance) become demanded and necessary to avoid social disintegration and strife. Keep in mind that measures to protect workers don't consist only of minimum wages but also guarantees of stability, working conditions and health care (of bloated costs in the US due to its mercantile and selective nature).

Do you want to have a serious discussion? No? Then please don't waste precious seconds of my life reading this crap.

While a hyperbole, it's quite serious, as they do exactly that when they can and find it convenient. Try reading about the behavior of mining or agricultural giants in countries with poorer populations. The populations in richer countries avoid the abuse by politically and collectively guaranteeing the labor protections we're arguing about, but if they lacked these, the difference would diminish... even further. My point above was also that unemployment is "convenient" because it lowers salary expectations. If a good percentage of the population is unemployed or subemployed, it's easier to get people to work for little, even less than what they need, and to keep things that way, especially when companies which have half their wealth elsewhere are involved. Worker's salaries and working conditions and continuity aren't just a measure of how much they can spend, they're also a measure of social power.

You can't micromanage a country like SimCity.

There is no need to jump with a straw man from an economy without minimum wages to extreme Stalinism. You do need to regulate various aspects socially to ensure a sustainable society, especially resources and infrastructure, health, housing and work availability. Many other businesses need much less "political" meddling, if any.

They're efficient because they desire profit, fear loss, and have a natural drive to avoid going bankrupt.

They also avoid many responsibilities by concentrating on profit and avoiding bankruptcy. This results in many aspects in society not being attended by private companies because they are not profitable to them or are risky.

Government entities can't go bankrupt, and so they don't have these benefits.

I didn't exactly dispute that efficiency, I made a move to specify what it is and that it isn't without costs. See below, in addition to what others replied.

If you argued that government was inefficient but that it's justified in certain circumstances, then maybe I could respect your position. But to imply that government is somehow equally or more efficient than the private sector is just beyond insane.

I was referring to being very wary of the ideology and procedures of private business applied to public government, because, as you note in some way (but not fully) in the quote above, they are like apples and oranges in various senses. I am not sure what you're trying to pin to what I said, but by putting efficiency in quotation marks I was noting that the efficiency of private enterprise comes at a cost to society in other ways, much of which has to be dealt with through public enterprise. Other private initiatives may contribute to fill in the gaps, but a focused response needs to be holding things together and is more direct than one filtered by the immediate interests of a third party (an intervening business.)

That's what the judicial system and law enforcement are for.

The law just formalizes and enforces what's established politically and socially. In the society without minimum wages, and thus weaker worker classes, that you suggest, the law will mainly have the task of kicking protesting people in the ass more than it does already. The law is also a key leg of the government. If you had a "small government" it wouldn't have much weight with which to apply the law except subserviently in the name of whatever entities collected the power it doesn't have. On one hand you retort "that's what the law is for" but also that the government should be roughly eliminated, except maybe for its security apparatus. Make up your mind.

Money represents wealth. Private companies are efficient at creating wealth. Wealth creation is a positive-sum game for the economy. That's where our standard of living comes from.

Half truths are not true, as I noted of this same simplistic assertion earlier in the thread. Wealth is created by an association between different actors including nature, workers, companies and governments. Every business in operation owes the other three for practically everything it does in some way, often in ways that are hard to compute, as they form the foundations from which is can accumulate the capital it uses for its specialties. There you find evidence for the "socialist" demands of "non-market" interests and why the formal markets can't really cover the drives behind those demands. Money represents wealth in the way a politician represents "the people", if not worse. Badly and in a skewed or partial manner, so other "political" means are used to correct that.

To take it a step further, without government subsidies of any kind, colleges would actually have to, you know, educate their students in order to compete in the market.

Yes, and it makes education subservient to the business of education.

That's what the government does through QE programs and TARP.

Except hardly anyone arguing against you here is going to defend those, which go mainly to elite financial institutions while what you're supposed to try to argue against here, that we may defend, goes to the general lower and middle class population.

Law enforcement is that one annoying part of a society that will have major flaws no matter what you do. If it's privately run, you end up with a mafia type situation. If it's government run, you get inefficiencies. I'm probably with you in that I'd have to accept the latter.

It's hardly the only public service with that problem. Such a mafia controls the US medical industry and to a large degree its higher education.

Now we're back in the realm where privatization would be infinitely better than what we have now. If colleges were forced into a "sink or swim" type capitalist system, they wouldn't have the luxury of making obscene profits because they'd be fighting tooth and nail with other colleges to attract students and avoid losing them. Tenured professors that show up late for class, barely speak English, teach 300 students in a theater and refuse to clarify anything or help students... these professors would be making the slave wages that they truly deserve.

What happens outside the books is that a number of successful schools share a loose alliance where they can guarantee prices that primarily benefit them all, seeing the demands of customers for cheapness as more threatening than concessions between each other. It's more profitable that way. The government also becomes involved in this alliance, where some key school owners and managers become part of it or are allied to it. Check out the news on Chile's education system and crisis for an example.

I live in a country with socialized medicine, and believe me, this is NOT how it works here.

At least you get medical attention even for serious and expensive operations no matter how rich or poor you are. Private companies, instead, scale their responsiveness depending on the client's ability to pay, which leaves a good deal of people with very limited services, if any.

Without those loans being available, tuition would be much lower.

A highly privatized educational system fails with loans, because people become heavily indebted and tuitions become higher, and without them, because prices are still not accessible enough to offer adequate accessibility to the general population without a heavy cut on quality for most people. You need to mass spend on public education to allow ample access of a decent level. There's also the issue that private companies control it ideologically in a more pervasive way than public institutions do, because the latter need to keep a degree of openness to comply with different interests, at least in a relatively democratic environment. Private companies are free to set limits to their coverage, and thus can more easily ignore any parties they don't gain anything from, or choose a specific client type. That also reinforces educational castes, of course.

Do you really believe that simply making it illegal for corporations to lobby and control the government would have any effect at all? Do you really believe the laws would be enforced or followed in any way?

Not completely under the current global framework, but you can diminish their influence if the regulations are backed by other measures to stall their power or ensure they subject themselves to the law, just like with any other legal restriction. You also need groups and organizations to back it up, since a government can't act out on thin air. But governments are there to be pressured by different actors, as a "public buffer zone" and gain their power from playing off many different sectors or forces.

If your answer is "no", then you should believe that the only way to solve the problem of corporations controlling the government is to castrate the government and make it not worth controlling.

That sounds rather messianic and it's still not clear that you're serious. A specialized part of society like private enterprise can't get rid of the government any more than it can get rid of workers and "nonproductive" people that aren't part of its ranks, at least not without the white phosphorous I recommended earlier.

Belial said:
Bleeding a person that's lacking medical expertise dry by convincing them their life is in danger would be easy for privatized healthcare.

A doctor under a private service attempted to operate my dad's spinal column after an accident he had, when it was risky and unnecessary. Any system which gives doctors bonuses for their efficiency or achievements encourages "gaming" that for profit. Not to mention lab incentives for facilitating their drugs and products, of course.

Gez said:
It can be if there aren't checks and balances on it. Unmitigated, capitalism results in an ever-greater concentration of capital until all the wealth ends up in a financial black hole. Money attracts money. Money is power. That's why there are wealth redistribution mechanisms -- the various forms of taxes, minimum wages, and all other things that those who wish they could get all the money of the world in their own pocket without sharing any penny say are evil.

That's what she said :p

[Gez]

Kirchner is pretty much right on all counts.

Unfortunately, getting rid of tax havens isn't going to be easy. You can bet that any measure going in that direction would be met by immediate veto from at least the USA and UK, and probably France and Germany as well.

[dew]

of course getting rid of tax havens is nigh-impossible. the world missed its chance after ww2 when they let switzerland get away with its bullshit. everyone knew they hoarded the jewish gold stolen by nazis, but britain needed a loan, so they let it slide. hence a precedent that's pretty tough to reverse nowadays. switzerland is the motherland of hypocrites and the corrupt values of the west.

[SYS]

I'm a tad overdue on this.

myk said:

to avoid looking down on the movement as if from above,

Well then stop making such assertions, looking down on the forum posters as if from above. Oh wait a minute...

myk said:

So Gez is a "commie" because he doesn't like the highly financialized nature of current global (and national) economic policies?

You're asking me to label him with the label you suggested in your own question. Those demanding free things aren't exclusive to any socio/political ideologue. Do you think he's a commie?

myk said:

People who demand socialist or socialized policies in the face of the current situation do not ask for "free stuff." It's "free stuff" to a certain perspective of property that simplifies it to whoever somehow acquires legal entitlements or "ownership". They're more or less asking for a refund to what was taken from them in the process.

While on the topic of property, if you owe the bank money for a home is it really your property before it's paid off? Secondly, once it's paid off and you "own" it, the government can take it away from you if you fail to pay property tax. So at what point did you ever actually own it at all?

Csonicgo said:

myk, you can't talk sense into the brainwashed. Some are so bad that even if there is no way for them to advance, or their view finally proven economical suicide, they'll still cling to what they were carefully taught.

Accusing someone of being brainwashed is merely a cheapshot method of trying to completely ignore or invalidate what they have to say.

[TMD]

Nice job stopping NDAA from passing, guys.
Your level of progress is truly awe-inspiring.

[Quast]

TheMionicDonut said:

Nice job stopping NDAA from passing, guys.
Your level of progress is truly awe-inspiring.

Oh, and how were we supposed to stop its passing?

.......

Yeah, I thought so.