> There are still people out there who can't afford toothbrushes, but
> that's a different story. The average standard of living has improved,
> but the average poor person lives in much the same way they did 200 years
> ago, with a few more perks. While the rich standard of living has
> increase, say , by a hundred fold, the poor standard of living has
> increased maybe three fold.
IAN: Govt regulations and taxes raise the price of consumer goods,
while laissez-faire competition lowers it. Yet, while you support
the former you condemn the latter for the effects of the former.
Illogical.
> Look at a company like Shell. They give us nice products like oil, right?
> They get it at the expense of people who can't afford to buy any of it.
> THe Ogoni in Nigeria. Yet, because they have our economic support, they
> don't need anybody else's.
IAN: Africa has followed socialism far far more than laissez
faire, yet you condemn laissez faire for the problems there.
Illogical.
>> IAN: Your saying that capitalism will lead to either [1] socialism
>> or [2] socialism so we would be better off with socialism.
>>
>> The fact is that both varieties of socialism you fear -- both
>> rule by a central cabal -- are achieved only by means antithetical
>> to capitalism, so there is a clear path: laissez faire.
>
>
>How will laissez faire prevent those things from happening? Either the
>workers and the poor, of which there will be far more, will revolt as
>Marx predicted. Or the powerful will have such control that the
>peop[le won't be able to revolt. Laissez faire will not move wealth
>around. It will centralize it into the hands of the most ruthless or capable.
IAN: Your claim that decentralization leads to centralization
(therefore we need centralization to prevent decentralization)
has no basis in fact. It is regulations and taxation that reduce
the number of business, not the opposite. Learn about Hong Kong.
> Socialism does not imply totalitarianism. It's completely different.
IAN: Socialism = universal social debt = totalitarianism.
> Batista, Duvalier, Suharto, and Duarte all ran with capitalism, and yet
> they were, (still are in the case of Suharto), completely totalitarian.
> This is because the government was run for and by the private interests.
> Which is what I think happens with laissez faire.
IAN: Laissez faire means "leave alone."
A totalitarian govt is by definition not laissez faire.
> I live in Canada, which is a fairly good liberal socialism. I agree with
> Banjo that capitalism needs a bit of government in order to keep it from
> running amuck. ... i think we need to get a strong populist government.
IAN: Well at least you've dropped the anarchist pretense.
> But it doesn't. The freedom to do what you choose is still there, but of
> course there are limits, because then you impinge on the freedom of
> others. There is more freedom than capitalism because noone can tell you
> what to do (with you having to take it, with no reasonable alternatives).
> There is also mroe equality. Of course it's not a perfect system. But I'd
> like a system that is flexible enough to meet the problems it runs into
> without too much bureaucratic procrastination.
IAN: Sorry but that's just pure pie-in-the-sky nonsense, which I'll
counter with the same quantity of logic and fact you've supported it with.
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IAN GODDARD <igoddard@erols.com> Q U E S T I O N A U T H O R I T Y
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