[p2p-research] My letter to Obama

[Kevin Carson]

My response to the solicitation of ideas at change.gov:

INDUSTRIAL POLICY

As always, my recommendations center on a theme of pursuing green ends
with libertarian means.

If we want to replace the present centralized economy of waste
production and planned obsolescence, it's an inescapable fact that a
great deal of excess manufacturing capacity cannot be saved.  In my
opinion it's a mistake to try to prop it up through expedients like
the Detroit bailout.

The goal should be a shift from the present system of overaccumulated,
centralized, oligopoly industry, and its business model of planned
obsolescence and "push" distribution, to a decentralized economy of
small-scale manufacturing for local markets.  This means, among other
things, a switch from capital-intensive production methods based on
product-specific machinery, to production with small-scale, general
purpose machinery.  It means, in place of the old Sloanist production
model, something like the present-day economy of Italy's
Emilia-Romagna region:  networked small manufacturers producing in
large part for the local market, with a high degree of cooperative
ownership.  Such an economy, based on a "pull" distribution model with
production geared to demand on a just-in-time basis, will be insulated
from the boom-bust cycles of the old national "push" economies.  And
we need a new model of user-friendly, modular product design aimed at
cheap and easy repairability and recycling.

Your main focus, in my opinion, should be to ease the transition by
eliminating present policies (market-distorting subsidies, privileges,
and cartelizing regulations) that impede it and protect the old
economy from the new one.

This means, for one thing, eliminating differential tax exemptions
that favor firms engaged in centralized, large-scale,
capital-intensive production:  e.g., the depreciation allowance, the
R&D credit, the deductability of interest on corporate debt, and the
exemption of stock transactions involved in mergers and acquisitions
from capital gains tax).  Then lower the corporate income tax enough
to be revenue-neutral.

It means, especially, eliminating the biggest subsidy to economic
centralization, and to artificially large market area and firm size:
i.e., subsidies to long-distance transportation.  The Interstate
should be funded entirely by weight-based user fees on trucking, which
causes virtually all of the roadbed damage.  All subsidies to new
airports or to expanding old ones should be eliminated, including all
federal guarantees of local bond issues.

Perhaps most important of all, it requires radically scaling back the
present strong "intellectual property" regime.  IP (through patent
pooling and exchange, monopolies on current production technologies,
etc.) is probably the single most powerful cartelizing force, which
enables each industry to be concentrated in the hands of a few
players.  It impedes the transfer of skills and new technology from
the old manufacturing dinosaurs to the kinds of small, local producers
we need.  It also serves as a powerful bulwark to planned
obsolescence, imposing legal restrictions on the manufacture of cheap
generic replacement parts.

Scaling back IP law (a good start would be repealing the DMCA, the
WIPO Copyright Treaty, and the Uruguay Round's TRIPS accord) would
eliminate the barriers to the diffusion of skill and technology that
currently prop up the old corporate dinosaurs of the software and
entertainment industries, and facilitate their replacement by
networked production on an open source model.  Please cut loose the
MPAA, RIAA, and Bill Gates, and do so yesterday!

Finally, we need to eliminate all subsidies to large-scale
agribusiness.  The result will be a flourishing sector of
community-supported agriculture, replacing the old agribusiness
dinosaurs as fast as new ground can be cultivated.

-- 
Kevin Carson
Mutualist Blog:  Free Market Anti-Capitalism
http://mutualist.blogspot.com
Studies in Mutualist Political Economy
http://www.mutualist.org/id47.html
Anarchist Organization Theory Project
http://mutualist.blogspot.com/2005/12/studies-in-anarchist-theory-of.html