[maester_miller]

What would you do to prevent it?

Public ownership of shares of stock is a natural effect and expression of property rights. If someone owns a business, they can sell shares of it to whomever they want, including the public at large. I would suggest to you that most “private” companies are the same. In fact, any form of business other than a sole proprietorship almost certainly is divided into “shares” that have been exchanged in various ways at one point or another. A “private” firm most likely has some shares held by the owner, some by a family perhaps, some by a private equity fund, etc.

[maester_miller]

I’m not sure it is in their best interest to do so. I haven’t studied this topic seriously, but it would seem to me that health insurance is a highly inelastic product. Almost everyone who has the means to purchase it does purchase it, regardless of the cost. Because of this, the insurance companies can (and do) easily pass along price increases of medical costs right to the consumers through increased premiums.

Also keep in mind that the employer-provided system means that most Americans not only avoid paying the true cost of their medical procedures, but they also avoid paying the true cost of their health insurance, as their insurance is often highly subsidized if not provided entirely by the employer. While those of us who understand economics might realize that greater health benefits must translate to lower wages (or lesser benefits of another type), the average person seems to have not made this connection.

If the end customers don’t care about price hikes, nobody else along the chain will either.

[maester_miller]

The reason that illegitimacy rates have skyrocketed is because of the welfare system and the “war on poverty.” The way to enhance personal responsibility is to eliminate the government safety net, which encourages moral hazard and essentially makes irresponsibility more preferable than it otherwise would be.

[maester_miller]

That’s a good idea, although I’d also like to see more resources provided, particularly in the US History lectures. Dr. Jewell did an outstanding job in the Western Civ lectures providing reading materials for almost every topic addressed in the lecture, but I’ve found the external sources a little lacking on the US History side of things.

[maester_miller]

It seems to me that this wouldn’t be much different from state attempts to nullify federal gun laws.

Basically, this would be a state nullifying federal espionage laws (or whatever the feds are attempting to charge him with). The state would likely have to explicitly say “We will arrest any federal official who attempts to enforce these laws in our state” which is essentially what some have said with gun laws.

Then, in the end, it comes down to whether or not the feds are willing to call the state’s bluff and risk a violent confrontation, or not.

[maester_miller]

I don’t think the issue is so much whether the free market “could” produce space travel, but rather if it “would.”

Remember, the free market is designed to fill the most urgent needs of individuals, not the arbitrary demands of governments. So, for example, I would say that the free market *could* have produced the Apollo Program and landed on the moon, but they didn’t, because landing on the moon was not economically viable, presumably because it wasn’t a very urgent need of many individuals out there.

While the resources of the free market are vast and *could* be used to meet almost any challenge, I don’t think the free market will necessarily be all that interested in sending a bunch of people to Mars until they figure out how to monetize it somehow. Going to Mars is not very high up on most people’s list of priorities.

[maester_miller]

I’m not exactly an economics expert, but I think your premise is a little backward. It’s not that the various schools “come to the same conclusion” but rather that the concept of price-controls being counter-intuitive is a fundamental concept of basic economics. Any introductory to macro textbook will likely address this in the first few chapters.

As far as I know, the various economic “schools” all agree on the basic core premises of economics that are covered in an Intro textbook. It isn’t until you start getting into the more complicated issues and the question of “well what should we do about it” that the various schools of thought begin to become distinct.

[maester_miller]

Their statement is just wrong.

Because government spending is included in GDP, GDP does not properly reflect “the economy.” Because it doesn’t properly reflect the economy, the question of whether it grows from year to year or from quarter to quarter is irrelevant.

If I were to propose to you that we can measure the strength of the economy by how many baseball games the Chicago Cubs win in a year, you would say that’s crazy. If I tried to say “Well it doesn’t matter if that’s crazy because at the very least we can look at how many games they won last year and compare it to this year and see if things are getting better or worse” that would be a ridiculous statement. Garbage in, garbage out, you know?

[maester_miller]

We have the right to negotiate with the landowners to exist on their property. That’s basically it.

[maester_miller]

Iowa could make enforcing the NDAA a crime within the state of Iowa, and send state/city/county police to arrest the FBI agents.

Not that I think such an idea would end well, but that’s something they *could* attempt…

[maester_miller]

Are you suggesting that we do not own ourselves?

Anyway, the main difference I have seen is that the paleo-conservatives are more likely to support war and foreign intervention.

[maester_miller]

I am having these same problems on my work computer, but not on my home computer. Odd.

[maester_miller]

I’m not sure the ninth amendment is one that would be specifically violated, but rather it is there for informative purposes.

Take, for example, any case that hinges on the “right to privacy,” say, abortion for example. The purpose of the ninth amendment is to clarify simply that the fact that “right to privacy” does not appear in the constitution does not mean that it is not a right, and that your privacy can be violated by the government willy-nilly.

[maester_miller]

But wasn’t Lincoln’s entire premise that secession is illegitimate and that the south is NOT their own country? I mean, he sure seems to adopt that rationale in the emancipation proclaimation.

[maester_miller]

CSA,

Sort of off-topic here, but whenever anyone hits me with “private ownership of the means of production” I always feel compelled to demand they answer: Can you really be said to “own” something when some external force that you have virtually no influence on can dictate to you all of the following:

Who you may hire (and who you can’t)
What products and services you may provide (and what you can’t)
What facilities you must have on site, and how they must be constructed
Who your customers may be (and who they can’t)

And of course, the same external force reserves the right to keep as much of your profit for themselves as it decides to in any particular year.

If you violate any of their dictates, they will shut you down and forbid you from engaging in trade, and maybe even imprison you.

The word “ownership” has little to no meaning in modern society. For my money, no private individuals own anything anymore. The state owns it all, and allows us to keep some of it. We have socialism in everything but the name.

[Author]

Posts