Myth 1: The market will ultimately be a froce for altruism. When corporations do bad things, people will find out about it, and support businesses who's practices are better, and thus "voting with our dollars" is really a far more effective way of getting utilitarian solutions to problems than dabbling in that innefective political system we've got.

Contraindicators:

A.) Advertising has proved to be a far more powerful force for getting people to spend money than word of mouth. Since victims of corporate largess, such as the famillies of murdered union organizers in Guatemala or residents downstream from chemical runoff do not have the kind of money neccesary to advertise these atrocities in the home countries of the companies in question, it is impossible for the consumer to make an informed decision.

B.) When it comes to certain goods and services, consumer choice does not exist. In medicine for instance, the customer cannot choose which diseases to have, nor ultimately who will treat them when they fall and need immediate care. As a result, no Dollar-voting can occur.

C.) Corporations have no incentive to work for utilitarian public good. If one wealthy person can afford a product that costs 100 times what others can affod, even if that product is somehow harmful to 100 other people, there isn't any consumer pressure that can be exerted by those who earn less. It isn't like they can take the business they're not giving the company elsewhere.

Good post agent grey ..............good to know some people are thinking before this election.

I think you are confusing Markets with Corporations and Commercialism.

I think he is confusing reality with hatred

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Its better to have fussed and crabbed then never to have fussed at all - Lucy

No, this is Milton Freedman style capitalism, the gentleman who set the tone for the whole of the Reagan administration and each gilded age thereafter. Of course he wasn't the first to suggest that "greed is good" but he's the most recent that has been embraced by the right wing in any serious way. I'm just here to dissect the basic assumptions of people who still support a fully free market system. I think its failures are glaring and obvious, even in the face of some its great and indisputable successes.

What is hateful about pointing out Capitalism is not a perfect ideology?

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"If you're going to tell people the truth, be funny or they'll kill you." -- Billy Wilder

"Never believe anything in politics until it has been officially denied." -- Otto Von Bismark

No it isn't. Corporations are government created entities, not a product of the market. Commercialism is something else all altogether.

As for "greed being good", all systems have greed. In different forms perhaps, but greed isn't always about money.

Free Markets have little to do with Corporations or large mercantilistic entitites of various names.

Free Markets are the ability to sell a product or service for whatever price the seller and buyer deem to be fair. I find it laughable that seeing as how most of the things we buy, with the exception of energy, certain food products, and monopolized communication networking, we get from a totally free market system. Cell Phones, Computers, Clothing, Electronics of all kinds of varieties, and even Tobacco, Liquor, and illegal narcotics, even.

So, would it not be hypocritical of a Socialist to use a computer, cell phone, x-box, wear Converse Shoes and drive a Honda?

These arguments are laughable, and the anti-Capitalism crowd here has none-if any serious argument against a free market. Now, I have actually heard some respectable points of argument for socialism or even Statist Policies in general. Noone here has come up with any.

Keep trying...

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"It is the Right of the People to alter or abolish the Government"
Declaration of Independence
"Never trouble another for what you can do for yourself."
Thomas Jefferson
"If you put the federal government in charge of the Sahara Desert, in 5 years there'd be a shortage of sand."
Milton Friedman

Corporation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Look, there's nothing about corporations neccesarily being a product of the government. It's true that their STATUS as an entity might be established by the legal system, but the term is also synonymous with a large business, which is obviously how I'm using it here.

more on this later today.

I disagree. We have seen in every free market system, that over time, competition breeds bigger and ostensibly better . Eventually those businesses leverage their success to effectively control the market in their respective industry, snuff meaningful competition out, and rule like kings.

I would go so far as to argue unchecked businesses, operating in a truly free market system (hence the lack of checks) begin to fulfill the very role we keep government out of the market to keep free to begin with.

I don't dispute that, but I would contend that all forms of regulation or incursion on the part of government into a market are percieved as a threat to the free-market system. At least that's what conservative economists howl whenever some agency tries to create a basic standard for say, the quality of foods or the availability of something as neccesary as medicine.

The fact of the matter, is that I strongly APPROVE of a hands off approach when it comes to Cell-phones, computers, clothing, electronics, tobacco, liquor and toys. I particularly like the free-market advantage of variety brought about in things like cereals. I just leave it behind when it comes to basics like medicine, water, or roads. There are some things which are not best served by a free-market approach.

As I say above, these things are luxery products in a market of consumer goods. A good socialist seeks to blend the best aspects of Free-Market capitalism and utilitarian communism to blend into what is best for the society he lives in. I think people's tendancy to confuse socialism for full-on communism is the greatest obstacle to getting our government to do anything useful.

The overarching theme of these threads will only be to illustrate how the free market does not serve all needs better than regulated markets or government programs. The theme of this thread specifically is only to demonstrate situations or services in which the basic premise of free-market apologist's logic (i.e. in a truly free system everything would be better because businesses would rise to fullfill all the needs of consumers, whatever they may be)

And what, may I ask, is so laughable about that?