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> Government can sometimes change things by deficit spending on infrastructure, but that's a tough sell to voters somehow. Because it is not free market econom

> Government can sometimes change things by deficit spending on infrastructure, but that's a tough sell to voters somehow. Because it is not free market economic activity governed by real demand. It is just government officials deciding to use other peoples money to create demand in certain sectors. If people in a community pooled their own money together to build a new bridge then you'd have economic activity that is created due to real demand and there would be a real incentive to make sure they are not overpaying or that their money is wasted. But when the government does it you end up building natural gas filling stations in Afghanistan for millions of dollars servicing a total of 3 cars running on natural gas in that country which on top of that has to be rebuilt multiple times because the Taliban bomb it again and again.

lmm 10y ago
> If people in a community pooled their own money together to build a new bridge then you'd have economic activity that is created due to real demand and there would be a real incentive to make sure they are not overpaying or that their money is wasted. Isn't people in a community pooling their money together what a government is? Often the increase in property values alone is more than the cost of building the bridge, the difficulty is co-ordinating them.
- DominikR 10y ago
  Ideally yes, but practically it more often than not isn't, especially if it's the federal government that decides. If governments owning and directing whole economic sectors truly was an efficient way to manage an economy then Socialism (government demand driving the economy) would've beaten Capitalism (private demand driving the economy) easily and by a long shot. It didn't just fail being more efficient than Capitalism, it even consistently ended up impoverishing and corrupting any nation that tried implementing it.

lmm 10y ago

> If people in a community pooled their own money together to build a new bridge then you'd have economic activity that is created due to real demand and there would be a real incentive to make sure they are not overpaying or that their money is wasted. Isn't people in a community pooling their money together what a government is? Often the increase in property values alone is more than the cost of building the bridge, the difficulty is co-ordinating them.

DominikR 10y ago
Ideally yes, but practically it more often than not isn't, especially if it's the federal government that decides. If governments owning and directing whole economic sectors truly was an efficient way to manage an economy then Socialism (government demand driving the economy) would've beaten Capitalism (private demand driving the economy) easily and by a long shot. It didn't just fail being more efficient than Capitalism, it even consistently ended up impoverishing and corrupting any nation that tried implementing it.