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Entrepreneurs have incentive to ensure everyone meets their maximum potential because this is the place where there is the most to extract. If my value is $10

Entrepreneurs have incentive to ensure everyone meets their maximum potential because this is the place where there is the most to extract. If my value is $10 per day and someone makes my value $20 per day, there is $10 per day worth of value for us to negotiate over. We _both_ have an incentive to maximize my potential. Also: >we should ... thats a morality statement but without a canonical source of ethics that some do not ascribe to. But, I would assume that "self interest" is more or less universal, and thus we can build systems that use self interest to ensure good outcomes for all.

opportune 9y ago
Real life isn't just an elaborate Austrian economics simulator. In this case, there are a lot of complex dynamics at play: will workers emigrate elsewhere if trained well (Basically the IIT problem)? Are constituents/subjects ok with reductions in their quality of life so that other people can be provided these resources. To act as if the market will magically fix this is lazy and not realistic. Also yes of course I used "should", as I am giving my opinion on this situation.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- dragonwriter 9y ago
  > Real life isn't just an elaborate Austrian economics simulator. Well, yeah; for one thing, given that Austrian economics is more normative than predictive, I'm not sure what such a simulation would do.
  - opportune 9y ago
    You know what I meant to say: the real world does not adhere to economic thought as strictly as many would claim it does. The main reasons are usually due to some additional complexity that economic models fail to account for. Humans like being able to describe things in terms of cogent, concise rules, and in doing so can oversimplify and lead themselves to faulty conclusions.
    - dnautics 9y ago
      > the real world does not adhere to economic thought as strictly as many would claim it does That's absolutely true, and if anything the assumptive concepts that underly how government creates regulations are more dependent on "economic" principles than the assumptive concepts that underly how businesses work. "people don't always do the most rational thing" is so often used as an excuse for government to intervene and make choices for people. As if government itself is not made and run by people who also don't necessarily (individually or collectively) make 'rational' decisions, only now given a really big stick. There are other ways besides government to provide for people, even when doing so does not fulfill an obviously incorrect model of human as the hyperrational self-maximizer.
- cookiecaper 9y ago
  The core fallacy here is believing that we can all agree to supersede biological imperatives and everything will all go fine. The challenge of society is the establishment of a system that cooperates with biology to create a peaceful, prosperous environment for all members of that society. Humans are naturally competitive. Humans have tribal instincts (which include a default hostility to known outgroups). Humans have a fundamental tendency to hoard resources to ward off the mortal dangers of scarcity and decay, visible in our dietary inclinations just as much as in the way we handle the abstraction of money. Like most other successful animals, we have an instinct to secure resources not just for ourselves but for the generations that will follow after us. These are inborn instincts and impulses, installed by millions of years of evolution. They cannot be hand-waved away. As a species, we are stuck with them, for better or worse. Throughout the 20th century, we see the rise and fall of economic policy that refuses to acknowledge these realities. This willful blindness inflicts a large amount of suffering on the populations that fall for the delusion that we are now superhuman. The argument is not that physical impulse does not need restraint, nor that society shouldn't have structure and authority. It is merely that our social systems need to exist as background processes that optimize and refine our basic natures instead of trying to pretend like they don't exist. Just as denial of the underlying structure of computer systems will, at best, seriously impede performance, denial of the underlying structures of human psychology will, at best, bottleneck any society. Hardcore socialist redistribution systems are so denialist that they result in the equivalent of a nation wide Blue Screen of Death shortly after bootup. Let's take notice of the blood and agony of the 20th century and not install SOCIALISM.DLL anymore.
  - state_less 9y ago
    We also have lesson from the 1920s to draw from and the breaking up of monopolies. Social security has social in the name, and nobody wants that social program to die off without something better replacing it (except for some crude wealthy folks). This isn't an install/uninstall thing. More of an alloy of waxing/waining ideas.
    - cookiecaper 9y ago
      I agree that it's probably more useful to conceptualize economies as kernel subsystems with complex interdependencies rather than individual drivers. :)
- weberc2 9y ago
  I have a really hard time believing that governments will do better at distributing resources equitably than a market. To act as though governments can magically fix this is lazy and not realistic.
  - oblio 9y ago
    Governments alone won't. Nor will markets alone.
    - weberc2 9y ago
      Neither will a combination of the two, bury I think it might come closer. I think the free market people have some legitimate fears; a government that tasks itself with "fair redistribution of wealth" is pretty easily abused. "Fairness" lends itself to loose interpretations which target particular groups, for example, all of the white/male privilege rhetoric in the last decade. I don't particularly want my wealth redistributed because of someone's hate for my demographic.
      - weberc2 9y ago
        Sorry for typos; iOS autocorrect is terrible, and HN won't let me edit.
  - pizza 9y ago
    Giant companies are incentivized to kill the competition and then jack up prices while also lobbying for their interests with lawmakers. Said markets will also only give you the choice between products that you don't want, when you really want something that only a government would take on. Another thing that is distorted is that if a transnational corporation has a factory in one country, sends it to one of their factories in another country, and then sends it back again because it's cheaper, that gets counted as international trade. It's hardly an export, it's a way to protect investors from having to pay market rates.. Corporations get massive protections from government, I wouldn't really call it optimal resource distribution if government interference
Retric 9y ago
Your assuming there is just one person. In the real world finding someone well trained is almost always much cheaper and lower risk than training someone.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
sharemywin 9y ago
Why is your assumption a better assumption than say children, the elderly, and disabled should be taken care of. outside of a psychopath compassion is also more or less universal.

opportune 9y ago

Real life isn't just an elaborate Austrian economics simulator. In this case, there are a lot of complex dynamics at play: will workers emigrate elsewhere if trained well (Basically the IIT problem)? Are constituents/subjects ok with reductions in their quality of life so that other people can be provided these resources. To act as if the market will magically fix this is lazy and not realistic. Also yes of course I used "should", as I am giving my opinion on this situation.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
dragonwriter 9y ago
> Real life isn't just an elaborate Austrian economics simulator. Well, yeah; for one thing, given that Austrian economics is more normative than predictive, I'm not sure what such a simulation would do.
- opportune 9y ago
  You know what I meant to say: the real world does not adhere to economic thought as strictly as many would claim it does. The main reasons are usually due to some additional complexity that economic models fail to account for. Humans like being able to describe things in terms of cogent, concise rules, and in doing so can oversimplify and lead themselves to faulty conclusions.
  - dnautics 9y ago
    > the real world does not adhere to economic thought as strictly as many would claim it does That's absolutely true, and if anything the assumptive concepts that underly how government creates regulations are more dependent on "economic" principles than the assumptive concepts that underly how businesses work. "people don't always do the most rational thing" is so often used as an excuse for government to intervene and make choices for people. As if government itself is not made and run by people who also don't necessarily (individually or collectively) make 'rational' decisions, only now given a really big stick. There are other ways besides government to provide for people, even when doing so does not fulfill an obviously incorrect model of human as the hyperrational self-maximizer.
cookiecaper 9y ago
The core fallacy here is believing that we can all agree to supersede biological imperatives and everything will all go fine. The challenge of society is the establishment of a system that cooperates with biology to create a peaceful, prosperous environment for all members of that society. Humans are naturally competitive. Humans have tribal instincts (which include a default hostility to known outgroups). Humans have a fundamental tendency to hoard resources to ward off the mortal dangers of scarcity and decay, visible in our dietary inclinations just as much as in the way we handle the abstraction of money. Like most other successful animals, we have an instinct to secure resources not just for ourselves but for the generations that will follow after us. These are inborn instincts and impulses, installed by millions of years of evolution. They cannot be hand-waved away. As a species, we are stuck with them, for better or worse. Throughout the 20th century, we see the rise and fall of economic policy that refuses to acknowledge these realities. This willful blindness inflicts a large amount of suffering on the populations that fall for the delusion that we are now superhuman. The argument is not that physical impulse does not need restraint, nor that society shouldn't have structure and authority. It is merely that our social systems need to exist as background processes that optimize and refine our basic natures instead of trying to pretend like they don't exist. Just as denial of the underlying structure of computer systems will, at best, seriously impede performance, denial of the underlying structures of human psychology will, at best, bottleneck any society. Hardcore socialist redistribution systems are so denialist that they result in the equivalent of a nation wide Blue Screen of Death shortly after bootup. Let's take notice of the blood and agony of the 20th century and not install SOCIALISM.DLL anymore.
- state_less 9y ago
  We also have lesson from the 1920s to draw from and the breaking up of monopolies. Social security has social in the name, and nobody wants that social program to die off without something better replacing it (except for some crude wealthy folks). This isn't an install/uninstall thing. More of an alloy of waxing/waining ideas.
  - cookiecaper 9y ago
    I agree that it's probably more useful to conceptualize economies as kernel subsystems with complex interdependencies rather than individual drivers. :)
weberc2 9y ago
I have a really hard time believing that governments will do better at distributing resources equitably than a market. To act as though governments can magically fix this is lazy and not realistic.
- oblio 9y ago
  Governments alone won't. Nor will markets alone.
  - weberc2 9y ago
    Neither will a combination of the two, bury I think it might come closer. I think the free market people have some legitimate fears; a government that tasks itself with "fair redistribution of wealth" is pretty easily abused. "Fairness" lends itself to loose interpretations which target particular groups, for example, all of the white/male privilege rhetoric in the last decade. I don't particularly want my wealth redistributed because of someone's hate for my demographic.
    - weberc2 9y ago
      Sorry for typos; iOS autocorrect is terrible, and HN won't let me edit.
- pizza 9y ago
  Giant companies are incentivized to kill the competition and then jack up prices while also lobbying for their interests with lawmakers. Said markets will also only give you the choice between products that you don't want, when you really want something that only a government would take on. Another thing that is distorted is that if a transnational corporation has a factory in one country, sends it to one of their factories in another country, and then sends it back again because it's cheaper, that gets counted as international trade. It's hardly an export, it's a way to protect investors from having to pay market rates.. Corporations get massive protections from government, I wouldn't really call it optimal resource distribution if government interference

Retric 9y ago

Your assuming there is just one person. In the real world finding someone well trained is almost always much cheaper and lower risk than training someone.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

sharemywin 9y ago

Why is your assumption a better assumption than say children, the elderly, and disabled should be taken care of. outside of a psychopath compassion is also more or less universal.