4 ms·

In addition it seems to me that labor is not a free market, simply because there is no choice to not offer your labor, since you'd starve. In large parts of th

In addition it seems to me that labor is not a free market, simply because there is no choice to not offer your labor, since you'd starve. In large parts of the world anyway, and globalization has brought them into the 'free' market.

justaman 9y ago
I think the labor market is free. If you choose not to offer your labor then you're not actually in the labor market are you? Perhaps rather the market has become overly populated with workers and there isn't much choice in which opportunities you pursue.
- jdavis703 9y ago
  In some US states you have to pay child support, even if you're unemployed. If you don't pay you go to jail. And while you're in jail the costs keep coming. If that's a free market, then I'm not sure what freedom is.
tdb7893 9y ago
Food always seemed a pretty free market to me, even though it's necessary. I was taught that free market is more about competition and access to information while necessity of the product mainly affected price inelasticity but that was econ 101 so idk if it's entirely accurate.
- lotsofpulp 9y ago
  Shopping for groceries might be close to a free market, but the production of food certainly isn't. Also, a big problem with the "free market" is inability and/or disincentive to price externalities, such as environmental damage. Although, it still seems to be a better system than others, we need to work on that front.
  - nine_k 9y ago
    Do you mean large subsidies to US farmers? Wholesale food markets dominated by few huge buyers, Walmart-style?
    - lotsofpulp 9y ago
      I'm referring to subsidies to US farmers and underpriced water also. I'm not familiar with other countries, but the domination by Cargill and Monsanto and John Deere also probably detract from a free market.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
lettergram 9y ago
Free market means you're free to choose, where you work, what to buy, where to sell. Its not free from consequences. You can most definitely not provide your labor, go and start a self sustaining farm ( you probably only need 1 - 2 acres of land in the right location )
- manjushri 9y ago
  Are you positing that this free market exists and accessible? There are countless examples of people with little to no meaningful choice of where to work, what to buy, and what they can sell.
emodendroket 9y ago
Sarah Bagley in 1845: > Whenever I raise the point that it is immoral to shut us up in a close room twelve hours a day in the most monotonous and tedious of employment, I am told that we have come to the mills voluntarily and we can leave when we will. Voluntary! Let us look a little at this remarkable form of human freedom. Do we from mere choice leave our fathers’ dwellings, the firesides where all of our friends, where too our earliest and fondest recollections cluster, for the factory and the Corporations boarding house? By what charm do these great companies immure human creatures in the bloom of youth and first glow of life within their mills, away from their homes and kindred? A slave too goes voluntarily to his task, but his will is in some manner quickened by the whip of the overseer. > The whip which brings us to Lowell is NECESSITY. We must have money; a father’s debts are to be paid, an aged mother to be supported, a brother’s ambition to be aided, and so the factories are supplied. Is this to act from free will? When a man is starving he is compelled to pay his neighbor, who happens to have bread, the most exorbitant price for it, and his neighbor may appease his conscience, if conscience he chance to have, by the reflection that it is altogether a voluntary bargain. Is any one such a fool as to suppose that out of six thousand factory girls of Lowell, sixty would be there if they could help it? Everybody knows that it is necessity alone, in some form or other, that takes us to Lowell and keeps us there. Is this freedom? To my mind it is slavery quite as really as any in Turkey or Carolina. It matters little as to the fact of slavery, whether the slave be compelled to his task by the whip of the overseer or the wages of the Lowell Corporation. In either case it is not free will, leading the laborer to work, but an outward necessity that puts free will out of the question.

justaman 9y ago

I think the labor market is free. If you choose not to offer your labor then you're not actually in the labor market are you? Perhaps rather the market has become overly populated with workers and there isn't much choice in which opportunities you pursue.

jdavis703 9y ago
In some US states you have to pay child support, even if you're unemployed. If you don't pay you go to jail. And while you're in jail the costs keep coming. If that's a free market, then I'm not sure what freedom is.

tdb7893 9y ago

Food always seemed a pretty free market to me, even though it's necessary. I was taught that free market is more about competition and access to information while necessity of the product mainly affected price inelasticity but that was econ 101 so idk if it's entirely accurate.

lotsofpulp 9y ago
Shopping for groceries might be close to a free market, but the production of food certainly isn't. Also, a big problem with the "free market" is inability and/or disincentive to price externalities, such as environmental damage. Although, it still seems to be a better system than others, we need to work on that front.
- nine_k 9y ago
  Do you mean large subsidies to US farmers? Wholesale food markets dominated by few huge buyers, Walmart-style?
  - lotsofpulp 9y ago
    I'm referring to subsidies to US farmers and underpriced water also. I'm not familiar with other countries, but the domination by Cargill and Monsanto and John Deere also probably detract from a free market.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]

lettergram 9y ago

Free market means you're free to choose, where you work, what to buy, where to sell. Its not free from consequences. You can most definitely not provide your labor, go and start a self sustaining farm ( you probably only need 1 - 2 acres of land in the right location )

manjushri 9y ago
Are you positing that this free market exists and accessible? There are countless examples of people with little to no meaningful choice of where to work, what to buy, and what they can sell.

emodendroket 9y ago

Sarah Bagley in 1845: > Whenever I raise the point that it is immoral to shut us up in a close room twelve hours a day in the most monotonous and tedious of employment, I am told that we have come to the mills voluntarily and we can leave when we will. Voluntary! Let us look a little at this remarkable form of human freedom. Do we from mere choice leave our fathers’ dwellings, the firesides where all of our friends, where too our earliest and fondest recollections cluster, for the factory and the Corporations boarding house? By what charm do these great companies immure human creatures in the bloom of youth and first glow of life within their mills, away from their homes and kindred? A slave too goes voluntarily to his task, but his will is in some manner quickened by the whip of the overseer. > The whip which brings us to Lowell is NECESSITY. We must have money; a father’s debts are to be paid, an aged mother to be supported, a brother’s ambition to be aided, and so the factories are supplied. Is this to act from free will? When a man is starving he is compelled to pay his neighbor, who happens to have bread, the most exorbitant price for it, and his neighbor may appease his conscience, if conscience he chance to have, by the reflection that it is altogether a voluntary bargain. Is any one such a fool as to suppose that out of six thousand factory girls of Lowell, sixty would be there if they could help it? Everybody knows that it is necessity alone, in some form or other, that takes us to Lowell and keeps us there. Is this freedom? To my mind it is slavery quite as really as any in Turkey or Carolina. It matters little as to the fact of slavery, whether the slave be compelled to his task by the whip of the overseer or the wages of the Lowell Corporation. In either case it is not free will, leading the laborer to work, but an outward necessity that puts free will out of the question.