4 ms·
Being pro-trade and pro-competition very often means not actually being for a free market. Policies that dictate what apple can do with its iphones’ app access
by crumpets 7y ago
Being pro-trade and pro-competition very often means not actually being for a free market. Policies that dictate what apple can do with its iphones’ app access might be “pro competition”, but the regulation used is against free markets.
The free market argument would be to let Apple do what it wants with its products. A “competition commissioner” is antithetical to that.
- threeseed 7y agoFree market != allowing companies like Apple to do what they want. Even in a free market there are regulations in particular around around anti-competitive conduct.
- TelmoMenezes 7y ago> Being pro-trade and pro-competition very often means not actually being for a free market. "Free" in this context is an ambiguous word. The libertarian argument is that no regulations make a market free to access for everybody. The counter-argument is that, under no regulations, rich-get-richer dynamics inevitably lead to such wealth inequality that most actors are free in strictly legalistic terms, but prevented in practice from taking any actions but the ones that attend to their immediate survival needs. It seems clear to me that unregulated markets inexorably condemn the majority of the population to wage-slavery and having most of their waking hours controlled by someone else. In Europe, we are interested in freedom in practice. This is only possible by protecting the underdogs, so that they do not fall into poverty traps that are impossible to get out of, as is the case in the US -- people having to work all of their waking hours just to survive, no chance of savings that would allow them to take a break and learn new things, or try new things, or just take a deep breath and think about the big picture for a second.