5 ms·

> Although that may be standard thinking in some circles, in reality there are clearly areas where more money would lead to far more goods and services, making

by javert 7y ago

> Although that may be standard thinking in some circles, in reality there are clearly areas where more money would lead to far more goods and services, making everyone in the area richer. Finance exists to do this. If it's a good investment, compared to the alternatives, money will be routed to it (and away from alternatives). Your government spending examples are examples where the government made "good" decisions, but it's equivalent to cherry-picking. For example, the U.S. government spends more on healthcare per capita than any other country, yet our healthcare is worse than most countries, AND patients still get bankrupted. The U.S. government indirectly financed the higher education bubble that has allowed college administrators to make out like bandits, AND students are still in massive debt. Government spending is an inherently vicious process because it overrides individuals' own economic judgement about how to deploy their resources and replaces it with authoritarian central "planning." Also, most of your examples (maybe all) are defense projects. I think defense is a legitimate part of the government and the DoD can make pretty good judgement calls when they have a reasonable and limited amount of funding. But should they have gotten trillions to punish Iraq and Afghanistan for something done by the Saudis? No. We can see government spending in the U.S. becoming increasingly more catastrophic and wasteful over time because that is the nature of an inherently vicious process.

EGreg 7y ago
Your own examples are just arguments in favor of government spending. Take for example your claim “the US government spends more on healthcare per capita hhan any other country, yet our heathcare is worse than most countries” The data is clear - single payer systems achieve lower prices thanks to having MONOPSONY POWER over the market. Providers compete, regular consumers don’t, for basic services. Instead resources are prioritized by urgent need. Almost All the systems ahead of US in quality and outcomes in the Commonwealth Fund list are single payer systems. If the US government had a single payer system, it would do well. All around the world we have seen that governments can cover EVERYONE and do it CHEAPER if they have a single payer system, thanks to their massive MONOPSONY power. As for education: I am not talking about government run schools, but if we had vouchers (a single payer system) then private schools would compete for those dollars and once again it would pop up in areas where they are needed (eg next to a failing school). I am not in favor of FREE COLLEGE being funded by government but I am massively in favor of FREE EDUCATION which can mean MOOCs, coding schools, apprenticeships acting workshops and much much more. The idea that an inherently wasteful “four year cruise” should be subsidized by money meant for EDUCATION, or that we need to lock up great teachers in lecture halls to only reach 300 people while another 30 are reached by crappy teachers is ridiculous. I am not saying government should dictate what FORM the education would take, just provide people with vouchers or UBI to make their own decisions. But my original point was that the FEDERAL government being the only one who can issue currency is actually pretty limiting. Look at how well the PIIGS countries did in the south of europe after joining the Euro and giving up the power of running their own monetary policy. When Greece had the Drachma they did way better. Similarly Detroit wouldn’t have gone bankrupt if it could issue its own currency like Bristol and Brighton in England. There are tons of examples. Venezuela is a great example of government mismanaging the currency and people needing an alternative. And in fact, during the Weimar republic’s hyperinflation, there were pockets of private currencies the did very well and HELPED PEOPLE until they were OUTLAWED by the stupid principle of enforcing sanctions by the French after the treaty of Versailles. Who knows that alone could have averted WW2 and the Nazis rise to power in an impoverished Germany. And then of course in peacetime this is THE DEFAULT. In the free banking era before the greenback, most everyday money was banknotes circulating issued by various individual banks not the “official sanctioned by the Federal Government banks” And now we have cryptocurrencies AND social networks payment systems increasingly competing with banks. Also, I don’t just talk, I put my $ where my mouth is and build what I believe: https://intercoin.org https://intercoin.org
- javert 7y ago
  Thank you for posting a detailed comment. > The data is clear - single payer systems achieve lower prices thanks to having MONOPSONY POWER over the market The data is clear that a free market for healthcare would do even better than a single payer system. I seriously believe that. But this is the problem with "the data is clear"-based arguments. I won't convince you by saying that "the data is clear" because it's much more complicated, and that's why you also won't convince me by saying that. Now I get that in a narrow sense your data is clearer than mine: we have the U.S. system and we have single-payer systems, and we can see that the latter are better. But we don't have a comparison point for a free market in healthcare. Although I think there is enough data to conclude that it would be far superior, by the criterion you are using---simply comparing the systems we have in the world today directly to one another---there is a gap missing; we don't have data on a free market in health care. So technically, you don't know that single payer is better than a free market in healthcare. If you have a free market for MOOCs, coding schools, etc., people will exercise their economic judgement such that good schools win and bad schools die out. If you have the government pay for it, it will be an inherently vicious process that will reward the schools that are best able to solicit funding and it will end up in the same place the 4-year colleges did. Greece probably didn't do better on the Drachma, it probably just hadn't had the pendulum swing back the other way again (i.e. come down from the sugar high). I mean, that's my guess, based on my economic views. This goes back to the "the data is clear" issue... causation is really complicated to understand. I'm sorry but I don't believe in local currencies. If there is an honest and sound money, people will always prefer it. I think that is what we should work towards. But props to you for making something. I think people should be free to choose any currency they like, including a local currency.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - EGreg 7y ago
    In a free market both sides compete. In a single payer system only providers compete. Basic macroeconomic models predict that prices would be lower, and in fact the data shows this. Now you can say that a free market doesn’t exist, but then what is the use of your theories? You don’t adjust them by encountering any data. If I am wrong, tell me what data you have ever encountered to make you change your theories about the free market and government? BTW I believe free markets do exist, and have always existed - at the highest levels of human organization. Today this is international markets. There is no monopoly of force. And I would like to see data that these markets are more efficient and less susceptible to, say, cornering (eg the Bank of England by George Soros, or international prices of bread/metals/etc. by Goldman Sachs) than managed markets like the US Public Stock Markets. “If there is an honest and sound money, people will always prefer it”. Actually Gresham’s law says the opposite. If the exchange rate is set by law them BAD MONEY will drive out the good. That’s because money is a means of exchange, more than it is a store of value. The means of exchange is always the thing you want to get rid of and others will take. The store of value is what you want to hoard. Even Aristophanes realized this thousands of years ago: https://mises.org/library/aristophanes-inflation https://mises.org/library/aristophanes-inflation

by javert 7y ago

EGreg 7y ago

Your own examples are just arguments in favor of government spending. Take for example your claim “the US government spends more on healthcare per capita hhan any other country, yet our heathcare is worse than most countries” The data is clear - single payer systems achieve lower prices thanks to having MONOPSONY POWER over the market. Providers compete, regular consumers don’t, for basic services. Instead resources are prioritized by urgent need. Almost All the systems ahead of US in quality and outcomes in the Commonwealth Fund list are single payer systems. If the US government had a single payer system, it would do well. All around the world we have seen that governments can cover EVERYONE and do it CHEAPER if they have a single payer system, thanks to their massive MONOPSONY power. As for education: I am not talking about government run schools, but if we had vouchers (a single payer system) then private schools would compete for those dollars and once again it would pop up in areas where they are needed (eg next to a failing school). I am not in favor of FREE COLLEGE being funded by government but I am massively in favor of FREE EDUCATION which can mean MOOCs, coding schools, apprenticeships acting workshops and much much more. The idea that an inherently wasteful “four year cruise” should be subsidized by money meant for EDUCATION, or that we need to lock up great teachers in lecture halls to only reach 300 people while another 30 are reached by crappy teachers is ridiculous. I am not saying government should dictate what FORM the education would take, just provide people with vouchers or UBI to make their own decisions. But my original point was that the FEDERAL government being the only one who can issue currency is actually pretty limiting. Look at how well the PIIGS countries did in the south of europe after joining the Euro and giving up the power of running their own monetary policy. When Greece had the Drachma they did way better. Similarly Detroit wouldn’t have gone bankrupt if it could issue its own currency like Bristol and Brighton in England. There are tons of examples. Venezuela is a great example of government mismanaging the currency and people needing an alternative. And in fact, during the Weimar republic’s hyperinflation, there were pockets of private currencies the did very well and HELPED PEOPLE until they were OUTLAWED by the stupid principle of enforcing sanctions by the French after the treaty of Versailles. Who knows that alone could have averted WW2 and the Nazis rise to power in an impoverished Germany. And then of course in peacetime this is THE DEFAULT. In the free banking era before the greenback, most everyday money was banknotes circulating issued by various individual banks not the “official sanctioned by the Federal Government banks” And now we have cryptocurrencies AND social networks payment systems increasingly competing with banks. Also, I don’t just talk, I put my $ where my mouth is and build what I believe: https://intercoin.org https://intercoin.org

javert 7y ago
Thank you for posting a detailed comment. > The data is clear - single payer systems achieve lower prices thanks to having MONOPSONY POWER over the market The data is clear that a free market for healthcare would do even better than a single payer system. I seriously believe that. But this is the problem with "the data is clear"-based arguments. I won't convince you by saying that "the data is clear" because it's much more complicated, and that's why you also won't convince me by saying that. Now I get that in a narrow sense your data is clearer than mine: we have the U.S. system and we have single-payer systems, and we can see that the latter are better. But we don't have a comparison point for a free market in healthcare. Although I think there is enough data to conclude that it would be far superior, by the criterion you are using---simply comparing the systems we have in the world today directly to one another---there is a gap missing; we don't have data on a free market in health care. So technically, you don't know that single payer is better than a free market in healthcare. If you have a free market for MOOCs, coding schools, etc., people will exercise their economic judgement such that good schools win and bad schools die out. If you have the government pay for it, it will be an inherently vicious process that will reward the schools that are best able to solicit funding and it will end up in the same place the 4-year colleges did. Greece probably didn't do better on the Drachma, it probably just hadn't had the pendulum swing back the other way again (i.e. come down from the sugar high). I mean, that's my guess, based on my economic views. This goes back to the "the data is clear" issue... causation is really complicated to understand. I'm sorry but I don't believe in local currencies. If there is an honest and sound money, people will always prefer it. I think that is what we should work towards. But props to you for making something. I think people should be free to choose any currency they like, including a local currency.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- EGreg 7y ago
  In a free market both sides compete. In a single payer system only providers compete. Basic macroeconomic models predict that prices would be lower, and in fact the data shows this. Now you can say that a free market doesn’t exist, but then what is the use of your theories? You don’t adjust them by encountering any data. If I am wrong, tell me what data you have ever encountered to make you change your theories about the free market and government? BTW I believe free markets do exist, and have always existed - at the highest levels of human organization. Today this is international markets. There is no monopoly of force. And I would like to see data that these markets are more efficient and less susceptible to, say, cornering (eg the Bank of England by George Soros, or international prices of bread/metals/etc. by Goldman Sachs) than managed markets like the US Public Stock Markets. “If there is an honest and sound money, people will always prefer it”. Actually Gresham’s law says the opposite. If the exchange rate is set by law them BAD MONEY will drive out the good. That’s because money is a means of exchange, more than it is a store of value. The means of exchange is always the thing you want to get rid of and others will take. The store of value is what you want to hoard. Even Aristophanes realized this thousands of years ago: https://mises.org/library/aristophanes-inflation https://mises.org/library/aristophanes-inflation