6 ms·

"That, like most people on this site, you place every person whose thoughts you read into one of a small number of mental "boxes." I, for instance, am apparentl

by theoj 15y ago

"That, like most people on this site, you place every person whose thoughts you read into one of a small number of mental "boxes." I, for instance, am apparently a "Looter" from Ayn Rand's novels." Notice how you placed all the people on HN in a single mental box. In the interest of fairness, can you tell me more about your outlook and why you believe privatization is theft?

asciilifeform 15y ago
My personality and political views won't fit into a HN comment box. And I dearly hope that yours wouldn't either.
- theoj 15y ago
  Well then, why don't we just stick to your statement that privatization is theft. Bonus points if you can show me how your arguments do not fall in any existing ideology.
  - asciilifeform 15y ago
    Try this example. It is 2015, the US Federal Government is approaching true bankruptcy. The decision is made to denationalize the Yellowstone National Park. It is sold to Exxon Corp. for $300 million. They will prospect for oil there. You, one of 300 million eligible shareholders, are sent a stock certificate worth $1. You sell it for $0.50 to buy a stale loaf of bread from a local gang (your family has nothing else to eat.) Did this story feature a theft? Which traditional political ideology does it support?
    - astine 15y ago
      "Did this story feature a theft?" No. If the government had the right to sell the damn park and had done so transparently, then that was not a theft no matter how you spin your scenario. In fact, as a person whose family is ostensibly in such bad straits that they would undersell promising stock in Exxon-Mobile by 50% for food I'm probably not all that interested in whether Yellowstone national park remains open.
      - pbz 15y ago
        The problem with how you look at it is that you consider transparency a possibility. It's not incompetence, it's corruption. If you believe such a deal would go through without a lot of money directly or indirectly exchanging hands behind the scenes then you're blindly idealistic.
    - anamax 15y ago
      > Did this story feature a theft? It featured govt incompetence at a grand scale. No, not selling Yellowstone (or buying Yellowstone), but going bankrupt. On the assumption that you think that Exxon did something wrong in your scenario, there are two cases - Exxon paid a "fair price" or it didn't. In the "fair price" scenario, the problem is not Exxon. In fact, they're the good guys - presumably the US govt is better off making the sale, and no, Exxon has no obligation to subsidize govt incompetence. In the "unfair price" scenario, Exxon can't buy a govt that isn't for sale.
      - devvieish 15y ago
        > presumably the US govt is better off making the sale This is a remarkably large assumption. The actually quite small group of people who together have the authority to make the sale are, presumably, better off making it (or they wouldn't). But there's no reason to think that they are even trying to maximize the benefit of "the US govt" as an institution, over time. > In the "unfair price" scenario, Exxon can't buy a govt that isn't for sale. So now you've defended Exxon from being the charge of thievery. Great, the government officials who made the sale were the "real" thieves, and Exxon was "only" their associate in crime.
        anamax 15y ago
        > > presumably the US govt is better off making the sale >This is a remarkably large assumption. Not at all. If follows from the prerequisites for that case. If you don't agree with those prerequisites, you choose the other case. > > In the "unfair price" scenario, Exxon can't buy a govt that isn't for sale. > So now you've defended Exxon from being the charge of thievery. Since they're not guilty of thievery (in this case), why are you offended by them being defended from the charge? Would you have the same reaction if it was "Happy Puppy Company"? > Great, the government officials who made the sale were the "real" thieves, Yes (and in more ways that one). > and Exxon was "only" their associate in crime. Not at all. We're assuming that govt officials have the relevant authority. If they exercise it poorly .... I'll assume that you think that govt "lets" Exxon do bad things. Let me point out that the fault for that is entirely govt. To be fair, a govt that does certain things is highly likely to do bad things as well. If doing those bad things bothers you, perhaps you might want to stop govt from doing the precursors. Not
  - kds 15y ago
    I'll give you a simple and real example that happened in Bulgaria that is not bound to any ideology or theory. In 2004 the national state-owned telecommunication incumbent company was privatized for a sum which nearly exactly matched the net annual profit in the very same year. (~120 x 10^6 Eur net profit out of ~500 x 10^6 Eur gross revenues; we're not a very big country, btw). So the actual effective acquiring cost was nothing - zero - for the buyers. There were public voices that said this was betrayal of the nation's interest but the then ruling party, full with 30-something MBA-suites from NY/London just babbled cheerfully in corporate-speak about the "free market", the "right price", and the "right timing" in the very same pointless way so much detested here in HN when it's about examples of corporate stupidity. A curious thing - the former chief economist of the World Bank,and Nobel prize winner, Joseph Stiglitz was a star-guest in a popular TV talk show and advised not sell at all at the moment (when was asked to comment on the matter, I happened to watch the show). He wasn't listened to, eventually. But the MBA-boys in a way weren't stupid at all - after around short 3 years the company was resold for ~1.1 x 10^9 Eur. Nothing that much changed, neither was invested in the company that really made some real difference in the market share or company's gross revenues. The deal was formally fully observing the legal regulations - there was nothing that could be pointed out as strictly illegal. In the political aftermath this party was voted out of the parliament into oblivion by the people. But those guys just don't seem to care anymore for the political life - they've "made" the bucks... foreign companies, investors, and top world investment bank consultancies were instrumental in the whole exercise. No doubt for me, similar scenarios on various scale have happened throughout the whole former Soviet block of countries. If this is theft and corruption - foreign western players milked also greatly from it (even if not the most of it).
    - pbz 15y ago
      Many similar robberies happened in other Eastern European countries. It's not as simple as X paid Y to get Z. As your example alludes, it's much more subtle than this. Closer to you scratch my back, I'll scratch your friend's of friend's of a friend's later. There are sufficiently enough layers that a normal person's this-can't-be-right sensors go off or it's simply too complicated to piece together with a reasonable amount of effort. Add a pinch of corruption in the judicial system and you got yourself a fertile ground for highway robbery. And don't think the same thing doesn't happen in the US... maybe a bit more subtle, but less and less so from what we've seen in the last few years.
- kds 15y ago
  How nicely said - I was literally struggling exactly with this, both as space limitation (something beyond me) and best possible achievable clarity as thoughts<->words choices (something depending only on me).

by theoj 15y ago

asciilifeform 15y ago

My personality and political views won't fit into a HN comment box. And I dearly hope that yours wouldn't either.

theoj 15y ago
Well then, why don't we just stick to your statement that privatization is theft. Bonus points if you can show me how your arguments do not fall in any existing ideology.
- asciilifeform 15y ago
  Try this example. It is 2015, the US Federal Government is approaching true bankruptcy. The decision is made to denationalize the Yellowstone National Park. It is sold to Exxon Corp. for $300 million. They will prospect for oil there. You, one of 300 million eligible shareholders, are sent a stock certificate worth $1. You sell it for $0.50 to buy a stale loaf of bread from a local gang (your family has nothing else to eat.) Did this story feature a theft? Which traditional political ideology does it support?
  - astine 15y ago
    "Did this story feature a theft?" No. If the government had the right to sell the damn park and had done so transparently, then that was not a theft no matter how you spin your scenario. In fact, as a person whose family is ostensibly in such bad straits that they would undersell promising stock in Exxon-Mobile by 50% for food I'm probably not all that interested in whether Yellowstone national park remains open.
    - pbz 15y ago
      The problem with how you look at it is that you consider transparency a possibility. It's not incompetence, it's corruption. If you believe such a deal would go through without a lot of money directly or indirectly exchanging hands behind the scenes then you're blindly idealistic.
  - anamax 15y ago
    > Did this story feature a theft? It featured govt incompetence at a grand scale. No, not selling Yellowstone (or buying Yellowstone), but going bankrupt. On the assumption that you think that Exxon did something wrong in your scenario, there are two cases - Exxon paid a "fair price" or it didn't. In the "fair price" scenario, the problem is not Exxon. In fact, they're the good guys - presumably the US govt is better off making the sale, and no, Exxon has no obligation to subsidize govt incompetence. In the "unfair price" scenario, Exxon can't buy a govt that isn't for sale.
    - devvieish 15y ago
      > presumably the US govt is better off making the sale This is a remarkably large assumption. The actually quite small group of people who together have the authority to make the sale are, presumably, better off making it (or they wouldn't). But there's no reason to think that they are even trying to maximize the benefit of "the US govt" as an institution, over time. > In the "unfair price" scenario, Exxon can't buy a govt that isn't for sale. So now you've defended Exxon from being the charge of thievery. Great, the government officials who made the sale were the "real" thieves, and Exxon was "only" their associate in crime.
      - anamax 15y ago
        > > presumably the US govt is better off making the sale >This is a remarkably large assumption. Not at all. If follows from the prerequisites for that case. If you don't agree with those prerequisites, you choose the other case. > > In the "unfair price" scenario, Exxon can't buy a govt that isn't for sale. > So now you've defended Exxon from being the charge of thievery. Since they're not guilty of thievery (in this case), why are you offended by them being defended from the charge? Would you have the same reaction if it was "Happy Puppy Company"? > Great, the government officials who made the sale were the "real" thieves, Yes (and in more ways that one). > and Exxon was "only" their associate in crime. Not at all. We're assuming that govt officials have the relevant authority. If they exercise it poorly .... I'll assume that you think that govt "lets" Exxon do bad things. Let me point out that the fault for that is entirely govt. To be fair, a govt that does certain things is highly likely to do bad things as well. If doing those bad things bothers you, perhaps you might want to stop govt from doing the precursors. Not
- kds 15y ago
  I'll give you a simple and real example that happened in Bulgaria that is not bound to any ideology or theory. In 2004 the national state-owned telecommunication incumbent company was privatized for a sum which nearly exactly matched the net annual profit in the very same year. (~120 x 10^6 Eur net profit out of ~500 x 10^6 Eur gross revenues; we're not a very big country, btw). So the actual effective acquiring cost was nothing - zero - for the buyers. There were public voices that said this was betrayal of the nation's interest but the then ruling party, full with 30-something MBA-suites from NY/London just babbled cheerfully in corporate-speak about the "free market", the "right price", and the "right timing" in the very same pointless way so much detested here in HN when it's about examples of corporate stupidity. A curious thing - the former chief economist of the World Bank,and Nobel prize winner, Joseph Stiglitz was a star-guest in a popular TV talk show and advised not sell at all at the moment (when was asked to comment on the matter, I happened to watch the show). He wasn't listened to, eventually. But the MBA-boys in a way weren't stupid at all - after around short 3 years the company was resold for ~1.1 x 10^9 Eur. Nothing that much changed, neither was invested in the company that really made some real difference in the market share or company's gross revenues. The deal was formally fully observing the legal regulations - there was nothing that could be pointed out as strictly illegal. In the political aftermath this party was voted out of the parliament into oblivion by the people. But those guys just don't seem to care anymore for the political life - they've "made" the bucks... foreign companies, investors, and top world investment bank consultancies were instrumental in the whole exercise. No doubt for me, similar scenarios on various scale have happened throughout the whole former Soviet block of countries. If this is theft and corruption - foreign western players milked also greatly from it (even if not the most of it).
  - pbz 15y ago
    Many similar robberies happened in other Eastern European countries. It's not as simple as X paid Y to get Z. As your example alludes, it's much more subtle than this. Closer to you scratch my back, I'll scratch your friend's of friend's of a friend's later. There are sufficiently enough layers that a normal person's this-can't-be-right sensors go off or it's simply too complicated to piece together with a reasonable amount of effort. Add a pinch of corruption in the judicial system and you got yourself a fertile ground for highway robbery. And don't think the same thing doesn't happen in the US... maybe a bit more subtle, but less and less so from what we've seen in the last few years.
kds 15y ago
How nicely said - I was literally struggling exactly with this, both as space limitation (something beyond me) and best possible achievable clarity as thoughts<->words choices (something depending only on me).