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That's a pretty bold claim not backed up by any evidence and I can think of numerous counter examples. So if you make such a claim I you really make a bit of an

That's a pretty bold claim not backed up by any evidence and I can think of numerous counter examples. So if you make such a claim I you really make a bit of an effort to support it.

WalterBright 4y ago
How about what happened to China when they switched from a centrally planned socialist economy to a free market based economy? Or look at the divergence of the fortunes of North & South Korea after the Korean War? The evidence is everywhere, and very strong.
WalterBright 4y ago
Name a couple counter examples. No evidence? It's all around you. The US for mostly free market. It's done spectacularly well. For communism, how about the USSR, N. Korea, etc. They're not hard to find. Do you think they did well? I read somewhere that N. Koreans were 4 inches shorter than their southern neighbors. Does that sound like hard over socialism is a success? Why is it that every country and society that tried collective farms starved, and sometimes resorted to cannibalism? The Pilgrims tried collective farming for their first year. They starved. Jamestown tried collective farms. They starved. The Israeli Kibbutzen are propped up by the government, as they cannot produce enough food. Kansas was called the "Breadbasket of the Soviet Union." And on and on. I saw on the news the other day an interview with a fellow trying to get in the US via the southern border. He has nothing. He spent 4 months getting from Cuba to that border. What would motivate someone to do that? Triumphant socialism in Cuba?
- cycomanic 4y ago
  Your statement was: "Free markets, however, have the wonderful property that the closer one gets to them, the better they work!" and you bring up the US compared to North Korea. That doesn't support your point. You simply showed that a market that is freer than NK works better, that doesn't mean that a market that is freer than the US would also work better than the US, or that the US is the global maximum. Europe is arguably a less free market than the US but it's by no means clear which one is working better. Somalia ruled by the warlords was a freer market but nobody was emigrating from the US to Somalia.
  - WalterBright 4y ago
    > Somalia ruled by the warlords was a freer market That kinda sank your argument, as Somalia is anarchy, not a free market. > it's by no means clear which one is working better The US economy does much better than the European one. Look at investment returns, for example. Look at which country all the FAANG companies are in.
    - cycomanic 4y ago
      > > Somalia ruled by the warlords was a freer market > That kinda sank your argument, as Somalia is anarchy, not a free market. A free market is an economical system, anarchy is a political one. They are orthogonal to each other. In fact there are anarcho capitalists (the most extreme liberterians) and anarchistic socialists. > > it's by no means clear which one is working better > The US economy does much better than the European one. Look at investment returns, for example. Investment returns? There are many developing nations that have higher than both. They are significantly based on risk of the investment. > Look at which country all the FAANG companies are in. So? They are also in the most regulated (least free market) state in the US, that really doesn't prove anything.
    - ncmncm 4y ago
      Somalia is the freest market possible, excepting only what the warlords confiscate.
      - WalterBright 4y ago
        I suggest looking up what a free market is, as evidently you don't believe me.

That's a pretty bold claim not backed up by any evidence and I can think of numerous counter examples. So if you make such a claim I you really make a bit of an effort to support it.

WalterBright 4y ago

How about what happened to China when they switched from a centrally planned socialist economy to a free market based economy? Or look at the divergence of the fortunes of North & South Korea after the Korean War? The evidence is everywhere, and very strong.

WalterBright 4y ago

Name a couple counter examples. No evidence? It's all around you. The US for mostly free market. It's done spectacularly well. For communism, how about the USSR, N. Korea, etc. They're not hard to find. Do you think they did well? I read somewhere that N. Koreans were 4 inches shorter than their southern neighbors. Does that sound like hard over socialism is a success? Why is it that every country and society that tried collective farms starved, and sometimes resorted to cannibalism? The Pilgrims tried collective farming for their first year. They starved. Jamestown tried collective farms. They starved. The Israeli Kibbutzen are propped up by the government, as they cannot produce enough food. Kansas was called the "Breadbasket of the Soviet Union." And on and on. I saw on the news the other day an interview with a fellow trying to get in the US via the southern border. He has nothing. He spent 4 months getting from Cuba to that border. What would motivate someone to do that? Triumphant socialism in Cuba?

cycomanic 4y ago
Your statement was: "Free markets, however, have the wonderful property that the closer one gets to them, the better they work!" and you bring up the US compared to North Korea. That doesn't support your point. You simply showed that a market that is freer than NK works better, that doesn't mean that a market that is freer than the US would also work better than the US, or that the US is the global maximum. Europe is arguably a less free market than the US but it's by no means clear which one is working better. Somalia ruled by the warlords was a freer market but nobody was emigrating from the US to Somalia.
- WalterBright 4y ago
  > Somalia ruled by the warlords was a freer market That kinda sank your argument, as Somalia is anarchy, not a free market. > it's by no means clear which one is working better The US economy does much better than the European one. Look at investment returns, for example. Look at which country all the FAANG companies are in.
  - cycomanic 4y ago
    > > Somalia ruled by the warlords was a freer market > That kinda sank your argument, as Somalia is anarchy, not a free market. A free market is an economical system, anarchy is a political one. They are orthogonal to each other. In fact there are anarcho capitalists (the most extreme liberterians) and anarchistic socialists. > > it's by no means clear which one is working better > The US economy does much better than the European one. Look at investment returns, for example. Investment returns? There are many developing nations that have higher than both. They are significantly based on risk of the investment. > Look at which country all the FAANG companies are in. So? They are also in the most regulated (least free market) state in the US, that really doesn't prove anything.
  - ncmncm 4y ago
    Somalia is the freest market possible, excepting only what the warlords confiscate.
    - WalterBright 4y ago
      I suggest looking up what a free market is, as evidently you don't believe me.