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> ... who has more power or resources. I imagine it's been said before but I recently had the thought that murder being illegal is a regulation of the market.

> ... who has more power or resources. I imagine it's been said before but I recently had the thought that murder being illegal is a regulation of the market. The point being that even the most staunch proponent of "free markets" is probably going to draw the line somewhere that defines a "not completely free market" which opens the door to questioning where the line should be drawn. I think that's always been the case but then you'll encounter arguments that something should not be regulated because the market should be free.

daveslash 4y ago
Killing someone is not illegal; it's just illegal for folks like you an I. There's a whole school of thought that asserts that The State holds a Monopoly on Violence [0] (which includes killing). It's been discussed here on HN periodically. [1]. But you're totally right: it's a sort of regulation of the market. (Note: 'Murder' is killing someone WITHOUT legal justification. With legal justification, killing someone is not murder, by definition. By definition, something that is illegal is illegal). [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly_on_violence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly_on_violence [1] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=state%20monopoly%20violence&sort=byPopularity&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...
- deleted 4y ago
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blowski 4y ago
"Nothing to excess." The Oracle at Delphi in Ancient Greece had wisdom that would help some of today's libertarians (and socialists).
bee_rider 4y ago
It turns out that the organizations with a local monopoly on killing have managed to leverage their market position to gain a foothold in the regulation of basically every other market. We might call this anticompetitive, but looking at places where the market for killing-services is highly competitive, having a single entity responsible for this is probably in consumer interest.

daveslash 4y ago

Killing someone is not illegal; it's just illegal for folks like you an I. There's a whole school of thought that asserts that The State holds a Monopoly on Violence [0] (which includes killing). It's been discussed here on HN periodically. [1]. But you're totally right: it's a sort of regulation of the market. (Note: 'Murder' is killing someone WITHOUT legal justification. With legal justification, killing someone is not murder, by definition. By definition, something that is illegal is illegal). [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly_on_violence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly_on_violence [1] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=state%20monopoly%20violence&sort=byPopularity&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...

deleted 4y ago
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blowski 4y ago

"Nothing to excess." The Oracle at Delphi in Ancient Greece had wisdom that would help some of today's libertarians (and socialists).

bee_rider 4y ago

It turns out that the organizations with a local monopoly on killing have managed to leverage their market position to gain a foothold in the regulation of basically every other market. We might call this anticompetitive, but looking at places where the market for killing-services is highly competitive, having a single entity responsible for this is probably in consumer interest.