3 ms·

Chaebols

by k0gi 3y ago

Chaebols

wnc3141 3y ago
Chaebols are sort of the product of a centrally planned economy. I.e the government backs a "winner" - so Korea can more quickly compete globally at scale. (competitive markets, but does not quickly industrialize an economy). The article instead looks at massive capital consolidation as the product of a free market. The scale begets massive synergies (for lack of a better word) across vertical integration and horizontal expansion. This particularly holds true software firms. With those efficiencies, it becomes impossible for new entrants to enter a market even adjacent to a large incumbent.
- sph 3y ago
  This is not the product of the free market. Let's stop blaming the free market because it doesn't exist and it is a convenient scapegoat. We have no free market. If the corner shop can go bankrupt but the trillion dollar company receives government help to pay its debts, it is not a free market. If any tariffs system exists, which inherently favours a niche over the other, it is not a free market. If once you reach a certain size you unlock ways to avoid paying your workers, skirt around taxes, because there are laws written to allow this, it is not a free market. If the amount of money you control pays your way into the king's court, and helps sway the ones in power to write laws that favours you, it is not a free market. > Chaebols are sort of the product of a centrally planned economy. I.e the government backs a "winner" - so Korea can more quickly compete globally at scale. How are our Western democracies not centrally planned economies? Don't we have a central bank and a single place where all state powers flow from? Of course we don't operate like the CCCP did, but we are no less centrally-planned than they or Korea are. We never had one a free market, we never had a decentralised economy, and we should be talking about that instead of living in that Eric Andre skit. Our system is set up to destroy any semblance of competition and meritocracy and then we wonder "who killed the small business?"
  - bee_rider 3y ago
    One thing free market enthusiasts and communists can agree on is that the attempts to implement their ideas are never quite pure enough to implicate the ideas themselves for the implementations’ failures.
    - sph 3y ago
      We have all seen communism fail, but I still have to see the free market even be allowed to exist at large scale. In the small scale, it has been working beautifully and as intended since its inception. My corner shop lives in pure, unadultered competition with all other shops in the corner, and the governments favour neither one nor the other. They are not at risk at growing like a cancer and swallowing the entire neighbourhood. As long as they provide good products at reasonable prices, they are allowed to exist. The day they get greedy, people stop giving them money, they go bankrupt and someone else eats their lunch. The free market creates an equal and opposing force to the human natural drive towards selfishness and greed. But if you put your hands on the mechanism, you risk tipping the scale in favour of one over the other. Blame the hand on the scale, not the market.
      - bee_rider 3y ago
        Is this some sort of parody or high-concept humor that has just gone over my head? The big failures were fundamentally flawed in some way, and weren’t <my economic system of choice>. Here’s a small scale <commune|kibbutz|corner store> model that shows it could work if only given a chance, just need to scale it up.

Chaebols

by k0gi 3y ago

Chaebols

Chaebols are sort of the product of a centrally planned economy. I.e the government backs a "winner" - so Korea can more quickly compete globally at scale. (competitive markets, but does not quickly industrialize an economy). The article instead looks at massive capital consolidation as the product of a free market. The scale begets massive synergies (for lack of a better word) across vertical integration and horizontal expansion. This particularly holds true software firms. With those efficiencies, it becomes impossible for new entrants to enter a market even adjacent to a large incumbent.

sph 3y ago
This is not the product of the free market. Let's stop blaming the free market because it doesn't exist and it is a convenient scapegoat. We have no free market. If the corner shop can go bankrupt but the trillion dollar company receives government help to pay its debts, it is not a free market. If any tariffs system exists, which inherently favours a niche over the other, it is not a free market. If once you reach a certain size you unlock ways to avoid paying your workers, skirt around taxes, because there are laws written to allow this, it is not a free market. If the amount of money you control pays your way into the king's court, and helps sway the ones in power to write laws that favours you, it is not a free market. > Chaebols are sort of the product of a centrally planned economy. I.e the government backs a "winner" - so Korea can more quickly compete globally at scale. How are our Western democracies not centrally planned economies? Don't we have a central bank and a single place where all state powers flow from? Of course we don't operate like the CCCP did, but we are no less centrally-planned than they or Korea are. We never had one a free market, we never had a decentralised economy, and we should be talking about that instead of living in that Eric Andre skit. Our system is set up to destroy any semblance of competition and meritocracy and then we wonder "who killed the small business?"
- bee_rider 3y ago
  One thing free market enthusiasts and communists can agree on is that the attempts to implement their ideas are never quite pure enough to implicate the ideas themselves for the implementations’ failures.
  - sph 3y ago
    We have all seen communism fail, but I still have to see the free market even be allowed to exist at large scale. In the small scale, it has been working beautifully and as intended since its inception. My corner shop lives in pure, unadultered competition with all other shops in the corner, and the governments favour neither one nor the other. They are not at risk at growing like a cancer and swallowing the entire neighbourhood. As long as they provide good products at reasonable prices, they are allowed to exist. The day they get greedy, people stop giving them money, they go bankrupt and someone else eats their lunch. The free market creates an equal and opposing force to the human natural drive towards selfishness and greed. But if you put your hands on the mechanism, you risk tipping the scale in favour of one over the other. Blame the hand on the scale, not the market.
    - bee_rider 3y ago
      Is this some sort of parody or high-concept humor that has just gone over my head? The big failures were fundamentally flawed in some way, and weren’t <my economic system of choice>. Here’s a small scale <commune|kibbutz|corner store> model that shows it could work if only given a chance, just need to scale it up.