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Honestly, what does regulation have to do with capitalism - where did this meme start and how can I kill it? Capital markets are a tool for allocating resources

Honestly, what does regulation have to do with capitalism - where did this meme start and how can I kill it? Capital markets are a tool for allocating resources. They're pretty good at it in that they tend to work better than e.g. palace economies and mostly everything else humans have tried. But there is absolutely nothing to the way that capital markets work that suggests regulation somehow breaks it or whatever other brain-damaged Koch-inspired bullshit they're selling on Fox News nowadays. It's like looking at a hammer lying on a table, stating 'that is for pounding nails', then leaving the room and expecting the hammer to pound nails for you.

wyager 12y ago
> But there is absolutely nothing to the way that capital markets work that suggests regulation somehow breaks it I don't think anyone is claiming that regulation necessarily breaks capitalism. It just tends to. Most regulations have very obvious innovation-stifling or friction-causing side effects that are deleterious to the free market.
- deciplex 12y ago
  The American government does this, but it mostly does it on behalf of the same folks trumpeting, to the masses, the virtues of capitalism as an ideology and end in itself. Anarcho-capitalism, really, or nearly so, although the ruling class itself is certainly not anarcho-capitalist of course. The ruling class has a clear interest in subverting free markets to keep the established players in power and any rivals out, and right now in America they are pretty much getting everything they could possibly want. But contract enforcement, private property, impartial justice systems, and yes even intellectual property, copyright, and wealth redistribution, all contribute to more effective capital markets, and they are all borne of government regulation and laws. That the American government happens to be so thoroughly corrupt that it can't do a single thing right, doesn't change that.
  - crusso 12y ago
    You know, I don't think that you and I are in that much disagreement on some of the basics. I think we'd both agree that Capitalism can be good. Government serves a purpose in maintaining the framework of items you listed. We also agree that the corrupt ruling class combination of the Government and Capitalists (along with way too much of the media these days, I'd add) is a disaster. Where I'd imagine that we differ is that I think that the pendulum has swung way too far in the direction of the State. With a debt that is now bigger than our GDP and the last hundred years of mostly one-way growth of government and its agencies, the Government is a huge black hole for money that encourages, institutionalizes, and legalizes ever-increasing degrees of corruption. The best way forward that I see is to cut back the size and scope of Government. Get it back to doing the basics that it was commissioned to do (The Constitution) and not much else unless there's enough impetus for those functions that would drive Constitutional Amendments. If the incentive to sway law-making power would be reduced, much of the cronyism that exists today would disappear. The ruling class would be significantly diminished. Sure, Wal Mart might have more economic power, but its lobbying and legislative power would be drastically reduced. At the end of the day, I have a choice to shop at Wal Mart or to not shop at Wal Mart. I don't have a choice regarding paying taxes to feed the behemoth of a Government that does not provide expected reasonable value for those taxes... not to mention the negatives of crippling public education, moving to a lowest-common-denominator-but-still-expensive healthcare system, etc.
    - deciplex 12y ago
      >Where I'd imagine that we differ is that I think that the pendulum has swung way too far in the direction of the State. With a debt that is now bigger than our GDP and the last hundred years of mostly one-way growth of government and its agencies, the Government is a huge black hole for money that encourages, institutionalizes, and legalizes ever-increasing degrees of corruption. Also, I don't think there really is a pendulum. As though you can swing back and forth between "too much government" and "not enough government", and then, by finding some balance between the two, get back an equitable, productive, and stable economic and political system. I don't think the ruling class is so dependent on the government to survive as you believe. In many ways it's the other way around. You can talk about reducing the scope of government all you want, but it will only ever be talk since you have no way to achieve it because you have absolutely no power over your government. None at all. And in fact, for the ruling class, the more people agitate about reducing the scope of government (or, on the other side, reducing the influence of big banks) the better, because it means they aren't paying attention to the power brokers in Washington, nor the capitalists Wall Street actually serves. Sorry if I'm getting too red pill / blue pill. My point is this: like it or not there is already class war being fought in America (and most everywhere else for that matter, but it's getting pretty dire in the US right now). One side though, for the most part, isn't fighting. Which is good for the side currently winning, because that's only way they can win. And if you don't believe me you can just observe the results: most Americans agree the US government needs to fuck off and quit doing a lot of the stuff it does, and most people understand that having a few megabanks holding a large fraction of the assets of the world is a pretty fucking dumb idea. How close are we to achieving either of those goals, do you think? Do you reckon it's time to be smart about achieving those goals, rather than pontificating about The Way Things Ought To Be if everyone would just be nice and play by the rules?
mempko 12y ago
There are known problems of markets in the form of externalized costs. Global warming might be the greatest example of capitalism and markets being the worst thing humanity has every done in distributing resources....
- crusso 12y ago
  How so? India and China are huge societies and have historically been much less capitalistic yet have been horrible polluters. More recently as they've embraced capitalism, their increase in pollution has more to do with their standards of living than with capitalism specifically. Yeah, they're polluting more, but then again they have a significantly reduced amount of starvation. If anything, capitalism tends to spur the types of innovation that seems most likely to innovate us out of the possible problems of global warming.
crusso 12y ago
Koch-inspired bullshit they're selling on Fox News nowadays Please avoid these types of overtly political inflammatory arguments on HN. Capital markets are a tool for allocating resources In the modern sense, when someone on HN is advocating capitalism, they're talking about Free Market Capitalism. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalism#Free-market_economy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalism#Free-market_economy Fundamentally, it's the freedom to trade with others based upon supply and demand without the government intervening to dictate what to provide, how to provide it, and at what price to provide it. The only way to counter that market freedom is to create rules (laws and regulations) to restrict how actors in the market are allowed to conduct themselves. Honestly, what does regulation have to do with capitalism If you have another way besides laws and regulations that can force all actors in a market to not act according to their own free will, what is that thing called?
- deciplex 12y ago
  >Please avoid these types of overtly political inflammatory arguments on HN. Don't tell me how to post. >If you have another way besides laws and regulations that can force all actors in a market to not act according to their own free will, what is that thing called? I think I'm not getting your point. Your false dichotomy there between "capitalism" and "remove negotiation from individual interactions" did set some alarm bells off in my head though. Specifically "this person is, at the very least, heavily flirting with anarcho-capitalism and it may develop into a serious relationship if it hasn't already". I'm not a fan of overbearing government bureaucracy either, I'm not a fan of a government that can't steward capital markets effectively, I'm not a fan of the brutal police state America has turned into, basically I'm not a fan of a lot of things. But that doesn't mean I think we should neuter government in the hopes that everything will turn out for the best. The problem with American government is not that it is too big - broadly there are areas where it does way too damn much, and there are areas where it fails through inaction - no the main problem with the American government is that it fails utterly to represent the will of the nation of people it governs. It's been hijacked. But that doesn't mean I want to get rid of it. Well, perhaps I do this particular government, but not the idea of effective government. Believe it or not humans can do politics well - it is always nasty in a sense but you'd be surprised what can be accomplished via politics, provided a balance of power is kept. Sadly, balance of power doesn't exist in American government right now, nor American society really. Even more tragically, one of the most ubiquitous and sophisticated propaganda campaigns in human history - spanning decades across the public and private sectors - has left Americans mostly unable to fix their problem. And no, I don't have another way to besides laws and regulations to force actors in a free market to behave according to their own free will. And, I don't think I need one - laws and regulations will do nicely.

wyager 12y ago

> But there is absolutely nothing to the way that capital markets work that suggests regulation somehow breaks it I don't think anyone is claiming that regulation necessarily breaks capitalism. It just tends to. Most regulations have very obvious innovation-stifling or friction-causing side effects that are deleterious to the free market.

deciplex 12y ago
The American government does this, but it mostly does it on behalf of the same folks trumpeting, to the masses, the virtues of capitalism as an ideology and end in itself. Anarcho-capitalism, really, or nearly so, although the ruling class itself is certainly not anarcho-capitalist of course. The ruling class has a clear interest in subverting free markets to keep the established players in power and any rivals out, and right now in America they are pretty much getting everything they could possibly want. But contract enforcement, private property, impartial justice systems, and yes even intellectual property, copyright, and wealth redistribution, all contribute to more effective capital markets, and they are all borne of government regulation and laws. That the American government happens to be so thoroughly corrupt that it can't do a single thing right, doesn't change that.
- crusso 12y ago
  You know, I don't think that you and I are in that much disagreement on some of the basics. I think we'd both agree that Capitalism can be good. Government serves a purpose in maintaining the framework of items you listed. We also agree that the corrupt ruling class combination of the Government and Capitalists (along with way too much of the media these days, I'd add) is a disaster. Where I'd imagine that we differ is that I think that the pendulum has swung way too far in the direction of the State. With a debt that is now bigger than our GDP and the last hundred years of mostly one-way growth of government and its agencies, the Government is a huge black hole for money that encourages, institutionalizes, and legalizes ever-increasing degrees of corruption. The best way forward that I see is to cut back the size and scope of Government. Get it back to doing the basics that it was commissioned to do (The Constitution) and not much else unless there's enough impetus for those functions that would drive Constitutional Amendments. If the incentive to sway law-making power would be reduced, much of the cronyism that exists today would disappear. The ruling class would be significantly diminished. Sure, Wal Mart might have more economic power, but its lobbying and legislative power would be drastically reduced. At the end of the day, I have a choice to shop at Wal Mart or to not shop at Wal Mart. I don't have a choice regarding paying taxes to feed the behemoth of a Government that does not provide expected reasonable value for those taxes... not to mention the negatives of crippling public education, moving to a lowest-common-denominator-but-still-expensive healthcare system, etc.
  - deciplex 12y ago
    >Where I'd imagine that we differ is that I think that the pendulum has swung way too far in the direction of the State. With a debt that is now bigger than our GDP and the last hundred years of mostly one-way growth of government and its agencies, the Government is a huge black hole for money that encourages, institutionalizes, and legalizes ever-increasing degrees of corruption. Also, I don't think there really is a pendulum. As though you can swing back and forth between "too much government" and "not enough government", and then, by finding some balance between the two, get back an equitable, productive, and stable economic and political system. I don't think the ruling class is so dependent on the government to survive as you believe. In many ways it's the other way around. You can talk about reducing the scope of government all you want, but it will only ever be talk since you have no way to achieve it because you have absolutely no power over your government. None at all. And in fact, for the ruling class, the more people agitate about reducing the scope of government (or, on the other side, reducing the influence of big banks) the better, because it means they aren't paying attention to the power brokers in Washington, nor the capitalists Wall Street actually serves. Sorry if I'm getting too red pill / blue pill. My point is this: like it or not there is already class war being fought in America (and most everywhere else for that matter, but it's getting pretty dire in the US right now). One side though, for the most part, isn't fighting. Which is good for the side currently winning, because that's only way they can win. And if you don't believe me you can just observe the results: most Americans agree the US government needs to fuck off and quit doing a lot of the stuff it does, and most people understand that having a few megabanks holding a large fraction of the assets of the world is a pretty fucking dumb idea. How close are we to achieving either of those goals, do you think? Do you reckon it's time to be smart about achieving those goals, rather than pontificating about The Way Things Ought To Be if everyone would just be nice and play by the rules?

mempko 12y ago

There are known problems of markets in the form of externalized costs. Global warming might be the greatest example of capitalism and markets being the worst thing humanity has every done in distributing resources....

crusso 12y ago
How so? India and China are huge societies and have historically been much less capitalistic yet have been horrible polluters. More recently as they've embraced capitalism, their increase in pollution has more to do with their standards of living than with capitalism specifically. Yeah, they're polluting more, but then again they have a significantly reduced amount of starvation. If anything, capitalism tends to spur the types of innovation that seems most likely to innovate us out of the possible problems of global warming.

crusso 12y ago

Koch-inspired bullshit they're selling on Fox News nowadays Please avoid these types of overtly political inflammatory arguments on HN. Capital markets are a tool for allocating resources In the modern sense, when someone on HN is advocating capitalism, they're talking about Free Market Capitalism. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalism#Free-market_economy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalism#Free-market_economy Fundamentally, it's the freedom to trade with others based upon supply and demand without the government intervening to dictate what to provide, how to provide it, and at what price to provide it. The only way to counter that market freedom is to create rules (laws and regulations) to restrict how actors in the market are allowed to conduct themselves. Honestly, what does regulation have to do with capitalism If you have another way besides laws and regulations that can force all actors in a market to not act according to their own free will, what is that thing called?

deciplex 12y ago
>Please avoid these types of overtly political inflammatory arguments on HN. Don't tell me how to post. >If you have another way besides laws and regulations that can force all actors in a market to not act according to their own free will, what is that thing called? I think I'm not getting your point. Your false dichotomy there between "capitalism" and "remove negotiation from individual interactions" did set some alarm bells off in my head though. Specifically "this person is, at the very least, heavily flirting with anarcho-capitalism and it may develop into a serious relationship if it hasn't already". I'm not a fan of overbearing government bureaucracy either, I'm not a fan of a government that can't steward capital markets effectively, I'm not a fan of the brutal police state America has turned into, basically I'm not a fan of a lot of things. But that doesn't mean I think we should neuter government in the hopes that everything will turn out for the best. The problem with American government is not that it is too big - broadly there are areas where it does way too damn much, and there are areas where it fails through inaction - no the main problem with the American government is that it fails utterly to represent the will of the nation of people it governs. It's been hijacked. But that doesn't mean I want to get rid of it. Well, perhaps I do this particular government, but not the idea of effective government. Believe it or not humans can do politics well - it is always nasty in a sense but you'd be surprised what can be accomplished via politics, provided a balance of power is kept. Sadly, balance of power doesn't exist in American government right now, nor American society really. Even more tragically, one of the most ubiquitous and sophisticated propaganda campaigns in human history - spanning decades across the public and private sectors - has left Americans mostly unable to fix their problem. And no, I don't have another way to besides laws and regulations to force actors in a free market to behave according to their own free will. And, I don't think I need one - laws and regulations will do nicely.