4 ms·
> Doing away with government-granted monopolistic regulations is the solution. I have no prescriptions, but I do observer that the grantor and grantee are typi
by pradocchia 17y ago
> Doing away with government-granted monopolistic regulations is the solution.
I have no prescriptions, but I do observer that the grantor and grantee are typically two hands of the same will. That monopolies are granted because the grantee wants it, and has found ways to make it so. How do you do away with that?
Capitalism is premised on the concentration of wealth to fund capital-intensive investment. Given the concomitant concentration of power, how do you prevent regulatory capture and the general perversion of government? How do you dilute power and preserve the system?
- anamax 17y agoOf course the grantee wants it. However, if there's no grantor, it doesn't matter what the grantee wants. > Given the concomitant concentration of power, how do you prevent regulatory capture and the general perversion of government? A govt that doesn't regulate isn't subject to regulatory capture. A "not govt" that tries to regulate can usually be ignored.
- pradocchia 17y agoI don't see how this answers the question. There is nothing to prevent a sufficiently influential grantee-to-be from creating a grantor. In fact, I believe this is the origin of many regulatory bodies and government powers.
- deleted 17y ago[deleted]
- javert 17y agoIn the context of the conversation at hand, "regulation"=="government regulation." So, your counter example isn't really relevant. Note that Google is not a monopoly. You are free to use whatever search engine or ad network you want. That will always be the case unless Google is given some sort of government-granted monopoly.
- javert 17y agoIf there is a "concomitant concentration of power," people are hosed, and you're exactly right. The point is to make sure there is NOT a concomitant concentration of power. In other words, you have to have limited government. In a free market system (capitalism), only government /actually/ has power. Corporations must compete. In our mixed economy, corporations do gain power, but that is because we do not have limited government.
- chrischen 17y agoIf you limit the power of the government, wouldn't this then simply shift the balance of power to private individuals and corporations? Then instead of abusive governments, we'd have abusive companies. I mean the government takes certain powers away from private citizens in order to prevent us from abusing these powers (murder, fraud, etc). I agree that there are probably regulations that impede competition from performing ideally, but sometimes it is necessary, like in the public utilities. Some of these things simply can't work as well if we have multiple companies trying to screw each other over. Certainly the argument is valid, at least theoretically, that if we do not codify net neutrality, and deregulate the internet business, the companies that favor the consumers the most (most likely the net neutral ones) will dominate in the end, but there are other issues that come in practice. Who gets to create infrastructure (cables and stuff) through the ground when there are hundreds of them? Imagine if we privatized electricity. We'd have multiple powerlines everywhere. It'd just increase overall waste. Or perhaps radio wave broadcasting were to be deregulated. Nothing would function. There are potential problems if we don't regulate the ISPs and let them all duke it out. Sometimes the sum of the whole does not equal the parts.