New Guy

[BigWhit]

Understood. Just preventing derailment of the current conversation...

[Obvious Leo]

BW. The problem with your free market ideology is that it is an unrealisable abstraction in a global marketplace. It assumes a level playing field for all players and this is simply an absurd assumption under the Westphalian notion of the sovereign nation-state. We all know that wealth and power go hand in hand and that wealth and power will always beget further wealth and power precisely because the power of wealth allows the holder of it to tilt the playing field in his own favour. Surely the only way to prevent this from occurring is that governments act in the best interests of the governed and make laws designed to prevent it. I'm not suggesting that this can ever be done perfectly but in my view the power of the people is eroded when the government of the people abrogates this fundamental responsibility.

[BigWhit]

How is it that the wealthy tip the scales to their own favor in the marketplace?

How do you expect to keep the wealthy from using government itself from tipping the scales in their own favor?

[Obvious Leo]

How is it that the wealthy tip the scales to their own favor in the marketplace?

How do you expect to keep the wealthy from using government itself from tipping the scales in their own favor?

You answered your first question by posing the second. The second question I already answered.

the power of wealth allows the holder of it to tilt the playing field in his own favour. Surely the only way to prevent this from occurring is that governments act in the best interests of the governed and make laws designed to prevent it.

Governments need to be told exactly who it is that they're supposed to be working for and ultimately this is something which they need to be told by the governed. The beautiful thing about democracy is that the people always get the quality of government which they deserve. The US is currently the most obvious example of this since its government is all but completely dysfunctional.

[Walker]

Understood. Just preventing derailment of the current conversation...

Sir, my apologies for interrupting the flow of thy focused, singular purpose. As I am learning here from those who have Mastered concise expression, may your efforts bear much good fruit! And once again, forgive if even this brief expression of appreciation is an interruption of more serious matters, for even though thou (or is it thee?) may be new to these environs, thine experience and judgement doth apply, and senseless invalidation is well, just senseless.

[mickthinks]

How do you expect to keep the wealthy from using government itself from tipping the scales in their own favor?

Democratic Socialism.

[Hobbes' Choice]

How is it that the wealthy tip the scales to their own favor in the marketplace?

How do you expect to keep the wealthy from using government itself from tipping the scales in their own favor?

You are applying self confirming deductive thinking.
You start from the assumption of the goodness of your ideology then you see history in terms that is favourable to your promotion of it, and your denigration of the democratising changes over the last 2-300 years.
Sadly your thoughts on history are devoid of the sort of detail and facts that could ever support your fantasy.
From time to time you have even written things which directly contradict, not only the evidence, but simple reason.

Before people power the market was free. The result slavery.
Your free market can only embolden those who would enslave us, as has happened increasingly all over the world in the last 30 years with a liberalisation of the market place. There are more slaves now that at any time in history. Without social protection, when people get desperate and have only themselves to sell, they will do so. So much fro freedom! When you are called on it you try to recover with absurd statements like this:

Free markets and more democratic governments were at that time an idea of liberals. Since then liberals, like you, have gone back to arguing for the return of their enslavement to the state.

The only way to mitigate this tendency is to control people from doing that. And the only way to do that is to promote a bottom up democracy.

[Hobbes' Choice]

Money is a facilitator of trade. Nothing more. And yes, one man's savings is another man's credit, even in this system. The difference is that most credit comes from printed fiat money which comes at the cost of inflation. Money has been around for a very long time and it isn't that hard to understand...

.
Like I've stated before in this response, interest rates are so low because the central bank is printing money at full speed and lending it at 0% interest. It's economics, not rocket science.

..
Well no. Interest rates are low because the banks have the power to set them. They have been offered the sovereign power to create money at the click of a button. This is a power that ought to stay in the hands of the people; the government.
But it is the SAME people who make YOUR argument about free trade that own the banks, and who by proxy own the government and own you. Financial markets have become so liberalised that money is now controlled by the banks.
Your argument led to the crash of 2008.
Governments need to seize control of the banking systems so that they work for the people and not simply for the financial markets. The money supply needs to be controlled at a level that promotes growth with limited inflation.
Banks have engineered a situation where zero inflation has maintained the wealth of the rich encouraging long term storage of wealth injurious to the economy. Its a rich person's protection racket. And you are making their argument for them.

[BigWhit]

How is it that the wealthy tip the scales to their own favor in the marketplace?

How do you expect to keep the wealthy from using government itself from tipping the scales in their own favor?

You answered your first question by posing the second. The second question I already answered.

So you're saying that the rich use their power to influence government to make laws which favor them and their business I take it. If so, I would agree being that it is a matter of fact.

Governments need to be told exactly who it is that they're supposed to be working for and ultimately this is something which they need to be told by the governed. The beautiful thing about democracy is that the people always get the quality of government which they deserve. The US is currently the most obvious example of this since its government is all but completely dysfunctional.

Aha! Now we're getting somewhere! Yes, any electorate will establish the quality of government they deserve and we are no doubt seeing this in the US. American politics is a circus but only because most voters are clowns! I know, I talk to them every day.

Yes, any government for the people must be of and by the people and requires an educated and involved electorate. The best way to do this is a democracy built, as HC said, from the bottom up. Local town/city and county governments should be the bulk of government and should collecitvely handle the majority of government funds. This would make it easier for the people to hold governemt officials accountable and to better direct funds where they are needed. In this we agree, I presume.

I suppose I should be more clear when talking about "big government" as to what this notion actually means to me so that we are using common definitions. Big government to myself and most Americans I know is talking about a large and powerful federal government. I'm against this because that is what we have now and, as has been pointed out, it is going to shit by the shovelfull.

If I had it by my choice I would have federal government funded by a direct tax on state government budget, states funded by taxes on county budgets, and only the county and city would be able to levy any direct taxes upon the people. The budgets of the federal and state governments would contract dramatically but this would be offest by the county and city governments gaining a lot of that money, where it can be used in a manner which is easier to oversee by the population. How big of local government and what it should be responsible for would be up to the people of those counties and cities.

[Hobbes' Choice]

How is it that the wealthy tip the scales to their own favor in the marketplace?

How do you expect to keep the wealthy from using government itself from tipping the scales in their own favor?

You answered your first question by posing the second. The second question I already answered.

So you're saying that the rich use their power to influence government to make laws which favor them and their business I take it. If so, I would agree being that it is a matter of fact.

.

So far so much progress.
Answer how you think we might change that?
What do you see as the role of government?

[BigWhit]

The role of the government should be to prosecute violent crime, enforce contracts, foreign diplomacy, national defense, and exploration.

I am in favor of public funding of primary education but there must be free choice for parents as to which school they send their children to.

[Hobbes' Choice]

The role of the government should be to prosecute violent crime, enforce contracts, foreign diplomacy, national defense, and exploration.

I am in favor of public funding of primary education but there must be free choice for parents as to which school they send their children to.

PRIMARY??
You mean lower the school leaving age to 11? Welcome the the 19th Century.

Giving an open choice means that schools end up having to do the selection and choosing - you do realise that don't you?

Not even China is that negligent of its populace, and is smart enough to know that to get ahead it has to educate its people through to higher levels.

[BigWhit]

Ah, cultural differences. I meant k-12 which would include "secondary school". Everything up to college.

As for free choice, parents would be able to apply for their children at those schools they think are best for their children. Schools may end up with more applications than they have capacity, and that's fine. Colleges do this all the time. Those schools with lower attendance would have the incentive to increase their quality of education to attract more students. It's worked for universities, why not public schools?

[Hobbes' Choice]

Ah, cultural differences. I meant k-12 which would include "secondary school". Everything up to college.

As for free choice, parents would be able to apply for their children at those schools they think are best for their children. Schools may end up with more applications than they have capacity, and that's fine. Colleges do this all the time. Those schools with lower attendance would have the incentive to increase their quality of education to attract more students. It's worked for universities, why not public schools?

It hasn't worked for either schools or Universities. In practice for schools it means that teachers tend to gravitate to "better schools" and the system just polarises. Same with Universities, with every one trying to get into the top five whilst the others have to set lower fees and have less resources to better equip their colleges. Further, with liberalisation of wages, it also means that "better" colleges can attract their own alumni to teach, whilst the less well subscribed colleges have to pay their staff less. This all leads to a massively hierarchical system with snobbery and elitism that feeds right the way through society in job application which are reserved for "old boys" wearing the correct school tie and a system of prejudice that works against "different" people; of colour, religion, region, becoming more about WHERE you studied and less about what you achieved.
In the UK kids that went to Charter House, and Eton go to Cambridge and Oxford to rule the land. They are the elite sausages of the sausage machine that you are advocating.

If teachers are appointed from a central pool there is more chance that a bright kid from a poor area will get contact with a great teacher.

[Walker]

I thought this was the causal chain prior to 2008 correct in the U.S.? I’m not a financial wonk, just recalling what I heard.

- Federal Govt. required banks, under threat of penalty, to issue housing loans to just about everyone.
- Federal Govt. guaranteed the loans.
- Banks jumped on that gravy train.
- Unqualified home buyers were granted loans.
- Housing for all.
- Massive defaults were the result.
- Banks sought their insured reimbursements.
- Instead of a run on the banks, there was a run on the government, by the banks.

Was it a scheme by the banks to suck up money?
Or, was it a socialist dream of housing for all?