Autor: AA/NA Member
~ 29/12/09
deryk359 asked:
Observe the correlations between the wealth & power of the incarceration industry, the erosion of K-12 education quality, the so-called war on drugs, the strangulation and dissolution of public mental health care, transferring addiction treatment to medical industries, & faith based brainwashers, & babysitting of would-be mental/addiction patients & all other non-conformists to prisons. As mental health care was shelved, orgs that promote brain parasites like F-Christianity, creationism …
SWF
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- What’s the point of going to rehab if over 80% of the addicts return to their addictions?
- is decriminalizing drug use and increasing rehab opportuniites the solution to illegal drugs?
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Posted in: Addiction Treatment | | Comments (24)
Also I would point out that the government has a track record of making very poor decisions in terms of regulations because they are the most politically feasible options, then they spend more resources justifying their actions, hiring economists to explain why their decision was best, or just out right stating it was and demonizing anyone who argues with them. I would rather the people involved in the industries be making the decisions that affect them instead of random elected people.
Comment by pilias — January 2, 2010 @ 6:36 am
All of the above. The roles are not needed is what I’m arguing.
If there is a problem in the market, for example in our current crisis with the banks, it was first off a problem caused by government regulations, and then it’s a problem that has now been compounded by further government involvement. If we let the banks involved go out of business the small businesses that make up the majority of the industry would now be big banks and we wouldn’t have the risks we’re now seeing them take
Comment by pilias — January 2, 2010 @ 3:46 pm
By regulating, do you mean strict laws like quotas, punitive taxation, price floors ect?
Because if you just mean laws then hoe exactly would they carry out their above role.
Comment by deryk359 — January 4, 2010 @ 11:39 pm
Well of course not, in fact its a good thing that when you get investors on your side they often have very specific ways they want you to spend the money, usually investors tend to have a pretty good idea of how to run a business and see things startup business owners don’t see and can take actions to prevent amateur mistakes.
Comment by pilias — January 6, 2010 @ 2:35 am
And most of the aggressive business practices, intimidation, and bribery would be where I would draw the line and have the government step in.
I see the government’s role as a referee who makes sure that everyone is playing by a set of rules with the purpose of preventing things like intimidation, blackmail and bribery, not to mention outright lying to customers about your products or services.
What I don’t like is the government trying to control how the market works by regulating it.
Comment by pilias — January 8, 2010 @ 1:39 pm
Also just because money is not strictly yours, that doesn’t mean that control over said money is not a form of power.
Comment by deryk359 — January 9, 2010 @ 6:49 pm
We’ have to go on a case by case basis. I am must outlining my overarching principles.
Comment by deryk359 — January 11, 2010 @ 5:39 am
Yea, but then I think you mistake efficiency as the sole source of a business’s power. A company can make it to number one purely out of intimidation bribery and aggressive business practices it just has to have the resources behind it. That said I think I agree with you to a large degree. I just feel that some really horrible exceptions can arise.
Comment by deryk359 — January 12, 2010 @ 5:50 pm
Well that is the question.
Comment by deryk359 — January 15, 2010 @ 6:20 am
2. I would be interested to hear where you would draw the line.
Comment by pilias — January 18, 2010 @ 1:40 pm
1. While that is true to an extent it is also true that once a company grows to a certain point it starts losing the ability to react to local conditions, opening up opportunities for smaller competitors to exploit new markets.
Secondly on this point I would point out that investors are a key part of capitalism and it doesn’t always have to be your money that you use to make money, and it is this key factor often overlooked by people that is hurt the most by the way we tax people.
Comment by pilias — January 21, 2010 @ 7:14 pm
First, an old adage. You gotta have money to make money. What that means is, power as well as wealth has a snowball effect. If I already own a business, it’s easy for me to open up another and breach a new market. That’s not the case for people just starting out.
Two. It’s not. This is why I only want a government with clearly defined restrictions. the power of the market should check and balance the power of the government. It’s dangerous for one to overpower the other.
Comment by deryk359 — January 22, 2010 @ 4:16 am
Two points: First why do you think that without regulations the natural state would be fore a few people to eventually gain a total monopoly over everything?
Second, how is it different to give monopolistic powers to the government to prevent individuals from gaining these same powers and why is it OK for one group of individuals to have the power and now another group?
Comment by pilias — January 24, 2010 @ 5:00 pm
Yes, but the problem is there needs to be a check against people acquiring too much capital because that translates into power very easily. If the market is left to unrestricted freedom, then it is possible for one or a few people to eventually gain a total monopoly on the economy. More likely this would be a single corporation. This super corporation would essentially be a socialist state. This is one reason why I think government intervention and the progressive tax system is necessary.
Comment by deryk359 — January 25, 2010 @ 2:57 pm
Well thats exactly the point, the great advantage of free market capitalism to various other forms of economic systems is that the power is more spread out so it makes it much more difficult for special interests to influence the market, and gives much more leeway to people to react and turn away from corrupt elements of the economy. When you concentrate power in a few individuals you take away that ability.
Comment by pilias — January 26, 2010 @ 2:05 pm
True nothing magic changed about human nature. But that’s exactly the point. How would you not expect bribery and nepotism to be features of capitalism as well?
Comment by deryk359 — January 29, 2010 @ 5:47 am
Thats part of the issue with Mercantilism, its all about helping out your friends, or helping out whoever bribes you to give them special privaledges. Even with that however there are plenty of examples of ambition in the 19th century, I would even argue it was at least as common as we see now.
Comment by pilias — February 1, 2010 @ 5:42 am
No just that it was hard to exercise in that time. And I suppose that’s true. But the think about Europe and monarchies is that it;’s really hard to tell where state ownership stops and private ownership begins.
Anyways, I’m having an off night. Up to 4 am last night and I have a million things going on at once over here. IF I’m giving you the impression that I’m disagreeing entirely then I’m sorry. I still consider myself a capitalist, just that some nuance needs to be attached.
Comment by deryk359 — February 1, 2010 @ 6:27 am
So people didn’t have Ambition before the 20th century?
Europe was Mercantiist, not Capitalist in the 19th century.
Comment by pilias — February 4, 2010 @ 9:34 am
Yea, but that to me is proof that this “free market” is an ideal that never really happens. People are not 100% rational beings and therefore the laws that govern economics are not to be blindly trusted. If people were 100% rational I would probably agree with you more. The fact remains that they’re not and some regulation is necessary.
Comment by deryk359 — February 7, 2010 @ 8:58 pm
Yea, that could have had something to do with a new world filled with ambitions people looking to make something of themselves, while Europe was stuck with old blood trying to hang on to what they had left. Europe was slow to change but then Europe was also strongly capitalist at the time. I guess this is proof that governments do not necessarily have a total monopoly on power. It really matters what the social structure is like, irrespective of the laws that govern it.
Comment by deryk359 — February 9, 2010 @ 12:42 pm
cont… was also one of the biggest advocates of great expansion of government intervention in all kinds of areas where the government had never been involved in before.
Also I wouldn’t call no bid contracts given to people with close government ties anything close to the free market as there is very little competition that goes on in the defense industry.
Comment by pilias — February 10, 2010 @ 12:06 am
Maybe the bigger issue is that you’re only examining the last 50 years, all of which was after the government really started the big push into the private sector, but even then we’ve seen pretty steady increases in where the government intervenes, and in general the number of regulations the government injects into the private sector. Hell just looking at the last 3 presidents you see a pretty big trend in that direction, especailly Bush, who liked to talk about deregulation but …
Comment by pilias — February 10, 2010 @ 2:05 am
The government didn’t ramp up production, they diverted production from certain sectors to other sectors, thats why they had rations on certain things during both WWI and WWII.
Most of the designs used in the Air force were designed by private companies who were competing with each other to win contracts with the military.
The US was a powerhouse economically before the “rest of the world” IE europe and colonies, started tearing itself apart in the later part of the 19th and early 20th century
Comment by pilias — February 12, 2010 @ 9:30 pm