Quote :

"Explain Africa."

Simple, no free market. The Governments are kleptocratic, taxes are high, trade barriers are insurmountable, and the Continent is rife with Corruption.

Quote :

"Explain Chile, which got poorer as their market got more free,"

I'm not sure it did. "From 1984 to 1990, Chile's gross domestic product grew by an annual average of 5.9%, the fastest on the continent. Chile developed a good export economy, including the export of fruits and vegetables to the northern hemisphere when they were out of season, and commanded high prices."

Quote :

"hell there are lots of poor south american countries that have tried free markets and not gotten anything but mounting debt."

Doesn't that tell you something? This was not freedom the South Americans so often try, it is a corrupt form of crony capitalism where none of the market mechanism responsible for wealth creations are allowed to operate. Specifically, the average citizen is unable to use the courts to enforce contracts or start businesses. What form of capitalism requires you to work two years and spending several years worth of income to get a license to start a business? (see Hernando DeSoto)

Either way, Kris, no South American, Asian, or African nation has ever become wealthy via socialism. However, every nation that has embraced economic liberty has become wealthy in time (S. Korea, Japan, Hong Kong, China eventually). Is not this lack of examples damning to your case?

[Edited on November 21, 2006 at 5:20 PM. Reason : .,.]

11/21/2006 5:18:05 PM

what happened to my thread

11/21/2006 5:20:36 PM

^ You're thread was done once everyone said "Yes, because people are financial morons." So the rest of us started a new one: Kris is a communist and the rest of us are anti-communists, lets talk!

11/21/2006 5:21:55 PM

lol

I was just shocked that most everyone agreed on this topic


I guess the new topic makes complete sense now

[Edited on November 21, 2006 at 5:29 PM. Reason : .]

11/21/2006 5:28:59 PM

Sexual literacy should also be taught in schools.

Everyone's all "Oh, they need to know about condoms," but I say we take it further. By age eight, our children should be competent in at least three different sexual positions.

Rates of childhood obesity and diabetes would drop. And the US would gain the respect of the world that it deserves.

How could anyone disagree with this plan?

11/21/2006 5:44:38 PM

Quote :

"I'm not sure it did. "From 1984 to 1990, Chile's gross domestic product grew by an annual average of 5.9%, the fastest on the continent."

And then fell right back down a few years later.
Let's look at another South American country, Argentina circa 1999. Free markets aren't a magical elixir that makes everyone rich, you're a fool if you think economics works in such a simple way.

Quote :

"Doesn't that tell you something? This was not freedom the South Americans so often try, it is a corrupt form of crony capitalism where none of the market mechanism responsible for wealth creations are allowed to operate."

Yes, it tells me that you'll make absolutely any excuse for capitalism's failure while accepting none for socialism's failure.

Quote :

"Either way, Kris, no South American, Asian, or African nation has ever become wealthy via socialism."

You forgot Russia.

Quote :

"However, every nation that has embraced economic liberty has become wealthy in time (S. Korea, Japan, Hong Kong, China eventually)"

Except the ones you have to make excuses for, they must not count.

Quote :

"Is not this lack of examples damning to your case?"

My system is new, and I can name more, but have named plenty that haven't worked out like you said they would and you just make up some BS excuse.

11/21/2006 6:08:06 PM

Quote :

"Let's look at another South American country, Argentina circa 1999. Free markets aren't a magical elixir that makes everyone rich, you're a fool if you think economics works in such a simple way."

No, they really are as close to a magical elixir as we have, the economics is quite plain and very well reinforced by historical data-sets. What is true, however, is that we have no magical elixir to create free markets. The people need to be ready to accept them and Governments need to be ready to enforce them, two requirements that are often insurmountable. As I've said before, even at the height of liberalization Chile had whole sectors of its economy operating as state monopolies and Foreign Direct Investment was banned (Nike could not set up a factory). Not to mention the in-effect monopolies created on the local level by government licensing and corruption.

The fact is, no South American country has ever gone "Hong Kong" on us because they had established elites (with money) and whoever was going to rule needed their support and the only way to get it was to promise to maintain their monopolies to the detriment of the economy, and every ruler did: Leftists, Rightists, Military Generals, etc.

This is why some say Mexico's president is in so much political trouble nowadays, he tried to liberalize some industries in the name of free markets, making it legal for other companies to compete against established providers, but was stopped cold by political reality.

To use anecdotal evidence, an international correspondent in several poor countries reported the difference with his home in France: In poor countries it is difficult to find someone to fix your refrigerator and when you do you discover that he is rich. Meanwhile, in the west, it is easy to find people to fix your refrigerator and they are only middle-class.

No wonder people become disillusioned with free-markets. They elect the free-market party and all they end up doing is cutting taxes for the wealthy and maybe privatising this or that small business, but they do nothing when it comes to actually creating markets. It is usually quite scary: some S.A. cities privatised the city water supply but if you want to start a business you will need to pay a bribe and even then you must hope the mafia doesn't kill you.

Quote :

"Yes, it tells me that you'll make absolutely any excuse for capitalism's failure while accepting none for socialism's failure."

But Kris, that is the crux of the issue, isn't it? Many free-market countries succeed, others fail, it is quite rational to try and figure out the difference between the two types of countries and these explanations seem to make sense.

Quote :

"You forgot Russia."

Right, and exactly how wealthy did Russia get? The best I can find out places the Soviet Union at just over $11,000 per capita in 2003 dollars, which is about where Mexico is today. Therefore, if you wish to call the Soviet Union a success then Mexico (which is growing much faster and isn't suffering widespread shortages of essentials) is even more of a success story, especially since Mexico didn't start growing until 1988 (after the last socialist meltdown, 1998 was a currency collapse) and the Soviet Union started in 1918 (until its own socialist meltdown in 1991).
http://www.russianeconomy.org/comments/042505fig1.html

11/22/2006 12:44:05 AM

Quote :

"No, they really are as close to a magical elixir as we have"

You truely have a completely simplistic and just plain wrong view of economics.

Quote :

"the economics is quite plain and very well reinforced by historical data-sets"

Wrong, and I think this was part of your mistake on the previous thread. Historical real-world data IS not accurate. It is not economics. Economics is a science, a science deals with theory. In science we use quantifiable units, real world data is not accurately quantifiable, there's too many forces at work to predict them all. When an engineer is going to build a bridge, he doesn't go out and take measurements from another bridge and build the exact same one, there's too many varibles there to even begin to account for them all. He uses math and physics to design a new bridge in theory and then he builds that one. You can try to interpret historical data sets, but that's not economics, that's masturbation.

Quote :

"As I've said before, even at the height of liberalization Chile had whole sectors of its economy operating as state monopolies and Foreign Direct Investment was banned (Nike could not set up a factory). Not to mention the in-effect monopolies created on the local level by government licensing and corruption."

Oh, more excuses!

Quote :

"The fact is, no South American country has ever gone "Hong Kong" on us because they had established elites (with money) and whoever was going to rule needed their support and the only way to get it was to promise to maintain their monopolies to the detriment of the economy, and every ruler did: Leftists, Rightists, Military Generals, etc."

Excuses agian!

Quote :

"To use anecdotal evidence, an international correspondent in several poor countries reported the difference with his home in France: In poor countries it is difficult to find someone to fix your refrigerator and when you do you discover that he is rich. Meanwhile, in the west, it is easy to find people to fix your refrigerator and they are only middle-class."

That would be an example of market power, a flaw in capitalism, not whatever the hell you're trying to make it out to be.

Quote :

"But Kris, that is the crux of the issue, isn't it? Many free-market countries succeed, others fail, it is quite rational to try and figure out the difference between the two types of countries and these explanations seem to make sense."

No, any time I point out a government that implemented your system and failed, you spout excuses, whenever I explain why one of my system's implementations fail, you discount my explaination.

Quote :

"Right, and exactly how wealthy did Russia get?"

It became the #2 world superpower. It became one of the largest technological developers. It did all of this in only a few decades. Should I go on?

11/22/2006 1:16:18 AM

Quote :

"That would be an example of market power, a flaw in capitalism, not whatever the hell you're trying to make it out to be."

Yes, it is even more examples showing how poor countries are not free-markets: very few of their markets are NOT directed by the government. It is no wonder why there are so few people fixing refrigerators in these poor countries, either the mafia beats up/kills the competitors or the government arrests them, activities which are not allowed in a free-market economy. The point is simple, the countries you point to and say "free market country failed!" were not free markets. If you want to call this an excuse then fine, you explain why countries that are free-market driven succeed and countries that are not fail? Why did Chile fail and S. Korea succeed if it had nothing to do with the glaring policy differences between the countries? Dumb luck?

As to your excuses, it is fine to offer reasons, such as obvious policy mistakes, it is quite possible that every socialist country in history would have suceeded except for a couple fowl-ups. But the embargo really is just an excuse as the negative effects of it are not debilitating.

Quote :

"It became the #2 world superpower. It became one of the largest technological developers. It did all of this in only a few decades. Should I go on?"

Yes you should. It became the #2 world superpower by spending over 1/3rd of its entire annual production on the military. Mexico could do that today and become the #2 world superpower, big whoop. And I've never really found its technological development that impressive. It dedicated so much of its productive capacity to technological development and the only consumer good whose invention flowed out of Russia to the west was Tetris.

11/22/2006 9:37:45 AM

Quote :

"Yes, it is even more examples showing how poor countries are not free-markets: very few of their markets are NOT directed by the government. It is no wonder why there are so few people fixing refrigerators in these poor countries, either the mafia beats up/kills the competitors or the government arrests them, activities which are not allowed in a free-market economy."

You're only further illustrating my belief that free markets are, by nature, self defeating.

Quote :

"The point is simple, the countries you point to and say "free market country failed!" were not free markets."

The only ones you'll accept as free markets are the ones that succeded, regardless of what their actual economic system is like.

Quote :

"you explain why countries that are free-market driven succeed and countries that are not fail?"

I've pointed out plenty, your best excuse is refusing to accept them as free markets.

Quote :

"Why did Chile fail and S. Korea succeed if it had nothing to do with the glaring policy differences between the countries?"

They didn't have glaring policy differences, there were some, but they were both free market.

Quote :

"It became the #2 world superpower by spending over 1/3rd of its entire annual production on the military."

It's not as if they wanted to. They were involved in the largest war in history, and then in the largest arms build-up immediately after.

Quote :

"And I've never really found its technological development that impressive."

Yeah, satelites aren't that impressive, semiconductor heterostructures aren't all that useful, etc.

11/22/2006 1:03:05 PM

i think bus 225 is a cool class to take at state

11/27/2006 12:49:37 AM