/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.12559196]

Why does he cherry-pick all the positives of free markets, but never addresses any negatives? I found this book to be incredibly disingenuous.

[Anonymous No.12559208]

could you believe that a black guy would write a book that advocates stealing (your wages)

[Anonymous No.12559232]

>>12559208
Communist racism is one polical position I never thought I'd see.

[Anonymous No.12559233]

>>12559196
He is a nigger that's why.

[Anonymous No.12559240]

>>12559232
wasn't marx pretty racist himself?

[Anonymous No.12559255]

>>12559240
yes, that's one of the many reasons he was so based

[Anonymous No.12559257]

>>12559240
Marx had a passing interest in eugenics. I don't think he wrote about it, but he read and talked about phrenology in his personal life.

>>12559196
If you want the exact opposite read anything by WEB Dubois. I read the Souls of Black Fold around Christmas and socialism felt like the missing piece to a lot of his observations about Black Belt economies following the reconstruction.

[Anonymous No.12559266]

>>12559232
That's because you're not well read and get all your information from memes.
Straight from the horses mouth himself.

[Anonymous No.12559286]

>>12559232
I guess this is what happens when you get your worldview from 4chan

[Anonymous No.12559287]

>>12559196
Could you give some examples? Right now you just come off as a salty idiot.

[Anonymous No.12559303]

>>12559196
Because he's a fucking hack anon.

[Anonymous No.12559343]

>>12559196
>no arguments

[Anonymous No.12559349]

>>12559287
unregulated capitalism
>destroys cultures and small communities
>makes everything a struggle for resources, thus creating endless divisions
>destroys the middle class
>doesn't provide financial incentive to protect earth's climate and clean air
>DOES provide financial incentive for corporations to lobby for government to bring in immigrants or outsource so they can lower their wages
>DOES provide financial incentive for child slave labor, which is still very prevalent today

[Anonymous No.12559369]

>>12559349
I'm confused about what you're responding to and why. How do the greentext statements relate to Thomas Sowell?

[Anonymous No.12559389]

>>12559369
I'm point out all the glaring flaws of CAPITALISM that Sowell refuses to address.

[Anonymous No.12559478]

>>12559196
It isn't an academic work, it's a popular presentation and would be defeating itself if it introduced concepts that undermined the vision of markets self-regulating towards the most efficient outcomes. Not that any real introductory text to the field of '''economics''' is much better. The title "Basic Economics" and the subtitle deploying the popular nomenclature of "common sense" functions as an indicator for the public for whom economics is considered to be both a very serious discipline and promises a non-problematic self-evident set of minimum axioms. I mean obviously there's no such thing and anyone would get more out of reading up on accountancy or something which would be at once more woke considering Sowell and pretty much every other '''economist''' in America have no idea how to actually read a corporate balance sheet

[Anonymous No.12560175]

>>12559196
he is definitely NOT a pseud. Read his 'Knowledge and Decisions', which won an award from Law and Economics Center.
Ironically the Basic Economics is the worst book of his about economics. It is very dumbed down.

[Anonymous No.12560177]

>>12559349
>destroys the middle class

the middle class only exists because of free markets in the first place you uttter brainlet

[Anonymous No.12560184]

>>12560177
>symptoms only exist because of diseases in the first place you utter brainlet

[Anonymous No.12560201]

>>12559349
>>DOES provide financial incentive for corporations to lobby for government to bring in immigrants or outsource so they can lower their wages

umm excuse me but communists support this, listen to any far leftist from chapo trap house to aoc, they all demand open immigration, so you should probably take that out since its the centerpiece of any 21st century communist program

[Anonymous No.12560207]

>>12560184
>The middle class is bad

[Anonymous No.12560220]

>>12560207
it's weird how everyone just has this gut hatred of the middle class, mclosky is pretty much the only person who is willing to defend the middle class, even though they are responsible for the explosion of freedom and prosperity in the last 250 years

[Anonymous No.12560414]

>>12560220
you mean the explosion of bad taste and globalization of stupid laws no one is out of reach of

[Anonymous No.12560456]

>>12559196
real capitalism has never been tried

[Anonymous No.12560549]

>>12560456
it was tried in the 19th century and it's what made USA the greatest country on earth.

[Anonymous No.12560613]

>>12560549
I'm pretty sure he was memeing but 19th century America was notoriously protectionist and largly rural and pre-industrial. 19th century Britain would be a better example. If America was the "greatest country on earth" it was due to other factors.

[Anonymous No.12560814]

>>12560613
Yeah I’d argue that US’s success is more related to geography than anything else though I personally am a supporter of the free market

[Anonymous No.12560920]

I think his goal with this book is to introduce the reader to a certain way of thinking about economic problems rather than providing a full and complete explication of economics, it is called Basic Economics after all. I wouldn't even say he's advocating a particular economic system in the book because a theme he constantly reinforces throughout is how important it is to approach economic policy in terms of tradeoffs and incentives rather than problems and solutions This is central and the examples and problems he points out with rent control and the minimum wage among other things support his point and illustrate the frame of thinking that differentiates conservatives and liberals in America.

It really is a great read and deserves to be taken seriously.

[Anonymous No.12560929]

>>12559257
>Souls of Black Folk
Typical, dry "woe-is-the-negro's-existence" garbage.

[Anonymous No.12560940]

>>12560220
I hate new riches. Poor people should stay poor.

[Anonymous No.12560949]

>>12559257
>WEB Dubois
WE WUZ KANGZ

[Anonymous No.12560967]

>>12560929
It was actually pretty colorful. I was impressed by Dubois's use of classics as metaphor. Exponentially less dry than your average German philosopher.

[Anonymous No.12561018]

>>12559349
There are plenty of authors who have addressed these.

[Anonymous No.12561026]

>>12561018
His point is that Thomas Sowell doesn't address them in his endorsement of capitalism

[Anonymous No.12561042]

>>12561026
He has many other books. I haven't read any of his other ones but maybe he addresses it

[Anonymous No.12561065]

>>12559196
I thought the same thing. The book was excellent, but he CLEARLY skates right past issues/abuses that can and do arise. It's both a 5 star and a 2 star book.

[Anonymous No.12561079]

>>12561042
Oh no no no no. He didn't address every conceivable problem in one single book therefore socialism is the answer.

[Anonymous No.12561101]

>>12561065
Can you give me an example of the sort of abuses and issues that arise in a free market?

[Anonymous No.12561109]

>>12561042
You know you're probably right. I bet he has. Glad we cleared that up.

>>12561079
I don't know to what degree Sowell neglected the topic (haven't read the book), but failure to address reasonable, and common counter-arguments is a sign of being a hack so the allegation is worthwhile if true

[Anonymous No.12561153]

>>12561109
You should read the book because the guy complaining about Sowell not addressing the things he listed doesn't realize Sowell did address them or indirectly did. He hasn't read the book either.

For example the poster makes a the ridiculous assertion that free market economics don't provide an incentive to care for the environment but Sowell argues the exact argument. The existence of private property is in itself an incentive to care for it in order to perpetuate any income derived and pass it on to your heirs. He uses the examples of tree farms operating in socialist and free market economies which resulted in the clear cutting of forests and the replanting of trees, respectively.

[Anonymous No.12561161]

>>12561153
>but Sowell argues the exact argument
I mean he argues the exact opposite. I'm eating so don't shame me.

[Anonymous No.12561164]

>>12561153
Exploiting and manipulating the environment for profit is not the same thing as caring for it. Also, we've seen before that capitalists will often chase short term profits to the detriment of long-term investments that don't melt the icecaps and put California underwater

[Anonymous No.12561184]

>>12561101
corporate influence in government

[Anonymous No.12561186]

>>12561164
Do you think there isn't exploitation or environmental abuse in socialist countries? Look at Russia during the height of communism if you want to see absolute desolation but that is beside the point. It is absurd to say there is no capitalist incentive to care for the environment when I just gave you an example. A lumberer in America has an incentive to replant trees while a lumberer harvesting from public land has no such incentive, since he can simply move on other public land to harvest lumber.

[Anonymous No.12561200]

>>12561186
I didn't say that. I just found that Sowell's argument doesn't bear out in my experience. Capitalism does not provide incentives to care for the environment.

Also lumber workers historically have not worked on land that they've owned in the US. Plenty of ongoing fracking operations take place on public land as well.

[Anonymous No.12561205]

>>12561101
there are a few that you just logically deduce from what he's saying, but then he just keeps moving along. I can't remember specifics, but do remember specifically thinking, "does he think we won't notice this?"

[Anonymous No.12561208]

>>12561184
Can you elaborate? That could mean so many different things from CEO's expressing political opinions which I would say is perfectly fine, or maybe you're talking about companies bribing the government to pass anti-competitive laws? If that's the case your problem isn't with the free market, your problem is with violations of the free market.

[Anonymous No.12561213]

>>12561208
a good example could be PACs which are based on a loophole, so not how you're supposed to use the free market, but not really a violation either

[Anonymous No.12561217]

>>12561200
As a homeowner and somebody who rents a house out to other people, is certainty bears out in my experience. I have an incentive to care for my property in a way the temporary renters do not. They consistently trash my properties while the house I live in is kept in an impeccable condition.

[Anonymous No.12561223]

>>12561208
you're saying that like it's some hypothetical situation that *could* happen, when in reality almost every single legislation is passed in exchange for money.

[Anonymous No.12561229]

>>12561213
What is this PAC loophole?

[Anonymous No.12561242]

>>12561217
Different versions of communism would abolish that kind of property ownership so everyone would have ownership of their own home, no mortgages, no landlords, no rents.

I'm not advocating taking your house away from you or anything, just stating that this is the actual point your arguing with. By that logic, if you didn't own the house, and your tenants still lived there, they would own it, and they would have a greater incentive to care for it.

[Anonymous No.12561256]

>>12561229
I don't know the specifics of the legislation, but I can try to summarize. You're not supposed to be able to donate large amounts of money directly to a political candidate under certain circumstances, especially if you're a big corporation. So PACs are a middleman for millions of dollars from the super-wealthy to politicians to get around campaign finance regulations.

[Anonymous No.12561260]

>>12561208
>not real free market

[Anonymous No.12561263]

>>12561242
It doesn't matter how long a family lives in the house, it's the ownership and ability to pass it on which provides the incentive to take care of it. Under a socialist system, you could live in the same house from birth till death but if it's just going to be assigned to some random family after you die then what's the point of going above and beyond and sacrificing to take care of it?

[Anonymous No.12561268]

>>12559196
If anything claims to be common sense it's probably wrong and/or propaganda desu

[Anonymous No.12561272]

>>12561256
Hold on, actually I remembered. Political campaigns are not allowed to accept donations that are above a certain amount. PACs are large corporate entities that accept large sums of money, then run ads and other kinds of campaign promotion for a candidate without being affiliated with them directly, so that's how you get around campaign finance regulation

[Anonymous No.12561278]

>>12561263
Socialism also doesn't necessarily entail that the state assigns shelter to you, nor that your children can't live in your house when you die. It wouldn't allow you to own houses that you didn't live in, or to rent houses out to other people though

[Anonymous No.12561283]

>>12561186
>capitalism incentivises caring for the environment
don't mind me, just chopping down the amazon at an alarming rate

[Anonymous No.12561306]

PACs aren't a loophole. Just because an election is happening doesn't mean the government gets to tell you what you can and can't say.

Citizens United is a very poorly understood case.

[Anonymous No.12561310]

>>12560201

>they all demand open immigration

not true at all, even on cth theres only one or maybe two who take that stand, and the only reason they do it is because they know it can never happen. its an easy position to take. virgil sucks dick.

[Anonymous No.12561313]

>>12561306
Yeah, they're perfectly legal, but Roger Stone will admit that when he actually started his own PACs it was to get around campaing finance regulation.

[Anonymous No.12561315]

>>12560201
other than the deep trenches of 15 year old anarchists larping as Stalin, I have never met a leftist that advocated open borders. it's mostly a koch brothers proposal.

[Anonymous No.12561319]

>>12561278
This is beside the point. Under capitalism there is an incentive to care for the environment. The reason capitalism incentivizes me to sacrifice and care for my house is the same reason I wouldn't want to dump toxic sludge outside my factory.

[Anonymous No.12561335]

>>12561256
I have a few problems with this. If the PAC is not working with or in contact with any politician, can they really be the equivalent of a donation to the politician? If me an my neighbor support a candidate a decide to take it upon ourselves to buy and put up signs around the neighborhood, we're just doing what PAC's do. Secondly, I'm not sure how this is a problem of capitalism. Are you asserting that the same sort of politics couldn't exist under socialism?

[Anonymous No.12561342]

>>12561319
Well you're only incentivized to care for places where you live and work regularly, and even then, only to make sure those places remain livable and profitable. Doesn't stop you from erecting enormous polluting oil derricks or dumping that toxic sludge in some other community's river so long as you don't own them.

[Anonymous No.12561350]

>>12559232
well..fuck

[Anonymous No.12561361]

>>12559349
>unregulated capitalism
>government

[Anonymous No.12561372]

>>12561335
The point is that American political campaigns, the way the law is written, are not supposed to be multi-million dollar affairs, and the wealthy are not supposed to have this much influence. Donations to political campaigns cap out at however many hundreds of dollars so that rich people can't give more money than middle class people.

Of course it doesn't work, but the issue is that American capitalism can easily become a self-perpetuating oligarchy where the rich have to do very little to keep all the money to themselves. Under a perfectly conceived socialism you could argue that a corporate aristocracy wouldn't exist, but regardless of socialism, this kind of robber-baron political influence comes with the territory.

[Anonymous No.12561375]

>>12561342
Private ownership of property isn't the only incentive I have to not dump toxic sludge on my property but it does suffice to refute the assertion that capitalism provides no incentive at all to care for the environment. If you want we could start talking about liability or the threat of being sued and how that incentivizes me to care for other peoples property.

[Anonymous No.12561394]

>>12561372
Yeah but non property owners, non whites, and women are allowed to vote now so it all balances out

[Anonymous No.12561426]

>>12561372
Who says campaigns shouldn't be multi-million dollar affairs? I thought Donald Trump proved that money in itself couldn't buy elections since he was so badly outspent by many different candidates, yet you treat the assertion as a given or something that doesn't need to be proved. I don't understand why you put an arbitrary limit on money in politics but choose to ignore the influence of ground level support and volunteers. If you're going to limit money then why not put a limit on how much people can attempt to convince others to vote a specific way?

[Anonymous No.12561453]

>>12561394
Yes but in order to compete in a political race these days you can't be entirely populist, you have to either already have millions of dollars or you have to appeal to the corporate aristocracy. So it's still pretty uneven.

>>12561375
I would say that if you're a big enough corporation you can bully or trick destitute people into giving you permission to exploit their land for things like mountaintop removal. It doesn't seem to stop Elon Musk from digging tunnels under residential areas without warning. Again, not trying to attack you personally, but how do you deal with real-world examples of capitalists disrespecting the property of others and not facing consequences? because it happens all the time

[Anonymous No.12561454]

>>12559266
Why is that racist?

[Anonymous No.12561459]

>>12559389
Who cares you dumb commie.

[Anonymous No.12561461]

>>12561426
I mean, one person isn't supposed to be able to give millions of dollars in support of a politician. You're right though, Trump let the media do a lot of his advertising for him, but that worked, in part, because Trump is already famous.

[Anonymous No.12561480]

>>12561453
Exceptional cases of abuse will exist regardless of economics. Under capitalism Elon Musk is digging tunnels but under socialism it's done by government directive. At least under capitalism we have the ability to sue Elon and get justice.

[Anonymous No.12561519]

>>12561480
Only if you can afford a lawyer. Under socialism, you may not have to be rich to get a good lawyer if your rights are violated. Meanwhile, nobody's suing Elon because the courts are inefficient and time consuming, nobody's house fell down, and lawyers are expensive.

[Anonymous No.12561570]

>>12561519
You can trust that if Elon Musk causes you damage by digging tunnels under your house, you will not have a single problem finding a lawyer will work for a percentage of the settlement. Under socialism you sue the government with the aid of a government official acting as your lawyer and the government investigates itself and finds no wrongdoing by the government. If I want justice I'll try my hand with the capitalist system.

[Anonymous No.12561580]

>>12561570
Why do you assume socialist lawyers would be government employed? Socialism doesn't completely abolish non-government agents, nor does it abolish money.

[Anonymous No.12561605]

>>12561580
You act as if that's crucial to the point. Fine, you and your private lawyer sue the government and the government investigates itself and finds no wrongdoing.

[Anonymous No.12561607]

>>12561570
Same guy. Full disclosure, I'm not a socialist, nor am I exactly well-versed in socialist rhetoric, but you keep defending your positions by asking me how a socialist would handle these situations, so I'm borrowing from things I've heard socialists say. I don't really think socialism would result in a utopia free from injustice, but it is an ideology entirely based problems with and solutions to capitalism

[Anonymous No.12561637]

>>12561605
In an American civil suit does the state conduct the investigation for the plaintiff or do they have to supply their own evidence of wrongdoing?

[Anonymous No.12561671]

>>12561605
I'm not trying to disparage or frustrate you, nor am I really trying that hard to defend socialism. I'm pointing out real-world examples of abuse of the system under capitalism, and trying to see how you square these realities with your belief in capitalism, and you keep asking me to defend myself in terms of socialism.

Another way to respond to your assertion about the state investigating itself would be something like a socialist system of checks and balances, which is pretty flimsy because you see how that works in a democracy.

[Anonymous No.12561679]

>>12561637
If I were to sue Elon Musk the judge would be acting as a mediator between two private parties and weighing evidence provided by the parties.

[Anonymous No.12561729]

>>12561671
I don't think the things you've pointed out can be considered abuses or abuses unique to capitalism. Politics can be corrupt and environmental abuses can happen regardless of the countries economic system. I would go so far as to say the abuses common to both capitalism and socialism are less of a problem under capitalism, meaning corruption and environmental abuses are usually worse under socialism. Historical reality would be on my side with this, because hell, the Russians destroyed the 4th largest lake in the world while under socialism among many other examples.

[Anonymous No.12561730]

>>12559196
He's a propagandist defending the theft of the third world

[Anonymous No.12561768]

>>12561730
is that why africans used to live in mudshacks before capitalism?

[Anonymous No.12561778]

>>12561729
The lake thing seems like it would be a product of Soviet, Cold War dick measuring, and not actually a result of socialist ideology. I'd say one of the USSR's biggest mistakes was fighting the US on its own terms.

Anyway, my point is that capitalism actually invites the exploitation of resources for short term profit more than it does actual long term investment, which is evident from the constant lobbying to maintain the fossil fuel industries instead of innovating eco-friendly fuel. Capitalism encourages doing what is immediately profitable over what is actually most beneficial to the citizens. I'm pointing out problems which aren't necessarily unique to capitalism, but which capitalists are known for perpetuating.

[Anonymous No.12561783]

>>12561768
Yeah then we gave them capitalism, and that's why Africa is a homogeneous utopian continent now. Thanks capitalism

[Anonymous No.12561806]

>>12561783
see: nigeria

[Anonymous No.12561820]

>>12561806
See: the Congo

[Anonymous No.12561869]

>>12561778
You assert that capitalism invites or maybe incentivizes the short term exploitation of resources but this is something that you need to argue because it doesn't bear with what we experience in reality. It goes contrary to the earlier tree farm example where a private land owner is incentivized against clear cutting since it ruins any potential income. They have a rational reason to take the time and plant new trees even if they won't personally benefit from them. It's an incentive a lumberer under socialism who is working on public land doesn't have, To them it's rational to cut down as much as they can and immediately move on to other land with no thought of the future.

If capitalism operated as you believe it does, there wouldn't any innovation at all in the private sphere. I can't imagine why anyone solely concerned with short term profit would spend any money on research and development, let alone the billions that companies like Amazon spend. Did you know they only recently started turning a profit? They've been around for decades but only recently started making money.

[Anonymous No.12562014]

>>12561018

Could you recommend some?

[Anonymous No.12562045]

>>12561283
Capitalism doesn't incentivise caring for the environment, but neither does socialism. As humans we exploit the environment for food and resources. That's just how it is. The only solution is to wipe out humanity but that would be retarded now wouldn't it?

[Anonymous No.12562225]

>>12562045
>>12561869

The point of the argument is that Sowell claims that capitalism does incentivise caring for the environment which is why its a superior economic form. The first thing isn't true so it can't be proof of the second thing. Capitalism only incentivises caring for the parts of the environment which produce renewable resources and which belong to you (or that you live in.)

Also, under capitalism a natural gas company may strong-arm you into signing a contract giving permission to frack on your property, or they may buy it from you outright. This is an environmental abuse, and an unethical treatment of another person's property which is contingent on capitalism. Capitalism incentivises oil companies to pay politicians to deny climate change. People wouldn't be motivated to do these things if profits weren't at stake

[Anonymous No.12563000]

>>12559349
unregulated capitalism.. lobby government. good try though
>>12561361
Thank You

[Anonymous No.12563005]

>>12562014
Basically the Austrians
>Man Economy and State
>Human action
>Road to serfdom
>Capitalism and freedom
>Democracy: The God that Failed
>Economics in one lesson
And anything else by Hayek, Hazlitt, Mises, Hoppe etc

[Anonymous No.12563036]

Excellent analysis, OP. You've really given us a comprehensive review using citations and opposing facts.

You should also probably kill yourself.

[Anonymous No.12563479]

>>12563000
government still controls the border and citizenship

[Anonymous No.12563870]

>>12561184
That would not be a free market then you silly goose

[Anonymous No.12563915]

>Capitalism has flaws therefore socialism is good
Still waiting for socialists to come up with a better alternative.

[Anonymous No.12563929]

>>12561778
Socialism is central-planning heavy, thus socialism invites central corruption and state rule. Once the state is corrupt it's game over, a la every failed Communist state in history.

[Anonymous No.12564577]

>>12559196
What are the negatives of capitalism? I always ask this but I get nothing but behavior common to every economic systems and things that are actually worse under socialism.

[Anonymous No.12565097]

>>12563915
the scandinavian model

[Anonymous No.12565119]

>>12565097
What is it?

[Anonymous No.12565139]

Don’t read Thomas Sowell. read this, get redpilled.

[Anonymous No.12565174]

>>12565119
It's the very big liberal capitalist government structure used by Nordic countries. There's really high taxes, but countries like Norway and Sweden have some of the highest qualities of life in the world.

[Anonymous No.12565181]

>>12565174
Do you think high taxes is what makes them prosperous?

[Anonymous No.12565194]

>>12565181
Not necessarily, but evidently they don't seem to unhappy with the government. Those countries also really do use the state to insure quality of life as in universal healthcare and education, which are some of the most expensive anxiety inducing institutions in the US. Same with Canada, people are statistically happier there because the state actually takes care of the citizens.

[Anonymous No.12565206]

>>12565194
People are happy to pay a 60% tax rate because the Nordic countries have the highest levels of social cohesion in the world and a great deal public trust in government. They are very egalitarian and a good place to live if you are a round peg trying to fit into a round hole, but otherwise you see some human capital flight to the USA.

[Anonymous No.12565209]

>>12565194
Well if people are happier for not having to take care of themselves why stop at healthcare and education? Maybe we should use the government to assign jobs and meal plans since these things are such a source of anxiety.

[Anonymous No.12565222]

>>12559240
abolitionist in America's context iirc, but even abolitionists were racist.

[Anonymous No.12565247]

>>12559349
He doesn't even support unregulated capitalism and has no pretense of it. He supports regulations like mandatory mudflaps where the actions of one has negative consequences for others to no cost for the harmdoer.

He mentions the problem of corporate lobbyists when he writes about the interstate commerce commision and mentions that it allowed for rent seeking. The solution he proposes is to reject the paternalistic regulations that enabled the capitalists to rent seek to begin with.

Don't remember if he mentioned the climate or pollution. Considering he's an old dogmatic conservative he might not even believe in climate change. But if he does believe in it, the logic of mandatory mudflaps go for climate change and pollution as well.

[Anonymous No.12565282]

>>12565209
Because those things would diminish freedom of the individual. We already have public education in the US and frankly I wouldn't mind not having to worry about medical bills. Anyway, that's what the state is for. People live in groups so that they can take care of each other and provide security. If your government doesn't provide services which make your life safer, easier, and better, then it's a bad government.

[Anonymous No.12565306]

>>12565206
That's certainly why it works as smoothly as it does, but I think the outcome is what promotes happiness. Homelessness in these countries is far lower than in the US, which is an easy way to measure that there are more relatively content people there than here.

[Anonymous No.12565307]

>>12559287
His definition of quality of life seems to pretty much mean availability of cheap products and consumer choice. So if Walmart outcompetes your local community's mom and pop stores this is better for everyone's quality of life as they offer a wider variety of products for less money (I think this is a literal example in the book, but I haven't read it in a while).

[Anonymous No.12565350]

>>12565282
Why is it okay to stifle freedom in regards to healthcare and education but not with employment and subsistence? The governments in Europe exercise a great amount of control when it comes to where people can go to school or how they can be homeschooled. We've seen some of the same restrictions of liberty in the US since they've nationalized schools.

With universal healthcare governments will necessarily have to ration the supply since healthcare is a limited resource, this means some people will inevitably be denied treatment. We've even seen people be denied the ability to travel to other countries for treatment.

If the governments job is to provide services which make your life safer, easier, and better then you can't rationally deny my government assigned jobs and meals program since they will make our lives safer, easier, and better.

[Anonymous No.12565394]

>>12565282
If your government doesn't provide services which make your life safer, easier, and better, then it's a bad government.
I think we should have state sanctioned childrearing centers where the government can take newborns away from their parents in order to raise them. Sure, the parents may be upset at first but this is an irrational behavior and they'll be much happier in the end for not having to wake up constantly throughout the middle of the night and change diapers. Be thankful I'm the one who gets to decide what makes people happy.

[Anonymous No.12565401]

>>12565350
>healthcare is a limited resource
This strikes me as disingenuous. There is enough medicine for everybody, everybody needs healthcare anyway and if a society can't provide it to everybody then it's a broken one. Everybody already gets a flu shot in the US and all diabetics need insulin. Why not have the government help pay for it? It works in other places.

The concern of freedom has a lot to do with things like whether or not you can still pick who your doctor is, which HMOs already limit, and which doesn't matter if you can't afford healthcare anyway.

>If the government's job is to make life safer, easier than you can't deny jobs and meals programs
It's already a matter of degree. It's all about which services you think the government is obliged to provide. In the US the government makes and maintains public roads, but that doesn't mean the government is obliged to cater to convenience in every way. However, the meals program would probably work in selective cases. Why not more welfare? We have the resources.

[Anonymous No.12565406]

>>12565394
this is a false equivalency. Helping a sick person pay for their medical bills is not the same as kidnapping a child.

[Anonymous No.12565418]

>>12565401
Healthcare being a limited resource is about the least controversial thing anybody can say. It's a fact of reality that there can only be a limited number of doctors and hospitals in the world.

[Anonymous No.12565424]

>>12565418
But the US already has a hospital in just about every town. It's just that not everybody can afford to use it.

[Anonymous No.12565428]

>>12565406
I didn't equivocate kidnapping with healthcare so good job pointing that out. You say the governments job is to make people happy, so if I'm in the government I get to decide what that means. I say kidnapping children makes people happy so the government is obligated to kidnap children.

[Anonymous No.12565433]

>>12565247
he's a libertarian, not dogmatic conservative, I don't know where you're getting that from. I've never seen him make a claim that wasn't based on some kind of precedent or study.

[Anonymous No.12565434]

>>12565424
Healthcare will be a limited resource even if there was a hospital every ten feet. You're not understanding what it means to be a limited resource.

[Anonymous No.12565440]

>>12565428
You did. I said "free healthcare, and public education" and you said "why don't we steal people's children while we're at it." These are not the same

[Anonymous No.12565443]

>>12565440
I think I've fried your brain

[Anonymous No.12565444]

>>12565434
Ok, is there any particular health resource which there isn't enough of for everyone in the US even if we had the means to distribute it.

[Anonymous No.12565446]

>>12565443
Not really, you just said something kinda dumb and now you're acting smug about it

[Anonymous No.12565455]

>>12565444
Are you mentally ill?

[Anonymous No.12565456]

>>12565307
it's not wrong. if you want to argue that those cheap products don't provide any meaning to people's lives and doesn't make people happy, you're free to, but you won't be making an economic argument.

[Anonymous No.12565460]

>>12565455
I was diagnosed with ADHD as a kid. Clearly there's enough amphetamines, weed, and alcohol for every 19 year old, and like I said before, everybody already gets a flu shot. What isn't there enough of?

[Anonymous No.12565475]

>>12565460
Just about anything in life there isn't enough of.

Scarcity is a real thing.

[Anonymous No.12565485]

>>12565475
Not always. For example, this isn't true of housing. There are more empty houses in the US than there are people. Something similar might be true of medicine. It's certainly true about food at this point.

[Anonymous No.12565492]

>>12565475
How can scarcity be real if we can just make more? Checkmate, every single economist.

[Anonymous No.12565511]

>>12565485
a lot of houses are empty because of rent control

[Anonymous No.12565515]

>>12565511
Yeah, or because people own multiple houses. My point is that the cause of homelessness isn't "there just aren't enough houses" because there actually are enough houses. The same could be true of medical resources in the United States.

[Anonymous No.12565536]

>>12565515

The trick is to allow real estate investment trusts to be vehicles for money laundering.

There is a reason why no one leaks the percent of Trump's condos used in money laundering, it would provoke such a great uproar that it would not simply remove Trump...

[Anonymous No.12565558]

>>12565485
Housing exists, the means to purchase a house is scarce however.

>>12565492
But you can't just make more of everything.

[Anonymous No.12565565]

>>12565558
Well yeah, but there's not a scarcity of housing. We could redistribute all the housing and provide everyone with shelter if we came to that consensus.

If medical scarcity is based on economic inequality, or just pricing, then we can distribute that as well if we give the government that power, which other countries, including those on the Nordic model, have done.

[Anonymous No.12565572]

>>12565565
Will you please Google the word scarcity

[Anonymous No.12565577]

>>12565572
>The state of being scarce or in short supply: shortage
We are not in short supply of housing or in food. Are we in short supply of medical resources?

[Anonymous No.12565582]

>>12565565
And who will pay for all the housing? When things inevitably break down, who pays for that? What about the current landowners, should they be forced to give up their property for free, or in fact a loss?

You can always try to redistribute healthcare, it is funny you mention the "Nordic model" as if that was something good that nations should strive to follow. If you want to know how bad healthcare gets under centralization you should study Sweden, turns out government monopoly on healthcare isn't so good after all.

[Anonymous No.12565586]

>>12565577
Look for something with an economic context, like this.

https://www.investopedia.com/terms/s/scarcity.asp

[Anonymous No.12565607]

>>12565582
Why would things inevitably break down? Homelessness isn't a universal truth. You can find civilizations where nobody, or almost nobody was homeless, including 17th century England where Anglican bishops were tasked with insuring shelter for their parishioners. You're implying that allowing rich people to keep their summer homes is more important than supplying US citizens with resources they need to live.

What happens in Sweden? Don't be vague, it's kind of irritating. What are the negative consequences of centralized healthcare.

[Anonymous No.12565643]

>>12565607
Because housing, just like anything else ages and breaks down over time. Homelessness is a universal truth, because poverty is.

You want the government to confiscate some peoples homes and give them to others? No thanks.

I think you are the one who needs to read about that for yourself, considering you are the person who is advocating for centralized healthcare in the first place.

[Anonymous No.12565644]

>>12565558
>But you can't just make more of everything.
I hate when people talk such nonsense you can't even tell jokes from honest opinions.

[Anonymous No.12565649]

>>12565644
Surely some fault lies on me, but having spent some time on both /lit/ and /his/ there are people who genuinely think that is the case, rather safe than sorry as they say.

[Anonymous No.12565652]

>>12560220
based and redpilled. i love me some mccloskey, i read her trilogy and the rhetoric book. in my econ phd program we rarely talk about meta subjects about econ beyond structural vs reduced form

[Anonymous No.12565658]

>>12565586
"the gap between limited resources and potentially limitless wants"

This is why I brought up housing. Housing is not just a "limitless want" it is also a universal need, everybody needs one, and materially, we have enough houses to do that. The scarcity is monetary rather than material, but it would be incredibly difficult to redistribute housing so I'm not arguing for that.

I don't know if its the same case for medicine though. There are plenty of instances of pharmaceutical companies price-gouging when they don't need to, which is a manufactured rather than a necessary scarcity, and an inefficient way to distribute resources.

There are plenty of historical examples of scarcity which is actually just inefficient resource allocation, like the Irish Potato Famine, where the English were slow and reluctant to send food to Ireland from prejudice. England handled the task of providing aid so poorly that some Irish historians still think the famine was an intentional attempt at genocide.

[Anonymous No.12565665]

>>12565643
So you're gonna challenge my position, then refuse to provide evidence.

Makes it sound like you don't know what you're talking about.

[Anonymous No.12565692]

>>12565658
I'm not trying to have a conversation with you because I think you're ignorant and maybe stupid. I asked you to look up with scarcity meant because you're being a fool.

[Anonymous No.12565694]

>>12565665
You are the one who holds a position which you know absolutely nothing about, then you get upset when someone tells you that perhaps you should read up on what you are proposing.

[Anonymous No.12565702]

>>12561200
>Capitalism does not provide incentives to care for the environment.
>what is the clean energy revolution

[Anonymous No.12565705]

>>12565694
I'm telling you I'll read it when you write it. If you know what's wrong with Sweden, why don't you tell me?

[Anonymous No.12565713]

>>12565705
Because me telling you now teaches you nothing, you will read it, maybe post a reply on two and tomorrow you will be back shilling for centralization and socialized healthcare again, without knowing anything about the consequences of such retarded policies.

If you yourself read up on the very thing you seem to care so much about, yet know nothing about, perhaps you will learn about it.

[Anonymous No.12565714]

The best thing about this book is that a lot of leftists/American liberals read it and finally understand counterarguments to the policies that make them feel good, such as increasing the minimum wage and rent controlling everything.

It serves as a panacea and hopefully a wake up call to the idiotic economic beliefs of most college-educated Americans

[Anonymous No.12565739]

because the pros outweighed the cons when the book was initially written

[Anonymous No.12565754]

>>12565713
If you want to change my mind you've gotta steer me in some kind of direction. There's some stuff about limited access and waiting times, but most of the online sources list Sweden's healthcare system as one of the best in the world for the past few decades.

I've also seen more than one site already describe it as "decentralized" and specify that there is still privately practiced medicine in the country but almost nobody uses it.

[Anonymous No.12565923]

>>12565754
Yes, there's limited access and wait times, that's part of the trade offs of having a centralized system. Anything that isn't life threatening is put on a waiting list that is months or years long. The E.R. does not treat you unless you are on the verge of death because there's massive queues.

Do you need an appointment for anything basic, be it to get a drug, check up or anything else? That's a minimum of 2 months wait time just to get an appointment. Do you need any kind of surgery? That's years on a waiting list if you are lucky. These are the realities of socialized healthcare. Are you in labor with a child on the way? I sure hope you live in a city with a maternity ward otherwise you have to give birth on the high way in your car. And god forbid should you get something serious, or even cancer, that's when you have to pay the ultimate prize of having a centralized healthcare system.

There is private care, and the government just imposed another tax on private insurance because they don't like the fact that people decide to go for private healthcare even though they have 70% of their paycheck stolen, just goes to show how awful the government monopoly healthcare is.

[Anonymous No.12565983]

>>12565923
USA wait times are just as bad.

[Anonymous No.12566234]

>>12559208
How is someone giving you money for your time and effort stealing (an arrangement that you both agreed to)? That's the lowest IQ position I have ever seen in my life.

[Anonymous No.12566269]

>>12565923
this>>12565983 and lots of people don't get to see a doctor at all.

And nothing that I read suggested that wait times were more than a year, nor that they wouldn't take care of their cancer patients or provide for pregnant mothers. That seems pulled out of thin air.

Do you think being subjected to long waits, and bad scheduling is really worse than dying of a preventable disease because you can't afford treatment?

[Anonymous No.12566289]

>>12559349
>destroys cultures and small communities
False, the basis of unregulated capitalism is private property. We currently have a system of government ownership of land whereby any person can travel to wherever they want. This would not happen in a free market, as everything would be owned privately. Therefore, you would have the right to associate or disassociate with whoever you wanted. Not to mention that laws governing who you can hire and fire would not exist.

>makes everything a struggle for resources, thus creating endless divisions
That is the human condition. You are born with a need for resources and a desire for more than you need. The opposite end of the economic spectrum is a system that promises you free shit (resources) but can't deliver.

>destroys the middle class
Objectively wrong, capitalism creates the middle class and shrinks the lower class. There is a direct correlation that can be seen between the freedom of the market and the size of these classes.

>DOES provide financial incentive for corporations to lobby for government to bring in immigrants or outsource so they can lower their wages
That's retarded. You don't even know what a free market is. A free market is free from government intervention. That's what makes it "Free". Therefore, what you are describing is not free market, but in fact a form of socialism (government intervention)

>DOES provide financial incentive for child slave labor, which is still very prevalent today
Socialism provides the same incentives - namely wanting more stuff. However, slavery is not tenable in a free market as it is not possible for someone to own you as self-ownership is the basis for private property rights. If you looked at the countries where slave labor is prevalent, you would see that they are not close to market economies.

>>12563005
The Mystery of Banking is a must read too.

>>12565174
Those countries essentially go though cycle wherby they generate wealth through the free market, start implementing socialist policies, start losing money and everything goes to shit, and then start going more free market again. Even with their high taxes, their laws are so much more free market oriented that they still qualify as the freest markets in the world.

All of their wealth was generated through the free market, the nanny state has nothing to do with it and was a later invention.

>>12565424
We found a real brain-genius here.

>>12565983
They're not, especially for specialized services.

[Anonymous No.12566400]

>>12566269
earth is overpopulated already, a few people dying here and there is no skin off my teeth.

[Anonymous No.12566435]

>>12565983
>>12566269
Except the difference is that you can pay for immediate care. In Sweden you would either have to leave for another country, or die.

[Anonymous No.12566443]

>>12566269
>Do you think being subjected to long waits, and bad scheduling
It's not "long waits" or "bad scheduling", it's non-existant healthcare. Having to wait years on a surgery you need to survive means you pay with your life.

[Anonymous No.12566459]

>>12566443
Do you have evidence that Swedes are being denied life-saving surgeries because of wait-times because nothing I saw even remotely suggested that.

[Anonymous No.12566481]

>>12566435
not really, emergency cases get moved up in the queue

[Anonymous No.12566497]

>>12566459
https://www.cancerfonden.se/press/ojamlik-cancervard-kostar-varje-ar-2-900-liv

2900 people a year, or 8 people a day, die from inadequate healthcare. And that's only cancer.

Sweden has the least amount of healthcare spots in the EU and the number is still decreasing because of shortages in doctors. As a result, wait times are increasing.

>>12566481
Not true for all cases, not at all.

[Anonymous No.12566500]

>>12566481
Yah, but brah, surgeons usually specialize. So you have one surgeon who is doing nothing but life saving surgeries. You can't move someone up in a queue in a case like this.

This is the real issue is lack of availability of specialized healthcare providers. In a market, if there is greater demand, prices go up which draws more people into the field.

In the US for example, there is a chronic shortage because of all the government intervention in our healthcare industry. Obamacare really made things a lot worse for healthcare providers due to the extra paperwork and lowered prices paid. When it was passed, you saw a shift towards lots of people wanting to get out of the industry. Hell, it forced one person I know out of business - now he chops trees for a living.

[Anonymous No.12566513]

>>12559196
>extremely vague opening accusing author of vague thing and equally vague counter-argument
I bet you haven't read it. Post concrete examples.

[Anonymous No.12566610]

>>12560220
It's not weird at all. Everyone under them is seething with envy, and the "actual upper classes" despise them as stepping above their station and being always a possible competition, preventing them from being eternally upper class without effort like in old time aristocracies.

[Anonymous No.12567136]

>>12566234

The form of value conceals material relations between people. Your understanding of a fair 'agreement that you both agree to' is historically contingent.

[Anonymous No.12567156]

>>12567136
Then start a coop with your comrades where you have mutual understanding of what is fair according to whatever political religion is in vogue. Simple. Fucking idiot commie.

[Anonymous No.12567168]

Is Thomas Sowell the only intelligent nigger? What will happen when he dies?

[Anonymous No.12567174]

>>12567168
>Is Thomas Sowell the only intelligent nigger?
no

[Anonymous No.12567183]

>>12567174
Who?

[Anonymous No.12567636]

>>12559208
NazBol gang

[Anonymous No.12568074]

>>12567136
Autism