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A Free-Market Perspective

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  • #31
    Re: Political Islam

    Originally posted by SoyElTurco View Post
    well. did you listen to it?

    and fetullah gulen has completely different propaganda. and you're armenian right?

    and anyway, the thread is under the "Intellectual" section. so i guess this thread is appropriately placed in that section.

    I just want to know what you would think after listening to a lecture like that.
    I know who is.Do you take any aid ( money, place, ..) for living in NY and for spreading their "humanist" propaganda? It seems that you are totally under their influence.Sure this is your choice but ..

    Comment


    • #32
      Re: Political Islam

      To Armanen:

      Due to the oligarchical plundering nature of Socialist America, you could say that there is no state to be found to begin with, just an international elite that wants to rob a nation of its remaining wealth rather than to feed it and nurse it back to health.

      The socialist programs merely serve to convert citizens into capital that can be used by the leadership's whims.

      As such, oligarchical "states" are businesses, not nations that produce and perpetuate their own civilization. They are more alike to an economic system in this sense, even though its nature and purpose is such an abstraction from the original free market system that it supposedly started with and fought for independence against Britain to attain.

      Besides, since when was America a state to begin with? It started off as a league or confederation of the colonies, each one of which later attained state status after the independence if I'm not mistaken. America was based on the idea of free market economics with which a nation could be built and its fruits can be shared by the citizens who participated in a competitive environment where one's hard work and ingenuity was rewarded and one's laziness and stupidity was not.

      However, once all the states were under the thumb of Washington for all political purposes, the seeds were sown for this system to change, in favor of a plutocratic, kleptocratic leadership. Bureaucracy was the tool with which the public would shy away from watching over their rights and slowly but surely, the nation that once fostered a common ethos of free market capitalism was subverted by the very mercantilists it ousted in the war for independence.

      Socialism today is just the "coup de gras" on an already beaten down and raped United States.

      Comment


      • #33
        Re: Political Islam

        So then in your opinion does the problem also stem from the fact that socialism without nationalism (national socialism) is leading to the downfall or ns wouldn't help the cause either?

        You will be hard pressed to find many governments that really care about the people, whether democratic or not. People are a commodity to rulers and therefore sentiment isn't attached to them by the ruling elites.
        For the first time in more than 600 years, Armenia is free and independent, and we are therefore obligated
        to place our national interests ahead of our personal gains or aspirations.



        http://www.armenianhighland.com/main.html

        Comment


        • #34
          Re: Political Islam

          Originally posted by Armanen View Post
          So then in your opinion does the problem also stem from the fact that socialism without nationalism (national socialism) is leading to the downfall or ns wouldn't help the cause either?

          You will be hard pressed to find many governments that really care about the people, whether democratic or not. People are a commodity to rulers and therefore sentiment isn't attached to them by the ruling elites.
          Your second point is true to an extent. The ruler of a state recognizes the importance of the class or even, caste system that provides him with the reins of power will thus respond to the classes he is standing on accordingly. He will not continuously plunder and ravage them with the aim of destroying them, though he might do so periodically to reinstate his authority. He will destroy opposition though, and if a certain class, for example, the bourgeoisie or the clergy, is his opposition, it is in his interests to destroy them. All other bodies of the public however are not the likely enemies, they are just the canon fodder of the classes who stand above them and are able to manipulate them (the masses) to their whims.

          The dumb public is wooed by ideas of liberalism which the bourgeois or banker classes have pioneered and perfected. All these ideas create is a strong revolutionary force to topple the existing leadership and replace it with, not the will of the people (only free market economics can even come close to doing such a thing), but with a treasonous class that is equally corrupt. Socialists are these people and they know they can't hold onto a state forever, only suck it dry of its resources and wealth, and then move onto their next victim.

          National Socialism is not an exception to this rule at all. It is a vehicle that ultimately leads to the same thing. However, in National Socialism in Germany, the role of the SS and elite societies bound by loyalty in arms and even occult rituals could be observed. It appears that its purpose was to create the aristocratic or warrior elite Aryan class of the 20th century under a New World Order based in Nazi Germany.

          If this had succeeded, the next step Germans would've had to take to become a true state was to abolish the National Socialist government, as it had served its purpose as a transition step towards nation building, and reinstate a rigid class or caste system by which a new aristocratic class (that won its legitimacy through staunch loyalty and ruthless idealism in building the new state) could rule with such virility that the public could not question their authority.

          Remember that most mainstream forms of nationalism, including that of Nazi Germany amongst the public, are just xenophobia, it does not solve economic problems, it just seeks to destroy certain social classes that had hitherto experienced safe shelter or former power in the country in question. In any deeper, more spiritual sense of nationalism, interest in producing civilization is the motive. You'd probably find yourself wasting your time with the scumbag bigots who just care about silting throats to secure power through wealth and control. These bigots have no care about your civilization experiencing another golden age, they just want their fat paycheck in the end and the only thing that separates them from the plutocrats of today is that they are more explicit in their xenophobia.
          Last edited by jgk3; 11-22-2008, 03:01 PM.

          Comment


          • #35
            Re: Political Islam

            Originally posted by jgk3 View Post
            To Armanen:

            Due to the oligarchical plundering nature of Socialist America, you could say that there is no state to be found to begin with, just an international elite that wants to rob a nation of its remaining wealth rather than to feed it and nurse it back to health.

            The socialist programs merely serve to convert citizens into capital that can be used by the leadership's whims.

            As such, oligarchical "states" are businesses, not nations that produce and perpetuate their own civilization. They are more alike to an economic system in this sense, even though its nature and purpose is such an abstraction from the original free market system that it supposedly started with and fought for independence against Britain to attain.

            Besides, since when was America a state to begin with? It started off as a league or confederation of the colonies, each one of which later attained state status after the independence if I'm not mistaken. America was based on the idea of free market economics with which a nation could be built and its fruits can be shared by the citizens who participated in a competitive environment where one's hard work and ingenuity was rewarded and one's laziness and stupidity was not.

            However, once all the states were under the thumb of Washington for all political purposes, the seeds were sown for this system to change, in favor of a plutocratic, kleptocratic leadership. Bureaucracy was the tool with which the public would shy away from watching over their rights and slowly but surely, the nation that once fostered a common ethos of free market capitalism was subverted by the very mercantilists it ousted in the war for independence.

            Socialism today is just the "coup de gras" on an already beaten down and raped United States.
            This shift happened over time, from the election of Lincoln, to the election of Teddy Roosevelt and the icing on the cake was the worst president, FDR, whose socialistic policies not only prolonged the depression, but there is reason to believe that he had knowledge of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, and allowed it to happen because he needed a backdoor entry into the war (if you remember the U.S. had committed to the supposed idea of neutrality, while at the same time helping Britain and China, including stopping the flow of oil, which is what caused Japan to attack America - it was false neutrality).

            In any event, wealth is never created by government, it is just shifted and redistributed by government. Politicians and government are not producers, they cannot produce but can only appropriate by means of force from the producers and redistribute it (in the process causing malinvestment and misallocation of resources from more productive uses - the ethanol subsidies come to mind). Here is an interview with Ron Paul on the Freakonomics blog of the New York Times:

            Ron Paul When we solicited your questions for Congressman Ron Paul shortly after the election, so many questions came in that we split Paul’s answers into two batches, the first of which was published last week. Here is the second. Like the first batch, they are well-considered and interesting throughout; they will surely make many readers continue to wish fervently . . .
            Achkerov kute.

            Comment


            • #36
              Re: Free-Market Economics

              Don't Blame the Market for the Housing Bubble


              by Ron Paul
              March 20, 2007

              The U.S. housing market, long considered vulnerable by many economists, is now on the verge of suffering a serious collapse in many regions. Commodities guru and hedge fund manager Jim Rogers warns that real estate in expensive bubble areas will drop 40 or 50%. Mainstream media outlets like the New York Times are reporting breathlessly about the possibility of widespread defaults on subprime mortgages.

              When the bubble finally bursts completely, millions of Americans will be looking for someone to blame. Look for Congress to hold hearings into subprime lending practices and “predatory” mortgages. We’ll hear a lot of grandstanding about how unscrupulous lenders took advantage of poor people, and how rampant speculation caused real estate markets around the country to overheat. It will be reminiscent of the Enron hearings, and the message will be explicitly or implicitly the same: free-market capitalism, left unchecked, leads to greed, fraud, and unethical if not illegal business practices.

              But capitalism is not to blame for the housing bubble, the Federal Reserve is. Specifically, Fed intervention in the economy – through the manipulation of interest rates and the creation of money – caused the artificial boom in mortgage lending.

              The Fed has roughly tripled the amount of dollars and credit in circulation just since 1990. Housing prices have risen dramatically not because of simple supply and demand, but because the Fed literally created demand by making the cost of borrowing money artificially cheap. When credit is cheap, individuals tend to borrow too much and spend recklessly.

              This is not to say that all banks, lenders, and Wall Street firms are blameless. Many of them are politically connected, and benefited directly from the Fed’s easy money policies. And some lenders did make fraudulent or unethical loans. But every cent they loaned was first created by the Fed.

              The actions of lenders are directly attributable to the policies of the Fed: when credit is cheap, why not loan money more recklessly to individuals who normally would not qualify? Even with higher default rates, lenders could make huge profits simply through volume. Subprime lending is a symptom of the housing bubble, not the cause of it.

              Fed credit also distorts mortgage lending through Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, two government schemes created by Congress supposedly to help poor people. Fannie and Freddie enjoy an implicit guarantee of a bailout by the federal government if their loans default, and thus are insulated from market forces. This insulation spurred investors to make funds available to Fannie and Freddie that otherwise would have been invested in other securities or more productive endeavors, thereby fueling the housing boom.

              The Federal Reserve provides the mother’s milk for the booms and busts wrongly associated with a mythical “business cycle.” Imagine a Brinks truck driving down a busy street with the doors wide open, and money flying out everywhere, and you’ll have a pretty good analogy for Fed policies over the last two decades. Unless and until we get the Federal Reserve out of the business of creating money at will and setting interest rates, we will remain vulnerable to market bubbles and painful corrections. If housing prices plummet and millions of Americans find themselves owing more than their homes are worth, the blame lies squarely with Alan Greenspan and Ben Bernanke.

              Don’t Blame the Market for the Housing Bubble by Ron Paul by Ron Paul DIGG THIS The U.S. housing market, long considered vulnerable by many economists, is now on the verge of suffering a serious collapse in many regions. Commodities guru and hedge fund manager Jim Rogers warns that real estate in expensive bubble areas will drop 40 or 50%. Mainstream media outlets like the New York Times are reporting breathlessly about the possibility of widespread defaults on subprime mortgages. When the bubble finally bursts completely, millions of Americans will be looking for someone to blame. Look for Congress to … Continue reading →
              Achkerov kute.

              Comment


              • #37
                Re: Free-Market Economics

                Alan Greenspan vs. Ayn Rand and Freedom
                Larry Binswanger
                source: Capitalism Magazine



                The connection of Alan Greenspan to Ayn Rand, decades ago, is being used to blacken her name and her ideas.

                This from the Leftist "Mother Jones" publication is one of the milder expressions:

                "In a historic moment, former Fed chair Alan Greenspan acknowledged he had been wrong for years to assume that government regulation was bad for markets. Whoops--there goes decades of Ayn Rand down the drain."

                Rightist publications are joining in the smear: Forbes magazine's online blog states:

                "Greenspan, protege of Ayn Rand and the driving mind behind the notion that risk can be contained by having ever growing numbers of market players taking pieces of that risk, has now admitted that 'Those of us who have looked to the self-interest of lending institutions to protect shareholder's equity (myself especially) are in a state of shocked disbelief.' [...] "The whole concept of self-regulation through self-interest is now dead,"

                In response, I posted this comment on the Forbes site:

                The lesson people have drawn from Greenspan's failure is exactly backwards. Greenspan, "the maestro," and his dream-team staff, couldn't figure out how to run the economy. It was the Fed's expansion of the money supply (1% interest rates!) that created the bubbles. So interventionism has failed, as it always does. Can anyone seriously say, "an even smarter version of Greenspan will get it right next time"?

                The article says self-regulation is now dead. Okay, what's the alternative? Regulation by the state--i.e., by new Greenspans? Forbes, above all publications, should be clear that the alternative to self-regulation is state dictation, the command economy.

                Deregulation? There were 51,000 NEW regulations added over the last 12 years. Banking, housing, and insurance are the most regulated areas of the economy. They are strangled by regulations. This is the failure of the regulatory state.

                As to Greenspan, this is the penalty of betraying Ayn Rand's philosophy. To paraphrase Lloyd Bentsen's famous riposte: Dr. Greenspan, I knew Ayn Rand, and you're no Objectivist.

                Let's review the record in regard to Greenspan's progressive split from Ayn Rand.

                I can't say I knew Alan Greenspan, though, being an associate of Ayn Rand, I met him a few times in the 1960s. But by 1970--almost 40 years ago--I and a couple of other Objectivists in that circle already realized that Greenspan was compromising on her philosophy. Little did we know how far his anti-Rand journey would take him. As the years rolled on,
                • he was hailed as the man who "saved" Social Security--by extending its confiscatory power,
                • when Bill Clinton's State of the Union address called for socialized medicine, he rose to his feet, standing next to Hillary Clinton in giving a standing ovation to that proposal,
                • he became head of the mammothly anti-capitalist Federal Reserve, directing the government's manipulation of money and credit,
                • he provided a laudatory dust-jacket blurb for a book attacking Ayn Rand (by a woman he had "irrevocably" condemned in print in 1968). Yet he repeatedly refused to contribute to or lend his name to the Ayn Rand Institute,
                • he wrote, in 1995, that government central banking is a necessity: "Only a central bank, with unlimited power to create money can guarantee that such a process ["a cascading sequence of defaults"] will be thwarted before it becomes destructive." (Note that we just witnessed this "cascading sequence of defaults" despite --or, actually, caused by --our central bank.),
                • he wrote in his autobiography about coming to reject Objectivism: "as contradictions inherent in my new notions began to emerge . . . the fervor receded",
                • and now he has blamed free markets (as if we had them!) for his failures at the Fed. In conceding that his "ideology" was wrong, he was understood to be saying Ayn Rand was wrong--even though he had long ago forgotten or evaded every essential of what Ayn Rand stood for.


                How much did he forget? Consider this interview with him from a year ago:

                Fox Interviewer: "Now you were a great admirer, in fact an acolyte, of Ayn Rand, the great philosopher, who believed in the absolute most limited role that the government could play in people's lives. She probably wouldn't have been a fan of the Federal Reserve Board, would she?

                Greenspan: "Well, uh, I don't know, because we never discussed that in particular."

                He doesn't know that Ayn Rand opposed the Fed?! Every Objectivist knows it. The Fox Interviewer knew it. Anyone who can form a syllogism, and who knows Ayn Rand's major premises knew it. But Alan Greenspan doesn't, because, he claims, they never discussed that in particular. Okay, let's imagine that's true; they never discussed that in particular. But did they not discuss in all those years, the principle of individual rights? the proper functions of government? the fact that Atlas Shrugged advocates a gold standard? her famous dictum about the absolute separation of State and Economics? Did he not read the very book he published in--Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal?

                From "Common Fallacies About Capitalism," in that book:

                "All government intervention in the economy is based on the belief that economic laws need not operate, that principles of cause and effect can be suspended, that everything in existence is 'flexible' and 'malleable,' except a bureaucrat's whim, which is omnipotent; reality, logic, and economics must not be allowed to get in the way. This was the implicit premise that led to the establishment in 1913 of the Federal Reserve System . . ."

                Perhaps Greenspan would claim, absurdly, he never read that particular article. But look at his own article in CUI, "Gold and Economic Freedom":

                "But the process of cure was misdiagnosed as the disease: if shortage of bank reserves was causing a business decline--argued economic interventionists--why not find a way of supplying increased reserves to the banks so they never need be short! If banks can continue to loan money indefinitely--it was claimed--there need never be any slumps in business. And so the Federal Reserve System was organized in 1913."

                So his statement that "he never discussed that in particular" with Ayn Rand is either evidence of how much his evasions have automatized or is an outright lie.

                For a breath of fresh air, look at this analysis of the financial crisis:

                "The excess credit which the Fed pumped into the economy spilled over into the housing market--triggering a fantastic speculative boom. Belatedly, Alan Greenspan at the Federal Reserve tried to sop up the excess reserves and finally succeeded in braking the boom. But it was too late: by mid-2008 the speculative imbalances had become so overwhelming that the attempt precipitated a sharp retrenching and a consequent demoralizing of business confidence. As a result, the American economy collapsed."

                Pretty good summary, isn't it? Only it was written not about today but about 1929--by Alan Greenspan. I simply changed the dates, made it the housing market instead of the stock market, and inserted Greenspan's name. For the original, See his "Gold and Economic Freedom," in CUI, p. 101.

                Back to the Fox interview of a year ago:

                "But I think she [Ayn Rand] recognized that there are lots of institutions which we would be better without, but nonetheless probably require them if indeed society as a whole decides to do that. Remember, we live in a democratic society and that compromise is the very essence of a democratic society. Because if we're all individuals with different ideas and we want to live together we have to do that."

                This--about the world's most famous opponent of compromise? The woman who wrote:

                "In any compromise between food and poison, it is only death that can win. In any compromise between good and evil, it is only evil that can profit. In that transfusion of blood which drains the good to feed the evil, the compromiser is the transmitting rubber tube."

                (It is not a compromise to accede to the majority vote in a constitutionally limited republic. But Greenspan was not doing that, not merely acknowledging the political impossibility of abolishing the Fed, he was endorsing the Fed, running it (badly), and arguing for its necessity, as in his 1995 paper.)

                The essence of Greenspan's testimony is: "a wrong ideology was to blame, not me." What ideology? Well, in the popular mind it is Ayn Rand's.

                So the meaning, which certainly has been seized on by the commentators, is: Greenspan belatedly realized how foolish he has been to believe in Ayn Rand's philosophy. The ideology of freedom, as taught by Ayn Rand to Greenspan, is what caused the current financial catastrophe.

                What makes this especially revolting, is that the real destroyer of the economy is Greenspan, through his inflation-generating last years at the Fed.

                So a man who betrays Ayn Rand, and who wrecks the economy of the U.S. in carrying out that betrayal, then succeeds in shifting the blame onto Ayn Rand and capitalism.

                Not everyone is fooled by Greenspan. Note this interview on CNBC's "Power Lunch" today with two former Federal Reserve Governors: Wayne Angell and Robert Heller.

                CNBC reporter: Congress lately has been play the blame game, gentlemen. They had the hearings in the House Oversight Committee. Former Chairman Greenspan testified there. It got a little testy between him and Chairman Henry Waxman. Let's remember what they were saying to each other last week. Listen to this:

                [Video: of hearings:]

                Waxman: Your view of the world, your ideology was not right. It was not working.

                Greenspan: Precisely. No, that's precisely the reason I was shocked, because I've going for 40 years or more, with very considerable evidence that it was working exceptionally well.

                CNBC reporter: A pretty contrite Alan Greenspan there. Wayne Angell, do you blame him for the crisis we are in right now?

                Angell: Yes, but not for what he says he now has repentance on. His ideology was correct. Markets do work--as long as the Federal Reserve doesn't do any harm. But his Fed, policywise, did a great deal of harm, creating an unsustainable housing bubble, and the crash of that bubble was soon to follow. And that was what was wrong, not letting markets work.

                CNBC: In other words, keeping rates as low as he did for as long as he did?

                Angell: That's it.

                CNBC: Robert Heller, do you think so? Did he keep money too cheap for too long?

                Heller: That's right. And after that, the Fed then took rates very high, kept them high again. And that really pricked the bubble.

                Let's return for one final look at Greenspan's statement: "Those of us who have looked to the self-interest of lending institutions to protect shareholder's equity (myself especially) are in a state of shocked disbelief."

                What this means is: "I am shocked that lending institutions actually fell for the trap I set for them when I inflated the money supply." And, of course, the whole purpose of his inflating the money supply was to get them to behave just the way they did--to increase loans. So he is in shocked disbelief that faking the supply of credit actually had financial consequences.

                Once again he is saying, "I didn't fail; it was you people out there who failed; you believed in the reality of the faked credit I created--where was your self-interest in doing that?"

                It turns out that if you wrap bankers from head to toe in regulations, then spin them rapidly around for awhile, they then stagger around and walk into walls. Who'd have thought it? It is on this basis that Alan Greenspan finds a flaw in his ideology.

                If Greenspan had set out deliberately to destroy freedom, he couldn't have done a more thorough job of destruction.

                Comment


                • #38
                  Re: Free-Market Economics

                  Very beautiful article Yerazhishda. Very lucid! We must be clear in these troubled times when the media, pundits and ignorant laymen blame the "free market" for what is really the failure of the regulatory state.
                  Achkerov kute.

                  Comment


                  • #39
                    Re: Free-Market Economics

                    Jobarama: Obama's "Investment"

                    Daily Article by Chris Brown | Posted on 11/14/2008

                    With all of the talk of how charismatic Barack Obama is, or of his oratory ability—and especially given his recent presidential victory—it is time to engage in a deeper economic critique of Obama's actual policies. Once we see the true effects of his policies and the incentives they create, we will see that his leadership skills and abilities make him more of a threat to freedom than if he were less articulate.

                    In this article we will start with a small part of Obama's program to "create" jobs, with the aim of tackling poverty. We find the following claim on Obama's website:

                    Barack Obama will expand access to jobs. Obama and Biden will invest $1 billion over five years in transitional jobs and career pathway programs that implement proven methods of helping low-income Americans succeed in the workforce.
                    First, there is the use of the word "investment"—in true government Orwellian fashion—as a euphemism for government spending. Investment signifies an accumulation of savings through lower present consumption, which will then be used to achieve (potential) profitable returns in the future. Obama does not have $1 billion of his own money (even including campaign contributions) that he will be investing. Isn't it bizarre how the more money politicians say they are "investing," the more excited people get? Do people not realize that it is their money politicians are referring to? It is as if a thief approached you and, instead of demanding half of your money, said, "Since I really do care about you and your future, give me 90% of your money." Wouldn't it be better if Obama could say, "We are going to invest $10 and creates thousands of new jobs"? Talk about a return on investment.

                    Second, there is no non-arbitrary way to determine whether a government program makes a profit or a loss. Indeed, government typically does not "talk" in those terms. If a private company is making losses for whatever reason, it must change and innovate in order to make a profit or it will continually make losses and go out of business. But with the government, if a program is labeled as failing, it receives more money—just think of FEMA, the current bank crisis, or, no doubt, Obama's future jobs program.

                    In contrast, when private companies fail it is not a proof of market failure; on the contrary, it is proof the market is working. It is eliminating failure; in sharp contrast, the government promotes failure: if you want more of something, subsidize it. Government's solution to government failure is consistent with Mises's theory of intervention: government meddling seems to require more government involvement (and more money). And there is nothing as permanent as a temporary government program.

                    Continuing, we read the following from Obama's program:

                    Obama and Biden will create a transitional jobs program to place people with extreme difficulties getting and keeping good jobs into temporary, subsidized wage-paying jobs to gain necessary job skills before applying for unsubsidized jobs in the private and public sectors.
                    Those who are being coerced into subsidizing these jobs should expect more and continued taxation. Obama claims these jobs will be provided by both the private and public sectors. We can assume that politicians want to ensure and, more likely, reassure their voters, that this program is working. After all, it's a $1 billion investment, right? Well, if private companies aren't hiring these workers, obviously, what will probably happen will be more government (public) jobs. As for incentives, if someone is guaranteed a "subsidized wage-paying job," albeit a government one, then they will be less likely to search for an unsubsidized, less-secure job. The obvious effect of this would be fewer private-sector, productive, wealth-creating jobs, and more public-sector, unproductive, waste-creating jobs.

                    Government investment through taxation means taxpayers must lower their current levels of consumption and investment. As Murray Rothbard points out,

                    When capital investment takes place in the free market, it deprives no one of consumption goods; for those save who voluntarily choose investment over some present consumption. No one is required to sacrifice present consumption who does not wish to do so. As a result, the standard of living of everyone rises continually and smoothly as investment increases. But a Soviet or other system of compulsory investment lowers the standard of living of almost everyone, certainly in the near future.
                    Standards of living will decrease as there will be a shift from private production and exchange to political demagoguery, as well as taxes levied on the more efficient to subsidize the less efficient, but privileged, group. As with most government programs, this creates a caste conflict where one man or group benefits at the expense of another man or group. Thus we see government as the true originator of conflict in a society; whereas the market creates mutual harmony, the government engages in exploitation to achieve its ends.

                    While Austrian economists do not necessarily promote economic growth, it is recognized that true growth can only come through an increase in savings and investment by individuals in the free market, determined by how much they want to consume in the future compared to the present. On the other hand, government "investment" leads to either malinvestment or does not turn out to be an investment at all. An increase in government spending leads to an increase in (government) consumption and a decrease in (private) saving and investment. Thus we see Obama's jobs program will distort the market by shifting workers and resources from the private sector to the public sector, toward government ends rather than consumers'.

                    Jobs cannot be created by government fiat. While it is true that neither governments nor entrepreneurs have any way of perfectly forecasting the innovations that will take place in the future, there is, however, one enormous and fundamental difference: entrepreneurs are putting themselves at risk—not taxpayers. An entrepreneur can only originate funds from consumers and investors, i.e., individuals with an interest in the entrepreneur's success who anticipate a profit. Government, however, can extract funds by taxation and obtain them seemingly at whim. Therefore, the profit-and-loss test functions as a market mechanism to properly allocate funds. Without the requirement of obtaining goods through voluntary exchange, government can neither calculate nor allocate funds rationally.

                    Without a free price system and profit-and-loss criteria, says Rothbard,

                    [T]he government can only blunder along, blindly "investing" without being able to invest properly in the right fields, the right products, or the right places. A beautiful subway will be built, but no wheels will be available for the trains; a giant dam, but no copper for transmission lines, etc. These sudden surpluses and shortages, so characteristic of government planning, are the result of massive malinvestment by the government.
                    Obama's jobs program will lower the standard of living of nearly everyone in the near future. The solution to any of Obama's policies would be to eliminate all current and future government "investments."

                    Achkerov kute.

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                    • #40
                      Re: Political Islam

                      Thanks for pointing that out Anon, I was looking for a nicely summarized and diachronically analyzed argument against state interventionalism to attack the Lyndon Larouche cult with (they are fierce advocates of FDR policy).
                      Last edited by jgk3; 11-22-2008, 09:00 AM.

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