File spoon-archives/marxism-thaxis.archive/marxism-thaxis_1997/97-02-10.192, message 75


From: davidmbr-AT-sprynet.com
Date: Wed, 29 Jan 1997 09:57:42 -0800
Subject: Re: M-TH: Free association, monopolies and markets


"Doesn't the fact that we (in the First World) haven't had a
depression in 60 years serve as any evidence that the state can do
something to stabilize capitalism?"

Doesn't the fact that government credit expansion and interventionism caused the 
Great Depression in the first place, and the fact that Roosevelt's expanding 
interventionist response elongated it into a ten-year slump, serve as evidence 
that individuals are better off without arbitrary burdens and restrictions 
hobbling their ability to plan and cope, and stealing what they've earned fair 
and square?

I agree that anarchism is baloney; there can be no proper competition between a 
just application of physical force and an unjust and irrational application of 
force.  The Mafia and the Libyans do not have a right to offer their competing 
product and see how well it can do in the open market.

But if anarchism is outlawed, that doesn't mean anything by government is 
permitted.  Essentially, government can do two things: protect rights to life, 
property and liberty; or violate those same rights.  When it protects those 
rights, it acts against theft and fraud, including any fraudulent claims by 
private banks.  A free competition among banks would, of course, generate a 
reputational reward for trustworthiness, just as such a feature arises among 
other types of vendors today; otherwise no such bank would be able to obtain any 
certain business.  But even if one wants to conclude that private banking is 
somehow untenable--is the only possible alternative the Fed system under which 
money supply and credit is expanded at will, progressively stealing the buying 
power of greenback holders?

Capitalism is a system of economic freedom, in which property--including the 
dread means of production--is privately owned and controlled.  If you want to 
"stabilize" such a system, you ensure that people are able to make plans and 
reap rewards from those plans without coercive interference from others.  You 
don't throw them in jail for cleaning up a puddle on their own property or for 
hiring somebody at a wage below an arbitrarily declared "minimum."  You ensure 
that people have the freedom to act on their own behalf and to cooperate with 
others, and you don't threaten them with jail for acting on their own judgment 
or for offering alternatives to fiat money or surly postal delivery.

The production of wealth in this country, the general level of 
self-responsibility, the sense of hope and well-being, the opportunities for the 
future would be far greater today for everyone, including the poor, if we had 
not had to contend with all the burgeoning taxes, arbitrary regulations and 
compliance requirements, price controls, etc. of the last sixty years so vaunted 
by the champions of government oppression.  All you have to do is relate each 
control to the individual who is being unnecessarily burdened and constrained by 
it, and you will recognize the immediate and incontrovertible harm it imposes.

We know that freedom works.  We know that capitalism works.  We know that it is 
wrong and immoral to beat people up and steal from them, and that it is better 
to cooperate and be honest.  Let's act on this knowledge.  Let's not give the 
STate a license to do things that we would never even think of doing in our own 
private lives.

David M. Brown
davidmbr-AT-sprynet.com




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