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 --- from list marxism-thaxis-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---
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