
It’s a Wonderful Loaf - oli5679
http://wonderfulloaf.org/
======
russroberts613
I appreciate all the comments. There is always a question of what is a "free"
market. Government plays an important role in enforcing contracts and trying
to preserve private property. And as some people have pointed out here,
government subsidizes wheat, keeps out competition, and so on. Yet in many
cities with very different roles for government, bread is still plentiful.
What the poem tries to get at is the fundamental principal of emergence that
makes bread plentiful across diverse political environments. The most
important "free" part of those markets is allowing prices to adjust.
Governments that play with prices (Venezuela is the tragic example today) can
prevent the supply of bread from emerging.

For those who want to go deeper into these ideas there is an annotated version
of the poem here:
[http://wonderfulloaf.org/poem](http://wonderfulloaf.org/poem) and a long list
of essays, talks, and interviews on the ideas in the poem, here:
[http://wonderfulloaf.org/resources](http://wonderfulloaf.org/resources)

------
bko
> [Boris] Yeltsin, then 58, “roamed the aisles of Randall’s nodding his head
> in amazement,” wrote Asin. He told his fellow Russians in his entourage that
> if their people, who often must wait in line for most goods, saw the
> conditions of U.S. supermarkets, “there would be a revolution."

Supermarkets and food production are an excellent example of how markets work
effectively in Western countries. One of the great practical liberties gained
from those who escape state run economies is one of consumer choice.

[0] [http://blog.chron.com/thetexican/2014/04/when-boris-
yeltsin-...](http://blog.chron.com/thetexican/2014/04/when-boris-yeltsin-went-
grocery-shopping-in-clear-lake/)

~~~
dpwm
Oh yes. Food production is now dependent on a handful of companies supplying
to the major supermarkets. This became apparent recently in the UK when hummus
was contaminated with a yet unnamed contaminant that gave it a metallic taste.
Most supermarkets were affected and had empty shelves. [0]

Milk is another example: supermarkets have used milk as a loss leader to
entice people to shop with them for their weekly shop. Now farmers are being
squeezed. The bigger ones can invest in more automation, the poorer ones
cannot.

What happens when food production is concentrated in the hands of fewer
companies?

What happens when a supermarket chain decides that they can bring increased
efficiency to food production and farming by controlling from end to end.
Isn't that what Amazon has done with deliveries and Amazon Logistics?

Immediately there's an efficiency improvements and the cost of bread can
decrease. Competitors go out of business. But we're now dependant on one
source for bread. What method do they use to decide how much bread to produce?

This video presents an idealised version of capitalism and attacks a straw-man
of central planning. Crucially, it does not mention that during times of war,
when resources are scarce, that all that the video celebrates gets abandoned
and something that looks suspiciously like central planning gets adopted.

[0] [https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/apr/25/humour-
bypa...](https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/apr/25/humour-bypass-as-
houmous-runs-dry)

~~~
bko
I would argue that integrated markets and mutually beneficial trade are a big
reason countries don't go to war.

Markets are wonderfully adaptable, much more so that central planning. Don't
have to source right now but I read that Japan had supplied most of the US
rubber before ww2. After the war broke out and trading stopped, there was a
big incentive to develop a synthetic rubber, which was accomplished very
quickly.

~~~
dpwm
It is therefore a curiosity that the most free-market obsessed leaders appear
to be those most likely to pursue conflict.

How do you prevent monopolies? Ideas that lead to wealth decay or
redistribution seem to be an anathema in modern capitalist societies.
Regulation apparently stifles the market. How does the monopoly avoid
overproduction? Lean methodologies?

[edit] Edited too much out to the point where it seems curt. I'm interested in
free-market proponents' views on monopolies. Also, forgot to mention I found
the info about synthetic rubber to be particularly interesting -- Wikipedia
has more info including posters.

[0]
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthetic_rubber#World_War_I...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthetic_rubber#World_War_II)

~~~
bko
> It is therefore a curiosity that the most free-market obsessed leaders
> appear to be those most likely to pursue conflict.

Source?

List of ongoing armed conflicts [0]. Very little in relatively free-market
areas such as the US and Europe.

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ongoing_armed_conflict...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ongoing_armed_conflicts#/media/File:Ongoing_conflicts_around_the_world.svg)

~~~
macawfish
The U.S. and other leading colonial governments have interfered in foreign
governments for decades. Source: Noam Chomsky.

~~~
bko
Okay, compared to non-market economies that have been bastions of civil
liberties?

------
grndn
For a counterpoint, see the "Victorian Bakers" doc from the BBC:
[http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x4h8mty](http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x4h8mty).
See 11 min mark for bakery conditions and 23:30 for flour adulteration. The
free market at its finest with no regulation.

~~~
nickik
How is that a counterpoint? The video did not claim that during this nobody
would ever have bad working condition.

Also, what possible society could you imagen where during that time you could
support citis of a massivly growing population with a constant stream of bread
without people actually doing that sort of work.

Only because bread could actually be supplied to so many people was it ever
possible for Britain to grow so large in population and basically invent the
modern world.

------
scribu
It's a badly-rhymed, gushing praise of the "invisible hand".

I assume it's meant for indoctrinating children into free market ideology.

~~~
gavinpc
It's complete nonsense. Wizards? More like straw men.

Actually my four-year-old just walked in.

Me: How does bread get on the shelves?

Tremé: By people carrying them. I don't know how they get up. People lift them
and put them on the shelf.

Me: If they don't have the bread we like, what happens?

Tremé: Uh... they let... we would just eat them.

Me: What if a _lot_ of people said they didn't have the bread we liked?

Tremé: They would give bread to someone else that didn't have food, and they
would get their money to have a different kind of bread.

Me: Are there wizards?

Tremé: No.

~~~
oli5679
Your son seems smart!

------
bbayles
This video isn't my cup of tea, but Roberts' EconTalk podcast has been
educational and illuminating for over 10 years now - highly recommended.

------
macawfish
The bread example is funny, considering how heavily subsidized wheat is around
the world. So where's the creator of this video at in repealing the farm bill?

There's too much "market demand" for a farm bill that works for some farms and
not others. They have "bought" politicians who deliver what they "demand".

~~~
mhaymo
If you're genuinely interested, the writer of this poem, Russ Roberts, has in
fact interviewed Daniel Sumner on that very subject, and they discuss in
detail what subsidies exist in American agriculture, and the political
economies that make them difficult to repeal.

[http://www.econtalk.org/archives/2015/02/daniel_sumner_o.htm...](http://www.econtalk.org/archives/2015/02/daniel_sumner_o.html)

~~~
macawfish
Can't argue with that :)

------
macawfish
This video proves that mammon is still as much of a religion as its always
been.

------
ricardobeat
> True economic maestros are as rare as unicorns

Are they? In the sense of fantastical dreams of communism, yes, but I think we
are seeing proof every other week that the opposite is true. There is a
staggering amount of power concentrated on few individuals/families, carried
across generations.

------
psyc
Software plays a big role in making this more efficient at a huge scale.
Point-of-sale / inventory / logistics systems enable the supply chain to make
better use of all this free choice.

~~~
nickik
Well lots of technology is both invented and used to meet all these
challanges. Maschinery for mass production was also invented because you can
now sell to huge markets.

------
Pica_soO
Taking a bread loaf. What a horrible choice. If anything is as far away from a
free market - its the food and power supply markets.

There are incentives by near all states for constant overproduction. The
remainder is shipped off as animal-food or gift to poor countries (basically
produce bound charity). And that's just the farmers. The millers have vanished
in Germany over the last 20 years until there where just a few left. Those few
do stuff with the flour to get it up to decent "quality" >>
[https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mehl#Zusatzstoffe_.28Mehlbehan...](https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mehl#Zusatzstoffe_.28Mehlbehandlungsmittel.29)

Now its reached the baker, one of those jobs i did before i learned to code.
Let me assure you, that the market will not cover you, if you are to exotic
and small. We had one customer asking for gluten free bread- and my boss said
no, cause it would have become ridiculous expensive and the customer was
unwilling to pay more. By now super-markets have the stuff, but its produced
by factory bakery's. Which are quite "something" if you listened in on the
chat among those who learned baker there. Production has to roll no matter
what. Mice squished dead in the bun machine? Kärcher to the rescue, steam and
water - and go. Adding cheap substances, instead of expensive ones - surely
the market would behave against that.

The invisible hand also doesn't regulate for invisible effects. Alot of
shortsighted agents result in shortsighted behavior. My current boss, a really
nice guy, has wrestled for years with chronic skin inflammation- and wonder of
wonders, it vanishes if he did not buy factory products- try it- buy the raw
ingredients and produce your own food.

So yeah, the health of the customer is a secondary concern, if the state is
not watching - as in the US. Food Diseases taking out every 1000 Person- the
invisible hand gives you the invisible thumbs up for that.
[https://wwwn.cdc.gov/foodborneoutbreaks/](https://wwwn.cdc.gov/foodborneoutbreaks/)

Poor flour, with lots of ergot, that's okay as long as you dont get caught, if
you dislike that - talk to the hand. You can market it as bio- and in that
case your customers are lucky, if your field is next to a conventional farm,
getting windswept by fungicides.

So, after carefully thinking- and comparing it with reality, this video must
be a parody.

~~~
bko
Your arguments against markets can be boiled down to:

1\. It's not actually a TRUE free market, which is tough to argue but
seemingly would invalidate all your next points. I think "free" is a relative
term compared to the state-run model of food production.

2\. Gluten free bread was not available in your bakery because it was too
expensive and customer was unwilling to pay more (markets working). But gluten
free bread is available at other retailers (markets working again)

3\. Cheap ingredients are bad and more expensive ingredients are worth the
extra cost, which is really a value judgement that you are free to make by
buying bread from your baker (markets working)

4\. Market doesn't regulate "invisible effects" but you don't state any
support that the alternative (presumably food czar) would be able to capture
"invisible effects"

5\. Food safety is more of a concern and better managed by some "food czar"
than the individuals effected. When in practice, food safety is better managed
by a "last time I ate this I got sick" approach to choice. Food safety is much
better in market economies.

Overall, the main problem with your argument is that it compares market
conditions to a perfect ideal without any account for cost and practicality

~~~
Pica_soO
1\. The argument for constant overproduction, and non-availability of a real
free market is called: starvation. If to many farmers give up, and speculants
on futures can hold grain back, people starve. Has happened several times. One
could argue, that this has positive outcomes as well- ideologues are less
energetic on a purely capitalistic diet. PS: Because there is always a counter
example that markets could work- here is one:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emperor_Norton](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emperor_Norton)

2\. That example is one of a working market yes. But as you can see in
medicine for rare diseases, no, not everybody gets a chance to buy what they
need. In a pure free market, you have to pray for a rich person to get the
same exotic sickness as you, to get help.

3\. Yes, but the result of those wrong micro-judgments, piles via insurance
upon society. Or its getting paid by having horrendous security payments, to
keep those struck with the avalanche of their bad decisions, becoming poor
from taking whats yours (The US approach).

4\. Invisible effects, which i stated a nice example and you in intellectual
dishonesty submitted, include very small accumulating negative effects or
negative effects on the allmende, which come back later.

5\. No, the food czar can be gambled too. I heard from some colleagues how in
factory bakery's, when the health inspector arrives, clothing is adjusted and
other violating points are "fixed" for the time of the inspection. But there
is room for improvement there. In a free market, if all bakers just agree on
the lowest common level of product, they churn out health bomb after health
bomb and nothing happens to them. At which point i presume you would point to
the jurisdiction of the nightwatch state- which by virtue of the free market
could be bribed out of existence.

My perfect ideal is not very perfect, its just a acknowledge that there must
be machinery that reigns in corroding elements, while leaving the positive
aspects of the market largely intact.

I will leave you with the nice results a free market has created, and which
you will hail as a great opportunity to sell health apps and bypass surgery.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obesity_in_the_United_States](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obesity_in_the_United_States)

I may take the right with others so inclined to opt-out this ideology.

~~~
woah
You make a good point. Communist countries tend not to have a lot of obesity.

~~~
Pica_soO
Eh, i m not arguing pro communism, im arguing for some bureaucratic oversight
as it happens in the EU and Germany.

Its fascinating that fanatics always see just the other extreme. There are
shades of grey, and i m arguing for a quite sophisticated machinery printed in
black and white - in such a fashion that it looks grey if zoomed out enough.

