Is Free Market Good for Public? - tai_hn
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tai_hn
Some people seem to believe that markets need to be free. They are against
interference of the government to dictate what participants can or cannot do.
This concept of a free market generally leads the privatization of the
governmental function. They think therefore it’s best to deregulate as much as
possible.

I have to say that this is a ridiculous idea considering unfairness in our
society.

It is a proven fact that most rich people are rich for the simple reason that
they were born into a rich family, while most poor people will remain poor
throughout their lives simply because they were born into a poor family.
Imagine the world where education, healthcare, public safety, criminal
justice, national security and immigration are all up for sale(although it’s
already happening in some countries...). This makes our level of inequality
worse than ever because the more money can buy, the more affluence matters.

What we need to do is not to discuss about the extreme logic between
libertarianism and conservatism, but to decide what money should and should
NOT be able to buy.

Seems to me that free market believer doesn't realize that there IS a
regulation that they value because they take its legitimacy for granted. For
example, there are many things that we are not allowed to trade. Human slaves,
human organs, electoral votes, government job and legal decisions, university
places or uncertified medicines although they were legal before.

On top of drawing the boundary of the market, government needs to design the
rule to prevent corporations from behaving unethically. History tells us that
corporation behave unethically without interference of the government.
Actually, we have been fighting for that. Thanks to our ancestors, in a labor
market, it is not allowed to have a child labor, and a minimum wage is
protected by the government.

People who believe in free market merely oversimplify things to make it easy
to understand for them. What we truly need is a market with well-designed
rules.

~~~
conanbatt
I will answer seriously, but i must reprimand: you open up a post with a
question, and your first comment already scorns and shows contempt for one of
the two possible answers.

If you want to truly hear the other side, you can expose your opinion as well
as separate the issue at hand, being more inviting.

Also the question itself lacks specificity. Is saying "No" meaning that you
need to have a centralized market a.k.a. communism? Because if you are asking
"Is communism the best for the public" you will get a very different answers.

Be that as it may, I will still try to answer some points you raise here:

> It is a proven fact that most rich people are rich for the simple reason
> that they were born into a rich family, while most poor people will remain
> poor throughout their lives simply because they were born into a poor family

This is a given, but its not necessarily bad. In communism, everyone is born
poor! We all agree that we want the best for our own children, and thats
precisely what happens when you give your kid a house, a college education,
etc. That some are better taken care than others is not a drain on society in
anyway, its actually great.

> Imagine the world where education, healthcare, public safety, criminal
> justice, national security and immigration are all up for sale(although it’s
> already happening in some countries...). This makes our level of inequality
> worse than ever because the more money can buy, the more affluence matters.

All the things you say are always better for people with money than for people
without. Literally every single one. But that doesn't mean it makes inequality
worse, it can actually be making it less. A rich man that needs a security
guard incurs an expense that goes to someone that wouldn't have that job
otherwise. Or pays for a doctor that will devise a treatment that will be
useful for other patients as well, etc.

Regarding the insistent of inequality, i'd give you this thought exercise: do
you prefer everyone had 2 apples, or everyone had 3 apples and one person had
1 million apples?

> What we need to do is not to discuss about the extreme logic between
> libertarianism and conservatism, but to decide what money should and should
> NOT be able to buy.

That's your opinion. I personally do not trust governments with my money, so i
don't like them deciding what to do or not to do with my own labor. At least,
libertarianism is not forcing you to do anything.

> Seems to me that free market believer doesn't realize that there IS a
> regulation that they value because they take its legitimacy for granted. For
> example, there are many things that we are not allowed to trade. Human
> slaves, human organs, electoral votes, government job and legal decisions,
> university places or uncertified medicines although they were legal before.

Oh boy. Free markets is about the liberty of exchange between a buyer and a
seller, not the absence of law. Libertarianism is be very well against
slavery. Human organs is kind of interesting, and votes also (i personally
think votes should be able to be bought/sold, and can only imagine we think
ill of that because of things from the past). But overall, the free markets is
precisely about the rule of law and the absence of violence and coercion.

> On top of drawing the boundary of the market, government needs to design the
> rule to prevent corporations from behaving unethically. History tells us
> that corporation behave unethically without interference of the government.
> Actually, we have been fighting for that. Thanks to our ancestors, in a
> labor market, it is not allowed to have a child labor, and a minimum wage is
> protected by the government.

I once read about the case of street car companies complaining against
segregation law, because it was just not good business. Jim crow's laws were
designed by government, against the interests of corporations!

As I mentioned in the before post, libertarianism and free market ideologues
generally agree on the need of laws.

Labor laws is a can of worms for a discussion at this level, it can take a
long time to discuss: its been argued many times that minimum wage harms the
poorest, and i can assure you there are definite externalities to unions and
syndicates.

~~~
atmosx
You start your comment with: _I will answer seriously, but i must reprimand:
you open up a post with a question, and your first comment already scorns and
shows contempt for one of the two possible answers._

And then you go with: _In communism, everyone is born poor!_

Out of curiosity: Is an average kid born in Cuba poor compared to an average
kid in US or Europe? I understand that living without internet access to us,
is like living without oxygen, but I've heard that the _happiness index_ in
Cuba is pretty compared to US/EU. Their healthcare system for example, seems
to be orders of magnitudes better than the US or the NHS (UK).

ps. I'm taking Cuba and not former USSR countries on purpose. I believe that
Cuba had a more successful version of communism.

~~~
conanbatt
Granted, the phrase has some comedic exaggeration, but in our worldly
experience, communism may have reduced some extreme inequality(emphasis on
may, since the ruling class in communism is always pretty rich), but it did so
by decimating the middle class.

For all the comparisons of Cuba and other capitalist countries i will make one
argument that encompasses all the other: "See how people vote with their
feet". How many people move TO cuba and how many people move out OF cuba.

That should be enough to measure the relative expectation and standard of
living of Cuba and the US.

------
zach417
A free market is one where two or more parties are free to exchange goods and
services voluntarily, thereby determining prices through the forces of supply
and demand. The nature of these transactions must be voluntary in order for it
to be considered free market exchange.

So, in my view, your question the following: is there a time when two or more
parties wish to voluntarily exchange goods or services, but given the
circumstances of the exchange, government has a duty to forcibly intervene,
thereby preventing the exchange?

Many are tempted to point to fraud, pollution, or other unjust conduct as
evidence that the free market does not work. However, each of the examples
that one could give would involve an exchange where one or more parties _did
not_ voluntarily engage in that exchange, and therefore, the injured party
would have a right to seek damages from the offending party. In a free market,
I am no more justified in destroying your garden or selling you snake oil as a
cure for cancer than I am in any other market system.

Therefore, I maintain that there exists no exchange that warrants government
intervention given that all parties involved engage in the exchange
voluntarily. We should conclude that the free market is good for the public
and that it is the only market system that equally and evenly respects the
rights and autonomy of all members of society. To that point, I conjecture
that it is immoral to forcibly intervene in such an exchange since doing so
would obstruct the autonomy of two or more moral agents, which I believe to be
supported by Immanuel Kant's Categorical Imperative.

------
twobyfour
A free market is good for the public. An entirely unregulated market is not.

A lot of people, especially in the U.S., seem to have trouble understanding
that a regulated free market is in fact not an oxymoron. Others have trouble
with the notion that a regulated market is not the same as a command economy.

An unregulated market suffers from externalities; power and information
imbalances; prisoner's dilemmas; tragedies of the commons; and other failures
that are detrimental to the public.

These failures are more common in, and cause more problems in some sectors
than others. For instance, a free market doesn't do a great job of
distributing health care, and externalities distort an unregulated market for
energy; but market forces seem to do a pretty decent job when it comes to
production and distribution of clothing.

Moreover, a free market can over time result in socioeconomic inequality that
in the long run erodes its own consumer base.

So yes, for most (but not all) goods, a free market is better for the public
than a command economy. But a free market requires regulation and taxation in
order to remain robust and continue to be beneficial to the entirety of the
population it serves rather than just those at the top.

------
oldmancoyote
A free market is an example of a non-linear dynamical system. Chaotic
fluctuation is the most common expression of such a system. In my lifetime I
have seen the the U.S. economy fluctuate wildly. I have seen lives and
enterprises destroyed and families suffer great hardship and broken dreams,
and in contrast I have seen equivalent periods of wonderful prosperity.

How can you say that policies regarding a huge complex system like the economy
are "good" or "bad". Some situations are favored some are harmed. Even
comparisons _between_ policies are suspect.

There is no way to rationally sum up the net effect. Those who try are
expressing a political preference couched in terms of pseudo-economics.

A thoughtfully administrated mixed economy offers some hope of dealing with
these issues. There are no magic bullets.

------
ParameterOne
The free market should be questioned AFTER the current rules of said market is
questioned. Rules can create inequality quicker than anything else.

------
bbcbasic
In a truly free market with no government interference there would be no fiat
currency, no tax, no property laws, no central banks etc. The capitalists
would hate it.

Not saying I'd advocate that scenario.

