Who said the following about self-interest and the market place?

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   My Esotericposted 10 years ago

   "It was because of the self-interest of [certain] individuals or groups of producers were often at odds with the public interest that the proper task of legislatures who are concerned with the public interest to prevent individuals or groups of people from short-circuiting the market mechinism, and to prevent them from doing that despite the fact that there would be organized economic interests trying to protect themselves from market competition." (paraphrased}

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      Quilligrapherposted 10 years agoin reply to this

      Obviously, someone who never learned about run on sentences.
      

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         My Esotericposted 10 years agoin reply to this

         Yeah, that is a point for sure. I did some paraphrasing, however; it was two sentences once, but it made no sense so I cut out a few words and joined them.

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      My Esotericposted 10 years agoin reply to this

      OK, the answer is ... ADAM SMITH.

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         Quilligrapherposted 10 years agoin reply to this

         As the only person who is following this thread, I thank you on behalf of everyone who is not. 
         

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            My Esotericposted 10 years agoin reply to this

            LOL, I appreciate that.

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   Kathryn L Hillposted 10 years ago

   Questions:
   1. What are organized economic interests/forces and what are they protecting?
   2. How do self-interested producers "short circuit" market mechanisms?
   3. How do/can/should (?) legislatures prevent self-interested producers from short circuiting market mechanisms?
   4. What is a market mechanism?
   
   4.) market mechanism:
   Market mechanism is a term from economics referring to the use of money exchanged by buyers and sellers with an open and understood system of value and time trade-offs to produce the best distribution of goods and services. The use of the market mechanism imply in a free market; there can be captive or controlled markets that seek to use supply and demand, or some other form of charging for scarcity, both in social situations and engineering. This is a main term when it comes to marketing in economics. In this, we have three types of economy free market economy, command or planned economy and mixed economy. In free market economy, all the resources are allocated by private sector (individuals, households, and groups of individuals); in planned economy, all the resources are owned by the public sector (local and central government); and, in mixed economy, the resources are owned by both private and public sector. Resources are allocated by private sector (individuals, households, and groups of individuals); in planned economy, all the resources are owned by the public sector (local and central government); and, in mixed economy, the resources are owned by both private and public sector. Resources are allocated according to the forces of demand and supply, and this is known as market mechanism.

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      My Esotericposted 10 years agoin reply to this

      Ahhh, a third voice, thanks.
      
      1. Adam Smith provides many examples of businesses and guilds who collude to protect and increase their profits.
      
      2. Adam Smith give multiple examples of how businessmen of his day, just like they do today, combine to limit wages to certain levels, fix prices, divvy up territory into local monopolies, and a myriad of other ways to increase profits by by-passing the free-market market mechanism.  In response to the wage limits, workers fought back with guilds who pushed wages up in limited sectors.
      
      3.  As they have done in America since about the time of President Teddy Roosevelt, earlier attempts were killed by a conservative Supreme Court, by enacting laws that attempt to prohibit business from abusing their superior strength and position and employing anti-free market tactics and strategies and allowing organization of labor to protect itself.  Since 1980, however, Conservatives have been successful of rolling back many of those protections.  (For the most part, Great Britain ignored Adam Smith for a long time as Parliament was owned by Big Business and protectionism (another thing Adam Smith railed against) was thought to be a great thing, a proxy to actual war in fact..

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   Kathryn L Hillposted 10 years ago

   Adam Smith
   (1723–90), Scottish economist and philosopher. Often regarded as the founder of modern economics, he advocated minimal state interference in economic matters and discredited mercantilism. His works include Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (1776).
   
   "The Wealth of Nations" (1776) is widely credited with laying the theoretical and philosophical foundations for capitalism. The work had an immediate impact on economic thinking, in light of its arguments for the freedom of trade. "The Wealth of Nations" is far more than a treatise of economic theory, however. In this work Smith presents a powerful blueprint for a stable and peaceful society which rests upon a hard-headed and realistic assessment of humans and their natures.
   
   
   http://www.amazon.com/Wealth-Nations-Li … 0760757615

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      My Esotericposted 10 years agoin reply to this

      The first definition is the myth of Adam Smith, the second is quite correct.  The paraphrase I began this Forum with is from a 26-part lecture on Capitalism, 3 or 4 of which are devoted to Adam Smith.  The myth is that Smith was a believer in laissez-faire private-gov't relationship; the fact is, he wasn't as the professor easily demonstrated with several quotes from Smith's books.
      
      Instead, Smith was for enough government interference to quash the shenanigans of private business moguls trying to by-pass the free-market mechanism. Something our gov't hasn't learned except for the periods 1903-1917, 1937 - 1980, and 2009 - present.

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         Kathryn L Hillposted 10 years agoin reply to this

         Checks on greed?  Have they been let go of? or not? Or what is your point?

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            My Esotericposted 10 years agoin reply to this

            Yes, they have, in a big way.  The one that has caused the most short-term harm was the repeal of the 1937 Glass-Steagall Act in 2000 and related regulations before and after that date.  That move alone set the stage for the 2008 Great Recession.
            
            The Feds used to be much more strict in letting major segment of an industry merge; today, they basically never say no.  That is why we are near an oligopoly in the airline industry as well as in the telephone industry. 
            
            The high marginal tax rates on estates and very high incomes were abolished which stopped the transfer of wealth from the lower and middle income to the higher income back down the chain.  At the same time, effective tax rates were increased on the low-middle and middle class incomes.  Consequently, since the 80s, disparity in incomes between the top 10% and the bottom 90% have been increasing at an increasing rate.  Those taxes were also a negative incentive to the exorbitant unearned, undeserved salaries some CEO's and senior Executives are paying themselves.
            
            Conservatives are doing everything in their power to roll back environmental regulations to pre-EPA days.
            
            Conservatives are doing everything in their power to not prepare for the man-made, early on-set of Global warming because "it will cost too much money in the short-term" (greed).  Of course they give no nevermind to the 100x more cost and lives disrupted and lost in the long-term when it comes to pass they were wrong, and they are wrong.
            
            Business, beginning in the 80s were deregulated wholesale in the name of laissez-faire without taking a close look at the likely outcomes of such a move.  For example, we have our shoddy healthcare system as a result.  Another outcome is, I don't want to fly anymore, the experience has become so terrible (no passenger bill of rights).  I drive or take the train when I can, inconvenient to be sure, but still more preferable; and I really used to like flying.  Hell, I even don't go on occasion because the thought of flying is so off-putting.
            
            I think the transportation industry is one place where it worked.  The jury is still out for me on utilities.  But what died with regulation, is accountability by private industry.  They can get away with ripping off, maiming, and killing the public with their products and often have government, the one that is supposed to protect the People, protect them instead.  Except for a short period of time in our history, that has always been the case.
            
            Lincoln got it wrong.  It isn't For the People, By the People, and Of the People; instead it is Of the People, By the Corporations, and For the Corporations.

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               Kathryn L Hillposted 10 years agoin reply to this

               What should the conservatives be doing about Global warming?

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                  My Esotericposted 10 years agoin reply to this

                  Supporting measures to reduce the carbon emissions and other contributors that man is putting into the air, for starters.
                  
                  It is a given, with the damage already done, territorial United States will shrink in size by 2100, just a mere 86 years away; children born today will live through it.  The cost of relocation alone will be mind-boggling; just think how many people and oil refineries are going to have to move as the ocean reclaims the coast.  Will New Orleans be given up to the sea or will they build higher walls?
                  
                  If Conservatives had joined the fight 50 years ago, when the flags were being raised, this scenario might not have been a foregone conclusion.

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                     Kathryn L Hillposted 10 years agoin reply to this

                     What do you think about nuclear power plants?
                     Russia is building one for Turkey and charging Turkey for the electricity. Turkey desperately needs power and so agreed. Heaven help Turkey if something goes wrong… which the Russians have assured them it won't.  But, what happened in Japan?  I think even Japan is considering doing the same thing as Turkey!
                     
                     - not Lithuania, although they also need a source of power… They do not trust Russia that much.
                     
                     Every one wants a comfortable life… will we use up the earth's supply of oil and uranium eventually 
                     and then…
                     "back to the bad 'ol days.
                     we used to know…" JT

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                        My Esotericposted 10 years agoin reply to this

                        Actually, I favor nuclear energy.  If we could ever get over the politics of how and where to transport and bury the waste, I think safe methods are available.  In time, one or two things will happen, 1) they will finally have a breakthrough on fusion energy, which I think will happen in my lifetime (I'm 67) and/or 2) they will find a way to breakdown the by-products into inert elements or find a way to safely reuse them (I think I will be dead by then).

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               wildernessposted 10 years agoin reply to this

               "They can get away with ripping off, maiming, and killing the public with their products and often have government, the one that is supposed to protect the People, protect them instead"
               
               Do you require industry to be 100% perfect in all production?
               100% oriented on safety without regard to cost?
               Do you hold industry responsible for stupid actions by product owners (using a sawzall as a sex toy, or an extension ladder as a scaffold)?
               
               Give credit where due; American products are in general at least as safe as anything in the world. That errors are made in production, that cost IS a consideration in safety and that stupid people do stupid things is normal.

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                  My Esotericposted 10 years agoin reply to this

                  Nope I don't and nope I don't, but my statement still stands.. If business knowing makes one unsafe product, then that is one too many.  I am not talking about products that ended up unsafe or deadly because there was no way of knowing at the time they were produced.  But, I am talking about those where the companies either knew they were dangerous, should have known they were dangerous, or found out they were dangerous and hid that knowledge while keeping the products on the market. 
                  
                  To name a few of the very big ones:
                  - Tobacco
                  - Asbestos
                  - GM ignition switches
                  - Ford Pinto defective fuel system
                  - The many environmental pollution convictions for knowingly contaminating land and ground water.
                  
                  From an Santa Clara University Markkula Center for Applied Ethics, we have this statement: 
                  
                  "Every year, 34 million people are injured or killed as a result of product related accidents. Such injuries are the major cause of death for people between the ages of 1 and 36, outnumbering deaths from cancer or heart disease. The estimated cost of these injuries is $12 billion annually."
                  
                  While there are many good, ethical, play by the rules businesses in America, there are many that are not and they have been responsible for tens of thousands of deaths and an uncountable number of injuries to employees and consumers since the 1800s

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                     wildernessposted 10 years agoin reply to this

                     Tobacco - would you then put corporations in the position of playing nanny and moral enforcer to a citizenry that wants something that someone, somewhere, deems dangerous to them?  I have a real problem with this.
                     
                     Cars are inherently dangerous and kill people, just as ladders are the #1 cause of workplace accidents.  Should corporations refuse to produce either, then, because of that?  I do recognize that there are a few cases where known defects are allowed to remain because of the cost, and abhor the practice, but also recognize that cost vs safety is always a part of the equation.  Disregarding for the moment those cases where a small defect will cause a large number of deaths/injuries (rare), do you expect companies to put safety ahead of cost in all cases?  That will make cars (and ladders for that matter) unattainable for most people and/or unusable for the purpose they are purchased for. 
                     
                     For instance, we could limit cars to 5 mph, radar controlled and built like tanks, and eliminate virtually all injuries, but they will no longer be of any value to anyone.  Any manufacturing defects that slip in won't matter then - safety has been guaranteed but at what cost?

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                        My Esotericposted 10 years agoin reply to this

                        You bet I would hold companies grossly negligent if they knew, without revealing, the deadly nature of their product and changed the formulation to make it deadlier and more addictive.  There should have been a few hundred tobacco executives and CEO that went to jail and paid enormous personal fines over that fiasco.
                        
                        Why you and others on the Right always want to let business off the hook entirely or, at most with a slap on the wrist, for doing very bad things to the human race and our planet is beyond me; but the fact is, you do.  You seem to want 100% of the blame to always fall on the consumer when if fact, in many cases, 99% belongs to the manufacturer and/or retailer or service provider.  Can you tell me why that is?
                        
                        Of course cars are inherently dangerous, but why do you let GM off the hook when they make it more dangerous with defective ignition switches which they know are deadly and refuse to tell anybody about it or to fix it.  Why is that OK with you?
                        
                        There are more than a 'few" cases; there are thousands upon thousands in America over the last two hundred years.  And, one thing you can count on, besides death and taxes, is that when they find out about it, the large majority of large companies will cover it up, keep it secret, hope nobody figures it out, and then litigate the hell out of it in order to not accept blame.
                        
                        You have at one time or another;
                        - All of your car companies
                        - All of your large chemical manufactures
                        - Most of your large financial institutions
                        - Most of your major insurance companies
                        - All of those companies whose by-products can pollute the environment
                        - Shall I go on?
                        
                        One thing that would help solve the problem is prohibit confidentiality agreements when suits are settled out of court so that the huge volume of the problems can be brought into the sunlight.
                        
                        This statement "do you expect companies to put safety ahead of cost in all cases?" tells me you have a limit on the value of a human life, be it an adult, child, or baby.  You bet I do.  If they can't make a safe product at a profitable cost, then they shouldn't make it.  That is the moral and ethical thing to do.

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