what do you expect for free?

lostinrates

ninky wrote: »

lir - why would someone of my thinking come onto this board other than to have their viewpoint challenged? what gets rather frustrating is when people turn attention away from attacking a viewpoint and instead attack the person with the viewpoint.

there is plenty of nonsense that gets posted on here that just gets ignored so if people think i am just posting nonsense (as has been suggested) then just ignore it - don't engage.

Ninky, I'm not pretending to second guess you. Only you know why you come here. You say its to be challenged, fair enough.

I enjoy your posts, because I find them fun and challenging. However, there are times where I feel like shouting or typing ''Ding'' after posts on such threads. I note we all, me included, tend to turn into caricature posts after the first couple of posts on a subject.

bendix

lostinrates wrote: »

Ninky, I'm not pretending to second guess you. Only you know why you come here. You say its to be challenged, fair enough.

I enjoy your posts, because I find them fun and challenging. However, there are times where I feel like shouting or typing ''Ding'' after posts on such threads. I note we all, me included, tend to turn into caricature posts after the first couple of posts on a subject.

Expresses my thoughts exactly. Now, i know I am a caricature here . . I deliberately play that up.

Curiously, I don't think ninky realises she is also, but for entirely different reasons.

These well meaning lefties are oh so serious all the time.

lostinrates

bendix wrote: »

Expresses my thoughts exactly. Now, i know I am a caricature here . . I deliberately play that up.

I do that sometimes. Treliac used to catch me at it though.

Mewbie also used to suss another game I played.

ninky_2

Generali wrote: »

Plenty. Building a house would be an example, so would planting a tree. Both create wealth as they allow for greater output/consumption in future.

Financing those things is a necessary precondition of creating the wealth (in the West at least) but isn't a part of creating the wealth IYSWIM.

so if the public sector buids a house or plants a tree it creates wealth?

to my mind wealth creation is creating abundance from scarcity through human endeavor. sort of.

Generali

ninky wrote: »

so if the public sector buids a house or plants a tree it creates wealth?

Yes it does.

The problem is that Governments very rarely use the most powerful tool for resource allocation which is the market. It is almost free in these days of abundant information and cheap processing power and provides very clear signals to buyers and sellers through the price mechanism. In doing so it tends to use resources less efficiently than is the case when those resources are allocated in a free market.

As a result, much Government spending, IMO, results in a net loss to the economy. They create wealth by planting the tree or building the house but more wealth is forgone in the private sector by the Government inefficiently using scarce resources. The economic theory underpinning this idea is called deadweight loss.

Clearly there are many, many exceptions but as a principle it is unarguable in any coherent way as all attempts to use non-market pricing for resource allocation systematically have failed catastrophically, often at the expense of millions of lives (eg collectivization by both Mao and Stalin, Mugabe's economic experiment, post-Empire India).

ninky wrote: »

to my mind wealth creation is creating abundance from scarcity through human endeavor. sort of.

Wealth is just another word for assets. It is what will create income in future either directly (eg planting a tree from which I can harvest apples or chop down and sell or use the wood) or indirectly (eg housing me so I don't have to pay rent to someone else).

That's a long way of agreeing with you I think.

ninky_2

Generali wrote: »

Yes it does.

The problem is that Governments very rarely use the most powerful tool for resource allocation which is the market. It is almost free in these days of abundant information and cheap processing power and provides very clear signals to buyers and sellers through the price mechanism. In doing so it tends to use resources less efficiently than is the case when those resources are allocated in a free market.

As a result, much Government spending, IMO, results in a net loss to the economy. They create wealth by planting the tree or building the house but more wealth is forgone in the private sector by the Government inefficiently using scarce resources. The economic theory underpinning this idea is called deadweight loss.

Clearly there are many, many exceptions but as a principle it is unarguable in any coherent way as all attempts to use non-market pricing for resource allocation systematically have failed catastrophically, often at the expense of millions of lives (eg collectivization by both Mao and Stalin, Mugabe's economic experiment, post-Empire India).

i think i understand what you are saying and i agree "the market" is an effecient way of distributing resources through effectively doing nothing - basically letting it happen.

i think what you are saying is that state intervention / control can lead to inefficiencies since it involves human judgement which can be wrong. however my view is that markets also involve human judgement (e.g. supply for perceived demand) and that can also be wrong / inefficient. stockpiles of excess / unwanted / unworn clothing are just one example of such inefficiency - all using labour and natural resources and creating waste.

it's also an amoral mechanism. that can create suffering and hardship imo.

ultimately it is all down to value judgements. on a pragmatic level i would err towards more state intervention than you. i think it's state intervention that makes us civilized. too much i agree has the opposite effect. however i suspect (hope) that neither of us is a raving extremist it's just a case of where the balance lies.

on a more philosophical level i do think that there may well be something beyond the socialism/capitalism dichotomy. not sure what it is though. you posted a link a while back that was very interesting about the origins of the money system. perhaps evolution has hardwired us to manage things the way we do. but evolution is a forever unfinished project imho and therefore our systems of management must be also.

bendix

That's more like it. That's the ninky I grew to admire - the thoughtful one, not the dogmatic sloganeer.

I'm intrigued by your Nietzsche quote. Putting aside for a moment the fact that he was a racist, anti-semitic woman-hater, can I assume that your attachment to all your favourite causes is less rigid than I might otherwise have thought?

ninky_2

bendix wrote: »

That's more like it. That's the ninky I grew to admire - the thoughtful one, not the dogmatic sloganeer.

I'm intrigued by your Nietzsche quote. Putting aside for a moment the fact that he was a racist, anti-semitic woman-hater, can I assume that your attachment to all your favourite causes is less rigid than I might otherwise have thought?

is that an olive branch of the bendix variety? okay accepted.

the nietzsche quote....i challenge my own thinking A LOT. however not only is it quite dull and wishy washy to do that in a debate context (at least i find it so) but the only way to see if something stands up to scrutiny is often to strengthen it until you find a breaking point.

you might not want to marry them but even racist anti-semite women haters can have good ideas. and the loveliest people can have quite ridiculous ones. unfortunately in our good / evil view of the world we frequently fail to see that.

bendix

ninky wrote: »

the nietzsche quote....i challenge my own thinking A LOT. however not only is it quite dull and wishy washy to do that in a debate context (at least i find it so) but the only way to see if something stands up to scrutiny is often to strengthen it until you find a breaking point.

.

Karl Popper - my intellectual idol - pushes pretty much the same line of reasoning.

You see, we're not that far apart really. I'm sure that if we met we'd get on fine. Hell, I'd even share a coffee with you, although in your case I suppose you'd want to make sure it was Fairtrade originated with soy milk if, indeed, you even drink coffee. I'm guessing you're more of a Chai Latte type, right?

:-0

ninky_2

bendix wrote: »

Karl Popper - my intellectual idol - pushes pretty much the same line of reasoning.

You see, we're not that far apart really. I'm sure that if we met we'd get on fine. Hell, I'd even share a coffee with you, although in your case I suppose you'd want to make sure it was Fairtrade originated with soy milk if, indeed, you even drink coffee. I'm guessing you're more of a Chai Latte type, right?

:-0

sometimes i even drink coffee from a large corporate chain in a disposable cup. single espresso two sugars.