Resource Prosperity & Reducing Poverty

Here's another issue someone brought up to me.

What of monopolies? It's my understanding that Libertarianism think legal monopolies don't exist in a truly free market because as soon as they jack their prices, competitors will come swooping in.

This doesn't work with M$. Startups haven't been able to compete with them. Heck, Linux, a free product with arguably better quality and more features haven't been able to shake M$.

How would a libertarianism explain this situation? Is M$'s dominance fair?
 


Ar Scion said:
Here's another issue someone brought up to me.

What of monopolies? It's my understanding that Libertarianism think legal monopolies don't exist in a truly free market because as soon as they jack their prices, competitors will come swooping in.

This doesn't work with M$. Startups haven't been able to compete with them. Heck, Linux, a free product with arguably better quality and more features haven't been able to shake M$.

How would a libertarianism explain this situation? Is M$'s dominance fair?
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I believe they would say that Microsoft is dominating the market because they provide a quality product that people still want to purchase. A company that gains dominance in a market by providing goods and services that are needed and useful to consumers is not bad. It's when they gain it by government regulation, and are able to restrict supply to gain higher profits.
 
cheezile said:
I believe they would say that Microsoft is dominating the market because they provide a quality product that people still want to purchase. A company that gains dominance in a market by providing goods and services that are needed and useful to consumers is not bad. It's when they gain it by government regulation, and are able to restrict supply to gain higher profits.
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Thats true. Also most austrians look at patents/trademarks as government created BS. How do you think microsoft would do if they didnt patent the fuck out of their systems?
 
Microsoft's coup wasn't patents. It was getting the US government as their biggest client. That meant all government suppliers had to use Office and Windows. Which means that almost all computer training programs taught people Windows and Office.

Which trickled down to the home, both from business and the education sectors.

That said, patents and trademarks do not exist in a free market.
 
I am an econoob, but patents do give an incentive for major corporations to invest Billions of dollars into R&D which is one of the reasons for what america is Today. (not the America you are talking about but the America people look up to). Noone would be be willing to invest in a cure for Cancer if they won't be given the exclusive rights for the first "few" year. This is the classic argument of Pharma company Execs that economists have dissed for decades, but still... there is some truth to it.

Misuse of Patents and copyrights is another thing though.


Talking about Monopolies, the Internet, which is the last bastion of free markets seem to be full of monopolies, on in techcrunch speak, Winner-takes-all companies... Google, facebook, ebay, Amazon et al..

I am all for Free Economy, because where I come from, it can only do good.. but I do believe in some level of intervention.

I seriously don't know what Free market has to say about individual greed? Any pointers there?
 
Without digging into the argument too much since I'm short on time, the definition of rich and poor seems to vary most by the level of development in the country. The poor in Mexico are nothing like the poor in Canada, for example.

The thing that amuses me about poverty and government standards is this: If I were a single mother (which I'm not) and I had three kids (I only have two) and I was working on a teacher salary (which I obviously supplement with real income) - My kids and I would qualify for Free and Reduced Lunches provided by none other than the federal government. Considering this is the measure of Title 1 and a working definition of poverty in many areas, I - a teacher with two degrees and three kids with eight years of experience in the classroom - would be "poor." The same can be said for just about any job where you make less than $45k per year if you have multiple dependents.

Fortunately, I'm just a teacher with two degrees, two kids and a kick-ass writing career that allows me to teach because I actually enjoy teaching. I always take any poverty argument with a very, very large grain of salt.
 
blogspotter said:
I am an econoob, but patents do give an incentive for major corporations to invest Billions of dollars into R&D which is one of the reasons for what america is Today. (not the America you are talking about but the America people look up to). Noone would be be willing to invest in a cure for Cancer if they won't be given the exclusive rights for the first "few" year. This is the classic argument of Pharma company Execs that economists have dissed for decades, but still... there is some truth to it.

Misuse of Patents and copyrights is another thing though.


Talking about Monopolies, the Internet, which is the last bastion of free markets seem to be full of monopolies, on in techcrunch speak, Winner-takes-all companies... Google, facebook, ebay, Amazon et al..

I am all for Free Economy, because where I come from, it can only do good.. but I do believe in some level of intervention.

I seriously don't know what Free market has to say about individual greed? Any pointers there?
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Good argument. Patents provide enormous incentive to companies, allowing them to take enormous risks. Ultimately, consumer benefits.

But can we say we wouldn't have the same quality without patents?
 
Unarmed Gunman said:
And why don't we measure how many ounces of gold you could purchase (since gold is non-fiat) with your salary in 1970 and compare that to what you could purchase now. In those terms, the average family would have to be earning about $160k to have the same net worth now that they had in 1970. The average American family is pretty far south of that figure. The whole argument is built on a bullshit fiat currency model that fluctuates with the wind, so when you use real value figures (ie. gold, silver etc.) it completely falls apart. The fact is people work more and earn less now (in real terms) than they did 40 years ago. That's not "getting richer" no matter how many DVD players, AC units and cars they're making monthly payments to Chase for.
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+rep

This sums it up nicely and debunks the entire argument put forth by the videos.
 
Unarmed Gunman said:
And why don't we measure how many ounces of gold you could purchase (since gold is non-fiat) with your salary in 1970 and compare that to what you could purchase now. In those terms, the average family would have to be earning about $160k to have the same net worth now that they had in 1970. The average American family is pretty far south of that figure. The whole argument is built on a bullshit fiat currency model that fluctuates with the wind, so when you use real value figures (ie. gold, silver etc.) it completely falls apart. The fact is people work more and earn less now (in real terms) than they did 40 years ago. That's not "getting richer" no matter how many DVD players, AC units and cars they're making monthly payments to Chase for.
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But not nearly working as hard as they did 100 years ago...
 
lukep said:
Far be it for me to agree with UG, but I don't think the concept of the American Debt system has been introduced enough to this thread.

Sometime over the last 80 years, let's say gradually since the Great depression, Americans (alone, I believe) have been weaned off carrying cash and made to feel it was just fine and natural to carry a credit balance.

My parents were among the worst. My friends referred to them all the time growing up as "The Joneses" even though that's not our last name at all.

Their mortgage was like $4,500 every month (1985 dollars!) their numerous credit cards all had monthly minimum payments of around $400 each, they had two car notes, student & medical bills left over, and didn't feel one bit of pressure for it... They encouraged ME to rack up the debt and live in luxury as a student too because they were typical, stupid, american debt-slaves.

As you can guess they are in a tiny condo today after going through a couple of Bankruptcies. -I was lucky, and CCCS was able to get me out of the trouble they caused me during my college years.

Back to my point, the condition of being cool while straddling $100K+ debt loads over long periods of time is commonplace here, but would NEVER EVER FUCKING EVER be allowed to happen in the first place in any other country I've ever been to.

That makes our system unique, but says some bad things about what the American Dream really is.

So I'd have to say the condition of being poor here is something you can rarely point to on this continent. Lots of people who look like they've got a million dollars in the bank are really a million dollars in the hole, with creditors chasing them around.

Like Donald Trump was a decade ago... Yet he never ate a can of tuna for lunch, I'd bet.
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Can't believe I didn't catch this.

I think it's directly related to social changes.

We're so hung up on social status and quality of life we can't find American workers to do the bottom rung work, instead handing it to Mexicans. Even minimum wage earners are buying brand name shit and looking like supermodels. This constant desperate climb to the top is what fuels this sort of debt culture and somehow we're seeing people get fucked up. Not that economic theory has anything to do with this explanation.
 
I can start a new thread if you guys would like some info on patents and such. People obviously have invented things and continue to invent things daily without patent protection. What patents give (privilege for exclusive use) they also take away (prevention of more rapid development of an idea by everyone else).

It's a contentious issue even among libertarians, but the tide is starting to turn against the notion that humans need to be incentivized to progress. Our entire history is proof we do it naturally.

If we remove that justification for patents, we end up with basically restricting people from being able to innovate on existing innovations. The patent system really only makes lawyers wealthy IMO.
 
Ar Scion said:
Do it. I wanna figure this shit out.
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Will do in a couple hours.



Here is some food for thought re: exchange creating wealth

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OLHh9E5ilZ4"]YouTube - Matt Ridley: When ideas have sex[/ame]
 
guerilla said:
the tide is starting to turn against the notion that humans need to be incentivized to progress. Our entire history is proof we do it naturally.
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Curiosity. That which does not kill us makes us stronger. (smarter and richer)
 
guerilla said:
Can he substantiate that?

And I am really arguing with some dude on FB by proxy?
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"On the growth of income inequality and the decline/stagnancy of real individual wages but rise in household wages, and how this affects upward mobility: http://goo.gl/WLNwm

Wanna see some data yourself?

1) Go here: Top Picks (Most Requested Statistics) : U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
2) Check each option that says "Constant median weekly earnings."
3) Set the yearly range from 1979-2010: You'll find that the real wage hasn't changed for much at all for 30 years; for men, there's been a decline and for women there's been a gradual incline.

Also, go here: Top Picks (Most Requested Statistics) : U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics to see the rise in consumer price index for various goods (or all goods at once).

Here's a NYT graph showing the divergence between real wages and rising productivity over the last 30 or so years: The New York Times > Business > Image > Chart: Not Sharing in the Gains

That oughta be enough for you to chew on."
 
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