It is not either/or on markets but
whether markets can clean up their act around the lack of availability of
resources for each person's talents i.e. the reason for their fulfillment
in life, wether there can be equality or whether both inequality and oppression
are built into the motivation for the Bazaar mentality and without which
everyone in that mentality would stay home and play with their children.
The market is incredibly wasteful as well, which surprises me everytime
you defend it.
. pg 148:
"The state of nature [including humans] contains billions of prisoner's dilemmas. The market does not make any of these go away. It simply creates a layer of incentives that keep them under control. But beneath this layer, there is still a simmering cauldron of anti-social behaviour just waiting for the opportunity to break through."
This is in the context of respecting the property rights of others, which, without rules, laws, governance, dis-incentives...much theft and free-riding occurs. He next discusses trust as far more efficient (ex. dealing with close family members in business as opposed to toatal strangers. Also, sometimes permitting minor theft (pens, paper clips, copy machine usage ...in offices) is more efficient than attempting strict enforcement.
The market is incredibly wasteful as well, which surprises me everytime you defend it.
Try to envisage doing without it! It is necessary in complex societies/economies.
Artistry demands balance and the exact marshalling of the forces involved in the art or it is bad art.Subjective evaluation, perhaps. But he agrees with both of us here using beauty/ugly of urban & suburbab areas of US ( parts of Canada fit too) :
Pg. 141
" It is hard to think of any great civilization in the history of the world that has so systematically failed to invest its wealth in the creation of beauty. This is not just an outsiders prejudice either. Americans complain about it just as much....The explanation is simple. The material prosperity of Americans is due to the relatively unrestricted operations of the marketb economy...It can cost alot of money to make buildings beautiful. Once they are built, their beauty can be enjoyed for free by anyone...Thus the 3enjoyment we get...is largely a positive externality. As we have seen, market economies systematically underproduce goods with positive externalities.(free to consumers, SK) And so beauty suffers."
We create and play within self- created Universes, markets create little and muck around in this one. The basic type of "needs" mentality that creates the need for more children to protect your wife and old age is the root of much of the over-population. That same "needs" aesthetic is what drives the market, ALL markets that I know or have seen described on this and other lists. So I think it is hollow at the core and until you deal with that shibboleth it will go nowhere. What do you think?
You seem to want all or nothing. Unrealistic. It is the social contracts restricting free markets which yield efficiency in combination in his (& my) view.
More in a few days.
Steve
-- http://magma.ca/~gpco/ http://www.scientists4pr.org/ Anyone who believes exponential growth can go on forever in a finite world is either a madman or an economist.—Kenneth Boulding
