Sorry for the delayed response. I got a bit busy this week, and didn't have the time/energy to dedicate that a response of this sort deserves. Thanks for your patience.

Your response suggests an adoption to Marxism which, in my opinion, is unmatched in the level of suffering it has caused, but leaving that aside...
In response to your bullet points:

#1. "ever wonder why there is an economics course and a business admin course? there is a reason for that.one is theory the other practical application. and economists get it wrong...and often."

This is the kind of thing Paul Krugman often says, and it's flat wrong. To the extent we have a free market, we have a successful exchange of goods and services at a fair and competitive price. To the extent to which we have socialism, with central planners, and governmental regulation, we have cronyism, plutocratic kleptocracy, and failure. The Austrian school of economics does a very good job of explaining -- step by step in a manner in which you can follow along using deductive logic, how such contradictions come about. Entrepreneurs are to Austrian economists as artists are to the best of art/literary critics. There's no discrepancy between theory and practice. They can clearly and accurately describe what entrepreneurs are doing. Unless you have studied Mises, you'll probably have little to no good idea as to what economics is or what it can or cannot do.

#2: fascism is, in fact, a type of socialism because it follows a socialist economic model.

#3: Yes, I've thought it through. Explain to me specifically how you arrived at your conclusions. Otherwise, you're just making assertions.

> "france is a democracy. they have capitalism AND
> socialism."

France has a mix of capitalism and socialism, not unlike the U.S. Again, to the degree that France has a free market, things work and to the degree that they have socialism, the problems arise and get worse, as they/we are seeing now. To the degree that they are socialist, they are a failure. Socialism is unsustainable because you have no economic calculation. (And the European Union, which includes France, is failing -- in case you haven't noticed. This video can provide you with the data you need to understand this.)

Socialism is planned chaos because the issue of economic calculation (and its absence) gets glossed over. The EU is partially socialist -- it's a mix -- so it can somewhat slow down the effects of socialist chaos, unlike full-blown socialist systems. But it is increasingly more socialist and the chaos increases.
To deal with this planned chaos, these mixed systems rely on Lord Keynes' theories and policies of credit expansion, which equates to basically "throwing money" at the problem.
But, (as the Keynes/Hayek rap video says) "there's a boom and bust cycle and good reason to fear it!"

(Quite honestly, I'm surprised that you're not for establishing stable rules for the banks. You know, so that they're no longer able to extend money/credit that they don't have without being charged with fraud.
Because if you were for such banking rules, then you would no longer support the Keynesian approaches upon which your ideology is resting. Personally, I think money and credit needs rules and, for this reason, I don't support socialism or central planning in the absence of economic calculation, which is only possible within a free market system.)

The credit expansion expands the circumference of the boom and bust cycle, slowing it down, extending the boom period, but setting things up for a worse bust. It's all very predictable. If some are still not convinced about Europe's failure, it is because even as bad as things are, the bust has not really hit. Yet, it will. Eventually.

Unlike the Dollar, the Euro is not the world's reserve currency, and there is no petro-euro like there is a petro-dollar. So Europe cannot delay the bust in the manner that the U.S. can. On the other hand, thanks to German objections, the credit expansion in Europe has not gone as high as in the U.S. so their bust may not be as disastrous as it can be for the U.S.

The boom and bust cycle cannot occur in an anarchy because you need a central bank with powers of credit expansion to make it happen.
The alternative explanation, the "animal spirits" (a la Lord Keynes) posits that all businesses suddenly make mistakes at the same time, and/or all consumers at the same time decide to stop buying, causing the bust. I doubt it. That's no explanation at all.

> "my point is that health care should be a collective project
> but i believe i also entertained a free market solution as well."

I think you need to define what you mean by "collective" because the free market is as collective as it gets. I don't think you grasp what the free market means (i.e., voluntary interactions that allow for economic calculation and involve zero violence, allowing for better service and cheaper prices). Unless you understand this, no further discussion will lead to very much.

You say some things should be done collectively. I say many things must be done collectively. That's the basic premise of Austrian economics, the division of labor. You cannot do everything yourself. That's one reason I say that the free market economy is as collective as it gets.

> "i am a dissident. an anarchist."

If you're an anarchist, then you don't believe in government, by definition. So you can't be a socialist, as socialism requires a government to manage things. Without government, the only thing left is voluntary exchanges, which is the definition of a free market, economic capitalism (not to be confused with sociological capitalism).

You shouldn't rely on economists to tell you how things are. See for yourself. Again, only the Austrian school (that I know of) enables you to follow deductively on your own and make rational sense of the market activity.

You say economists are "probably wrong." How do you know? Economics isn't mysterious heuristics and sociological prophesy. It's like mathematics. You don't need to "believe" me that 2 + 2 = 4. You can deduce it for yourself.

I think that if you can learn a few basic economic lessons (which you can easily verify for yourself), you'll understand better where I'm coming from. (Then you'll be a coherent anarchist and not sound so confused ).

If you are an "anarchist," then who do you want administering things if not the government?

Hayek was much more of an anarchist (again, the rap video:
"The question is who plans for whom? Do I plan for myself, or leave it to you? I want plans by the many, not by the few.")

An anarchist who thinks otherwise is not much of an anarchist, is he?

He is right -- you need innovation to create things and then competition to bring prices down, but then arrives at some strange conclusions and inconsistencies. (All the while sounding like he is on crack.)

He makes a case for government giving money to entrepreneurs. Isn't that the "partnership system" that we have now? The mix of giving "public" money to "private" entrepreneurs?

His "solutions" require omniscient central planning to know who to give money to.

It's kind of sad the level of audience he is addressing his ideas to.
MTV meets pop-econ.

Basically he is advocating, like in the other video, a form of crony capitalism here. And the "problem" is that we don't have enough of it. So we should be giving more money to cronies because it doesn't matter if their "pizzas" get bigger, their "success" will "trickle down" to the rest of us and everyone will have a bigger pizza even if it's nowhere near as big as that of the wealthy entrepreneurs. A dog chasing its tail.

It's a weird sort of crony capitalism, though, because you give money to everyone and then one or two of those will build successful businesses and employ everyone else who didn't do as much with the money that was given to them. That's a kind of circular and it's not realistic to think that a couple of entrepreneurs will make up for all the money "given" to everyone else, and the resulting inflation and the myriad of problems therein.

I think he is trying to appeal to both left and right wingers, but it seems rather incoherent, a fact he may be trying to disguise with the fast pace and choppy editing, i.e., a video version of "fast-tlking" (i.e., swindling) to prevent any real and careful analysis of what he says.

I think there's more useful information in the videos this guy produces, but alas, they're not as "zany" as these...

@enoch, thanks for your comments. I thought it better to respond directly to your profile than on the video, about which we're no longer discussing directly. Sorry for the length of this reply, but for such a complex topic as this one, a thorough and plainly-stated response is needed.

You wrote: "the REAL question is "what is the purpose of a health care system"? NOT "which market system should we implement for health care"?"

The free market works best for any and all goods and services, regardless of their aim or purpose. Healthcare is no different from any other good or service in this respect.

(And besides, tell me why there's no money in preventative care? Do nutritionists, physical trainers/therapists, psychologists, herbalists, homeopaths, and any other manner of non-allopathic doctors not get paid and make profit in the marketplace? Would not a longer life not lead to a longer-term 'consumer' anyway? And would preventative medicine obliterate the need for all manner of medical treatment, or would there not still remain a need to diagnose, treat, and cure diseases, even in the presence of a robust preventative medical market?)

I realize that my argument is not the "popular" one (and there are certainly many reasons for this, up to and including a lot of disinformation about what constitutes a "free market" health care system). But the way to approach such things is not heuristically, but rationally, as one would approach any other economic issue.

You write "see where i am going with this? It's not so easy to answer and impose your model of the "free market" at the same time."

Yes, as a matter of fact, it is. The purpose of the healthcare system is to provide the most advanced medical service and care possible in the most efficient and affordable way possible. Only a free competitive market can do this with the necessary economic calculations in place to support its progress. No matter how you slice it, a socialized approach to healthcare invariably distorts the market (with its IP fees, undue regulations, and a lack of any accurate metrics on both the supply-side and on the demand-side which helps to determine availability, efficacy, and cost).

"you cannot have "for-profit" and "health-care" work in conjunction with any REAL health care."

Sorry, but this is just absurd. What else can I say?

"but if we use your "free market" model against a more "socialized model".which model would better serve the public?"

The free market model.

"if we take your "free market" model,which would be under the auspices of capitalism."

Redundant: "free market under the auspices of free market."

"disease is where the money is at,THAT is where the profit lies,not in preventive medicine."

Only Krugman-style Keynesians would say that illness is more profitable than health (or war more profitable than peace, or that alien invasions and broken windows are good for the economy). They, like you, aren't taking into account the One Lesson in Economics: look at how it affects every group, not just one group; look at the long term effects, not just short term ones. You're just seeing that, in the short-run, health will be less profitable for medical practitioners (or some pharmaceuticals) that are currently working in the treatment of illness. But look at every group outside that small group and at the long run and you can see that health is more profitable than illness overall. The market that profits more from illness will have to adapt, in ways that only the market knows for sure.

Do you realize that the money you put into socialized medicine (Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security, etc.) is money you deplete from prevention entrepreneurship?

(As an aside, I wonder, why do so many people assume that the socialized central planners have some kind of special knowledge or wisdom that entrepreneurs do not? And why is there the belief that unlike entrepreneurs, socialist central planners are not selfishly motivated but always act in the interest of the "common good?" Could this be part of the propagandized and indoctrinated fear that's implicit in living in a socialized environment? Why do serfs (and I'm sure that, at some level, people know that's what they are) love the socialist central planners more than they love themselves? Complex questions about self-esteem and captive minds.)

If fewer people get sick, the market will then demand more practitioners to move from treating illness into other areas like prevention, being a prevention doctor or whatever. You're actually making the argument for free market here, not against it. Socialized bureaucratically dictated medicine will not adapt to the changing needs as efficiently or rapidly as a free market can and would. If more people are getting sick, then we'll need more doctors to treat them. If fewer people are getting sick because preventive medicine takes off, then we'll have more of that type of service. If a socialized healthcare is mandated, then we will invariably have a glut of allopathic doctors, with little need for their services (and we then have the kinds of problems we see amongst doctors who are coerced -- by the threat of losing their license -- to take medicaid and then lie on their reports in order to recoup their costs, e.g., see the article linked here.)

Meanwhile, there has been and will remain huge profits to be made in prevention, as the vitamin, supplements, alternative medicine, naturopathy, exercise and many other industries attest to. What are you talking about, that there's no profit in preventing illness? (In a manner of speaking, that's actually my bread and butter!) If you have a way to prevent illness, you will have more than enough people buying from you, people who don't want to get sick. (And other services for the people who do.) Open a gym. Become a naturopath. Teach stress management, meditation, yoga, zumba, whatever! And there are always those who need treatment, who are sick, and the free market will then have an accurate measure of how to allocate the right resources and number of such practitioners. This is something that the central planners (under socialized services) simply cannot possibly do (except, of course, for the omniscient ones that socialists insist exist).

You wrote "cancer,anxiety,obesity,drug addiction.
all are huge profit generators and all could be dealt with so much more productively and successfully with preventive care,diet and exercise and early diagnosis."

But they won't as long as you have centrally planned (socialized) medicine. The free market forces practitioners to respond to the market's demands. Socialized medicine does not. Entrepreneurs will (as they already have) exploit openings for profit in prevention (without the advantage of regulations which distort the markets) and take the business away from treatment doctors. If anything, doctors prevent preventative medicine from getting more widespread by using government regulations to limit what the preventive practitioners do. In fact, preventive medicine is so profitable that it has many in the medical profession lobbying to curtail it. They are losing much business to alternative/preventive practitioners. They lobby to, for example, prevent herb providers from stating the medical/preventive benefits of their herbs. They even prevent strawberry farmers to tout the health benefits of strawberries! It is the state that is slowing down preventive medicine, not the free market! In Puerto Rico, for example, once the Medical Association lost a bit to prohibit naturopathy, they effectively outlawed acupuncture by successfully getting a law passed that requires all acupuncturists to be medical doctors. Insanity.

If you think there is no profit in preventative care or exercise, think GNC and Richard Simmons, and Pilates, and bodywork, and my own practice of psychotherapy. Many of the successful corporations (I'm thinking of Google and Pixar and SalesForce and Oracle, etc.) see the profit and value in preventative care, which is why they have these "stay healthy" programs for their employees. There's more money in health than illness. No doubt.

Or how about the health food/nutrition business? Or organic farming, or whole foods! The free market could maybe call for fewer oncologists and for more Whole Foods or even better natural food stores. Of course, we don't know the specifics, but that's actually the point. Only the free market knows (and the omniscient socialist central planners) what needs to happen and how.

Imagination! We need to get people to use it more.

You wrote: "but when we consider that the 4th and 5th largest lobbyists are the health insurance industry and the pharmaceutical industry is it any wonder that america has the most fucked up,backwards health care system on the planet."

You're actually making my point here. In a free market, pharmaceutical companies cannot monopolize what "drugs" people can or cannot take, sell or not sell, and cannot prevent natural alternatives from being promoted. Only with state intervention (by way of IP regulations, and so forth) can they do so.

Free market is not corporatism. Free market is not crony capitalism. (More disinformation that needs to be lifted.)

So you're not countering my free market position, you're countering the crony capitalist position. This is a straw man argument, even if in this case you might not have understood my position in the first place. You, like so many others, equate "capitalism" with cronyism or corporatism. Many cannot conceive of a free market that is free from regulation. So folks then argue against their own interests, either for or against "fascist" vs. "socialist" medicine. The free market is, in fact, outside these two positions.

You wrote: "IF we made medicare available to ALL american citizens we would see a shift from latter stage care to a more aggressive preventive care and early diagnosis. the savings in money (and lives) would be staggering."

I won't go into medicare right now (It is a disaster, and so is the current non-free-market insurance industry. See the article linked in my comment above.)

You wrote "this would create a huge paradigm shift here in america and we would see results almost instantly but more so in the coming decades."

I don't want to be a naysayer but, socialism is nothing new. It has been tried (and failed) many times before. The USSR had socialized medicine. So does Cuba (but then you may believe the Michael Moore fairytale about medicine in Cuba). It's probably better to go see in person how Cubans live and how they have no access to the places that Moore visited.

You wrote: "i feel very strongly that health should be a communal effort.a civilized society should take care of each other."

Really, then why try to force me (or anyone) into your idea of "good" medicine? The free market is a communal effort. In fact, it is nothing else (and nothing else is as communal as the free market). Central planning, socialized, top-down decision-making, is not. Never has been. Never will be.

Voluntary interactions is "taking care of each other." Coercion is not. Socialism is coercion. It cannot "work" any other way. A free market is voluntary cooperation.

Economic calculation is necessary to avoid chaos, whatever the purpose of a service. This is economic law. Unless the purpose is to create chaos, you need real prices and efficiency that only the free market can provide.

I hope this helps to clarify (and not confuse) what I wrote on @eric3579's profile.

Bono's place in the big-boy's club-To make scheduled appearances to remind his ineffectual, 30-50 yr-old former fan base that the paradigm is here, it's fucked, and it's only going to get worse so let's all have a group sob for this species-threatening state-of-affairs.

Jolie can only adopt so many children from representative nations...AT which point, space entrepreneur Elon Musk will use his advanced vertical TOAL ships to ferry this collection of human DNA to their new homes on Mars.

Bonos' a tool.

Why did you ban me?

Probably because you self-linked. Have a look at the posting guidelines. You might find your answer there.

You had to know the rule before you posted this, and you posted it anyway.
http://videosift.com/video/Entrepreneur-behavior-Business-Angel-investment

Therefor you have been *banned.

Healthcare should be left to entrepreneurs and the free market? So only people with money can receive healthcare? I still don't know how people can think that's better than socialized healthcare where everyone gets looked after...

Thank you QM for that thoughtful reply.

It just seems that the imbalance right now is in demand, not the availability of capitol to invest.


>> ^quantumushroom:

Your logic isn't flawed per se, just incomplete.
In an unstable environment like the one created by Obama and his ilk, no sane wealthy person is going to expand businesses or invest.
Lower tax rates mean more investing and more lending to entrepreneurs. It also means less "hoarding" by the wealthy, who in an electronic world can transfer monies rapidly and keep them parked elsewhere.
The idea is that even though the tax rate is lower, there is more economic activity, and thus greater revenue.
Taxation is only half of the equation, the other is spending. Government spending will certainly not stop under a Romney Administration; a continuing taxocrat-majority Congress means spending will barely slow down.

Outrage over the Ryan proposal is selective at best. His Earness has already screwed the middle-class. Here are the new taxes the middle class will be paying for Obamacare. The ink is already dry.
>> ^TheFreak:
Give me $2500 over a year and it will all be spent on household expenses in the bat of an eye, directly into the economy. Give $250,000 to a millionaire and what exactly is it going to do? How is that money going to stimulate the economy better than the millions they're already hoarding?
Someone give me a coherent argument for how an extra fraction of wealth is going to encourage these people to invest and grow anything. Show me the flaw in my logic.

Your logic isn't flawed per se, just incomplete.

In an unstable environment like the one created by Obama and his ilk, no sane wealthy person is going to expand businesses or invest.

Lower tax rates mean more investing and more lending to entrepreneurs. It also means less "hoarding" by the wealthy, who in an electronic world can transfer monies rapidly and keep them parked elsewhere.

The idea is that even though the tax rate is lower, there is more economic activity, and thus greater revenue.

Taxation is only half of the equation, the other is spending. Government spending will certainly not stop under a Romney Administration; a continuing taxocrat-majority Congress means spending will barely slow down.


Outrage over the Ryan proposal is selective at best. His Earness has already screwed the middle-class. Here are the new taxes the middle class will be paying for Obamacare. The ink is already dry.

>> ^TheFreak:

Give me $2500 over a year and it will all be spent on household expenses in the bat of an eye, directly into the economy. Give $250,000 to a millionaire and what exactly is it going to do? How is that money going to stimulate the economy better than the millions they're already hoarding?
Someone give me a coherent argument for how an extra fraction of wealth is going to encourage these people to invest and grow anything. Show me the flaw in my logic.

Being someone who has done as much downloading as I have (and will probably continue to do so) I don't think I'm in a position to complain about it too much. If I were a writer, artist, or musician and I was making enough to make a decent living then I'd probably shrug off the rest and be happy that people were actually paying attention and get on with my life. I think the digital age has really thrown many of us for a loop, I can't remember if there was a time in human history before this when we were able to reproduce a product at virtually no cost and yet our thinking is still heavily rooted in the concepts of scarcity and supply and demand. So our entrepreneurs and our business tycoons spend centuries perfecting the art of manipulating these market forces and have suddenly run smack into something that is shiny and new and also resistant to the old ways of doing things, chaos ensues.

Are you at all sympathetic to the view that there is too much concentration of capital in the financial sector, and not enough in the real economy? I think the compensation has gotten way out of whack in relation to the services they perform. I also think the securitization of debt was a horrible idea. What was wrong with glass steagall you know? What I'd like to see is a return to bankers loaning out deposits, and investors seeking out entrepreneurs. Instead, we have investors seeking to leverage systemic risk knowing full well they have a lifeline because the government can't go ahead and flush our life savings down the toilet now can it?

>> ^kevingrr:

What we are going to see shortly is traditional banks close up shop in low to low-mid income areas.
The banks offered "Free Checking" with the knowledge that people would overdraft and they would make fees on those overdrafts. There is no such thing as a free lunch or free banking. This was always part of every banks business plan. Caveat Emptor.
Those fees are now being restricted by Dodd-Frank. Therefore the banks can no longer turn a profit in many low/mid income neighborhoods. Banks are in business to make a profit and when they cannot make a profit they will close or downsize.
The solution is fairly simple. Banks will close and currency exchanges and payday loan shops will open. I don't think these businesses are preferable to banks. It an unintended consequence of the bill. It will hurt people it was meant to help.
I have free checking. I maintain a four to five figure balance and I have never been charged. I don't have everything I want, but I have more "things" in my life than I will ever need.
Chase lost $2 Billion dollars? Yea that's a bad call, but they have $2.26 Trillion in assets, $90 Billion in revenue, and $19 Billion in net income. I think they can absorb the loss.

I've swam through a few of her books,the Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged,and I think her philosophy of Capitalism is Holy could work except for one basic problem:human nature. And her supporters in the GOP really don't get where she was coming from either. The protagonists of these books are people who run large companies struggling to provide their excellent products and services in spite of heavy regulations at the hands of the small minded government. They are personally involved with their companies,willing to go the extra mile and get their hands dirty in the persuit of delivering the goods and providing livings for their extended families of employees they feel responsible for. Yet the government in pettiness and jelousy scheme to thwart them in this:making the Creative Movers of Industry gasp under the strain of mad laws written by parasites to sap the energy of the Doers to feed the gluttony of the lazy masses. More or less this. Unfortunatelythis fairy story is a bit backwards nowadays...
Instead of clever creators marketing their dreams,we have souless corporations dissecting the labours of the many to feed the obscenely rich the lions share of profits,and existing only to figure out new ways of paying themselves incentive bonuses while the companies they run heave and expire beneathe them from the sheer weight of their greed. Emploees are not families to these executives,all cooporating with the mutual goal of seeing the company succeed,but disposable pawns easily replaced and forgotten,not worth providing benefits for and certainly not worth considering when cheap if not competant labour is available elsewhere.And regulations ? Taxes? Blasphemies!

Some of Rand's opinions I find valid:armies of the unambitious would swollow every dime you earn with demands for welfare and other government mandated largesses. For every brave sould with a creative spark there are a dozen happy to make them fall for the perverse pleasure of simply watching a great idea fail. These exist:but a socialism is not on the genda in this future of ours...it seems to be evolving into a new sort of feudalism where the Rich rule and the serfs provide the neccessaries. And I suppose there are entrepreneurs out there fighting the good fight,and fighting it with style and dignity for themselves and their employees.

They just don't make the headlines.

Now deaf people can hate it too, although I'm amazed there exists a sign for "entrepreneur niggas".

You're a funny guy Mr Pennypacker
>> ^Winstonfield_Pennypacker:

[...]
But American Exceptionalism is not jingoism or arrogance. It is a quick way to summarize the American spirit of enlightened self-interest combined with personal freedom and entrepreneurism. The liberal left hates to admit it, but the US Constitution, economy, and position in the world was no accident of chance or random luck. Our constitution was a model to the rest of the world. Our freedoms and way of life still make us the envy of just about everyone. People still want to come here in droves to escape oppression, poverty, and intolerance. America was innovating, inventing, testing, and producing when the rest of the Western world was literally standing still. This is not arrogance or snootiness. It is just fact. American Exceptionalism summarizes this - and apparently makes Proglibdyte leftists squeal like stuck pigs when they hear the words.

Where in there was a justification for global empire? We aren't debating words "the left hates." We're debating why we were attacked by a handful of radical folks. Further we're debating whether or not our military engagement, specifically since WWII, has been productive in any measurable way. Can you provide some examples?

>> ^Winstonfield_Pennypacker:

The only reason the Proglibdyte left is such a fan of Ron Paul is because he is a non-interventionist. The liberal left's vision of the ideal world is the United States giving all its cash - no questions asked - to the United Nations. At that point the US is supposed to sit down, shut up, and do whatever the UN orders them to do. Then - in the minds of the left - we will have world peace. RP would do about 90% of that by just being an isolationist. He won't give the UN any money, but the left will settle for the US just shutting down all its involvement (especially military).
But American Exceptionalism is not jingoism or arrogance. It is a quick way to summarize the American spirit of enlightened self-interest combined with personal freedom and entrepreneurism. The liberal left hates to admit it, but the US Constitution, economy, and position in the world was no accident of chance or random luck. Our constitution was a model to the rest of the world. Our freedoms and way of life still make us the envy of just about everyone. People still want to come here in droves to escape oppression, poverty, and intolerance. America was innovating, inventing, testing, and producing when the rest of the Western world was literally standing still. This is not arrogance or snootiness. It is just fact. American Exceptionalism summarizes this - and apparently makes Proglibdyte leftists squeal like stuck pigs when they hear the words.