The most scathing post from Dr Siegel on new ALA position on vaping
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Unintended consequences are the result of 'knee-jerk' thinking. Where the 'intervener' thinks that stopping some action will actually work, giving no regard to how humans react to being stopped or restricted. It's a 'surface only - one level of thinking (or actually just not thinking at all, but reacting - hence 'knee jerk').
One of the best recent examples (other than prohibition) was in the 80's with the 'luxury tax' on yachts and certain cars over $30,000, iirc. The 'rich' stopped buying yachts and any geographical area that had a coastline went into a recession. Some boat builders, sellers went out of business. The 'execs' went to other industries but the 'middle class' and 'lower class' workers - people sanding hulls, doing the grunt work, went on unemployment insurance and welfare, since relocating wasn't an option. They repealed parts of the tax, but the damage was done. Another 'solution' to help the 'middle class' that did just the opposite. Unfortunately, the 'middle class' and 'poor' almost always fall for the hype and elect or re-elect the knee jerks.
Even with the mortgage crisis, one of the main pushers of the CRA (community reinvestment act - for low to medium income home buyers) and a 'protector' of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae - Barney Frank said, after the debacle, that 'perhaps some people should be renting instead of buying homes'.
The same will happen if the deeming goes as planned. Even if it results only in taxes to recover cig taxes and MSA money/junk bonds, etc. - either a full black market or a type of fashion clothing/cheap watches 'under-market'
Not only the financial aspect but also the impact on smoking (and yes the smoking children too).
Regulations are supposed to correct the trajectory of something. If you don't understand that trajectory, you cannot correct it (other than "let's push this button to see what it does" style aka political monkeying).
Antz come to the table saying "we don't understand what vaping does" all while proposing regulations to "correct" it. It's such a stupid proposition on so many levels.
That's what's meant by the 'undermarket' part - cheap stuff - like during prohibition where many went blind drinking methyl instead of ethyl alcohol and the various 'fillers' that are used in other unmentionable stuff. And the cost of say, taking Sudafed off the market.
The main thing, though is thinking that any political monkeying in the economy can do anything good. Only the market can truly 'correct' anything in the market - it sometimes takes time and maybe even a few lives but nothing that could compete with how slow gov't works and how many lives it has taken or severely affected by it's 'good intended interventions'.
Governments should stick to their job of protecting rights via Defense and Justice rather than violating them through market manipulations.
But, within its own microcosm boundaries, isn't the "black market" the perfect example of a "free market"? The Govt can be viewed just as an external factor or "natural force", let's say an ogre that temporarily removes players and / or partially destroys their wealth.
It's not a 'perfect example' in anyway. The black market is a free market without the protections of an actual free market above ground. Where the gov't can prosecute instances of fraud, theft, etc.. In the black market a dealer can't go to the cops saying someone has robbed him, or a buyer can't go to the cops saying 'this product is defective', etc. It's why black markets can be deadly to both the buyer and the seller, as well as supplying people with restricted/regulated goods (the free market aspect).
One could argue that gov't is responsible for creating organized crime and for every drug related drive-by shooting, or shootings in areas where only criminals have guns. I'd say that those that commit the crimes are responsible but gov't created the situation by intervening in the market in the first place. Why hasn't prohibition been the great history lesson where people actually learn this?? There are some - ANTZ-types - that would reinstitute prohibition.
There's no protection and no government in a "free market". There's just the market itself. It's supposed that the guys selling bad stuff will get their customers sick/dead, the customers will notice and buy from a different supplier, bankrupting the offender if he doesn't behave, etc.
And that's why the black market is the best approximation we have for a free market. As soon as you install a government that will enforce any other rules than "supply and demand", it can't be called "free market" anymore. It's a "regulated market" by any name.
And that's why the black market is the best approximation we have for a free market. As soon as you install a government that will enforce any other rules than "supply and demand", it can't be called "free market" anymore. It's a "regulated market" by any name.
Communist propaganda. We had a free market for over a century - almost two before the progressives took over both parties - where free exchange of goods and services took place without gov't intervening in the exchange. When there was fraud or robbery involved, then the gov't - whose job it is to protect individual rights from harm, would intervene on behalf of the victim. There would be a hopefully fair trial and the bad guys punished and people informed of it all.
It's like playing baseball -there are umpires who make judgments on certain plays but don't play themselves. Regulation is the umpire playing too, or changing rules to favor one team and punish the other. Free market is baseball players doing what they do and the umps making sure they don't break the rules.
When there was a product that caused harm in regular use, it vanished from the market by no demand for it. Although at a certain point in time, it took that 'information' time to travel around. Now, any bad product is known by almost all who use or might use it almost immediately. Ie. less harm done through the swiftness that information travels these days. It's why no one should be able to sue any tobacco company now or in the last several decades.
The problem with regulation is that it is inspection before the fact that something bad has happened by the worrywart/do-gooders who think almost anything is or can be harmful and will be. Basically, it's protection for the stupid, but.... people remain stupid under those conditions by relying on gov't to protect them. The stupid get smarter with every wrong decision they make in the market. Some are really bad decisions and end in death, but again, not the amount of harm and deaths than can come from gov't regulations over a period of time - as we may well see if ecigs are banned.
I suggest you check the definition of "free market" in a few economics text books. Its very definition takes care that it is impossible to implement in practice (the "equal access to information" axiom). What you had was a libertarian market with minimal regulation - mostly regarding liabilities. If you accept the term "libertarian" instead of "free" then I can agree with the rest of your post. Otherwise I would say that the baseball players will, over time, self-tune to play in a style that attracts the most paying spectators. And the resulting style may have little resemblance to baseball.
As for the protection of the stupid (or weak or underage or whatever), I suspect it's an excuse not the real goal.
As for the protection of the stupid (or weak or underage or whatever), I suspect it's an excuse not the real goal.
Or more like, "We're turning a blind eye to the evidence already put out because the facts don't fit our narrative or worldview."
What they hate more than anything else is the thought that vaping may prove to be at least quite a lot safer than smoking and then vaping, which looks to them a lot like smoking, will become as commonplace as smoking once was. The only valid reason for their existence in the first place is that smoking is so damaging to health. But in absence of that damage, why bother quitting? And, why be concerned about anyone else doing it? That's their worse nightmare, and for at least that reason they must convince everyone that vaping may be worse than smoking. Just maybe, they will one day come to realize this is causing them to lose sight of their original objective.
Free market in any economic text I've read - quite a few I might add - refers to the condition in a market where the forces of supply and demand are free from intervention by government. This is in contrast to a 'controlled market where gov't thinks it knows best and controls the supply of a the market from some centralized authority who knows best. Like in Communist countries where the queue for toilet paper was longer than an iPhone release.
The 'free market' is quite separate from the gov't's function of protecting and upholding rights - I just showed how it enters into the market vs. in a black market. But that is an aspect that a free market can have in a Republic vs. no protection in the black market - which is why I questioned your statement that a black market was a 'perfect example' of a free market, which it is not. Plus in the black market there are added costs - because the exchange is illegal and buyers have to make up for that difference. But of course, having read so many economic texts you likely already knew about that externality.
Let me recommend you this:
Debunking Economics - Revised and Expanded Edition: The Naked Emperor Dethroned?:Amazon:Books
If it doesn't shake a little bit your beliefs, then nothing will.
Debunking Economics - Revised and Expanded Edition: The Naked Emperor Dethroned?:Amazon:Books
If it doesn't shake a little bit your beliefs, then nothing will.
If socialist economic policy worked the Soviet Union and East Germany would be the world's economic powers. I'm not so keen on Steven Keen or any Keynesian - pre-present-or post.
I'm invoking Mark Twain and leaving this discussion.
Perhaps this is a case of degrees. I see "free market" as one unfettered by regulation/taxation, and "perfect market" as the unobtainable economic construct of all investors having all information available such that no one actor can influence the market.
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