[mloc]

Originally Posted by southsiderosie

My goodness, there is a lot of nonsense on this thread.

The problem with Ireland isn't socialism, capitalism, or whatever ill-defined ism that people use to put people they disagree with into a box. The problem is gombeenism. The only thing that matters is pleasing key political constituencies - election-ism is the only ism that matters.

The Irish government over the last 15 years has adopted neo-liberal regulatory and tax policies to please its key (US) business constituencies, and engaged in reckless public spending in order to please key voting constituencies: the elderly and public sector trade unions. Any fool could tell you that cutting taxes and increasing spending is a recipe for fiscal disaster REGARDLESS of their ideological bent, and those pretending that the situation in Ireland is due to anything other than Fianna Fail's desire to stay in power endlessly are leading you up the garden path.

This is largely true. We have a horrendous history of patronage and cronyism in this country, and most of our political ills stem from that. It's not just the politicians that are to blame here, indeed, most of the blame lies with the general populace.

[_Gawd_]

Originally Posted by southsiderosie

My goodness, there is a lot of nonsense on this thread.

The problem with Ireland isn't socialism, capitalism, or whatever ill-defined ism that people use to put people they disagree with into a box. The problem is gombeenism. The only thing that matters is pleasing key political constituencies - election-ism is the only ism that matters.

The Irish government over the last 15 years has adopted neo-liberal regulatory and tax policies to please its key (US) business constituencies, and engaged in reckless public spending in order to please key voting constituencies: the elderly and public sector trade unions. Any fool could tell you that cutting taxes and increasing spending is a recipe for fiscal disaster REGARDLESS of their ideological bent, and those pretending that the situation in Ireland is due to anything other than Fianna Fail's desire to stay in power endlessly are leading you up the garden path.

Yeah because Ireland is the only country dealing with financial problems...

The more corporatist the US becomes, the more you're starring into a black hole. Time to go back to your founding fathers. Time to go back to capitalism...it's the only thing that will save you.

[Monty Burnz]

Originally Posted by _Gawd_

Your Phd in economics obtained in university is nothing more than a Keynes toilet paper. You learn in school about the man that brought the worlds finance to it's knees. The Fed has hundreds of economists with Phd's working for them, sadly it doesn't define or proves one's economic savvy as the Americans are looking into the oblivion.

Sigh. I presume you have some publications I could look at?

In the interests of full disclosure, I haven't finished the PhD. But thanks for your fascinating insights - who knew that Keynes wasn't the latest word in economics?

[Monty Burnz]

Originally Posted by _Gawd_

Oh now I understand...you're speaking of State controlled capitalism? i.e - corporatism? State controlled corporatism is NOT free market capitalism sorry to disappoint you.

It's a bit like talking to a scientologist who thinks that calling common concepts by different names = new knowledge.

[_Gawd_]

Originally Posted by Monty Burnz

Sigh. I presume you have some publications I could look at?

In the interests of full disclosure, I haven't finished the PhD. But thanks for your fascinating insights - who knew that Keynes wasn't the latest word in economics?

Look, I'm not attacking you personally. My blood boils when people tar capitalism as a failure because it's not - you know how we get. I invite you to listen to both sides of the argument, and please...leave that idiot Krugman alone...we do not need another Keynesian in this world.

[Monty Burnz]

Originally Posted by _Gawd_

You can have a government to only organise police, courts and the military NOTHING ELSE.

Where does the money come from to run these things? You've already defined capitalism as having no involuntary redistribution of wealth - so the police force and the military are run on charity? The Salvation Army?

[Monty Burnz]

Originally Posted by _Gawd_

Look, I'm not attacking you personally. My blood boils when people tar capitalism as a failure because it's not - you know how we get. I invite you to listen to both sides of the argument, and please...leave that idiot Krugman alone...we do not need another Keynesian in this world.

Capitalism in any shape or form hasn't failed. That's just rhetoric from socialists who've seen their workers' paradises collapse time and time again everywhere they've been (temporarily) established.

[Princess Consuela Bananahammock]

Originally Posted by Eric Cartman

I said leave them out because I am aware that support for disabled children is a necessity as the medical treatments and assistive devices required would bankrupt most families

Fair enough, you did, but you also implied that their dfmailies should look after them and NOT the state, or did I misunderstand?

if the state, then this is a form of welfare.

This is why a small government of a bare minimum set of services would be most capable of keeping this country on track, the public sector is too large and completely opaque and this needs to be resolved.

But I still dont think that any able bodied person should be entitled to dole without working. Its utter madness that people can leave school/ college without doing a tap and receive money.

This is why I would be in favour of voluntary schemes that people could pay into while employed and phasing out government welfare until your basically left with only the school leavers and layabouts being cut off

Again, I would agree with this PROVIDED the number of positions exceeded the number of unemployed. At present, you would need 400,000 placements and I'm pretty sure they don't exist. In any case, it was NOT your initial argument! Also, the government has already launched such a scheme, and it is already being abused by corporations.

[_Gawd_]

Originally Posted by Monty Burnz

Where does the money come from to run these things? You've already defined capitalism as having no involuntary redistribution of wealth - so the police force and the military are run on charity? The Salvation Army?

That depends entirely on how far you want to go....

Capitalism as you defined earlier clearly states private service, private production, private citizens. There are numerous schools that are willing to allow a government to exist purely for the sole reason of enforcing contracts between private individuals and overseeing an army, police and the courts system.

There are other schools that say that the States grip on even the justice and defense is tyrannical. So these would be provided privately. Just look at ancient Ireland - a largely Libertarian society in nature. The English couldn't oppress them because the Irish didn't understand the concept of a "State" or "collectivism". They weren't "institutionalised" and therefore, couldn't be tamed. It was only with a mentality of a State i.e - Us Vs. Them that they conquered. A State can only survive when you obey. This leads me to defense which you've asked. People don't fight each other - only governments do. The American people had no problem with the ordinary Iraqi's - the war started because the American government had a problem with the Iraqi government.

We need to free our minds of this patriotic nationalism and recognise everyone as an individual. Your fellow countryman is just as likely to rape and murder your daughter as the man you've never met on the other side of the world. If you had capitalism, you could forget about war because what mad individual would wage war? Who could he wage war against? Only States can wage war against each other, and it is the State that steals private capital to use it to their preferred ends.

[benway]

Originally Posted by Monty Burnz

Capitalism in any shape or form hasn't failed. That's just rhetoric from socialists who've seen their workers' paradises collapse time and time again everywhere they've been (temporarily) established.

Whoa whoa whoa.

There's plenty more I'd like to get into, but for now, are you denying that every attempt to let the markets run free and work their "magic" has ended in disaster? Lassez faire, deregulation, light touch ... in the 1880s, the Great Depression, Asia in the 1990s, and most of the western world today.

Only massive state intervention has prevented the whole edifice from collapsing entirely. Neoliberal capitalism absolutely has failed, as a logical consequence of its inherent contradictions. Would take quite the feat of cognitive dissonance to deny this.

Enter stage left:

[_Gawd_]

Originally Posted by benway

Whoa whoa whoa.

There's plenty more I'd like to get into, but for now, are you denying that every attempt to let the markets run free and work their "magic" has ended in disaster? Lassez faire, deregulation, light touch ... in the 1880s, the Great Depression, Asia in the 1990s, and most of the western world today.

Only massive state intervention has prevented the whole edifice from collapsing entirely. Neoliberal capitalism absolutely has failed, as a logical consequence of its inherent contradictions. Would take quite the feat of cognitive dissonance to deny this.

Enter stage left:

I'm a capitalist and I'll admit that neoliberalism has failed...why wouldn't it? It's morally wrong and economically destructive. But neoliberalism is not capitalism because neoliberalism doesn't advocate a free market which is the very foundation of capitalism. Therefore, capitalism has not failed. The debt we ran up for services was our own stupidity by borrowing too much simple as that. But bailouts is not a feature of capitalism because giving people money for making a mess of things is the opposite of capitalism (they should be punished and go out of business).

[southsiderosie]

Originally Posted by _Gawd_

Yeah because Ireland is the only country dealing with financial problems...

The more corporatist the US becomes, the more you're starring into a black hole. Time to go back to your founding fathers. Time to go back to capitalism...it's the only thing that will save you.

You have posted a lot of uncontested nonsense in this thread. The countries that are having serious financial problems are the countries that engaged in wild government spending and/or extensive de-regulation of the banking and finance industry. Ireland and the US did both simultaneously, but unlike the US, Ireland cannot manipulate its own currency, and subsequently cannot inflate its way (partially) out of crisis.

And while we are at it, let's go back to the Founding Fathers. Benjamin Franklin was a strong supporter of public education. Jefferson (along with Monroe and Madison) helped to set up the University of Virginia, one of the finest public universities in the country. Madison supported strengthening both the military and the fiscal and monetary powers of the federal government. Jefferson was highly suspicious of the banking sector - he would have been aghast by the extent to which this industry has been allowed to run rampant over the last 15 years.

Also, a large number of the Founders were not at all in favor of the free market or individual rights when it came to slavery - which perhaps represents the biggest perversion of the labor market or the idea of individual rights there is.

Finally, you, like other free-market fetishists, seem to assume that the market exists outside of human foibles. Different actors do not interact in the market as equals (employers and employees, for example), and those with the means will always try to exploit market failures and loopholes to their benefit. Marx was wrong about a lot of things, but he was spot-on in his observation that capitalists did not have the good sense or the wherewithal to restrain themselves before driving the entire economic (and political) system over a cliff. And, like clockwork, as soon as the regulatory restrictions were lifted (in the case of the U.S., Glass-Steagal), we had 1920s redux.

The market will never be a perfect arbiter of prices or allocator of goods and services because, ultimately, the 'market' isn't some abstract thing: it is made up of very, very imperfect human beings.

[K-9]

Originally Posted by SeanW

You are serious?

You do realise that what we had was anything but free market capitalism?

In free market capitalism:

1. The currency would be "hard" e.g. a credible gold standard. It would have been much harder for the construction bubble to form (or indeed any bubble) because loanable funds would have been limited to the savings rate only.
2. The tax incentives to build apartments a million miles into the sticks etc would never have been granted, and most importantly:
3. BANKS THAT MESSED UP WOULD HAVE FAILED. That is, they would disappear, go away, and the government would have realised that the best way to respond was to compensate retail depositors like the American FDIC does as a matter of routine when banks do fail. We would not have had our government sign away the wealth of generations compensating bank bondholders because in a genuine free market, that doesn't happen.

All of these contributing factor came from government meddlinng and the maliciousness and neglect of European institutions. It had nothing to with freedom or markets.

We had freer markets before and gold standards, in the US and the UK as good examples, still had crashes. Crashes just happen on markets, no matter if they are right or left wing. Greed rules and in many ways relies on crashes.

[_Gawd_]

Originally Posted by southsiderosie

You have posted a lot of uncontested nonsense in this thread. The countries that are having serious financial problems are the countries that engaged in wild government spending and/or extensive de-regulation of the banking and finance industry. Ireland and the US did both simultaneously, but unlike the US, Ireland cannot manipulate its own currency, and subsequently cannot inflate its way (partially) out of crisis.

Why would you have banking regulations set by the banks? Because that's how it works...I say we need ZERO regulation i.e - capitalism and let whatever business that makes stupid decisions go out of business. So you're wrong in your thinking.

Originally Posted by southsiderosie

And while we are at it, let's go back to the Founding Fathers. Benjamin Franklin was a strong supporter of public education. Jefferson (along with Monroe and Madison) helped to set up the University of Virginia, one of the finest public universities in the country. Madison supported strengthening both the military and the fiscal and monetary powers of the federal government. Jefferson was highly suspicious of the banking sector - he would have been aghast by the extent to which this industry has been allowed to run rampant over the last 15 years.

I'm not curious as to why Jefferson didn't like the banks. A central bank has no place in a capitalist system because it only exists to prop up an ever expanding government.

Originally Posted by southsiderosie

Also, a large number of the Founders were not at all in favor of the free market or individual rights when it came to slavery - which perhaps represents the biggest perversion of the labor market or the idea of individual rights there is.

I encourage you to cast a vote for the good Texas Congressman running for the Oval Office. He knew what the founders envisioned, minus the slavery of course. Were they perfect, no. But you brought us closer to freedom.

Originally Posted by southsiderosie

Finally, you, like other free-market fetishists, seem to assume that the market exists outside of human foibles. Different actors do not interact in the market as equals (employers and employees, for example), and those with the means will always try to exploit market failures and loopholes to their benefit. Marx was wrong about a lot of things, but he was spot-on in his observation that capitalists did not have the good sense or the wherewithal to restrain themselves before driving the entire economic (and political) system over a cliff. And, like clockwork, as soon as the regulatory restrictions were lifted (in the case of the U.S., Glass-Steagal), we had 1920s redux.

This is BS to assume the repealing of GS was the cause of this recession and you know it. Even a 1st class economics student can recognise this. Your problem is the Federal Reserve and your massive government intervening, bailouts, huge welfare and social programs, starting wars and basing themselves in 130 countries.

Originally Posted by southsiderosie

The market will never be a perfect arbiter of prices or allocator of goods and services because, ultimately, the 'market' isn't some abstract thing: it is made up of very, very imperfect human beings.

The market system you're against is what dictates supply and demand bringing almost if not perfect equilibrium. Who else is going to achieve this? Some bureaucrat sitting in an office somewhere? And here was me thinking that Americans hated central planning.

[randylonghorn]

Originally Posted by _Gawd_

Just look at ancient Ireland - a largely Libertarian society in nature.

With a tiny population, relatively speaking, living in an entirely agrarian economy with an abundance of natural resources.