Rand Paul's Guide to Improving the Grand Old Party - Polidicks

[QUOTE=archangel125;40044382]Er... Morcam. The idea is called Liberalism, coined by Adam Smith, but it's a hallmark of conservative policy. Look it up. Neither the Democrats nor Republicans are truly liberal. What you see under liberal governments is an increase in taxes, especially to corporations, and increased regulation, putting the buying power in the hands of consumers and improving social security.[/QUOTE] [url]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiscal_conservatism[/url] Republicans generally support lowering regulations. They widely do not support increased government spending. You said, [QUOTE]Here's the problem with conservative fiscal policy - Their response to an economic crisis with high unemployment is to give more money to huge corporations and hope they use it to create jobs.[/QUOTE] Which simply isn't true.

[QUOTE=Morcam;40044418][url]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiscal_conservatism[/url] Republicans generally support lowering regulations. They widely do not support increased government spending. You said, Which simply isn't true.[/QUOTE] Maybe I should have made this clearer: When I say 'giving corporations money' I mean through big tax breaks.

[QUOTE=archangel125;40044424]Maybe I should have made this clearer: When I say 'giving corporations money' I mean through big tax breaks.[/QUOTE] Such as? Last I checked, the only people running the federal government and giving away free money to corporations for the past 5 years have been the democrats, not the republicans.

And just to be clear, lowering regulations is the problem here. [editline]26th March 2013[/editline] [QUOTE=Morcam;40044467]Such as? Last I checked, the only people running the federal government and giving away free money to corporations for the past 5 years have been the democrats, not the republicans.[/QUOTE] Go back and read my post. The Democrats and Republicans both adopt conservative fiscal policy. NEITHER are liberal. The Republicans are just the worse of the two.

[QUOTE=Jeep-Eep;40044086]It's not like your alternative is proving any good for us common folk.[/QUOTE] but free trade is responsible for the massive increase in wealth we've had over the past 2 centuries

[QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;40044539]but free trade is responsible for the massive increase in wealth we've had over the past 2 centuries[/QUOTE] Free trade is only beneficial if your means of production are cheaper than the country you're trading with. You end up fucking up their economy and making it entirely dependent on yours. It's B.S.

[QUOTE=archangel125;40044548]Free trade is only beneficial if your means of production are cheaper than the country you're trading with. You end up fucking up their economy and making it entirely dependent on yours. It's B.S.[/QUOTE] Even if a country has no absolute advantage in trade it can still gain by trading comparative advantages. Here is Ricardo's classic example: Labor necessary to the production Country\Product|Cloth|Wine England|100|120 Portugal|90|80 [quote]Benefits from trade in Ricardo's example are easy to be seen. Ricardo assumes that cloth and wine (of the given quantities, but not specified) are exchanged at equal international value. Therefore, if England exports cloth, which is the produce of 100 workers a year, it gets wine, which would be the produce of 120 workers a year and can reduce the total amount of labor by 20 workers. As for Portugal, it exports wine, which is the produce of 80 workers a year, and procures cloth, which is the produce of 90　workers a year. Thus both countries can reduce by trade labors which are necessary to procure the same amount of commodities.[/quote]

[QUOTE=ravenhurst;40045011]Even if a country has no absolute advantage in trade it can still gain by trading comparative advantages. Here is Ricardo's classic example: Labor necessary to the production Country\Product|Cloth|Wine England|100|120 Portugal|90|80[/QUOTE] It assumes that the country with lesser resources has something valuable to trade. In Jamaica's case, they were forced to open their borders to free trade with the USA by the IMF, and it was all so that Jamaica would be available as a market. They had nothing the US wanted, but since the US was able to produce Jamaica's chief domestic product (fruits and vegetables) more cheaply, they drove most Jamaican farmers out of business.

[QUOTE=archangel125;40045111]It assumes that the country with lesser resources has something valuable to trade. In Jamaica's case, they were forced to open their borders to free trade with the USA by the IMF, and it was all so that Jamaica would be available as a market. They had nothing the US wanted, but since the US was able to produce Jamaica's chief domestic product (fruits and vegetables) more cheaply, they drove most Jamaican farmers out of business.[/QUOTE] Except that works better in the long run. Really, when you protect various industries, all you are doing is prolonging their death. America is horribly guilty of this as well (such as with the corn lobby and sugar tariffs). If I was in power in America, I would eliminate special protections for corn and not give a penny of compensation to all the corn farmers who went out of business. Freeloading bastards.

[QUOTE=Sobotnik;40045365]Except that works better in the long run. Really, when you protect various industries, all you are doing is prolonging their death. America is horribly guilty of this as well (such as with the corn lobby and sugar tariffs). If I was in power in America, I would eliminate special protections for corn and not give a penny of compensation to all the corn farmers who went out of business. Freeloading bastards.[/QUOTE] this doesn't work better in the long run. and the reason that the us is able to fuck up the economies of jamaica and mexico is because these "free trade" agreements take away mexican agricultural subsidies while leaving american agricultural subsidies in place, allowing american corporations to flood the market with artificially cheaper goods.

[QUOTE=Sobotnik;40045365]Except that works better in the long run. Really, when you protect various industries, all you are doing is prolonging their death. America is horribly guilty of this as well (such as with the corn lobby and sugar tariffs). If I was in power in America, I would eliminate special protections for corn and not give a penny of compensation to all the corn farmers who went out of business. Freeloading bastards.[/QUOTE] archangel125 here. When a country's economy depends upon a certain industry, it needs to be protected. Sad but true. That's why the idea of small government is total bullshit to anyone with half a brain.

[QUOTE=yawmwen;40046649]this doesn't work better in the long run. and the reason that the us is able to fuck up the economies of jamaica and mexico is because these "free trade" agreements take away mexican agricultural subsidies while leaving american agricultural subsidies in place, allowing american corporations to flood the market with artificially cheaper goods.[/QUOTE] That's not free trade then. The point behind free trade is that all of the countries trading have no tariffs in place. [editline]26th March 2013[/editline] [QUOTE=Harnbrand;40046707]When a country's economy depends upon a certain industry, it needs to be protected. Sad but true.[/QUOTE] No it doesn't. The industry should be allowed to be replaced. If the country can't exist without that industry, why even bother having that country in the first place?

[QUOTE=archangel125;40039566]So, like communism, it operates on the assumption that nobody'll abuse the system. And like communism, it'll never work on a national level because human beings are assholes.[/QUOTE] except communism doesnt reward people for being assholes, capitalism does

[QUOTE=Harnbrand;40046707]archangel125 here. When a country's economy depends upon a certain industry, it needs to be protected. Sad but true. That's why the idea of small government is total bullshit to anyone with half a brain.[/QUOTE] [quote]THE LOBBIES OF Congress are crowded with representatives of the X industry. The X industry is sick. The X industry is dying. It must be saved. It can be saved only by a tariff, by higher prices, or by a subsidy. If it is allowed to die, workers will be thrown on the streets. Their landlords, grocers, butchers, clothing stores and local motion pictures will lose business, and depression will spread in ever-widening circles. But if the X industry, by prompt action of Congress, is saved—ah then! It will buy equipment from other industries; more men will be employed; they will give more business to the butchers, bakers and neon-light makers, and then it is prosperity that will spread in ever-widening circles. It is obvious that this is merely a generalized form of the case we have just been considering. There the X industry was agriculture. But there is an endless number of X industries. Two of the most notable examples have been the coal and silver industries. To “save silver” Congress did immense harm. One of the arguments for the rescue plan was that it would help “the East.” One of its actual results was to cause deflation in China, which had been on a silver basis, and to force China off that basis. The United States Treasury was compelled to acquire, at ridiculous prices far above the market level, hoards of unnecessary silver, and to store it in vaults. The essential political aims of the “silver senators” could have been as well achieved, at a fraction of the harm and cost, by the payment of a frank subsidy to the mine owners or to their workers; but Congress and the country would never have approved a naked steal of this sort unaccompanied by the ideological flim-flam regarding “silver’s essential role in the national currency. To save the coal industry Congress passed the Guffey Act, under which the owners of coal mines were not only permitted, but compelled, to conspire together not to sell below certain minimum prices fixed by the government. Though Congress had started out to fix “the” price of coal, the government soon found itself (because of different sizes, thousands of mines, and shipments to thousands of different destinations by rail, truck, ship and barge) fixing 350,000 separate prices for coal!* One effect of this attempt to keep coal prices above the competitive market level was to accelerate the tendency toward the substitution by consumers of other sources of power or heat—such as oil, natural gas and hydroelectric energy. Today we find the government trying to force conversion from oil consumption back to coal. Our aim here is not to trace all the results that followed historically from efforts to save particular industries, but to trace a few of the chief results that must necessarily follow from efforts to save an industry. It may be argued that a given industry must be created or preserved for military reasons. It may be argued that a given industry is being ruined by taxes or wage rates disproportionate to those of other industries; or that, if a public utility, it is being forced to operate at rates or charges to the public that do not permit an adequate profit margin. Such arguments may or may not be justified in a particular case. We are not concerned with them here. We are concerned only with a single argument for saving the X industry—that if it is allowed to shrink in size or perish through the forces of free competition (always called by spokesmen for the industry in such cases laissez-faire, anarchic, cutthroat, dog-eatdog, law-of-the-jungle competition) it will pull down the general economy with it, and that if it is artificially kept alive it will help everybody else. What we are talking about here is nothing else but a generalized case of the argument put forward for parity prices for farm products or for tariff protection for any number of X industries. The argument against artificially higher prices applies, of course, not only to farm products but to any product, just as the reasons we have found for opposing tariff protection for one industry apply to any other. But there are always any number of schemes for saving X industries. There are two main types of such proposals in addition to those we have already considered, and we shall take a brief glance at them. One is to contend that the X industry is already “overcrowded,” and to try to prevent other firms or workers from getting into it. The other is to argue that the X industry needs to be supported by a direct subsidy from the government. Now if the X industry is really overcrowded as compared with other industries it will not need any coercive legislation to keep out new capital or new workers. New capital does not rush into industries that are obviously dying. Investors do not eagerly seek the industries that present the highest risks of loss combined with the lowest returns. Nor do workers, when they have any better alternative, go into industries where the wages are lowest and the prospects for steady employment least promising. If new capital and new labor are forcibly kept out of the X industry, however, either by monopolies, cartels, union policy or legislation, it deprives this capital and labor of liberty of choice. It forces investors to place their money where the returns seem less promising to them than in the X industry. It forces workers into industries with even lower wages and prospects than they could find in the allegedly sick X industry. It means, in short, that both capital and labor are less efficiently employed than they would be if they were permitted to make their own free choices. It means, therefore, a lowering of production which must reflect itself in a lower average living standard. That lower living standard will be brought about either by lower average money wages than would otherwise prevail or by higher average living costs, or by a combination of both. (The exact result would depend upon the accompanying monetary policy.) By these restrictive policies wages and capital returns might indeed be kept higher than otherwise within the X industry itself; but wages and capital returns in other industries would be forced down lower than otherwise. The X industry would benefit only at the expense of the A, B and C industries. Similar results would follow any attempt to save the X industry by a direct subsidy out of the public till. This would be nothing more than a transfer of wealth or income to the X industry. The taxpayers would lose precisely as much as the people in the X industry gained. The great advantage of a subsidy, indeed, from the standpoint of the public, is that it makes this fact so clear. There is far less opportunity for the intellectual obfuscation that accompanies arguments for tariffs, minimum-price fixing or monopolistic exclusion. It is obvious in the case of a subsidy that the taxpayers must lose precisely as much as the X industry gains. It should be equally clear that, as a consequence, other industries must lose what the X industry gains. They must pay part of the taxes that are used to support the X industry. And customers, because they are taxed to support the X industry, will have that much less income left with which to buy other things. The result must be that other industries on the average must be smaller than otherwise in order that the X industry may be larger. But the result of this subsidy is not merely that there has been a transfer of wealth or income, or that other industries have shrunk in the aggregate as much as the X industry has expanded. The result is also (and this is where the net loss comes in to the nation considered as a unit) that capital and labor are driven out of industries in which they are more efficiently employed to be diverted to an industry in which they are less efficiently employed. Less wealth is created. The average standard of living is lowered compared with what it would have been.[/quote]

[QUOTE=Sobotnik;40046728]That's not free trade then. The point behind free trade is that all of the countries trading have no tariffs in place. [/QUOTE] that's why i put quotes around "free trade". nafta is only free trade in name, but these "free trade" agreements are not free, and they are not equal for both partners.

The republican party will always lose young people. Conservatism stands for the old, liberalism stands for the new. You can't appeal to young people with talking about the good ol' days and keeping things the same. Young people vote democrat, old people vote republican.

i agree with you. people should be allowed to move goods back and forth freely without worrying about tariffs or subsidies. however, governments are generally not conducive to free trade.

[QUOTE=yawmwen;40046881]i agree with you. people should be allowed to move goods back and forth freely without worrying about tariffs or subsidies. however, governments are generally not conducive to free trade.[/QUOTE] Britain was one of the few countries to actually implement it widely, but it started to cause problems a century down the line when the Germans or French took advantage by dumping goods on British markets whilst protecting their own trade. An ideal state is to remove all subsidies and tariffs for pretty much every industry in every country. Plus establishing an extensive safety net for workers when an industry dies. It is not the industry which must be protected, but the workers in them.

[QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;40046824]*article*[/QUOTE] Here's the thing. If you continue to hold up a dying industry, sure, it ends up becoming a sinkhole for resources with negligible returns. That said, if a country's economy is dependent on said industry (It sure as hell was in Jamaica's case), letting it die WILL cause a depression. The objective, then, should be to keep the CPR up just long enough for the economy to become less dependent upon said industry as investors sell and look for other, more stable and relevant industries or for the beleaguered industry to recover and become independent again, whichever comes first. Doing nothing at all is worse than feeding a dying industry, even if it does drain resources over time. Because that's preferable to a depression.

[QUOTE=Harnbrand;40046975]Here's the thing. If you continue to hold up a dying industry, sure, it ends up becoming a sinkhole for resources with negligible returns. That said, if a country's economy is dependent on said industry (It sure as hell was in Jamaica's case), letting it die WILL cause a depression. The objective, then, should be to keep the CPR up just long enough for the economy to become less dependent upon said industry as investors sell and look for other, more stable and relevant industries or for the beleaguered industry to recover and become independent again, whichever comes first. Doing nothing at all is worse than feeding a dying industry, even if it does drain resources over time. Because that's preferable to a depression.[/QUOTE] If it's obvious enough to the government that an industry is dying then why is it not obvious to investors? If the company is tanking quickly then that will encourage investors to sell and move onto greener pastures. If however, you keep it on life-support, this reduces the incentive. Due to the uncertainty in how long the government will keep up the subsidy, some investors might hang on in the hope that the government might extend it. Therefore you get the sticky situation where the government [I]cannot[/I] withdraw subsidies, because it would piss off so many investors and allow all the economy's problems to catch up with it. Once you start propping up an industry, it's very difficult to stop. [editline]26th March 2013[/editline] [QUOTE=archangel125;40045111][B]It assumes that the country with lesser resources has something valuable to trade.[/B] In Jamaica's case, they were forced to open their borders to free trade with the USA by the IMF, and it was all so that Jamaica would be available as a market. They had nothing the US wanted, but since the US was able to produce Jamaica's chief domestic product (fruits and vegetables) more cheaply, they drove most Jamaican farmers out of business.[/QUOTE] No, the Law of Comparative Advantage is more general than that. It doesn't necessarily have to be goods, it can be services or something else. Jamaica's comparative advantage seems to be in tourism and in its important location along shipping lanes; indeed it profits greatly from these. [editline]26th March 2013[/editline] [QUOTE=thisispain;40046813]except communism doesnt reward people for being assholes, capitalism does[/QUOTE] the perverse incentive structure in communist bureaucracies definitely encourages dickishness in those types of institutions, everything really is zero-sum.

[QUOTE=archangel125;40039701]Let's say now they have a massive advantage. Implement libertarianism and they'll literally OWN their workers. Like people used to own slaves. See, without regulation, companies don't have to pay their workers a minimum wage. They don't have to give them benefits, like insurance. They don't have to keep the working environment clean or safe. They don't have to pay them overtime, and they don't have to pay them for all their work, so long as a small, token amount is paid. Did you know workers in China make eighteen cents an hour? Workers immediately have no rights, and can be fired for refusing to do unsafe work. Hell, they can be fired for literally any reason. Without regulation, insurance companies can deny anyone insurance. [editline]25th March 2013[/editline] Libertarianism's a pretty word for Anarchy. Sorry, Emperor, but I maintain that people being people is the reason it'll never work on a large scale. A small village or a family unit, sure. Nationally? Look at Somalia.[/QUOTE] You can't own Americans in such an overt sense, too many guns, too much volatility involved. Rich corporate boss rape and fire your daughter? Angry mob kills him and nails his entire family to the ceiling. Can the police do anything? No, the entire population is armed and swears that they have no idea how that happened. Your modern day feudal system fantasy can't happen in this country, the bill of rights expressly prevents it.

[QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;40047035] No, the Law of Comparative Advantage is more general than that. It doesn't necessarily have to be goods, it can be services or something else. Jamaica's comparative advantage seems to be in tourism and in its important location along shipping lanes; indeed it profits greatly from these. [/QUOTE] Tourism is a local industry. Advertising in other countries has no special exportation duty attached; free trade does not positively or negatively affect it to any great degree. It damaged the rest of the country massively instead. [editline]26th March 2013[/editline] [QUOTE=SaltyWaters;40047483]You can't own Americans in such an overt sense, too many guns, too much volatility involved. Rich corporate boss rape and fire your daughter? Angry mob kills him and nails his entire family to the ceiling. Can the police do anything? No, the entire population is armed and swears that they have no idea how that happened. Your modern day feudal system fantasy can't happen in this country, the bill of rights expressly prevents it.[/QUOTE] The objective is to prevent such vigilante justice from becoming more commonplace.

[QUOTE=Harnbrand;40047625]Tourism is a local industry. Advertising in other countries has no special exportation duty attached; free trade does not positively or negatively affect it to any great degree. It damaged the rest of the country massively instead.[/QUOTE] opportunity cost

[QUOTE=Harnbrand;40047625] The objective is to prevent such vigilante justice from becoming more commonplace.[/QUOTE] The current system benefits the rich and powerful much more than it does the general populace. In a system that allowed a certain degree of vigilantism, the general population is able to defend itself from the advances of those who would abuse them.

[QUOTE=SaltyWaters;40050477]The current system benefits the rich and powerful much more than it does the general populace. In a system that allowed a certain degree of vigilantism, the general population is able to defend itself from the advances of those who would abuse them.[/QUOTE] And anyone's allowed to justify killing anyone for any dubious reason. [editline]26th March 2013[/editline] [QUOTE=DainBramageStudios;40047726]opportunity cost[/QUOTE] Negligible. So what would they be sacrificing to advertise their country as a tourist destination? And how would Free trade change that at all? They get in contact with private businesses like airlines and big-name travel agencies, who only stand to benefit from advertising Jamaica as a tourist destination.