When you hear a politician blather about preserving our "dynamic free-market" economy, what exactly do you think he is blustering about? Do you imagine that he is talking about eliminating "government regulations" that prevent businesses from growing? Indeed, in today's political discourse, a "free-market" means little more than an unregulated market. In that case, would Somalia and cartel dominated northern Mexico pass for free-market economies?
Modern American politicians generally shy away from serious discussions of macro-economic topics and when confronted with this question, they'd find a way to provide a well-polished, but an intellectually vacuous answer. To be sure, Adam Smith's original conception of the free-market sharply differs from anything an average voter understands it to mean.
It is impossible to provide a full account of Smith's comprehensive definition of the free-market in such a short post, but perfect competition was its essential component. Part of his definition of the free-market held that no merchant should be able to coerce his competitors or customers by withdrawing from the market. That is, in a true free-market economy, when a merchant leaves the market, his customers would be free to purchase goods or services from his competitors.
By the same token, he would not be in the position to raise prices far beyond what the consumers are willing to pay because they would have the option of buying from his competitors. However, the forces of the market are disrupted when one enterprise becomes sufficiently powerful to eliminate adversaries and coerce consumers into paying higher prices: it is here where the government must intervene to preserve the free-market economy.
In stark contrast to Adam Smith's prescriptions, far from preserving the freedom of the market, the government colludes with the most powerful industries in this country. Recently, Congress passed a bill at three in the morning that prevented the Federal government from negotiating prices of prescribed medications with the pharmaceutical companies. As evidenced in the report that was originally aired on the 60 Minutes show, this event took place at that hour because the pharmaceutical lobbyists did not want the average viewer to see this odious event on C-Span in broad daylight. Congresspeople who opposed the bill have been coerced into subordination and its leading supporters shortly obtained jobs with the pharmaceutical companies.
Other proponents of the legislation were pharmaceutical lobbyists and those who would shortly join their ranks. For example, Republican Congressman Billy Tauzin was commended by George W. Bush for the "great work" he has done in passing the bill. In the 60 minutes interview, Tauzin asserted that the pharmaceutical lobbyists always get what they want in the political arena because they "stand for the right things". He clarified his point by insisting that the recent bill that dramatically increased the prices of pharmaceutical drugs was good for the patients whom the pharmaceutical companies represented.
The reality of the situation is that pharmaceutical products are already much more expensive than they are in all other developed capitalist economies such as Canada, Denmark, Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and Germany. It is very likely that as the drug prices continue to soar, they'll become even less accessible to the general public and the quality of health-care in this country will decline even further.
Predictably, Tauzin left his congressional post to become the chief lobbyist for these companies. He was followed by his cronies who also played an instrumental role in legislating the infamous bill such as John McManus, Linda Fishman, Calving Weldon and at least 12 others. Far from being an act of a free-market economy, this legislation is a clear example of a trend that has been undermining economic freedom in the United States for the last two decades. According to the Index of Economic Freedom, the U.S is only the 10th freest economy in the world and continues to decline.
The analysts of this international agency cited the "trend toward cronyism that erodes the rule of law" as one of the salient reasons why the U.S economy is becoming less free every year. Most Americans tend to think that the United States is a bastion of economic freedom and countries such Canada and Denmark are socialistic by comparison. The reality is that the economies of both countries are freer than that of the United States, most notably, the Index of Economic Freedom places Canada four positions ahead of the United States. Rule of law is an essential component of a free economy and the corporate lobbyists' ability to heavily influence government policies with impunity is one of the greatest threats to economic freedom in this country.
Friday, January 3, 2014
Why Lowering Taxes For The Rich Does Not Decrease Unemployment
Lowering taxes for the rich does not decrease
unemployment because it is not in the best interest of the transnational corporations to use the resulting profits for job-creation. Instead, they often
opt to channel the additional funds into activities
that promote their growth more than job-creation. For example, they often use the funds obtained due to decreased taxation to finance their expansion projects in other countries. Just as frequently, they make political campaign contributions
through lobbying that leads government executives to enact
laws favorable to their companies. Even more commonly, they spend it on duplicitous advertisements that
enable them to post windfall profits for sales of products of
questionable quality.
To be sure, impoverished employers who cannot expand are incapable of giving jobs to the unemployed. That is why the government may combat the problem of unemployment by lowering taxes on moribund small businesses whose very existence is threatened by onerous taxation. Clearly, small organizations will find it in their best interest to expand and thereby provide additional jobs, but that is not always in the best interest of the transnational corporations.
If Wal-Mart wished to expand today, their capital is already more than sufficient to achieve that objective. Wal-Mart's profits are not threatened by the scarcity of consumers and they do not need to create more jobs to service more buyers. Instead, Wal-Mart's profits are threatened by laws and regulations that prevent them from behaving in a manner that most of their customers view as immoral. For example, Wal-Mart is threatened by the members of the government who do not always support policies favorable to their business interests, regulations on advertisements that prevent them from unethically marketing their products and laws that do not allow them to pollute the environment as they wish. Thus, it stands to reason that any windfall profits because of the "Tax cuts for the rich" will be used for purposes other than job-creation.
To be sure, impoverished employers who cannot expand are incapable of giving jobs to the unemployed. That is why the government may combat the problem of unemployment by lowering taxes on moribund small businesses whose very existence is threatened by onerous taxation. Clearly, small organizations will find it in their best interest to expand and thereby provide additional jobs, but that is not always in the best interest of the transnational corporations.
If Wal-Mart wished to expand today, their capital is already more than sufficient to achieve that objective. Wal-Mart's profits are not threatened by the scarcity of consumers and they do not need to create more jobs to service more buyers. Instead, Wal-Mart's profits are threatened by laws and regulations that prevent them from behaving in a manner that most of their customers view as immoral. For example, Wal-Mart is threatened by the members of the government who do not always support policies favorable to their business interests, regulations on advertisements that prevent them from unethically marketing their products and laws that do not allow them to pollute the environment as they wish. Thus, it stands to reason that any windfall profits because of the "Tax cuts for the rich" will be used for purposes other than job-creation.
Thursday, January 2, 2014
Nine symptoms of an intellectual neophyte
Seasoned participants in intellectual discussions have encountered them at least once. We're all familiar with the people who cannot help but disrupt the conversation by digressing it into irrelevant topics, vehemently attacking a certain point of view without understanding it or making effete attempts to substantiate their position with fallacious arguments. Fortunately, it is possible to identify them at a very early point in the interaction by recognizing their key characteristics. The document below contains a list of several cognitive tendencies that most intellectual novitiates tend to display consistently.
1. The Rationalist's fallacy. Lack of openness to examination of the core ideas of their worldview, tendency to presume that they can comprehensively and indisputably establish their theoretical framework on a small number of premises that can be used to critique all rival theses. In general, people who are experienced with intellectual or even plainly academic endeavors tend to be more mindful of how easily even the most apparently solid of premises can be undermined.
2. Sloppy generalizations. Tendency to be glib by working with sloppy generalizations as opposed to specific ideas and referencing apparently difficult concepts without making a clear point. Clarity and thoroughness of thought is the hallmark of an experienced thinker, we all start out with vague notions and amorphous intuitions about the concepts we're studying and only later gain the ability to think in more precise or comprehensive terms. The sloppy generalizations also manifest in the composition fallacy (this candidate voted against the pro-labor laws, so all other members of his party will always do likewise).
3. The bifurcation fallacy. This trait is generally displayed in dichotomous or black and white thinking; inability to evaluate concepts on the basis of a continuum rather than categorical bifurcations or absolutes. Experienced thinkers tend to understand that most dichotomies are false as they've grown out of that phase years ago.
4. General intellectual insecurity. Evident displays of personal insecurities in intellectual discussions that manifests in vehement opposition to a particular concept, eminent thinker or another interlocutor in the group. Experienced discussion participants enjoy challenging their own worldview and aren't easily threatened or unsettled by challenges.
5. Poor pattern recognition. This trait manifests in narrowness of perspective and repeated inability to grasp the main idea behind the discussion and the subsequent tendency to excessively focus on a rather trivial or a tangential point at the expense of the general pattern or the overarching theme. Pattern recognition constitutes a vital elements of most intellectual undertakings. If someone struggles with that, chances are that their skill-level is rudimentary at best.
6. General arrogance. A haughty, supercilious attitude that stems from the person's inflated opinion of their intellectual abilities. Experience tends to humble us and that's true in virtually every walk of life, not just philosophy. If someone is a fundamentally conceited person, but they have studied philosophy to the point where they've become proficient at intellectual inquiry of some kind, they shouldn't be arrogant about philosophical matters. It is much easier to shelter illusions of one's own stupendous competence in many other activities in life than it is in philosophy. In my experience, even the very egotistical people tend to become humble about their intellectual abilities once they start becoming proficient in philosophy or any other similarly intellectually demanding discipline.
7. Failure to emotionally disengage from the discussion. People who display this quality tend to become embroiled in polemical confrontations and have a tendency to strongly identify with one side of the discussion by taking umbrage at criticisms of their preferred position. In general, emotional detachment is one of the core competencies of intellectual inquiry.
8. Failure to demonstrate autonomy of judgment. This manifests in the person's intransigent or partisan support for a particular authority-concept that could be intellectual, religious, political or even personal. I.E, "
the Bible says so that's what I am sticking to, I looked it up on the internet so this stuff must be right! Atheism is the way to go as our secular humanism is the antidote to religious bigotry, my grandfather told me this before he died! I've read this in a philosophy book or a real scientific study, so bow to me!"
9. Excessive image consciousness. Tendency to excessively rely on recherché vocabulary, technical or neo-logistic words and unwillingness or inability to clarify and simplify their position once requested to. Such people tend to be far more interested in merely appearing intelligent as opposed to increasing their intellectual competence. In stark contrast with the experienced thinkers, these people generally have little interest in learning or helping others do so.
To conclude that an individual displays any of the above symptoms, the above described behaviors must be part of their general repertoire as opposed to isolated incidents. A member of the discussion group can be classified as a neophyte if he or she repeatedly displays at least five of the aforementioned symptoms.
1. The Rationalist's fallacy. Lack of openness to examination of the core ideas of their worldview, tendency to presume that they can comprehensively and indisputably establish their theoretical framework on a small number of premises that can be used to critique all rival theses. In general, people who are experienced with intellectual or even plainly academic endeavors tend to be more mindful of how easily even the most apparently solid of premises can be undermined.
2. Sloppy generalizations. Tendency to be glib by working with sloppy generalizations as opposed to specific ideas and referencing apparently difficult concepts without making a clear point. Clarity and thoroughness of thought is the hallmark of an experienced thinker, we all start out with vague notions and amorphous intuitions about the concepts we're studying and only later gain the ability to think in more precise or comprehensive terms. The sloppy generalizations also manifest in the composition fallacy (this candidate voted against the pro-labor laws, so all other members of his party will always do likewise).
3. The bifurcation fallacy. This trait is generally displayed in dichotomous or black and white thinking; inability to evaluate concepts on the basis of a continuum rather than categorical bifurcations or absolutes. Experienced thinkers tend to understand that most dichotomies are false as they've grown out of that phase years ago.
4. General intellectual insecurity. Evident displays of personal insecurities in intellectual discussions that manifests in vehement opposition to a particular concept, eminent thinker or another interlocutor in the group. Experienced discussion participants enjoy challenging their own worldview and aren't easily threatened or unsettled by challenges.
5. Poor pattern recognition. This trait manifests in narrowness of perspective and repeated inability to grasp the main idea behind the discussion and the subsequent tendency to excessively focus on a rather trivial or a tangential point at the expense of the general pattern or the overarching theme. Pattern recognition constitutes a vital elements of most intellectual undertakings. If someone struggles with that, chances are that their skill-level is rudimentary at best.
6. General arrogance. A haughty, supercilious attitude that stems from the person's inflated opinion of their intellectual abilities. Experience tends to humble us and that's true in virtually every walk of life, not just philosophy. If someone is a fundamentally conceited person, but they have studied philosophy to the point where they've become proficient at intellectual inquiry of some kind, they shouldn't be arrogant about philosophical matters. It is much easier to shelter illusions of one's own stupendous competence in many other activities in life than it is in philosophy. In my experience, even the very egotistical people tend to become humble about their intellectual abilities once they start becoming proficient in philosophy or any other similarly intellectually demanding discipline.
7. Failure to emotionally disengage from the discussion. People who display this quality tend to become embroiled in polemical confrontations and have a tendency to strongly identify with one side of the discussion by taking umbrage at criticisms of their preferred position. In general, emotional detachment is one of the core competencies of intellectual inquiry.
8. Failure to demonstrate autonomy of judgment. This manifests in the person's intransigent or partisan support for a particular authority-concept that could be intellectual, religious, political or even personal. I.E, "
the Bible says so that's what I am sticking to, I looked it up on the internet so this stuff must be right! Atheism is the way to go as our secular humanism is the antidote to religious bigotry, my grandfather told me this before he died! I've read this in a philosophy book or a real scientific study, so bow to me!"
9. Excessive image consciousness. Tendency to excessively rely on recherché vocabulary, technical or neo-logistic words and unwillingness or inability to clarify and simplify their position once requested to. Such people tend to be far more interested in merely appearing intelligent as opposed to increasing their intellectual competence. In stark contrast with the experienced thinkers, these people generally have little interest in learning or helping others do so.
To conclude that an individual displays any of the above symptoms, the above described behaviors must be part of their general repertoire as opposed to isolated incidents. A member of the discussion group can be classified as a neophyte if he or she repeatedly displays at least five of the aforementioned symptoms.
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