What Individualism Is Not • Frank Chodorov

a reply to: daskakik

This is a big topic and you are the second person I have come across that demands a more thorough and convincing free market monopoly immunity argument.

Monopoly and Competition • Murray N. Rothbard
Fear of Monopoly • Edmond S. Bradley

originally posted by: greencmp
This is a big topic and you are the second person I have come across that demands a more thorough and convincing free market monopoly immunity argument.

Whatever mental exercises Rothbard and Bradley can come up with might sound nice but I know what I have seen.

a reply to: daskakik

It is a big field, economics, none of us knows everything but, when you find an hypothesis that withstands scrutiny, it makes sense to continue to inspect it.

originally posted by: greencmp
It is a big field, economics, none of us knows everything but, when you find an hypothesis that withstands scrutiny, it makes sense to continue to inspect it.

Inspect away but the topic of your thread is individualism and when it comes to individuals, if there is no "oversight" and even when there is, there is nothing to keep one guy from smashing the competition, literally.

So yes, Mises, Rothbord and all that sounds good but when it comes down to it even their theories need a "sense of community" to have the logic work out.

a reply to: daskakik

The theory is that individual humans, acting in their own best interests, make the most productive choices which results in the most productive resource allocation model, unplanned.

There is no ethical or moral measurement in the economic sense.

What people do with their dramatically improved financial standing is up to them and them alone.

originally posted by: greencmp
The theory is that individual humans, acting in their own best interests, make the most productive choices which results in the most productive resource allocation model, unplanned.

Sure, until they figure out there is strength in numbers. That is the small fact that anarcho-capitalism seems to overlook.

a reply to: daskakik

We don't overlook it, we oppose it. Cartels cannot exist without the support of state coercion.

originally posted by: greencmp
We don't overlook it, we oppose it. Cartels cannot exist without the support of state coercion.

Sure they can, but they are called something else like family, tribe, gang, etc.

a reply to: daskakik

Which do you think is more difficult to overcome as an enemy of your ability to live your life as you see fit, you're uncle and his gang or the state alcohol authority?

originally posted by: greencmp
Which do you think is more difficult to overcome as an enemy of your ability to live your life as you see fit, you're uncle and his gang or the state alcohol authority?

Doesn't matter, I never said they were equally powerful, I said that they can exist without government.

a reply to: daskakik

They exist as smaller scale threats as compared to the state regulatory structure which allows for systematic monopolization at greater scales and forbids circumvention.

Another individual or group will capitalize on the opportunity to undercut an unreasonably high asking price indeed, it could be said that attempted monopolists are the market's best friend.

a reply to: greencmp

So instead of claiming that they can't exist you are now trying to argue that they are the lesser of two evils? How big does a gang have to be to coerce an individual?

The more important point, of course, is that the claim that anarcho-capitalism "withstands scrutiny" is untrue.

a reply to: daskakik

It does, what is your ratiocinative argument against the premise?

a reply to: greencmp
Really, you have to ask?

a reply to: daskakik

Yes.

a reply to: greencmp
In the real world humans are a little less perfect than AC needs. Some a lot less perfect.

You have to get everyone to respect everyone elses freedoms. That is the reason no other system works either.

a reply to: daskakik

That sort of plays into the pithy Churchillism:

"Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time."

He really did mean the whole free market liberal system but, it can be difficult to establish that against a competing interventionist doctrine and popular alternate history.

a reply to: greencmp
Who cares who said what, reality isn't swayed by catchy snippets.

Free markets don't exist and have never existed. Even black markets often have some form of control.

a reply to: daskakik

Black markets are free markets in exile.

a reply to: greencmp
They can be but they can also be hierarchical.

That is the problem with AC, what they say sounds good because government is big and bad, but getting rid of one never really changes anything.