Isn't it time to start calling BS at some of the Libertarian arguments?

[VarlosZ]

@Revenant Threshold

Profit isn’t income, it’s income over expenditure, and profit may be made by decreasing manufacturing costs or employee benefits, moving to a cheaper location, cutting back on material quality or quality assurance, for just some examples.

True, but it’s worth pointing out that those are not always bad things. Everyone clucks their tongues if a company shuts down a factory, lays off its 500 workers, and relocates to China. And while it does suck for the people who lose their jobs, to consider only the negative consequences and deride the company’s executives for being greedy bastards (as some in this thread undoubtedly would) is myopic.

There are opportunity costs involved with the continued operation of that factory. It costs money to run, and if it’s function can be performed more cheaply overseas then closing it frees up capital, which can be used to create more or better paying white collar jobs, to lower retail prices, and for research & development (and, yes, for increasing the size of the CEO’s paycheck). The people who lost their jobs will eventually get new ones, presumably with companies which have more need for their services than their former employer – in all likelihood, some percentage of the 500 will be retrained and able to enter an industry that’s growing rather than shrinking. Most fundamentally – and also most seldom mentioned – those 500 manufacturing jobs that were here represented 500 potential manufacturing jobs that were not somewhere else; there are people in China who need jobs, too.

There are similar potential benefits to the other examples you mention. While I’m certainly not saying that those things are good in every instance, it is true that they’re necessary (and therefore good in aggregate, over time). An economy in which companies were not allowed to reduce employee benefits, or relocate manufacturing to cheaper areas, or reduce product quality is an economy that would die a quick and ugly death.

And providing goods and services most certainly can be evil at times, though I’m unsure if you’re arguing that it can never be here.

I’m not disagreeing, but I’m curious: what did you have in mind?

[Voyager]

@Renob

OK, but how are those things “evil”? They may be amoral, but are they immoral? Why should I pay an employee a certain wage if someone else will work for less? If the person who will work for less wants a job and freely accepts it, is it evil if I agree to give him one? Or if someone wants to supply me the same parts at a lower price, why should I refuse to buy from him? To reward the more inefficient supplier? And if I cut quality and people still buy it, that certainly seems that I am still catering to the demands of my customers.
Sure, I’ll say that some desires of people can be “evil.” There are certainly businessmen who cater to providing the shadier things in life. But that certainly does not mean all businesses are “evil.”

Those Chinese factories which used shoddy ingredients, or even poison, must be the epitome of free enterprise in your book.

As for want, companies also create want. If you deny this, you are saying the entire advertising industry is a waste of money. Sure, some advertising is informational, but if all was I doubt we’d have seen the Swedish Bikini Team.

Profit is not necessarily evil, but you seem to be denying the existence of short sighted business practices that help the company in the short term and harm society in the long term. Cleaning up your waste is expensive - how in your model to justify not dumping it in the river? Cutting wages is good. If everyone does it, who can afford to buy your products? (A case of which we are seeing right now.)

[Renob]

@Der Trihs

It IS “the will of the people”; just because it doesn’t always work doesn’t mean that it never works. The difference is, first that we have more influence over the government than a corporation, and second governments have one less motive to harm people. Corporations have every motive for malice that governments do, plus the profit motive.

If I don’t want AT&T in my life, I refuse to do business with them. It has zero effect on me. If enough people are like me, AT&T goes out of business. If I don’t like the rules promulgated by my Congress, I have no recourse. I can’t simpy refuse to comply. I can’t opt out. People voluntarily choose how much power they give to corporations. They do not do the same for governments.

Furthermore, your argument that goernments have less motives to harm people is pretty easily refuted by pointing to the hundreds of millions of corpses littering the globe in just the last century. They did not get there by corporations, they got there by governments.

They haven’t been allowed to merge and form a monopoly. And, in the good old unregulated days, they DID starve people, even burning food during the Depression rather than giving it away.

You do realize, don’t you, that the orders to plow fields under and slaughter animals came from the government, don’t you? Furthermore, corporations provided food before there were anti-trust laws. They provided all kinds of products before these laws existed. Or do you really think that anti-trust laws are the only reason that competition exists today?

Only if it’s profitable. if producing inferior products is more profitable, that’s what they do. For example, it’s standard practice to make products that are grossly inferior in durability to what could be made, because it’s more profitable to sell them again and again.

It’s cheaper, too, and people like to be able to, you know, afford to buy things.

Ah, yes, the deregulated industries, where prices go up, accidents increase, and services go down. And where the only thing preventing monopolies is the government occasionally getting the anti-trust bug and breaking them up.

And what proof do you have for any of these assertions?

Because it’s immoral to starve someone, no matter how profitable it is. And because you are setting the stage for either the election of those evil, evil socialists, or for being murdered by your own starving workers.

I hope you are moral and have given away all your goods and services to feed people, then. Because it’s immoral to allow anyone to starve, in your view. As long as you have a computer or a house or even some clothes you are being immoral because somewhere someone is starving.

[Freddy_the_Pig]

@Voyager

Cutting wages is good. If everyone does it, who can afford to buy your products? (A case of which we are seeing right now.)

If a business doesn’t cut wages, when it can, then it’s either charging more than it needs to for its product, or returning less money than it could to its shareholders. Any one of these alternatives takes money out of somebody’s pocket. Why is one more evil than the other?

[Renob]

@Voyager

Those Chinese factories which used shoddy ingredients, or even poison, must be the epitome of free enterprise in your book.

If people agree to buy products with shoddy ingredients (and they know they contain such ingredients), then what do I care? As far as poison goes, of course that’s wrong. No one knowingly agrees to buy poison (OK, I bought some to poison my moles in the back yard, but you know what I mean).

As for want, companies also create want. If you deny this, you are saying the entire advertising industry is a waste of money. Sure, some advertising is informational, but if all was I doubt we’d have seen the Swedish Bikini Team.

Yes, so? People still choose to buy these products. If someone helped them make that choice, why is that a bad thing.

Profit is not necessarily evil, but you seem to be denying the existence of short sighted business practices that help the company in the short term and harm society in the long term.

Why is profit evil? It is a signal that you are offering a good or service that people want.

Cleaning up your waste is expensive - how in your model to justify not dumping it in the river?

Because it harms someone else.

Cutting wages is good. If everyone does it, who can afford to buy your products? (A case of which we are seeing right now.)

Wages go in both directions. Yes, if you don’t have the right skills to offer something of value your wages go down. So what? Why should I pay you to produce something that no one wants or that a lot of other people can offer? Why do you have that obligation to force me to do something?

[Revenant_Threshold]

@Renob

OK, but how are those things “evil”? They may be amoral, but are they immoral? Why should I pay an employee a certain wage if someone else will work for less? If the person who will work for less wants a job and freely accepts it, is it evil if I agree to give him one? Or if someone wants to supply me the same parts at a lower price, why should I refuse to buy from him? To reward the more inefficient supplier? And if I cut quality and people still buy it, that certainly seems that I am still catering to the demands of my customers.

Those were really just examples of things you could do to increase profits that aren’t “sell more stuff”, not examples of evil things.

I would say that business ethics should have the same standard applied to them as I would normally apply to anything else; what is being done is not necessarily the important part in good/evil terms, but what is the motivation? As you’ve done here, it’s in the giving of examples of why the action is taken that can make something marked as good or bad.

You could cut quality and still have a decent product. You could cut quality and have an inadequate product but have no fear of reduced sales because there is no better product - not evil for some things necessarily, but perhaps for vital needs. Are you sinking those funds back into the company, creating new jobs and the like? Or is it merely to line your own nest? Actions can be good or bad, and adding to your paycheck is certainly not innately good or evil, but doing so at the expense of safety or risk of products? I’d kinda peg that in the “evil” camp. And I feel the need to point out that if you cut quality people need to buy it to know it is something they don’t want to get. The first adopters can buy it without their needs being fulfilled.

Sure, I’ll say that some desires of people can be “evil.” There are certainly businessmen who cater to providing the shadier things in life. But that certainly does not mean all businesses are “evil.”

Hence why I pointed out I disagreed with BG.

[Revenant_Threshold]

@VarlosZ

True, but it’s worth pointing out that those are not always bad things. Everyone clucks their tongues if a company shuts down a factory, lays off its 500 workers, and relocates to China. And while it does suck for the people who lose their jobs, to consider only the negative consequences and deride the company’s executives for being greedy bastards (as some in this thread undoubtedly would) is myopic.

There are opportunity costs involved with the continued operation of that factory. It costs money to run, and if it’s function can be performed more cheaply overseas then closing it frees up capital, which can be used to create more or better paying white collar jobs, to lower retail prices, and for research & development (and, yes, for increasing the size of the CEO’s paycheck). The people who lost their jobs will eventually get new ones, presumably with companies which have more need for their services than their former employer – in all likelihood, some percentage of the 500 will be retrained and able to enter an industry that’s growing rather than shrinking. Most fundamentally – and also most seldom mentioned – those 500 manufacturing jobs that were here represented 500 potential manufacturing jobs that were not somewhere else; there are people in China who need jobs, too.

I have no problem saying there are benefits and not just problems with things like that. The line as I see it though is that all of these things are possibilities. Will that capital be used to create jobs, lower retail prices and the like? Will those laid-off people be able to get jobs? (I don’t think the company is morally bound to keep its employees, but what they’re gaining in balance may tip the scales).

I too notice the very seldom mentioning of relocation meaning that jobs aren’t gone - they’re just given to other people. Generally the arguments against moving that hinge on that particular point are of a selfish nature - but you can’t really blame people for that. In the grand scheme of things, you’re right, it’ll mean some people will have their lives improved (again, possibly). But was that the motivation? What will happen to the improved revenue stream? What is the purpose for increasing profits like this? That’s the point that makes something bad or good.

There are similar potential benefits to the other examples you mention. While I’m certainly not saying that those things are good in every instance, it is true that they’re necessary (and therefore good in aggregate, over time). An economy in which companies were not allowed to reduce employee benefits, or relocate manufacturing to cheaper areas, or reduce product quality is an economy that would die a quick and ugly death.

Most certainly. Like I said to Renob, those were just examples of alternate profit methods, not eeeeeevil profit methods. But I would point out in response that we also have laws aginst reducing employee benefits too far, reducing product quality too far. We don’t say all these things are necessarily bad - but we do recognise a point at which they’re presumably near-certainly so.

I’m not disagreeing, but I’m curious: what did you have in mind?

Weapon sales to those you know will themselves perform evil acts. Reducing quality to levels of safety just barely above a competitors, to maximise profit while still ensuring it’ll be bought. Buying up component makers/farms/anything at the first stage of a chain so that you reduce the amount of competitors, and using that to sell inferior products. Providing products which then require further products in order to continue working. And then the simple providing of products which are knowingly unsuited or incapable of matching a customer’s needs.

[Der_Trihs]

@Renob

If I don’t want AT&T in my life, I refuse to do business with them. It has zero effect on me. If enough people are like me, AT&T goes out of business. If I don’t like the rules promulgated by my Congress, I have no recourse. I can’t simpy refuse to comply. I can’t opt out. People voluntarily choose how much power they give to corporations. They do not do the same for governments.

Garbage. Corporations have just as much power to compel an individual as any government. That’s how they force people into working themselves until they are crippled or dead, when the government doesn’t stop them.

@Renob

Furthermore, your argument that goernments have less motives to harm people is pretty easily refuted by pointing to the hundreds of millions of corpses littering the globe in just the last century. They did not get there by corporations, they got there by governments.

They got there by both. and in many cases, the governments were just doing what the corporations wanted them to.

@Renob

You do realize, don’t you, that the orders to plow fields under and slaughter animals came from the government, don’t you?

And from farmers and agricultural companies, who would rather destroy their own product than help others.

@Renob

Furthermore, corporations provided food before there were anti-trust laws. They provided all kinds of products before these laws existed. Or do you really think that anti-trust laws are the only reason that competition exists today?

Yes. And much of the food they produced was contaminated. And quite often, they didn’t produce enough food.

@Renob

It’s cheaper, too, and people like to be able to, you know, afford to buy things.

Shoddy goods that need to be replaced constantly aren’t cheaper, they are more expensive. That’s the point.

@Renob

I hope you are moral and have given away all your goods and services to feed people, then. Because it’s immoral to allow anyone to starve, in your view. As long as you have a computer or a house or even some clothes you are being immoral because somewhere someone is starving.

That’s the GOVERNMENT’s job, not mine.

[BrainGlutton]

@Renob

How is it evil to provide goods and services that people want (the only way to make a profit, outside of using the government to force people to buy your produt)? Is serving your friends, neighbors, and strangers and catering to their desires evil?

Because, when it comes to things like water (the original example), we’re not talking about General Motors turning a profit, we’re talking about your local police force turning a profit.

[VarlosZ]

@BrainGlutton

[Profit is evil. . . ] Because, when it comes to things like water (the original example), we’re not talking about General Motors turning a profit, we’re talking about your local police force turning a profit.

1. That’s not what you said before.
2. For (nearly) all intents and purposes, the police force does turn a profit; they just have a different sort of revenue stream.

[Dorothea_Book]

People voluntarily choose how much power they give to corporations. They do not do the same for governments.

Yes, Renob but people vote for governments which are accountable to them in a democracy. Corporations are only accountable to consumers insofar as there are other good options for people to choose from. But often there aren’t. Or maybe the relationship is employer/employee. Or maybe the problem is the polluting of a nearby river which has nothing to do with purchasing anything. Or maybe the product was advertised as good but was harmful and now the person is sick or dead as a result.

In any case, this pitting of corporate evil against government evil, as though one has to choose between the two, is IMO facile. Obviously both can be good and both can be evil. Liberals acknowledge that the best situation is a productive relation between government and the market (powered people who are citizens as well as consumers). So far as I can tell, libertarians seem to think the market is almost wholly good and government almost always bad (inefficient, unfree, etc.) Consequently, they tend to see people as consumers first and foremost.

[Little_Nemo]

Cleaning up your waste is expensive - how in your model to justify not dumping it in the river?

Because it harms someone else.

So? Your job is to make profits for your shareholders not to spend their money for the benefit of strangers. Not only did you misappropriate company funds you also allowed your competitor to get a step ahead of your company because he was doing his job correctly.

This is the divide between private businesses and governments. The role of a private enterprise is to serve its owners. The role of a government is to serve its citizens. So a government has the duty to regulate the actions of private enterprises. By doing so it sets a standard for all businesses so there is no relative advantage or disadvantage to be considered. The government isn’t a business and shouldn’t operate like one - profit considerations have no place in the government just as they have no place in families or religions.

Businesses are good for doing business things. Governments are good for doing government things.

[nd_n8]

@Merkwurdigliebe

Do you seriously not understand? The fact that it benefits that 10 percent will in the end collectively help everyone. It’s like saying that Amtrak only benefits a small percent of people. But then how many car-drivers depend on economic activities provided by Amtrak passengers? Guess what, a lot of people on the East Coast use Amtrak, and a huge percent of people in middle America depend on the economic activity on the east Coast for their well-being

Collective good doesn’t have to benefit everybody equally. It is the idea that helping out one group will benefit the rest through less than obvious mechanisms.

So it… um… trickles down?

[Renob]

@Der Trihs

Garbage. Corporations have just as much power to compel an individual as any government. That’s how they force people into working themselves until they are crippled or dead, when the government doesn’t stop them.

Obviously the CEO of AT&T does not want me to buy my Internet connection from Verizon. Yet I do. The CEO of AT&T cannot do anything to stop this, except offer me a better price or a better product (from which I benefit). The Governor of my state doesn’t want me to buy cocaine. Let’s say I do. The forces of the Governor can and will use force (even to the point of death) to stop me.

How can you plausibly say that corporations have as much power to force me to do something as government? Corporations cannot use force against anyone. No one is forced to work until they are crippled or dead. Yes, some people may choose to do so. But corporations never went to the houses of sick people and forced them to work when they did not want to do so.

They got there by both. and in many cases, the governments were just doing what the corporations wanted them to.

What corporations caused Stalin and Lenin to murder millions of their people, Mao to start the Cultural Revolution, and Pol Pot to begin his murderous rampage?

And from farmers and agricultural companies, who would rather destroy their own product than help others.

When the government is paying you (or forcing you) to do this, it’s pretty hard to blame the corporations or farmers.

Yes. And much of the food they produced was contaminated. And quite often, they didn’t produce enough food.

I’m sure you probably think corporations are evil for developing techniques to grow more food on less land and becoming more efficient, too.

Shoddy goods that need to be replaced constantly aren’t cheaper, they are more expensive. That’s the point.

They may or they may not be. When my parents bought their first microwave oven back in the 1970s that thing cost hundreds of dollars. They used it for probably twenty years. I’ve gone through a comple microwaves in the past decade. However, at $50 a pop I have a lot easier time affording them than my parents did (and, frankly, they are far superior machines). Yes, they don’t last as long but there are other factors to consider.

That’s the GOVERNMENT’s job, not mine.

That’s not what you said. You said it was “immoral to starve someone, no matter how profitable it is.” If it is immoral for a company to make a profit on food when someone is starving, then how is it not immoral for you to have surplus cash when you’ve spent enough to prevent yourself from starving?

@Little Nemo

Your job is to make profits for your shareholders not to spend their money for the benefit of strangers. Not only did you misappropriate company funds you also allowed your competitor to get a step ahead of your company because he was doing his job correctly.

As all libertarians agree, the one legitimate function of government is to prevent one person from harming another (or punish him for doing so). If pollution harms others, then it is up to the government to deal with that (usually libertarians suggest that a strict tort system is better than a command-and-control regulatory structure, though).

@Dorothea Book

So far as I can tell, libertarians seem to think the market is almost wholly good and government almost always bad (inefficient, unfree, etc.)

Yes, because government is predicated on force. Libertarians think that it’s evil to force people to do something, whether that force originates from the government or individuals. In the free market, there is no force. There is only people offering to sell you goods and services that you may need or desire. It is the free exchange of these goods and services which is superior to the coercion that is inherent in government. Yes, there is a need for coercion sometimes. However, that coercion should be limited to preventing coercion from others.

Saying that government is “accountable” to people doesn’t really mean much. A majority of the people can desire things that violate the rights of a minority. Just because “the people” want something doesn’t mean they should get it.

[Dorothea_Book]

@Renob

Yes, because government is predicated on force. Libertarians think that it’s evil to force people to do something, whether that force originates from the government or individuals. In the free market, there is no force.

And yet if you’ve read this thread carefully you’ve seen numerous examples of how the (so-called) free market is pervaded by as well as predicated on force: because corporations and wealthy elites wield disproportionate power and aren’t accountable to average citizens through democratic mechanisms. Consumer activism works only for a certain number of things.

Saying that government is “accountable” to people doesn’t really mean much.

Really? Care to live somewhere where it isn’t?

A majority of the people can desire things that violate the rights of a minority. Just because “the people” want something doesn’t mean they should get it.

Oh absolutely. I agree that a straightforward democracy can result in tyranny of the majority. But that’s why I like our system–a constitutional democracy, which guarantees certain rights and limits what legislatures can do.

[Renob]

@Dorothea Book

And yet if you’ve read this thread carefully you’ve seen numerous examples of how the (so-called) free market is pervaded by as well as predicated on force: because corporations and wealthy elites wield disproportionate power and aren’t accountable to average citizens through democratic mechanisms. Consumer activism works only for a certain number of things.

I’ve seen no such examples of force. Corporations can only offer products or jobs that people are free to take or leave. If someone would be worse off without taking those jobs or buying those products, he makes a rational choice and takes the job or buys the product. That doesn’t mean force is involved. Life is all about trade-offs. Every decision you make is a choice between competing alternatives. How is that “force”?

Really? Care to live somewhere where it isn’t?

If I could live in a place where I had no vote and yet the government was strictly banned from telling me how I could spend my money, I would certainly choose that.

Oh absolutely. I agree that a straightforward democracy can result in tyranny of the majority. But that’s why I like our system–a constitutional democracy, which guarantees certain rights and limits what legislatures can do.

Unfortunately, the limits on the power of government have been systematically eroded since the misnamed “Progressive” Era.

[RickJay]

@Der Trihs

They don’t respect freedom at all; just power.

Who is “they”?

I’d try to address some of your points, but you seem to be arguing against a boogeyman. I don’t know who “they” are or what “they” think, and suspect “they” is whatever or whomever you personally decide they are to facilitate your worldview.

[VarlosZ]

@Dorothea Book

So far as I can tell, libertarians seem to think the market is almost wholly good and government almost always bad (inefficient, unfree, etc.)

In my unsubstantiated opinion, libertarians do frequently go overboard in defending the purity and justice of the free market. I think it’s that they get so used to arguing for the superiority of unregulated markets as compared to regulated markets that they sometimes forget to acknowledge that there are problems in unregulated markets as well. OTOH, it’s not that important that they acknowledge those problems, because their existence doesn’t necessarily suggest that the government ought to get involved, and of course a libertarian wouldn’t suggest that it should, regardless.

@Dorothea

And yet if you’ve read this thread carefully you’ve seen numerous examples of how the (so-called) free market is pervaded by as well as predicated on force: because corporations and wealthy elites wield disproportionate power and aren’t accountable to average citizens through democratic mechanisms.

The free market is predicated on force? I’m curious to heat what you mean by that, since it seems to me that that statement can only be true in the same way that private property in general is predicated on force – e.g., you’re forcing me not to move into your house (even though I’m homeless and it’s twice as big as it needs to be). To a lesser extent, even the statement that the free market is “pervaded” by force depends on some particular definitions which, while neither wrong nor inaccurate, may be unusual.
ETA: Oh, and I’m still kinda wondering what you’re former screen name was (I’ve been around long enough to remember it, probably) – if you just missed my question before or forgot, I mean. If for whatever reason you’d rather not say, that’s cool too.

[VarlosZ]

Just to expand on my point:

Based on your previous posts, I assume you’d say that the free market “forces” about 16% of Americans to go without health insurance – I happen to be in that 16%. What I’d point out is that the “free market” is an abstraction; it can’t force anybody to do anything, and it’s not the free market that forces me to go without comprehensive health care. What literally forces me to go without health care is that doctor over there (and that one, and that one) who refuses to treat me for free.

We can use the words like that if we want, but if we do we ought to be consistent. I’m forcing children to live in orphanages (because I’m not adopting them). That girl at the end of the bar is forcing me to be celibate (because she said no). More directly to the point, you’re forcing some destitute Algerian to go without the penicillin he needs to live (because you won’t send him $20).

Alternately, we can stick to the standard definitions, in which “force” works the other way: it means to demand something (under threat of violence) that someone doesn’t want to give, rather than to refuse to give something that another person desires. And we can do this while still acknowledging that a free market does not leave people perfectly free.

[Little_Nemo]

Saying that government is “accountable” to people doesn’t really mean much.

It means a lot. People in a stable democracy tend to underestimate the benefits of living in such a society. They just assume that they’re living in some natural state and that the government isn’t really doing anything for them. But a good government is like air - you don’t see it or feel it but it’s there working for you all the time. Goverments tend to only get noticed when they do something but their real function is all the bad things they prevent from happening.