Sure, after you show any unregulated market that is free from fraud and immune to depression and recession.
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Every free marketeer and libertarian around will gladly support the role of government to prevent fraud. So that’s a strawman.
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The second point is also a strawman, or requires proving a negative.
I don’t have to ‘prove’ that a transaction between you and me doesn’t cause a depression. That’s a ‘When did you stop beating your wife?’ type-fallacy.
You’re arguing that the default state is government force and coercion, and I have to somehow prove that a state of freely-entered voluntary transactions isn’t worse.
All I have to be willing to do, and all you have to be willing to do, is agree to enter into a voluntary transaction, abide the rules you agreed to, and live with the consequences of your decision. That’s it. That’s all there is to it. It isn’t any more complicated than that.
This doesn’t exactly inspire confidence in this school of which you speak if you’re any testament to its academic curriculum.
I feel the need to point out that generally local taxes paid for the one-room schoolhouses and the 19-year old WOMAN. Also, that teacher was not required to take in the mentally handicapped, the physically handicapped, or the disruptive. It was also generally considered acceptable to hit an unruly child at will (with ruler, paddle, hand, or switch, as needed), or to humiliate a child for any reason (dunce caps, public punishment, standing at the front of the class repeating shameful phrases, and even encouraged ridicule and bullying).
With the advent of social reform, teachers must now take all comers, not discipline the students harshly (not physically at all, on pain of legal issues), not say “bad” words, not refer to anything anyone may find offensive, not be considered aggressive or threatening, and gasp they can get married, be a single parent, or any number of other things. Also, amazingly, female teachers are actually paid a living wage (though male teachers are still paid more(and there are special programs that increase those for specific backgrounds and locations)). I’s no longer just the local “extra” girl (since all the others are married or spoken for or harlots) sent to teaching school so she could serve her community while living at home and turning all her meager pin-money earnings over to dear old dad. Oh, and heaven forbid she got married or did anything the least improper. Not only was she suddenly unemployed and unemployable, she was socially ostracized.
Personally, I’d love to be a teacher if I could kick out any child I didn’t like teaching, abuse/humiliate/torture any child that misbehaved, and didn’t have to fill out 4000 tons of paperwork justifying any grade I give any particular student. Since that is not the case, I’ll just let the professionals handle the teaching so I don’t get put in jail for shooting the idiotic 15 year old that wanted to pull a knife on me in class or smacking the potty-mouthed preteen who just grabbed my rear upside the head. And I’ll respect the professionals for doing the job too.
(Admittedly some of the teachers unions may have taken the hard-to-fire thing a little to far. 700 people in a rubber room because they can’t be fired, teach, or do paperwork freeeing up an admin somewhere? Shameful use of public funds.)
There is no bigger critic of educational bureaucracy and the general ethos motivating many education decision makers than myself. In fact, I hightailed my ass out of teaching as quickly could partially for that very reason. I have no doubt whatsoever that public education is in need of serious reform.
However, this statement is so laughably naive that it falls apart under even the most basic scrutiny.
First, private schools cost money and even in situations where they don’t due to scholarships or whatever, a parent still has to put some effort into getting their child to the school. Thus, a parent is forking out a significant amount of cash, or at the very least, invested some time and effort in finding out about the opportunity, so that their kid can go to private school. Therefore, these parents obviously care about their child’s education. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that a school where pretty much every parent has demonstrably gotten involved and cares about their child’s education is going to outperform a school with a bunch of kids who’s parents are deadbeats.
Second, private schools being private, they don’t have to educate everyone in the way that public schools in the U.S. are required to do. I assure you, let a public school cherry pick students the way that a private school can and they will perform as well. (In fact, I taught in a city magnet school that pretty much did get to cherry pick students and surprise we performed comparably to many of the top suburban schools). Comparably, force private schools to start educating everyone and watch how quickly their quality declines.
Again, none of this is to say that a lot of things aren’t in need of changing in public schools. But to unequivocally say that private schools do a better job than public schools demonstrates a real lack of sophisticated thought about the matter.
Charter schools are required to accept ALL students. It’s not a negative for schools to selectively choose its students – it’s a positive. I realize you and others dislike that but part of what makes a great learning ENVIRONMENT is the filtering out (via tests) the students that do not have the aptitude or motivation to be there.
People will not admit that trying to create a egalitarian school is incompatible with the highest academic achievement.
Michael, what is the problem you are trying to solve here?
Are you trying to solve the problem of
(1) ensuring parents have enough resources to educate their children, or
(2) ensuring that parents educate their children in a certain way?
Or perhaps a conflaguration of the two (option 2.5) which is to say ‘once I, as the taxpayer, start giving my resources for education, I want to have some say in HOW they are educated.’ That is the slippery slope, is it not?
I see so many posters above confusing the discussion, and perhaps confusing themselves, about what problem they are trying to solve.
If the problem is (1)…then give the poor parents vouchers. Hell, just give them money. Let them spend it on education, healthcare, or hookers and blow and trips to Vegas. It doesn’t matter.
If your concern is that they won’t have enough resources, give resources to those who need them. Then let them spend them as best as they see fit. They are the best decision-makers for how to spend resources on their children.
What I don’t see in the SDMB postings is clarity around this issue. None. At all.
If parents with ‘special needs’ children have subsidized resources to spend on their children, I guarantee schools will be created who are happy to offer their services in exchange for their resources. Special needs, or not.
There is no need for the government to get involved at all beyond redistribution of resources, if (1) is the problem you are trying to solve. They don’t need to get involved in the delivery mechanism.
I think you are incorrect. They accept the role of goverment to punish fraud after the fact, but prevention is just another name for regulation which they rale against
Yes, I realize that the Libertarian philosophy is not compicated. In fact, it is simplistic. It reminds me of the frustrated woman married to the Microsoft engineer who keeps telling her how good it will be when they finally do it. There are no examples of succesful societies that are free from financial regulation, and in the case of both states and countries you can show that wealth is tied to greater regulation rather than less, but yet there are still some who are sure that someday…
So given that tere are no example of your philosophy being practised, you expect me to show you an example of where it didn’t work. You are right, I can’t do that. I also can’t show you any examples of leprechauns causing a depression or recession. Maybe we should just hire shorter regulators.
And we know this because countries with higher test score have less govt intrusion on education, right? And bad liberal states like Massachusetts must have worse test scores than states like Missisippui and Alabama run by good ole conservative free marketers.
I think you might have misunderstood me. I was explaining that private schools do a better job educating students largely because of extraneous factors that have little to do with their ability to offer a better “product.”
In what sense are the schools in Mississippi and Alabama more ‘free market’ than the ones in Massachusetts?
Regards,
Shodan
Damned if I know. I just assume since they are “Red States” run by conservatives they must be more free market than those socialist states such as Massachusetts and Vermont. Conservatives are always harping on how their views are superior, so I assumje their must be some objective measurement of it. Just like the objective measurements of the white candidates shows they were better than those with lower scores.
Regulation prevents fraud before the fact? How is that possible? Fraud is misrepresentation in order to circumvent a voluntary transaction. What regulation prevents fraud? A law saying ‘Don’t misrepresent?’ Isn’t that redundant?
Or are you referring to regulations that stipulate the font size on the warning labels on cigarettes? Are you arguing that somehow prevents fraud? Right. You’d make a great Congressman.
The rest of your post assumes that the freedom to engage in voluntary transactions is some sort of special right that I somehow need to ‘prove’ I am allowed to have. It also assumes that government involvement is the default state (exactly how much is unclear from your post) but if I want to move the needle towards less regulation and more freedom, I somehow need to prove that it won’t cause a depression.
The simple explanation is the best because it is the easiest to understand. Waving it away with a cute simile about some Microsoft engineer having sex doesn’t really add anything to the discussion, does it?
Voluntary transactions between other individuals cannot harm you (and cannot cause a ‘depression’) unless
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There are externalities, such as a voluntary transaction between Persons A and B to create a nuclear mushroom cloud that drifts over your house, person C. That’s obviously not what we’re talking about here.
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The transaction creates losses to either Person A or B that are socialized and affect you, Person C, via government involvement that reaches into your wallet. The two major ways that can happen are by (1) mismanagement of fiat money, and the associated credit expansion/contraction and (2) taxation to subsidize the other party’s losses.
Your claim that somehow the free market caused a depression must mean there are additional reasons above-and-beyond numbers 1 and 2 above, that no one else has thought of yet.
I’d like you to explain what those are.
Is this a serious question? One example is the FDA requiring testing of drugs. Unregulated homeopathy drugs are just water and are 100% fraud, but the FDA does not require firms selling them to verify safety or efficacy.
It doesn’t help the Madoff investors much that he is going to jail after the fact, what they needed was regulators before the fact making sure that the trades he claimed he made were actually done.
It’s an extremely serious question. Thank you for your response. Unfortunately, it hasn’t served to advance your case one iota.
The buyers of drugs are perfectly free to select drugs for purchase that have an ‘FDA approved’ label on them, if that is important to them. If they don’t wish to do so (as many who travel to Mexico and India to buy drugs, do) they can buy other drugs.
People are also free to invest only with RIAs who are registered and monitored by the SEC, if that suits their fancy.
Oh wait. Madoff was registered and monitored by the SEC. Hmmmmm. That didn’t seem to help, did it?
Here.
Also, I’ve been to Mexico and seen what a mess their medical system is. I think you picked a poor example. Can you come up with a country that has a better health system than the United States AND less regulation?
I don’t have to.
What difference does it make? If an individual wishes to travel to Mexico for health care, that is his/her choice. Why do you care? Why should I care?
Because the topic is about the United States government regulating drugs sold in the United States. It wasn’t about the individual freedom of people to go to other countries to buy drugs. Do stop changing the topic to argue a point no one has made.
What? Who? Which?
The topic was
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Why the government needed to get involved in education. Some of us claimed the free market worked best.
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That morphed into ‘Oh yeah? Look at what the free market did. It caused the depression.’
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Which morphed into ‘What? How can a free market cause a depression? Government interference causes depressions.’
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Which morphed into ‘No, government interference and regulation is good. Look at the FDA and the SEC.’
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Which then went to ‘No, the FDA is not good. People should be free to choose what drugs they want to use.’
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Which then morphed into ‘Oh yeah? But then they might go into Mexico. Which is bad.’
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Which prompted my reply ‘So what? It’s their choice.’
So what was your point again?
You are making it sound like I am the first person to ever utter the concept. There are some pretty heavyweight economists that think that laissez faire policies led to the great depression. See, John Maynard Keynes.
You mean like the credit default swap market?
That’s right and they exercised that control with a hands off attitude and look where it got us.
Fannie mae and Freddie Mac have been securitizing mortgages since at least the 1970, so why did the meltdown occur now?
Really? Which regulators did that?
Interest rates were only part of the problem. Unregulated outfits like Countrywide and Ameriquest were pretty instrumental as well.