Harry
It looks like you did OK on your Toyota lease deal NOT because there was competition but because you had the inside track with your own bit of special information and market power in the form of a friendly dealer who passed on his benefits to you. You make the case for countervailing power. And a good case it is. If memory serves: Adam Smith got some of his ideas from Mandeville's "Fable of the Bees". Why is it that each bee flying around and apparently tending to its own selfish interest leads to the common good? Are there lessons for England in the 1700's? And the result is the Wealth of Nations (not to forget a Moral Sentiments). arthur -----Original Message----- From: Harry Pollard [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Wednesday, December 11, 2002 4:49 PM To: Brad McCormick, Ed.D.; Selma Singer Cc: Ray Evans Harrell; Mantle, Rosalyn; Anthony, David; Bradskey, Teresa; Cole, Karen Watters; Dawn Anthony; Downs , Jason; Dunn, Darcy; H, Joan; harrell, jane; Krueger, Jack A.; Sagowa; Sleigh, Ben and Roz; Watters, Valorie; futurework Subject: Re: Whining ("Stop it! And say: 'Thank you'! .... ) + The Invisible Hand Brad and Selma, Selma, price-fixing, corporate bailouts, subsidies, import quotas and tariffs are antithetical to the free market. All of them are supported by, lobbied for, bought and paid for, by corporate monopolies. All are anti-market privileges that make the corporations wealthy at the expense of the rest of us. If one opposes the free market, one is in the same corner as GM, Ford, Chrysler, the agricultural corporations, and all the others who use a willing government (whether Republican or Democratic) to feather their nests at the expense of the people. Brad wrote: "The goal is to show how the invisible hand cuts off its own circulation (turnd gangrenous, etc.). Unfortunately, as Harry keeps pointing out to us, governments and others keep restraining the invisible hand from hurting itself, both for practical reasons, but also just out of spite to keep making sure Marx stays wrong." Your prose is, as always, entertaining - though it lacks a certain coherence. You say you read what I say, but I doubt it. I'll try once more. Smith pointed out that if each of us goes freely about our business, exchanging our goods, services, and ideas with each other, although we do so each for his individual well-being, as if by an invisible hand, the whole community will be benefited. In other words, the community will be an awfully good place to live in, because the inhabitants are free to exchange. Brad, you act as if the invisible hand is a kind of material bogeyman which does things and can have things done to it. Not the case - "as if by an invisible hand" is the phrase you should remember. Not, I fear, that you will. Whatever the subject, you manage to get a little "invisible hand" and "Bush" into the post. Read Marx's third volume of Kapital - "Capitalist production as a whole". After a lot of involved nonsense in Volume I - mostly repeated in Volume II - Volume III has a lot of good stuff. Unfortunately, it's the volume almost never read. Communists read Volume I, or more likely, a condensed Volume I - and that's it. I don't remember ever checking how much of Volume III is Marx and how much is Engels, but in any event it's the volume worth reading - even though neither of them was a fighter pilot. What do you mean by a "trade relation". As it so happens, I do have a trade relationship with Toyota. I like their products. My first station wagon I kept for 8 years - even though I had a tax advantage if I bought a new one earlier. In 8 years, I didn't even have to replace a light bulb. I got a new one so a son could have the old one. He's had it for another 8 years, though he has had various maintenance items to deal with. I leased the new one - the tax advantages were worthwhile. I handled it through a friend in the business who happens to be a Georgist. I listened on a speaker phone as he bargained with the wholesaler. He was trying to get $1,000 kickback on the wholesale price. He failed, but he did get $800 which went to me. I normally buy for cash, but for a lease I had to do it through Bank of America. I then learned that the banks have two interest rates - the one they charge you and the one they ask from the dealer. The difference over 3 years was more than $2,000. That advantage also came to me. But, all over the country, people are buying cars that they think are priced lowest, when hidden in those "lowest" prices are all kinds of hidden extras. One is naive to think that this kind of thing can be dealt with by government regulation, or policing - particularly as government is in the pockets of the car companies. Also, in the pockets of the automobile unions, for the unions get their higher wages by sharing some of the loot provided by government largesse. (Even though it harms the rest of the people.) The only way to handle it is by "Cut-price Competition" or the "Law of the Jungle" - epithets invented not by the world's consumers, but by the world's monopolists. They don't like the free market. The free market is not just something to be enjoyed just by villagers, but by all the world's peoples at every level. Harry --------------------------------------------------------------------- Brad wrote: >Selma Singer wrote: > > > > I haven't been reading too many of these very carefully so just delete this > > if it has been mentioned before, but has anyone mentioned (in the > context of > > this invisible hand and free competition, etc.)corporate price-fixing, > > government bail-outs of failing corporations,etc.etc.? How do these things > > fit in this'free', 'competitive' market'? do these things and the myriad of > > other dynamics like them not interfere with the 'free', 'competitive' part > > that is supposed to control this invisible hand? >[snip] > >Not in disagreement, but elaboration: > >One of the things I learned from the new book about Jack Boyd >(_Boyd: The fighter pilot who changed the art of war_) was >that the way Boyd and the other "reformers" went about >demolishing the Pentagon's sacred cows was not just to >do their homework VERY THOROUGHLY, but, also: > > (1) Use the adversary's data whenever they have any > real data, and: > > (2) Whenever there is a margin of error, always use the > end of the range that is most favorable to the adversary. > >Then you help them dig themselves into a deeper hole faster >and more easily for all to see. > >I've always believed this. Of course price-fixing >etc. is important in reality, but it is *interesting* >only if it is an *inevitable* part of the *essence* >of capitalism in its most plausible ways of elaborating >itself. Otherwise it becomes a red herring for >George Bush to remonstrate that we have to purge the >barrel of the few rotten apples that threaten to >upset the applecart.... > >The goal is >to show how the invisible hand cuts off its >own circulation (turnd gangrenous, etc.). Unfortunately, >as Harry keeps pointing out to us, governments and others >keep restraining the invisible hand from hurting itself, >both for practical reasons, but also just >out of spite to keep making sure Marx stays wrong. > >-- > >And, yes, Harry, I did read what you wrote about the >market and about trade, and I responded, >basically to the effect that >I think your idea of the market is noble but has >nothing to do with economics. Rather it relates to >relations within small peer groups (personal relations). >So it *would* have to do with economics in a small >18th century colonial village with some farmers, >a blacksmith, a baker (could such a small community >support even one baker?), a school teacher -- and, >ah, yes! -- a "Divine". But that's not the kind of >place even the man in the gray flannel suit >lived in, much less we denizens of the new Global >Pillage (are we thus ex officio >members of the coalition of the willing?).... > >Let me try the question again: What does what you, >Harry, call "trade" hae to do with the only traders >who(sic) matter these days: Supranational Legal >Fictions? When was the last time you had a >trade relation with Microsoft Corp. or Toyota Corp. or even >your local supermarket (I presume you do not >have an employer but rather that you are >an independent professional, who lives from >the only fully human form of compensation: honoraria, >rather than either unearned income [which hurts >others] or wages [which hurt oneself])? > >Is the invisible hand something "on the human scale"? >The only person I know of who studied such a >thing in our social world was Erving Goffman, whose >ideas I think can fairly be summed up by what I >call Goffman's First Law: > > Where there's a system, there's a way to work it. > >(Like in the story of the man who left the factory >every evening pushing an empty wheelbarrow, and the >security guard would carefully inspect the wheelbarrow >for anything the man might be trying to steal from >the factory but the wheelbarrow was empty so the >guard would wave the man through, and thus did the >man steal wheelbarrows.) > >Me thinks that the invisible hand of human-scale >trade operates, in our world, mainly "off the books" -- >below the radar of the IRS et al. I think it also >operates in such places as >those parts of Northern Pakistan where >the US cannot find Osama bin Laden but AK-47s >and Stinger missiles are offered for sale in the marketplace. > >\brad mccormick ****************************** Harry Pollard Henry George School of LA Box 655 Tujunga CA 91042 [EMAIL PROTECTED] Tel: (818) 352-4141 Fax: (818) 353-2242 *******************************
