Calm down Justin. Hayek's critique is not theoretically deep. It is simply an
empirical claim. But he has done not one empirical study to back it up. It may be
correct or it may not. Only experience will show. Pointing to past incidents of
failure proves very little. As Michael and many others have pointed out it is easy to
detail many occasions when markets have failed to work any where near their
theoretical ideal. Shall we infer from that that markets never work? In fact, most of
us are socialist because markets do such a miserable job at some very basic tasks. It
is pointless to keep referring to the Soviet Union. I have at no time suggested,
implied or meant that the Soviet Union should be a model for anything. And we would be
poor socialists if that was the best we could dream up. All of my examples have been
much more mundane and closer to home.
I have admitted several times that you are right about incentives. But you have given
no evidence (other than applying superlative adjectives to Hayek) for your claim that
only markets can provide that incentive. When I give an example of a non market
institution that works better than the market, you grant it.
All right, now you say that non market institutions will work in individual
industries, but not in all at once. Any critical percentage? A theoretically deep
critique should have something to say about that. I propose that we design alternative
institutions one good at time, and when we can't find something better than a market
organization we will leave the market? On a practical level in the U.S. that would
involve a vigourous protection of public education and the advocacy of a public health
programme. In Canada, it would involve protection of those non market institutions and
the creation of new ones in other areas. My favourites at the moment are housing, food
and transportation.
Until now I have tried to ignore your implications that disagreeing with you proves my
stupidity. I will grant that without you having to shout it continually. Lets stick to
the debate.
Rod
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> So the argument is meaningless if it does not estabalish a priori that markets are
>better than any kind of planning anywhere? Rubbish. Nonsense. That is a fast way of
>not having to try to answer a very strong, empirically supported, theoretically deep
>critique of a nonmarket economy. To see this, consider the answer: you say, the only
>way to see if nonmarket alternatives will work is to try. But try what? You say,
>planning. I say, look at the USSR. You say, but our planning will be democratic! I
>say, that wpn't help (see what I have argued above). At this point you say, that's
>meaningless, because otherwise planning would never work. No, say I, and Hayek: the
>problem is that planning won't work outside a market framework, to give us the
>information we need. An starting to feel like a proken record. I really do appreciate
>Jim Divine's contribution, whicha t least comes to grips with real issues and offers
>real arguments. --jks
>
> In a message dated Mon, 17 Jul 2000 8:15:23 AM Eastern Daylight Time, Rod Hay
><[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
>
> << In that case, the argument is meaningless. We can only know if alternatives to
> markets can work if we try. Even then we can only know that that particular
> experiment did not work, not that no institutional arrangement can work. If the
> proposition is not general, it is merely an empirical hypothesis.
>
> Rod
>
> [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
>
> >
> >
> > Hayek had a deep insight, and, like many peop;le with such an insight, went
> > overboard with it. We might take it for what it is worth, while correcting
> > for its overstatement. However, his main point was not that _nothing_ could
> > be planned, but that _not everything_ could be planned. He was in fact a lot
> > less ferocious about markets than a lot of his followers, A big U of Chicago
> > Law School libertarian, Richard Epstein, recently took him to task for that
> > in a piece in the U Md. L. Rev. My poiint too is that planning cannot
> > tiotally or largely displace markets, not that it cannot be used where
> > experience shows it works. --jks
>
> --
> Rod Hay
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> The History of Economic Thought Archive
> http://socserv2.mcmaster.ca/~econ/ugcm/3ll3/index.html
> Batoche Books
> http://Batoche.co-ltd.net/
> 52 Eby Street South
> Kitchener, Ontario
> N2G 3L1
> Canada
>
> >>
--
Rod Hay
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
The History of Economic Thought Archive
http://socserv2.mcmaster.ca/~econ/ugcm/3ll3/index.html
Batoche Books
http://Batoche.co-ltd.net/
52 Eby Street South
Kitchener, Ontario
N2G 3L1
Canada
