The Daily WTF: Curious Perversions in Information Technology

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

Jack:
Every time "A" trades with "B" they do so because both of them expect to be happier after the trade. That additional happiness is called profit and they both enjoy it.
Every profit-making transaction, invariably must make the world a better place, because it makes both parties happier. Profits are a measure of how much good one has done.

Unless there's violence involved. If "A" forces "B" to part with property, that is not free trade. That is theft, and it is always harmful in the net analysis, though it may benefit the recipient of the stolen goods.

Let's see: False, false, and false.

When I am forced to buy, say, a city sticker for my automobile, I don't expect to be happier after it. The city chamber of commerce doesn't expect to be "happier" after it (how exactly do you measure the "happiness" of a legal entity, anyway?). It's just something that's in an ordinance and therefore I must legally do it whether it makes me happier or not. In fact, frequently I make transactions with the expectation that I will be UNHAPPIER after the transaction. Have you ever bought tickets to go see a movie with your significant other that you knew you were going to hate, but did anyway because your S.O. pressured you into it? Or how about when my employer raises the rates on our health insurance because the insurance company's saleslady showed him a good time last Friday? I certainly don't expect to be any happier after paying the extra $100/month and getting the exact same coverage. So the happiness test fails miserably, right out of the gate.

The second claim -- that all transactions must make the world a better place -- relies on the first claim and therefore already has been shown false, but let's approach this from a different direction. If all transactions MUST make the world a better place, then the simplest way to make the world better and better every day would be for just two people to keep trading ALL the world's wealth between them. Right? If all the world's wealth is changing hands once per day, then each of those transactions must be making the greatest possible amount of improvement in the world. And therefore if you just had two people, trading the money back and forth as fast as possible, the world would get better... and better... and better! Right? Except that it only takes three or four brain cells to realize that if only two people controlled all the world's wealth, eight billion people would starve to death. So that would actually mean the world is getting worse. So there's a contradiction if we start from the premise that all transactions must make the world a better place. So that's false too.

Lastly, the idea that A taking B's property against their will is ALWAYS harmful in the net analysis is also false. Let's say you have a city of 10,000 people. This city needs streets, sewers, water, power, police forces, EMTs, and firefighters. All 10,000 people get together and they decide between two options. They can either (a) each individually hire someone to build roads to their houses, someone to pump water to their home, someone to patrol the streets, someone to take them to the hospital when they have a heart attack, or they can (b) pool their resources and collectively buy these services in bulk, at "wholesale" rates. If they go with option (a), the individualistic method, each person may need to pay $75,000 each year (that's assuming that the policeman, EMT, and firefighter that each person hires doesn't mind working for about $20k... which is a hell of an assumption). But if they go with option (b), they are going to pay about $90,000,000 collectively, but that works out to only $9,000 per person. Now, Jim-Bob in the back row is a stubborn old man and refuses to vote for the collective purchase option (b). He'd like to buy all his own services. But he gets outvoted by everyone else, because they don't have an extra $75k lying around. Now the other citizens are forcing Jim-Bob to give up $9,000 against his will, but it is easy to demonstrate that for them to do so benefits Jim-Bob greatly. He's getting all the same services he would have paid for anyway, but at an 88% discount! He gets to keep that extra $66k and use it to bring himself other happiness. It also benefits the rest of the citizens of the town, in that Jim-Bob's participation allows them to also receive this discount. Everyone's life is improved, including Jim-Bob's, because he was forced to part with his property against his will.

So... zero for three. But keep going, please!

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

Jazz:
Let's examine the process of "producing" that wealth and "earning" that two million dollar bonus from the point of view of the business leader.
I'm J. Random Bossman, and I'm sitting on my yacht cruising along the Pacific coast. Looking at my data, I can see that another boss man somewhere is on track to be able to give you a return on investment of $80, while as it stands right now I am only able to give you an ROI of $60. I want the bonus you've offered, so I need some way to raise the ROI. Which means some way of getting extra profit without any extra expense.

So I grab my cell phone, I call up the manager of each local production facility. I give him an option. "Either raise your profitability by X%, or you're fired. I don't care how you do it. Either fire people, or cut their benefits, whatever." And I hang up. Now it's someone else's problem. I don't actually have to figure out what to do -- I just have to hold the threat of being without a job over someone else's head so that they figure it out for me.

Some managers decide to lay off huge numbers of workers. Some cut the benefits. So out of my 5,000 workers that I had at all facilities, 3,500 of them lose their jobs and the others now no longer have health care. Of course, if one of them complains to me, I get to hold up my hands and say, "I didn't fire them, the managers did. You should take it up with them," while I take another sip of single-malt scotch from the bar on my yacht. The savings I get from these layoffs allows me to return an extra $40 to you as an investor, bringing your ROI up and earning me the two-million dollar bonus.

I just earned two million dollars by making ten phone calls and screwing ~15,000 people (5,000 employees and their family members) out of their living. I didn't actually PRODUCE anything! In fact, the capacity of the capital that I own to actually produce products has gone DOWN, since I have fewer workers with experience on my production line, and the workers I have left are likely to suffer increased attrition due to worse health over time. But I, sitting on my yacht, produced nothing. I hired other workers to produce something for me, but that demonstrates THEIR economic value -- not mine. As you said, "so it goes, back layer by layer, every capital tool was made by workers" -- you are correct. Every tool was made by WORKERS. None of the tools were made by OWNERS. The worker produces the good or service; it's the worker that has value. You can't count that value once for the worker and then again for whoever is paying him.

So how does me producing nothing, over a thirty-minute time span, "earn" me sixty times more than one of my workers would have earned in a year? What output did I generate? What good or service did I produce? What exactly is it that you, Randy, value so highly about J. Random Bossman's half-hour of sailing that you believe he deserves two million dollars for?

If your answer is, "well, what I value about his actions is that I just made an ROI of $100" then you're essentially saying "I value the fact that I am making money, regardless of the fact that in order for me to make it, many other people were dehumanized and will suffer going forward." Which is absolutely your right to say. Just like it's our right to think that that makes you and those like you cold-hearted Scrooges, who believe money is more ethically important than people. (And that's not an insult. That's a description.)

With all do respect, you have a very "saturday morning cartoon villain" view of business leaders, and no real understanding of running a business. Certainly you may decrease your costs by making such unreasonable phone calls to lower costs for everyone, but the deminished productivity of those facilities would seriously damage the long-term profitability of those facilities and would very quickly get that leader a meeting with a very angry board of directors. Businesses cannot survive if they make such whimsical choices - they must plan for the long term.

Also, if you really want to cut costs in that fashion, you don't diminish the costs of each facility by X%, you close X% of your facilities. That's just economics 101.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

Bub:
"People who work with their brain? That's still a worker."
Really? Like investors and executives? They're workers too?

No, no, NO!!! Investors have money. That makes them baaaaad! Executives just sit on yachts all day firing people. That's all they do. I know because I used to be one, before I got a heart.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

Elron the Fantastic:
I don't believe it's ultimately possible to keep governments accountable, at least not as accountable as we would like. We can only limit it's power so it can't screw up too much.

Then how can they keep corporations accountable or in check? Isn't that like attempting to add precision downstream of an algorithm?

A [private] corporation that [competes against the other corporation(s) by offering better services or lower cost, which forces the other "bad" corporation(s) to change ways or go out of business.]

What happens when instead they just simply offer more of the same? For example, see any oligarchy in communications, television, fuel, food.

So yes, in essence, corporations are the counter to other corporations; A corporation, is just a collection of people working for a specific purpose, which is usually making money.

When is it not making money?

Ambitious people who recognize that a corporation is bad for one reason or another will form their own corporation that works better.

You're not paying any mind to the barrier of entry to do so. No amount of ambition will make up for the wealth required to say, go against Wal-Mart. Now, you can say Target or K-Mart or whatever exist, but again they're all more of the same. If you open up your own shop and start to actually pose a thread to Wal-Mart they will run you out of business without breaking a sweat.

The problem that I see, is the government is insulated from public concerns,

Even local government?

and they're managing areas they should be. You say we elect the government, but I don't believe that to be case; rather we're presented with a small list of candidates who are deemed "acceptable".

Agreed, it's mostly a farce. It's actually a lot like... doing business with corporations! Televisions, home appliances, beer, all made by the same companies yet pretending that there is far more choice than there really is!

These candidates enter government and work on behalf of various interest groups to enact legislation that is good for that group and bad for the nation.

Couldn't agree more. Sounds like a perfect opportunity for some kind of reform.

They also enact "nice sounding" legislation in order to trick the population in to thinking they represent them wall accomplishing nothing of real value.

Which sounds like most of the products I've ever been asked to buy in my life. I suppose your point is that I didn't. That's fair.

I believe that most of the nations problems can be traced to government interference; the government is attempting to manage areas in which it's not qualified to manage, such as education and healthcare.

Given that we've established that the only goal of a for-profit entity is to make a profit, don't you feel like that is in conflict of interest with say, the goal of health care or education?

It is a monolith which is only capable of assigning priorities in a very blunt and broad fashion.

Not unlike a corporation - though you've already said that the government is a large corporation. I don't see how, yet, you've established that they're any different. The only difference I see thus far is that if the government does something good - accidentally even, if I give you that - it's actually doing what it's supposed to. If a corporation does, it's made a mistake.

The solution to the problem is to eliminate the excess laws that work outside of the primary purpose of the central government (protecting property), and reduce its overall power.

Can you give an example of a law that is unnecessary?

By taking these powers away from the federal government, you put the power in the hands of the more local state governments, who are in a better position to address the concerns of their individual populations.

Ah, so your argument isn't against big government, just centralized government?

When the government acts in its proper single role, the rest of the jobs can be taken by the people. Who cares more about your child's education and healthcare than you? Who better knows your healthcare needs?

Actually I don't know shit about my child's education and health care. Those are disciplines that require a lifetime of commitment in order to be competent, and just because it's "my child" doesn't mean I know what is best. I want to speak to a professional who is vetted by other professional peers about those. That's the most important part. The only difference between the government and a corporation then, is the access: in my version, the government may somehow make that affordable (as it has been shown to in many, many well-developed countries in the world). In your version, it costs as much as possible and no less, because that's contrary to the very nature of the entity offering me the access.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

Jazz:
Everyone's life is improved, including Jim-Bob's, because he was forced to part with his property against his will.

Or Jim Bob could choose to not have a road going to his house, install his own well, buy a gun, pay for private emergency coverage, save a bunch of money, and not submit to the 'force' of the mob.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

Karl:
Bub:
"People who work with their brain? That's still a worker."
Really? Like investors and executives? They're workers too?

No, no, NO!!! Investors have money. That makes them baaaaad! Executives just sit on yachts all day firing people. That's all they do. I know because I used to be one, before I got a heart.

You have a heart? I have a CO2-spewing reactor fueled by infant aboriginal brains.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

"Given that we've established that the only goal of a for-profit entity is to make a profit, don't you feel like that is in conflict of interest with say, the goal of health care or education? "

If the focus of profit-making is the provision of that healthcare or education, then I would say that their interests and ours are well-aligned.

What keeps their focus aligned to ours? Competition.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

C-Derb:
ObiWayneKenobi:
America isn't capitalist anyways, it's corporatist, and that's a big part why things are so fucked up. Everything revolves around big business and the inevitable lobbying that they do.
+1
It is also a big part of why things are so hard to change. Show me a common sense solution to a widely acknowledged problem, and I will show you someone who will lobby against it because change will impact their bottom line.

Machiavelli on change:

"There is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things. For the reformer has enemies in all those who profit by the old order, and only lukewarm defenders in all those who would profit by the new order, this lukewarmness arising partly from fear of their adversaries … and partly from the incredulity of mankind, who do not truly believe in anything new until they have had actual experience of it."

Mason Wheeler · 2012-12-03 Reply Admin

[quote user="Dave Insurgent"][quote user="Elron the Fantastic"][quote]When the government acts in its proper single role, the rest of the jobs can be taken by the people. Who cares more about your child's education and healthcare than you? Who better knows your healthcare needs?[/quote]

Actually I don't know shit about my child's education and health care. Those are disciplines that require a lifetime of commitment in order to be competent, and just because it's "my child" doesn't mean I know what is best. I want to speak to a professional who is vetted by other professional peers about those. That's the most important part.[/quote]

This. Requiring (or even expecting) a person to know enough about these important matters to be able to make their own decisions by themselves is contrary to one of the most fundamental principles of civilization: specialization. Since the very beginning of civilized society, mankind has grown and advanced by carving out niches of knowledge and expertise that get handed off to specialists who are trusted to do a good job of it so that the rest of us don't have to.

To speak against the principle of specialization is barbaric, not in the vernacular sense of "I don't like what my opponent is saying so I'm going to call it a mean name," but in the literal sense that to oppose specialization is to advocate barbarism, the opposite of civilization. And this is the point that libertarians, with their talk of "self-reliance" and "caveat emptor" never seem to understand. If we were to truly listen to them, we would not improve society; we would set the progress of civilization back by thousands of years.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

Mason Wheeler:
Since the very beginning of civilized society, mankind has grown and advanced by carving out niches of knowledge and expertise that get handed off to specialists who are trusted to do a good job of it so that the rest of us don't have to.

Should you be allowed to choose which specialist you turn to for advice?

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

PedanticCurmudgeon:
Mason Wheeler:
So, given the choice between having that power in the hands of democratically elected representatives that I can vote out if they do a bad job, or having that power in the hands of a conqueror, I'll choose the former every time.
You were doing OK up to this point, (except remember that history is written by the winners). Here's the thing: if a group of powerful people ever managed to take over the major political parties, your vote would be as useless as it would be living under a conqueror.

Look up how the real capitalists ran things before the antimonopoly laws were around.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

Bub:
"Given that we've established that the only goal of a for-profit entity is to make a profit, don't you feel like that is in conflict of interest with say, the goal of health care or education? "
If the focus of profit-making is the provision of that healthcare or education, then I would say that their interests and ours are well-aligned.

What keeps their focus aligned to ours? Competition.

Again, in the case of health care, as I've spelled out already: the "competition" isn't "oh oh hey if you won't save that guy, I will!". First of all, for most reasons you'd be going to an emergency room, you're not going to shop around. Secondly, health care is the very opposite of profitability, of competition. It's about keeping the weak alive. That costs. The profit motive is, absolutely, at odds with the idea of spending money to save someone. I don't mean to appeal to conspiracies, but imagine if you will, what motive is there not to just pull the plug on you knowing that you will take millions of dollars in care after your injury? Only customers getting angry. What that means is the number of transgressions to make, and the extent of them, need only be small enough to go unnoticed or written off by apologists. Do we not have ample evidence of insurance companies trying to screw people out of payments because it affects their bottom line? Is that not the conflict of interest right there in front of you?

I'd say the best argument against the idea that competition makes everything better is ... present day. If you don't see that, then I'm afraid we've reached a point where our life experiences render us mutually incapable of seeing the situation from the others perspective - which is to say, we've reached the point every argument on the internet ever reaches.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

Pete:
Mason Wheeler:
Since the very beginning of civilized society, mankind has grown and advanced by carving out niches of knowledge and expertise that get handed off to specialists who are trusted to do a good job of it so that the rest of us don't have to.
Should you be allowed to choose which specialist you turn to for advice?

That choice is an illusion. The best specialists won't see you because they can charge as much as they want. Odds are you will not be high enough on the totem pole to afford that. Don't kid yourself.

But that's why it's supposed to be a profession, with standards and what have you. The problem is the fact you seem to want to see a different doctor or educator. Something is going wrong that is producing people with such a disparity in skill. The solution isn't to just mix it up and let everybody fight for themselves.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

"we've reached the point every argument on the internet ever reaches."

Agreed.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

Dave Insurgent:
We elect the government. Corruption comes in to play but that's a whole other matter.
...

I don't see what you're saying to be a solution, or even a clear problem description. You're basically playing in to the "power corrupts" hand, which is true - but if you assume / strive for a counterbalance to that power, then what do you end up with?

A responsible government that actually is accountable and transparent

A [???] corporation that [???]

Can you fill in the blanks?

Given that the problem is "power corrupts, for both the State and the Corporation", I DON'T think that the solution is to give all the power to the State and then just concentrate on trying to rein in resultant corruption by means of the one vote each of us has with to elect who runs said uber-powerful State and gets corrupted by it.

As has been said multiple times already, the more wealthy/powerful you are, the easier it is to usurp more wealth/power. Left unchecked, ANY locus of power has the potential to grow, to use that gravitational effect until it becomes a black hole of power, a singularity that pulls everything around it into it. (As in your example about how impossible it is to compete with Wal-Mart. The more Wal-Mart eats, the more powerful it gets, the easier time it has squashing any upstart competition trying to start up in the same space like a bug, and the less choice people have other than to shop at Wal-Mart.)

So yes, it can absolutely happen in business; that's why we have anti-trust laws. Now, maybe those should be tighter, more stringent. Maybe they're not getting enforced nearly as much as they should be. That can be argued. But either way, I agree that they're necessary, because they're our mechanism for trying to stop the above-described "feedback loop" before it goes too far, trying to stop the power from being effectively all concentrated in too few hands that it becomes virtually impossible to take it back within the structure of the laws.

(And this is definitely flying in the face of the pure "Libertarian, let me do my own thing" rhetoric. Because at whatever level you set it, it's a law limiting success, plain and simple. You could become a complete monopoly by the most scrupulous means imaginable, paying your workers generously all the way... but the point is that we, as a society, have decided that we can't risk letting anyone succeed quite THAT well, can't let THAT much power stay under one umbrella, such that the difference in power reaches the point where it can just SQUASH any competition from even having a chance in the market. There's no "fair" about it. It's a purely practical safeguard our society has adopted.)

But by the same token, I think it's just as dangerous to let the balance of power tip too far in the other direction. Anti-trust laws and their like put a limit (or try to, in theory) on the ability of any given citizen to accumulate too much power to themselves personally through their business. But if you move TOO much of the power from the private sector citizen and into the hands of the State (elected or not) I see that as JUST as much a recipe for disaster as going the other way.

You talk about how the State is "intended" to function (or more accurately, how YOU intend it to function) but I don't find the intent particularly meaningful one way or the other. Whatever the State is "intended" to do, put too much power in its hands and the people controlling it WILL find a way to use that power to their own benefit.

So to answer your initial question, I don't see it as an either-or. I'd aim for a strong enough State that it can act as a check on private enterprise and personal economic power from running amok, but I'd ALSO aim to keep enough personal power in the hands of the private sector, distinct from the State, that it can push back and--yes--influence the State right back as well.

It's not a question of which one of the two is better suited for not being corrupted by power. Neither of them are. Nothing is, EVER. So rather than concentrating the power in the State and trying to find some way to make it not corrupt, the idea is to spread the power around as much as possible, keep as little power in one place as you can.

And the one nice thing about corporations in that respect, the one "superiority" they have over the State in terms of holding power, is that there can be a lot MORE of them to diffuse the power amongst than there are States. Doesn't mean that a monopoly CAN'T start to snowball, but that's always a danger.

The State, on the other hand, to the extent in gains power, is for better or for worse a natural-made monopoly as far as its physical borders extend. If anything, that'd be one thing that makes tipping the balance more in its direction PARTICULARLY dangerous. Not to say that it's never necessary, or the best choice, but let's not kid ourselves about the danger.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

ObiWayneKenobi:
Free education and healthcare--really free healthcare, not Obamacare "We're going to force you to buy health insurance to pad the pockets of crooked insurance companies" type of healthcare--should be available to everyone, at a reasonable level of service. Those with the money to spend can "upgrade" as it were to better things, but the basics should be there. Sadly with healthcare as is proven in other nations that DO have free healthcare, the quality suffers drastically because you get doctors that don't care about helping the sick, they want money, and so they do a half-assed job because they can't charge for it.

As as been shown by numerous international studies that I'm too lazy to look up right now, those nations with free healthcare have much better health outcomes than we have in the USA. The USA is unique in paying huge amounts of money for mediocre healthcare results.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

I used to work in a corner office with one other developer. Over the weekend, the roof caved in to about head-level. Luckily, nobody was in the office when it happened. When we arrived to work Monday, we could see blue sky through the gaping whole in the roof.

The owner of the building had a contractor come look at the damage. He was up there about 20 minutes, then came down and announced "This entire building has been constructed incorrectly."

Unlike TFA, this was due to negligence of parties long ago and nothing to do with company management. Still rather frightening.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

Friedrice The great:
ObiWayneKenobi:
Free education and healthcare--really free healthcare, not Obamacare "We're going to force you to buy health insurance to pad the pockets of crooked insurance companies" type of healthcare--should be available to everyone, at a reasonable level of service. Those with the money to spend can "upgrade" as it were to better things, but the basics should be there. Sadly with healthcare as is proven in other nations that DO have free healthcare, the quality suffers drastically because you get doctors that don't care about helping the sick, they want money, and so they do a half-assed job because they can't charge for it.

As as been shown by numerous international studies that I'm too lazy to look up right now, those nations with free healthcare have much better health outcomes than we have in the USA. The USA is unique in paying huge amounts of money for mediocre healthcare results.

Thomas Sowell would disagree.

I am amazed that our healthcare system has survived as well as it has, considering the staggering amount of government interference handicapping it.

I can buy car insurance across state lines, why not health insurance? Hmmm....I wonder....

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

TGV:
Why do I get the nagging feeling that this is a US-based operation?

Beats me. Last weekend's tunnel collapse and last year's nuclear meltdowns weren't US-based.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

Dave Insurgent:
Then how can they keep corporations accountable or in check? Isn't that like attempting to add precision downstream of an algorithm?

A large focus on few tasks is better than one with small focus on many tasks - this has been shown in production lines where it's more efficient to have one person stick arms on a doll torso, one person puts on the head, and other puts on the legs, rather than having each person make indivitual dolls. By extension, this applies to government, the less they do, the better they will be at it.

What happens when instead they just simply offer more of the same? For example, see any oligarchy in communications, television, fuel, food.

These oligarchies can only exist because government regulations (likely funded by the corporations) stifle new entries into the market by making the cost for entry prohibitive, where large corporations can afford the requirements.

When is it not making money?

When it's a non-profit organization that is focused on some other thing, like cancer research; these causes are directly subject to the votes of the people, because people vote with their dollars. If people don't like them, they will not pay.

You're not paying any mind to the barrier of entry to do so. No amount of ambition will make up for the wealth required to say, go against Wal-Mart. Now, you can say Target or K-Mart or whatever exist, but again they're all more of the same. If you open up your own shop and start to actually pose a thread to Wal-Mart they will run you out of business without breaking a sweat.

No legitimate business under the law can "run you out of business". They can use their position to force suppliers who do business with them to not do business with you, but that's against the law and they should be punished fully. If the government is actually doing it's job, all they can do is try to run a better business than you, and if you offer things they don't (for a long time Wal-Mart didn't sell contraceptives), then people will choose your business over theirs.

Even local government?

I should have been more specific - the federal governement. Local government should be much more subject to the will of their populace due to their locality. In my experience, however, people don't pay as much attention to local politics.

Agreed, it's mostly a farce. It's actually a lot like... doing business with corporations! Televisions, home appliances, beer, all made by the same companies yet pretending that there is far more choice than there really is!

You have a point on that - corporations have a tendency to copy anything that turns out successful. That's sort of the nature of the beast. But I still have more choices in who I buy my tv from, than who I vote for.

Couldn't agree more. Sounds like a perfect opportunity for some kind of reform.

Indeed, we do need reform.

Which sounds like most of the products I've ever been asked to buy in my life. I suppose your point is that I didn't. That's fair.

And you can always choose not to buy them.

Given that we've established that the only goal of a for-profit entity is to make a profit, don't you feel like that is in conflict of interest with say, the goal of health care or education?

I don't agree with that. If I was a doctor, I would try to do the best job I could to try and make the most money. The best brain surgeons make tons of money, precisely because they're good at their job.

Not unlike a corporation - though you've already said that the government is a large corporation. I don't see how, yet, you've established that they're any different. The only difference I see thus far is that if the government does something good - accidentally even, if I give you that - it's actually doing what it's supposed to. If a corporation does, it's made a mistake.

Hmm, this is an interesting insight on your views. Do you believe that corporations can do no good, and they only do harm? I know I certainly prefer to spend my money at corporations that provide me a benefit.

If a corporation does a good job, people do business with that corporation. If they do a bad job, people go to another corporation, unless they're a monopoly which they're forced to business with, like the government.

There only real difference between governments and corporations, except that governments have the power of law, and can throw you in jail for not doing business with them, corporations can't.

Can you give an example of a law that is unnecessary?

Hmm, at the state level, I believe it was Ohio that made it illegal to fish with a spoon. At the national level, I think tariff on steel imports and no child left behind were unnecessary; in fact, those were only passed to win the electoral votes needed for President Bush's reelection in 2004.

There are laws created by politicians to win votes, and those are disgusting. But I also think we pass too many laws in general. It just seems to be a kneejerk reaction of people for whenever something bad happens to pass a law.

Ah, so your argument isn't against big government, just centralized government?

I oppose big, centralized government :P

Actually I don't know shit about my child's education and health care. Those are disciplines that require a lifetime of commitment in order to be competent, and just because it's "my child" doesn't mean I know what is best. I want to speak to a professional who is vetted by other professional peers about those. That's the most important part. The only difference between the government and a corporation then, is the access: in my version, the government may somehow make that affordable (as it has been shown to in many, many well-developed countries in the world). In your version, it costs as much as possible and no less, because that's contrary to the very nature of the entity offering me the access.

I'm not suggesting neccissarily that you teach your child yourself (although I certainly don't oppose home schooling), but you should have a general idea at least of what schools are better than others.

As far as healthcare is concerned, most of the reasons the costs are high seem to be, to me, either the result of government action, or the failure of the government to act in its proper role. Individual states have mandates on what types of coverage insurance must provide in all their policies - this increases the cost of the insurance by forcing everyone to get covered for things they may or may not need, and limit the portability of policies from one state to another; the federal governments role as established in the constitution is to facilitate the free trade between states, they have not properly addressed this. Another thing that raises costs is simple inflation: why the inflation? The money supply more that quadrupled in the past 12 years.

If you look at a medical procedure that hasn't been insured or heavily regulated, LASIC, you can see that the prices have actually gone down over time. In my view of how things should be, costs will be more effectively managed, because people are in control of where they put they're dollars.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

snoofle:
Hmmm. Here in the US, the IRS doesn't let you choose how much to pay in taxes, or when; it's mandatory. If you don't, they will eventually come after you and make your life miserable.

WTF? Why would that be a problem? If you have taxable income, you should expect to be required to pay tax on it.

The IRS collects more than the mandated amount of tax. If you declare the actual amount of withholding, they will eventually come after you and make your life miserable. When they figure out that you declared the actual amount of withholding, they refuse to refund it and they make your life more miserable.

http://www.treasury.gov/tigta/congress/congress_05082012.pdf

And they STILL don't stop. Socialism and capitalism have nothing to do with it.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

Elron the Fantastic:
These oligarchies can only exist because government regulations (likely funded by the corporations) stifle new entries into the market

No offense, but, surely you don't think that is true, right? I feel like your responses are one part brutal truth, the other part glistening idealism. It's literally like there are two people writing your replies.

When it's a non-profit organization that is focused on some other thing, like cancer research; these causes are directly subject to the votes of the people, because people vote with their dollars. If people don't like them, they will not pay.

I'm not sure how "people will pay for it if they want it" proves that corporations do things that don't make them money. They certainly do things that lead to indirect money in addition to direct money - but that's not my point. If there's no money in cancer research, they won't do it. I think it stands to some philosophical reason that not all things of value are worth money.

No legitimate business under the law can "run you out of business". They can use their position to force suppliers who do business with them to not do business with you, but that's against the law and they should be punished fully.

So you're saying you honestly believe that Wal-Mart can't afford to sell items at a loss for long enough for me to go out of business? How can you possibly expect to prosecute or enforce that with only local government? That's like pitting a child against a football player.

I don't agree with that. If I was a doctor, I would try to do the best job I could to try and make the most money. The best brain surgeons make tons of money, precisely because they're good at their job.

A doctor is not a corporation (and all use of the corporation past present and future means "large publicly traded entity" in my vernacular) -- he's not even a capitalist. He's a worker. Of course you want to do the best job you could, and you might not make a particularly good brain surgeon but you would do what you can to help people. On the other hand, if you were a corporation, and you had a choice: We can save two people and make $100 each, or one person and make $1000, which do you choose? The corporation must, and I mean it is legally bound to pursue profit, make the later decision. Even if the difference is not so much, if it's only $250 for the one person, that is the rational - that is the only choice of the corporation.

Hmm, this is an interesting insight on your views. Do you believe that corporations can do no good, and they only do harm? I know I certainly prefer to spend my money at corporations that provide me a benefit.

I certainly don't think they can never do good - but they act as a sort of good-pump. The consolidate money, which is power, in to the hands of thew few from the many. There will always be less owners than workers, that's just how it has to be in order for there to be a system at all, so that's what I mean when I say they consolidate the wealth, the power, in to the hands of the few. The way they do this varies, but history has shown us that they will do many things that do cause real harm - just not to their shareholders and possibly not to their customers (though that is not guaranteed: see tobacco companies). We'll cut the jobs and move the factory overseas, where we can pollute the local environment and produce cheaper goods to improve profits. There's no "Why?" (the answer is "for profit") and there's no "How?" (the answer is unpleasant).

If a corporation does a good job, people do business with that corporation. If they do a bad job, people go to another corporation, unless they're a monopoly which they're forced to business with, like the government.

Or an oligarchy, of which there are many. Your choices of food are very limited. So are televisions - you only buy from a small few, and nobody goes "Man, I really want to work hard and make TVs - I'll start a TV business!" - you will never, not ever, be able to compete with the prices and features of the competition. This is logical when you think about what I said before: capitalism, corporations, serve to consolidate power. It is the absolute nature of the beast.

There only real difference between governments and corporations, except that governments have the power of law, and can throw you in jail for not doing business with them, corporations can't.

Well, not yet at least :) Let's be honest, corporations have plenty of ways to screw you over, do I need to bring up Monsanto and the antics regarding farmers who have had seed merely blown in to their farms by wind? The corporations manipulate the government, and I don't see how shrinking government (while corporations continue to grow, as I've said, that part is inevitable) will lead to less of that.

Hmm, at the state level, I believe it was Ohio that made it illegal to fish with a spoon.

Ah, that's not what I meant (or thought you meant). That's an example of a stupid law, which I agree is not necessary, but I assumed you had some kind of example of a law where the government stepped in and did something that was "reasoned" but not useful. All you had to do was say Marijuana and you won :P

There are laws created by politicians to win votes, and those are disgusting.

Agreed! It's also a byproduct of the stupidity of the masses. I hate to break this to you, but those same stupid people dictate which products are made and which aren't, so you're in for some problems there too... at some point, only Brawndo will be available for drink.

I oppose big, centralized government :P

Well that's not fair: a lot of local government is still "big", but it's relative to the country. That's still big.

I'm not suggesting neccissarily that you teach your child yourself (although I certainly don't oppose home schooling), but you should have a general idea at least of what schools are better than others.

That's really not true. I mean, I can read about it, but the odds of finding an unbiased report are slim to none (especially considering that, in a purely profit-driven market, the person with the biggest bankroll will be able to "sponsor" the research. This happens right now, all the time). Furthermore, even if there is some kind of study that just lists empircal data, I don't necessarily know what's best. I don't oppose homeschooling either, but it's a very, very delicate subject not because it's sensitive, but because you're asking people who literally have no clue what they are doing to take on a huge responsibility. I don't practice home dentistry for this reason, nor would I attempt to perform some kind of amputation of a small appendage like a toe.

As far as healthcare is concerned, most of the reasons the costs are high seem to be, to me, either the result of government action, or the failure of the government to act in its proper role.

I won't dispute that! Canada is a prime example of this. But I will point at the numerous affordable, government run healthcare systems that top the list of countries by lifespan and greatly surpass that of the United States. Can you provide an example of a fully privatized health care system and it's resulting effect on public health?

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

And this is why you don't discuss entrepeneurship and economics on an IT website.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

" If there's no money in cancer research, they won't do it. "

Why would this position be wrong? In fact, there is vast amounts of money to be made, and they are making it...and cancer survival rates are improving accordingly - faster in the US than anywhere else. Only Israel comes a close second.

I do not believe that you actually understand what "money" truly is

It is a proxy token.....for what, I ask you?

When you finally understand the answer to that question, your current worldview will unravel.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

ObiWayneKenobi:
Incidentally the Supreme Court also ruled at one point that it was unconstitutional to tax labor,

Was that before or after the 16th amendment was enacted? Could it possibly be the reason why the 16th amendment was enacted?

I'd say it's a worse problem when the IRS gives breaks to actual tax protestors (your kind of stuff), while making life miserable for honest taxpayers who can't afford to fight.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/propublica-review-of-pardons-in-past-decade-shows-process-heavily-favored-whites/2011/11/23/gIQAElnVQO_story.html

http://edition.cnn.com/2012/03/20/us/tax-refund-scam/index.html

And they still don't stop.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

Austin:
And this is why you don't discuss entrepeneurship and economics on an IT website.

Nor relationship advice

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

"I don't practice home dentistry for this reason..."

British NHS subjects doing just this...I wonder why?

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

Mason Wheeler:
Bub:
I make something. I have sole authority over it. It is mine. I decide to offer it for sale at a profit of 1000%. Somebody freely decides that the price is worth it. We both profit from our transaction. No coercion.
or

I make something. I do not have sole authority over it. Therefore, it is not truly mine. You decide I can only offer it at a certain arbitrary maximum price, dictated by your quasi-religious mantra of 'fairness' and 'greater good'. I get screwed, by you, out of optimally profiting from my work. You use force and coercion to accomplish this.

Interesting how you use the term "force and coercion" as if it were two words for the same thing. The truth is, there are many other forms of coercion besides (the threat of) physical violence.

One is the interaction of simple necessity and Hobson's Choice. "Pay what I ask or do without" sounds like a fair proposition, until the thing being requested is necessary to sustain life and physical well-being. Things like food, shelter, access to medical care, and clean water. When "choosing to do without" is not a viable option, the statement "pay what I ask or do without" is itself a form of coercion.

Isn't the intersection of neccesity and Hobson's choice an extortion? Additionally,I would argue that baring necessity,sometimes I am stuck with a double bind, where none of my choices yeild desirable outcome.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

Taxes - the ability of a violent gang to siphon vitality from an economy.

Stockholm Syndrome - when victims of this gang argue for its necessity.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

Happened to me:
The owner of the building had a contractor come look at the damage. He was up there about 20 minutes, then came down and announced "This entire building has been constructed incorrectly."

So, not unlike what software development contractors do then.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

Dave Insurgent:
Wikipedia:
In Japan, health care is provided by national and local governments

Well that needs a rewrite.

Health INSURANCE is mandated by the national government.

Health INSURANCE PREMIUMS can be administered by local governments or by employers' groups, and are actually taxes (computed based on income, mandated by the national government though the national government delegates administration to local governments or industry groups).

Health INSURANCE BENEFITS are mostly mandated by the national government, usually 70% of medical fees, though paid by the same organizations that collected the premiums.

Health CARE is provided by private practitioners and by privately operated hospitals and by local government operated hospitals and by national government operated hospitals and by university operated hospitals etc. So yes local governments are involved, but they're not a majority and not even a plurality.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

Mason Wheeler:
s73v3r:
Mason Wheeler:
Bub:
I make something. I have sole authority over it. It is mine. I decide to offer it for sale at a profit of 1000%. Somebody freely decides that the price is worth it. We both profit from our transaction. No coercion.
or

I make something. I do not have sole authority over it. Therefore, it is not truly mine. You decide I can only offer it at a certain arbitrary maximum price, dictated by your quasi-religious mantra of 'fairness' and 'greater good'. I get screwed, by you, out of optimally profiting from my work. You use force and coercion to accomplish this.

Interesting how you use the term "force and coercion" as if it were two words for the same thing. The truth is, there are many other forms of coercion besides (the threat of) physical violence.

That's the thing these people never, ever get. They think that the only way to get someone to do something against their will is to threaten to hit them. They don't think that economic coercion exists, because if you didn't want to do it, you just wouldn't.

You know, as I think about it, I realize that there's an element of force to economic coercion after all.

Let's say that you're starving, and someone is selling food, at a price you can't afford, and they say "pay what I ask or do without." If you choose to exercise your natural right to preserve your own life, you will be called a thief, and by the power of force in the hands of the state you will be arrested and imprisoned.

Then again, there really is nothing new under the sun. This is hardly an original argument; it was the premise of one of the greatest and best-known novels in the history of literature, way back in 1862.

It really says something about our priorities, though, that if I were to kill a man to preserve my own life, I'm considered justified before the law, but if I were to steal food to preserve my own life, I'd find myself playing Jean Valjean and not on a stage.

Clap. Clap. Where I live, a few months ago,aguy called 911 because a local fast food place did not give him part of his order. Police were upset,said "It is a civil matter.",and charged the guy for calling 911. Now, if the guy had reached over and taken fodd,it would have been theft. Corporation takes from me,it is a civil matter.I take from corparation,it's theft. Says a lot about us.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

Tom:
Jazz:
the capacity of the capital that I own to actually produce products has gone DOWN
So how are you going to produce a positive return on investment again next quarter?

I am going to quit this CEO position a la Mark Hurd.

2012-12-03 Reply Admin

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/01/us/supreme-court-takes-up-question-of-patents-in-gene-research.html?src=recg&_r=0

The patents were challenged by scientists and doctors who said that their research and ability to help patients had been frustrated. “Myriad and other gene patent holders have gained the right to exclude the rest of the scientific community from examining the naturally occurring genes of every person in the United States,” the plaintiffs told the Supreme Court in their petition seeking review. They added that the patents “prevent patients from examining their own genetic information” and “made it impossible to obtain second opinions.”

Free market! Competition! Rah!

2012-12-04 Reply Admin

Norman Diamond:
http://www.treasury.gov/tigta/congress/congress_05082012.pdf

And a link to a study on tax fraud through identity theft does what to prove your point?

2012-12-04 Reply Admin

Paul Neumann:
Norman Diamond:
http://www.treasury.gov/tigta/congress/congress_05082012.pdf
And a link to a study on tax fraud through identity theft does what to prove your point?

If you actually read the report, the IRS admitted that insiders participate in thefts and the IRS makes life miserable for honest taxpayers. I was replying to someone who asserted that the IRS makes life miserable for cheaters.

Jochen · 2012-12-04 Reply Admin

Totally agree. The biggest problem in society is greed. it's what causes company's to move to third world countries where they can create their products cheap.

2012-12-04 Reply Admin

Sounds reminiscent of my industrial placement year during uni. The office was a part converted barn on the owners farm, power provided by an extension lead strung from the farmhouse, with a join outside, taped over for weatherproofing.

If it rained, the power went out, if someone turned on the washing machine in the farmhouse, the power went out.. one of the servers (repurposed old desktop) power supplys was knackered and its fan would require a poke to get started in the morning. And there was no heating. And the farmyard outside was unlit, and crisscrossed with 3ft deep trenches for pipework and cabling that never got put in.

Working there reminded me of the poor denizens of doom levels going to work. 'but I have to go through the lava, then get the yellow key to get the blue key to get the red key..'

One morning I turned up and the water in the toilet was frozen over. After taking emergency measures to unfreeze it I went home.

TRWTF was the software. The interview described it to me as 'like ebay, but with a client side app. And everything, even the UI is XML. We wrote our own parsing + interpreting engine'

Unsurprisingly it didn't take off.

2012-12-04 Reply Admin

I never get tired of saying this: this has nothing to do with "Information Technology", and shouldn't appear here. If a guy smokes pot in his office, gets fired, and happens to work at IBM, will you put that here too, because the guy worked in IT?

Hatshepsut · 2012-12-04 Reply Admin

PiisAWheeL:
I believe Margaret Thatcher said is best: "The problem with socialism is eventually you run out of other peoples money."

I think capitalism has run into that problem a couple of times too.

Jochen · 2012-12-04 Reply Admin

Bub:
"When competition, win-or-lose, live-or-die, is the spirit of your essence, I can't see how that can be good for most of the inhabitants of our planet."
You may not be aware of this, but you have just described the operating ruleset of all life on this planet. Seems to have been working out OK for millions of years.

Your "greater good" philosophy is a quasi-religious luxury afforded to the intellectually idle, cosseted by their astonishing - and unappreciated - wealth.

so you wouldn't have a problem if somebody showed up at your door and kicked you out of your house while you can do nothing about it because hey you lose he wins.

2012-12-04 Reply Admin

Dave Insurgent:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/01/us/supreme-court-takes-up-question-of-patents-in-gene-research.html?src=recg&_r=0
The patents were challenged by scientists and doctors who said that their research and ability to help patients had been frustrated. “Myriad and other gene patent holders have gained the right to exclude the rest of the scientific community from examining the naturally occurring genes of every person in the United States,” the plaintiffs told the Supreme Court in their petition seeking review. They added that the patents “prevent patients from examining their own genetic information” and “made it impossible to obtain second opinions.”

Free market! Competition! Rah!

Excuse me, but what you've just pointed out is government granted monopoly, enforced by men with guns not free market competition.

So, thanks for finally coming over to the correct side.

2012-12-04 Reply Admin

As you say, "long-term" is the key... As the owner, this makes sense. But if you're simply employed as a manager, doing this is perfect: it gives you the short-term bonus, and that's all they care about. Think about the sub-prime debacle, where traders got bonusses based on "good" trades, that just was not good.

2012-12-04 Reply Admin

Van The Man:
Think about the sub-prime debacle

Yes, let's think about that for a moment, shall we?

First you had politicians from both sides saying we want to legislate an outcome -- more poor people in houses they own. Guns driving transactions again. Will they ever learn?

So they created "incentives" (through laws) for lenders to make risky loans.

Then when the loans failed, they bailed them out.

It is a game of heads you win tails the taxpayer loses. Impossible without those guns forcing money to flow where it shouldn't.

J Ware · 2012-12-04 Reply Admin

[image] I like turtles.

PedanticCurmudgeon · 2012-12-04 Reply Admin

Friedrice The great:
PedanticCurmudgeon:
]You were doing OK up to this point, (except remember that history is written by the winners). Here's the thing: if a group of powerful people ever managed to take over the major political parties, your vote would be as useless as it would be living under a conqueror.
Look up how the real capitalists ran things before the antimonopoly laws were around.

How does this relate in any way to what I posted?

2012-12-04 Reply Admin

Making sure people only work 8 hours a day and have enough disposable income is how corporations can survive. If you turn back the clock to 1700s where a farmer struggled to survive and only a rich minority could afford "luxuries" such as new clothes every year, the market was tiny

Those workers that many despise are actually consumers as well. Who will buy the products that factories produce? In the U.S. there are people with two jobs that still need food stamps to survive. Between work and sleep they have little time to consume

You should read what Henry Ford had to say about this:

http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/HENRY_FORD:_Why_I_Favor_Five_Days%27_Work_With_Six_Days%27_Pay

2012-12-04 Reply Admin

Rick:
Dave Insurgent:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/01/us/supreme-court-takes-up-question-of-patents-in-gene-research.html?src=recg&_r=0
The patents were challenged by scientists and doctors who said that their research and ability to help patients had been frustrated. “Myriad and other gene patent holders have gained the right to exclude the rest of the scientific community from examining the naturally occurring genes of every person in the United States,” the plaintiffs told the Supreme Court in their petition seeking review. They added that the patents “prevent patients from examining their own genetic information” and “made it impossible to obtain second opinions.”

Free market! Competition! Rah!
Excuse me, but what you've just pointed out is government granted monopoly, enforced by men with guns not free market competition.

So, thanks for finally coming over to the correct side.

Actually its about property, which is what you believe the government should protect. On your side, you've not established any limitations on property (especially intellectual) and therefore it is the world you wholly endorse: ownership of information. Enforced by a minarchist government. Who are you to say that the corporation who undertook the effort to discover the knowledge has no right to own it? That is your rhetoric. Can we take it from them? Use it wout permission? How about digital copies of anything? Or 3D printed designs at home?

Thanks for showing that natural law libertarianism can't handle the situations presented by the world we live in. That, in addition to being perversely selfish, those that endorse it havent even started to think it through.

PedanticCurmudgeon · 2012-12-04 Reply Admin

Dave Insurgent:
Actually its about property, which is what you believe the government should protect. On your side, you've not established any limitations on property (especially intellectual) and therefore it is the world you wholly endorse: ownership of information. Enforced by a minarchist government. Who are you to say that the corporation who undertook the effort to discover the knowledge has no right to own it? That is your rhetoric. Can we take it from them? Use it wout permission? How about digital copies of anything? Or 3D printed designs at home?
Thanks for showing that natural law libertarianism can't handle the situations presented by the world we live in. That, in addition to being perversely selfish, those that endorse it havent even started to think it through.

9/10. Would definitely flame.

2012-12-04 Reply Admin

Jochen:
Bub:
"When competition, win-or-lose, live-or-die, is the spirit of your essence, I can't see how that can be good for most of the inhabitants of our planet."
You may not be aware of this, but you have just described the operating ruleset of all life on this planet. Seems to have been working out OK for millions of years.

Your "greater good" philosophy is a quasi-religious luxury afforded to the intellectually idle, cosseted by their astonishing - and unappreciated - wealth.

so you wouldn't have a problem if somebody showed up at your door and kicked you out of your house while you can do nothing about it because hey you lose he wins.

It would be the 'somebody' that would have the problem, not me.

Multiple, large calibre, bleeding, penetrative problems. In their skull.

I win.

The Budget is Through the Roof

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