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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices

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To: TimF who wrote (320995)	1/16/2007 3:45:36 PM
From: tejek	Read Replies (1) of 1574050

So then, what you are saying is that democracy has failed the poor in S.A. because it failed to create free markets. Democracy and dictatorships both have failed the poor in S.A. by failing to create the conditions for free markets. Free markets are not the problem. Most S. American countries have free markets. Where the poor get screwed is in situations like we saw with Halliburton in Iraq. The gov't pays out huge sums to corporations without regards to reasonableness or competition. In effect, the public treasury gets looted. If the Halliburton contracts in Iraq were the template for all contracts in the US, people would be up in arms in this country too. In addition, laws are passed in S. American countries that exclusively benefit the rich. In other words, there are free markets in S. America but little economic democracy. Do you understand the premise of socialism? Its to insure a better distribution of a society's wealth among all its people and not just the rich. When its done to the extreme, it can take away the incentive to create new business and hurt the society Even when done more moderately it reduces the incentives. The argument is over when the benefits (to the extent they exist) outweigh the reduction (and distortion) of the incentives and when/how they do not. Exactly. The benefits need to be weighed against the negatives to find a good balance. Generally SA has had relatively unfree markets. But free markets do not guarantee less corruption. Having a free market doesn't guarantee less corruption, but it helps. Many forms of corruption are directly moves away from a free market. If the government imposes trade barriers or monopolies to benefit special interests the market is less free. To an extent to say "but free markets do not guarantee less corruption" is to say "but existing free markets don't guarantee that the market will remain free". See above.......the free markets are not the issue. Free markets can be circumvented when the rich control the gov't.

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