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Politics : American Presidential Politics and foreign affairs -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Peter Dierks who wrote (9394)	6/14/2006 6:31:13 PM
From: Jim S	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 71588

You're really gonna drag me into the "how much is enough" argument, aren't you, Peter? <GGG> As a mostly libertarian-minded kinda guy, this is a tough one for me. And, like your "unions cause professional aircraft mechanics" comment, I have to admit that it is government licensing that makes for professional A&P licensees, even though I hate to admit that governmental interference and regulation benefits anyone. But I sure don't think that the unions have much to do with airline safety, the provence of safety is more in line with the mandate the airlines themselves enforce through their management. (I know, I know, that's gonna start a whole 'nuther discussion! <G>) But back to the discussion of the point of where size becomes an impediment to capitalism, I think of the industrialists in the early 1900s and Microsoft more recently. Or the old Ma Bell, or monopoly utility providers. There's a point at which their size, and control of the rules about what they do, begins to interfere with the conduct of business. If allowed to continue unimpeded, growth and progress ARE impeded. Similarly, I'm not sure that individual family wealth will always be diluted through incompetent or numerous progeny. And even if we could all be certain that such dilution would happen, it could well be over the course of several generations, during which time considerable damage (or, at least lack of benefit) could occur. To reiterate, I'm not talking about the vast majority of estates, I'm only talking about the mega-estates. To rely on devolution of wealth through natural economic processes is simply the mirror image of the Marxist contention that power will always devolve to the worker. And, we KNOW that doesn't always happen. As a practical matter, I really don't know how to handle the situation. Like you, I oppose the idea of using taxes to redistribute wealth, but I also don't much like the idea of the majority of wealth being amalgamated in a concentrated feudal few.