To: skinowski who wrote (703556 ) 2/11/2020 11:50:04 PM From: sense Read Replies (1) | Respond to “You didn’t build it yourself”. They're just generalizing their own experience... since they got all that they did through corruption... they assume that anyone else who has similarly accumulated wealth must have obtained it the same way. They equate wealth with corruption... yet... they all manage to "win their share" without creating anything ? I think it is clearly unconstitutional for Congress to exempt themselves from any of the laws that apply to everyone else... but nowhere is that fact in the exemptions they have carved out for themselves more egregious... than in Congress exempting themselves from insider trading laws... as they have. I've boiled down the requirements for free markets to "no fraud, no monopoly, and no obstacles to participation"... As in any theoretical game, you need all the participants to buy into the rules... and not work to skirt, cheat, or subvert them, or support those who do... so, to work, free markets require an actual commitment by participants to sustain the market principles... you need a culture that values integrity and fair play... more than winning. If you can't recognize that every competition has its own sets of rules... that competition itself is in fact a form of cooperation enabled by rules... you're not likely to understand much about how free markets do work better than other choices. And without all of that... you don't, or soon won't, have a free market... as we do not, today... What should be apparent in that context... is that we don't have a free market today... while a lot of the wealth we see being accumulated through corruption results just there... not from winning in competition, but from cheating others by imposing monopoly, or from erecting barriers that operate as tollgates... empowering the gate keepers to choose who participates, also choosing who wins and who loses in "competition"... based on political considerations...who you know... cronysim instead of meritocracy. Free markets... require that there will be a meritocracy... a too little considered aspect of "getting it right"
