To clarify further, the USA is a state. France is a state. China is a state.

'State' is a generic term for an agency that claims a monopoly on force within an area.

FACT: Private prisons in America are in no way 'free market', they are still funded by tax dollars.

It is entirely possible to have a system in which prisoners work to pay off the cost of the prison, in America most prisoners are locked in their cells for 23 hours a day, being woefully underproductive with their time.

In my proposed system prisoners could apply to be transferred to a different prison, such that if they are productive and do not exhibit anti-social behaviour whilst in prison they will be accepted into the highest quality prisons that provide the greatest standard of living as a reward for their good behaviour, so they are incentivised to work hard and be productive with their time.

In the current system in America you have little choice in which prison you are thrown in, nor are you working for the prison, and as such the prison owners don't give a toss what your living standards are.

You dont have accurate knowledge of prison life in america. In most prisons they do not spend 23 hours a day in their cells.


Private prisons and reform schools are businesses that are listed on the dow-jones, and are bought and sold like any other stock.

They do make their money off the taxpayer. 30 - 40 thousand dollars a year is given to them for each prisoner housed.

If you had your money invested in them for the last 20 years you would not have lost anything because of the recessions.

Prisons: (state run vs not state run - run ) Not run efficeintly of course ...

True- Many prisons have been "privatized"  and more open all the time... and much like it is when military activities (in a war zone) are privatized - (blackwater) the Private companie make a huge profit  (yes we taxpayer still haev to pay for it)

The private company - will most likely offer cheaper foods and less security (lower paid guards - most likely not as well trained - if at all- not staffed adequately...)

However, that is not to say that there are not prisons run directly by government employees that are run the best they can be... Some states have dreadful prison systems.

By the way - skyblue is correct - it is rare for prisoners to have confinement as the poster described - solitary...

Most prisoners share rooms and I dare say SOME prisoners wish they were sequesterd more from the others...

MAny prisons have full gyms and lots of tv/cable and computer priveledges....

NOT many prsions foolw the Hard labor rules of WAY back (I kind of wish that were the case) LEss time for criminal gang mishief more time to learn a skill or maybe AVOID jail...

I wish that great behavior could get people moved from awful/violent prisons to ones as the poster described....

The US needs to revamp it's prison idealogy - to rehabilitae - the recidivism rates are horrible  AND our prisons get more and more crowded by NON violent (drug/pot) offenders who end up violent AFTER prison - after being convicted it is hard to get a job - not to mention the psychological damage of prison....

I have not read the thread - I will now.

The privitization of the military was also a fiasco of bad behavior (black water and chenny's).  There is a profound lack of oversite and transparency, and there is a complete lack of care for human, let alone any other species, life.  It is cold blooded.

But every example of privatization failure has been shot down by the proponants.  I will throw the ball in their corner.  Please give an example when it worked...

You think things are corrupt now, under anti-statism, corruption would be on steroids.

Give it up Burzum, you cant win the argument this time. Too many older adults here.

The bottom line - corrupts - eventually - in almost every circumstance...

the military, the courts, prisons, roads... (ick so much has gone astray)

I don't mind reminiscing about the concept - it is way better than anarchy after all...

But, skyblue may be right - even I may be too old (with my Hopey changey ness as I cannot imagine a case where it would turn out well - in the end.

I do like the prison idea- maybe I should run a prison as if it were a college....ton of money in it.

No, I mean the financial industry that snubs its nose at any attempts to regulate it at all, and any attempts to enforce regulations already in place. Can you please point to the regulations that made the financial industry bankrupt the entire country of Greece?

What if it's the road right outside my house? What if it's the road right outside where I'm going? What if all of the roads in one particular area are owned by the same company? Do you really expect that that won't happen?

I'm not saying it would be impractical to plan a different route. I'm saying that one company would do everything it could to buy up every road in a city, and then you literally have no choice who's road you're driving on.

And then, there would still be no difference. The roads would still suck.

Nothing would be different for us, except maybe who we had to give our money to. Its still all about who gets our money.

Notice we are the only ones who dont get to keep any. The money in my hands today is in someone elses tomorrow.

Even if there were two alternative roads that would take you to your destination, each owned by different entities, what is to stop the operators of those roads from conspiring to maintain an artificially high price on both roads. This sort of thing already happens a lot more than people realize - despite it being illegal. Privatise everything and this behaviour will increase exponentially.

Anti-Statism would also need very effective laws (and enforcement) to prevent predatory pricing.

Look at the deregulation of the finance industry over the past couple of decades, away from government control and regulation, towards a freer market. A free market driven by the doctrine that "Greed is Good". Look at the end results of that.

AMEN!

With all due respect, age means nothing in a debate.
Plus this discussion is fun, aren't you having fun?

If that is true, then I apologise, I just remember hearing it on a prison documentary.

The point still stands though, prisoners are underproductive.

Exactly.

Exactly.

Taxation is force, not a willing exchange of service. If your government suddenly decided that food was going to be subsidized entirely by taxes, but the management of food was still left in the hands of private third parties, it is not free market. It is not a good thing either, and I entirely disagree with this practise. By funding it through taxation, you are largely removing the profit system, meaning food manufacturers and distributors would have little incentive to produce quality food.

Obviously forcing prisoners to engage in hard labour is not a willing exchange of service either, but they are prisoners and are being punished so it is acceptable in this instance. Not only this, but as I said, my system rewards those prisoners that exhibit good behaviour, giving them a choice in how they work, and what they receive for that work, so there is a degree of willing exchange of services.

I'm glad you agree.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackwater_Worldwide
"At least 90% of the company's revenue comes from government contracts."

I can't find any information on "Chenny's" at all. Is that the name of the company?

Ok. I will give an example of an incredibly important resource that we are dependent on, and without said resource we would all die: food.

During Mao's regime in China, the production of food was managed entirely by the state. What happened? Around 40,000,000 people died as a result of the famine it caused.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Chinese_Famine

Now let's contrast this with the USA, in which production of food is for the most part free market. The USA is the first nation in history in which the poorest citizens can achieve obesity.

I could give a million more, but this is by far the best example, as opponents of free trade in markets such as healthcare argue that it is an essential service that should not be left in the hands of 'profiteers', but what could be more essential to human life than food? And clearly freeing the production of food is the best way to increase the supply of food, this is objective fact.

No, because under statelessness there would not be an agency with a monopoly on force. That is the entire cause of corruption - The state can do what ever it likes, and its only fear is revolution. You would consider it a terrible thing for a private road company to forcibly make people pay for its roads, whether they use the roads or not, wouldn't you? Why is it ok for a state to do this, then?

I'm glad you're giving it some thought, then.

You mean this crisis?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_Europe...ing_crisis

I'm going to go through this and quote all the important parts for you that show why it was the government that caused the crisis, not the economic freedom of banks.

"A strong economy and falling bond yields allowed the government of Greece to run large structural deficits"
"In order to do so, successive Greek governments have, among other things, run large deficits to finance public sector jobs, pensions, and other social benefits. Since 1993 debt to GDP has remained above 100%."
"To keep within the monetary union guidelines, the government of Greece has been found to have consistently and deliberately misreported the country's official economic statistics."
(Here's where private banks come into it... Their part in it was entirely the fault of the government itself)
"In the beginning of 2010, it was discovered that Greece had paid Goldman Sachs and other banks hundreds of millions of dollars in fees since 2001 for arranging transactions that hid the actual level of borrowing"
"The purpose of these deals made by several subsequent Greek governments was to enable them to spend beyond their means, while hiding the actual deficit from the EU overseers"
"In May 2010, the Greek government deficit was estimated to be 13.6% which is one of the highest in the world relative to GDP"

All these are sourced. To sum it up: The Greek Government borrowed and spent an incredibly large amount of money, racking up a huge debt, then bribed the private banks to keep it a secret from the EU. You're blaming it on the private banks though. Why?

Most people like to blame the economic crises around the world on private banks, because they believe they are spending their money irresponsibly and 'gambling' it on the stock market. However, to claim this is to imply that you know more about banking than world-class bankers whose entire lives revolve around banking itself. You are implicitly stating that you know how to manage a bank and its funds better than bankers do. Is this what you believe? Do you believe bankers lose money because they're incompetent?

Almost all cases of economic failures can be traced to market controls, most notably the Federal Reserve Banks of the nations around the world, which artificially expand credit. This is outlined in depth in The Austrian Business Cycle Theory.

I was thinking more along the lines of main roads and highways. You can simply own the road out the front of your house.

This guy has a slightly different theory to mine, he believes suburban roads (like your street) would be owned by a collectivist 'company', in which all members of the area own shares. I don't really agree with him, but hey, there's another option to consider.

Why? I need an argument to counter. I have already made my case for why it is a better option - Competition increases quality and drives down prices, this is a basic economic fact.

The state has a monopoly on roads, why are you opposed to private monopolies but not the state's monopoly?

There are often more than just two routes to a destination, but let's assume that all road owners conspire together and form a cartel.

If a bunch of businesses come together and say "hey, let's not compete, and then raise our prices really high!", there are two reasons why it will not function for long.

First, who's making sure all the businesses keep their prices high? If you're a business in a cartel, you will realise that if you undercut the others that are involved in the cartel, you can make a huge profit. Why? Everyone will come to you to escape the exceptionally high prices the other guys are demanding, and thus you will steal the market. So every single business involved in a cartel has incentive to undercut the rest for this reason, and unless they are keeping each other in check using threats and/or violence (which would be illegal), then it's likely there will be one to undercut the rest.

Second, new competition is going to spring up. If you're a businessman and you see an area of the market in which a cartel has formed, you're going to want to enter the market because you know you can undercut the cartel and steal the market.

Now what stops the cartel from undercutting the new competition and driving it out of business, before setting the prices super high again?

Well, that would be assuming that undercutting the new competition occurs only for a brief period. New competition doesn't just stop appearing after the first try. New competition is going to be constantly coming, every time new competition is put out of business by the cartel it gives newer competition even more incentive to enter the market, as they will know that the cartel has been weakened due to running at a loss to undercut the previous competition. No matter how big a cartel is it cannot run at a loss indefinitely. And of course, if they're undercutting new competition the whole time, their cartel is no longer a problem, is it?

Ok, so what about companies that buy up all the roads, and the roads lost by the new competition? What happens when they have their 'monopolies'?

Monopolies don't form in a free market. A good example I have read of why they don't is that as they get bigger, the cost of buying out the market increases. If companyA's competitors see companyA trying to become a monopoly, they know they can charge much higher prices when companyA tries to buy them out. If companyA owns 95% of the market, and you are one of the last few competitors, you know you can charge incredibly high prices for companyA to buy you, as there aren't many other companies you are competing with in stock price. Not only this, but companyA is continually faced with new competition springing up. The more monopolistic a company becomes, the less competition they face, and the more inefficient they are able to become. This means it is in fact easier to compete with them, so people begin investing in firms that are in competition. Also, as a company buys out the market, it is accumulating debt on account of the incredibly high cost of buying out the market. This means it has to increase its prices in order to make up for this debt, making them easier to compete with for new competitors.

Where???

In the USA, regulation has only increased.

Barzum- you fell right into the "Age" thing... age is NOT the issue - true - most times- but - like when playing jeopardy - we (older/been around longer) people just manage to get the references...

Cheney-- as in Dick Cheney , as in up to his neck in making money from Blackwater....

Also: the idea of making your own road is quaint... I mean one of the big instigators of the so called new Jasmin revolution is the fact that a business man got tired of having to pay extra money every few meters (in kickbacks) just to deliver his goods and he just flipped out. People - with more money -r to make more money - or to extort more money (people that may even be prone to more than threaten violence)... so very close to anarchy...

Barzum - are you from the U.S.?

Nope.

So you might not know who Cheney is? He and other neocons and the CIA? Do you know about Halliburton and Cheney? Cheney and Oil?

How about the Jasmin revolution...?

This post was last modified: 03-08-2011 05:27 PM by windy.