Trying to explain each instance of how capitalism works to people who can't seem to absorb the concept as a first principle is a lot like explaining something to a small child. The actual abstraction never actually clicks in. "Do animals eat food like people do?" Yes, kid, they do. "How about monkeys?" Yes, they eat food. "Do elephants eat food, too?" Yes, they do. "How about squirrels?"

And so on. I've reviewed some of my long-winded explanations of the concept on this board, and they don't really make a dent.

Free market capitalism is not just everybody doing whatever the hell they want without limits.

...Capitalism is a social system based on the recognition of individual rights, including property rights, in which all property is privately owned. The recognition of individual rights entails the banishment of physical force from human relationships: basically, rights can be violated only by means of force. In a capitalist society, no man or group may initiate the use of physical force against others.



The only function of the government, in such a society, is the task of protecting man's rights, i.e.., the task of protecting him from physical force; the government acts as the agent of man's right of self-defense, and may use force only in retaliation and only against those who initiate its use; thus the government is the means of placing the retaliatory use of force under objective control.

--Ayn Rand, "Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal"

Recommended, by the way.

If government force or force by other private entities is being used, it isn't free market capitalism.

...capitalism without checks leads to things like the company store, economic slavery where there is only one place to work and where there is only one place to buy, where debt owns people. Sort of like the IMF on a local scale.

Without trying to go into first principles yet again, take this simple test:

1. A company in a small town owns a company store. The prices are fixed, and high. Stock is limited. One morning, someone comes into town and wants to open a competing store with lower prices and better choices. The company and its store respond by:

a. Lowering prices and improving goods and services to meet the competition.

b. Slip a load of cash to the mayor and have arbitrary and phoney regulations passed preventing the store from opening.

c. Wait until the store opens and have some of the "boys" (or the cops in your pocket) come around and bust a few windows and heads. Works on Union guys, too.

Answer "a" is what happens with capitalism. The others--more likely to be sure--are what you get when force is used, and it isn't free market capitalism. A proper government would defend the rights of the new store instead of being a corrupt extension of the company, a common enough occurence in the old days to be sure. Actually, come to think of it, answer "b" is still in common use. A number of examples come to mind.

Unlimited capitalism, greed, is not enlightened. It is by definition selfish. Your beloved Ayn Rand with her economic Rambos, ignores the infrastructure necessary for her heroes to function. And prosper.



I have seen enough "enlightened" societies in the last century to last me five lifetimes. I ask you to go back and think of every society that has referred to itself as "enlightened."

Not sure what you mean by "infrastructure." Ayn Rand acknowledges the need for government to protect individual rights. On the other hand, if you had tried to convince her that there would be no highways in existence in America unless Ted Kennedy built them, she would have laughed in your face. She was considerably ruder than I am.

Because where capitalism runs without checks, there is no middle class. Peru, Columbia, Mexico, etc., are all more or less capitalist economies, with very rich and very poor people. Not much in the middle, to create markets, to run sophisticated enterprises.

Ref. the "company store" example. Such societies have combined their governments with their businesses into a large monolith. Sometimes it isn't even subtle, with El Presidente and his relatives owning large chunks of the business sector.

This is not free market capitalism either.

Unrestrained capitalism would result in every elephant shot for its tusks, every fish being dragged from the sea, because there was a market for the product.

Your model for managing wildlife requires an interruption of the "free market". A government strong enough to suppress the poachers who would, and do, operate anyway.

This gets into a discussion of the "tragedy of the commons," which if we had a real education system, I would not have to explain. Suffice it to say, the real problem of elephants in Africa is that no one owns them. The solution that is working best is essentially making the wildlife the "property" of the local people, who then have an incentive to preserve them, not just eat them. I posted a link on this once, but can't find it now. Some areas like fishing are more difficult to attach property rights to, but not impossible.

In the Serengeti case you mentioned, it is likely the kids with the AK-47s were locals, and that the poachers were in real trouble. Local wildlife "owners" tend to shoot first and ask questions later. No system will prevent all poaching, any more than a police force keeps all crime from happening.

The unrestrained free market always works, but not to everyone's benefit.

Most often not to the benefit of those who want extensive political power, which is why governments are typically hostile to the concept. It isn't Utopia, it is a system that works with human nature, not against it.