Maybe we should take Eugenics more seriously?

[Robinho]

If that were true then the US would be the best economy in the world.

It is the best economy in the world.

[DodgyAgent]

We should have supported indigenous manufacturing, yes.*
We should have tried harder to not throw out the baby with the bathwater.
Everyone else does it, not least that bastion of free enterprise, the US.

*Even the Tories are making noises about this now.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing

[ZARDOZ]

Essentially it is all self-regulating in the end though. What we have just got is a huge learning lesson in the age of financial deregulation. Does that mean we should slap all the regulations back on? No, we should just think more carefully about getting that crazy mortgage on a pauper's wage. In addition the government shouldn't deficit spend during the boom years.

It's not though is it, the market spectaculary failed and the Taxpayer had to underwrite that failure otherwise the whole system would have imploded. If something isn't done it WILL happen again. What was allowed to happen was madness.

[Old Greg]

No this is exactly what Anarcho-Capitalism or Libertarianism does. Fascism control large parts of the economy - this is not capitalistic. Punishment of the working class is not a capitalistic concept. Collective bargaining is capitalistic - capitalism is about negotiating for the sale of goods and services. What is not capitalistic is giving trade unions unnatural rights.

State control under fascism is substantially overstated because it is viewed within the context of the war-time economy. And in any case you are, I think, confusing capitalism with free market capitalism. Capitalism dies not require free markets. It requires the ability to deploy capital for profit and the less restrained that deploymentl, the better.

But we may have to agree to disagree.

[Robinho]

It's not though is it, the market spectaculary failed and the Taxpayer had to underwrite that failure otherwise the whole system would have imploded. If something isn't done it WILL happen again. What was allowed to happen was madness.

It happened to Iceland and they're doing alright now.

[Scoobos]

If the liberalisation of markets had not been allowed, perhaps we wouldn't have had the illusion of wealth that the City and Wall Street seemed to create over the last 25 years.

QFT

[Scoobos]

its been downhill since we went off the gold standard.

and this too, too true!

[Scoobos]

The key to a good economy is to minimise government intervention. There is basically no need for it at all.

Thats scary to me.. very scary.

Do you truely believe that without regulation and intervention from governments , business will behave?

The only mandate is to maximise profits.

Holy hell, this statement really does scare me.

[Robinho]

State control under fascism is substantially overstated because it is viewed within the context of the war-time economy. And in any case you are, I think, confusing capitalism with free market capitalism. Capitalism dies not require free markets. It requires the ability to deploy capital for profit and the less restrained that deploymentl, the better.

But we may have to agree to disagree.

I will agree that you are fundamentally wrong.

[Robinho]

Thats scary to me.. very scary.

Do you truely believe that without regulation and intervention from governments , business will behave?

The only mandate is to maximise profits.

Holy hell, this statement really does scare me.

And how do you maximise profits? By agreeing to mutually beneficial transactions with consumers.

The government must protect property rights and contract laws and that is more or less it.