Okay, then divide a monopoly up into two types, one being “private”, the other public, then perform comparative analysis of the two. You seem unable to divorce normative from economic analysis.
-Jon
Your categories are wrong. There is only one kind of monopoly. What you call ‘public’ monopoly and ‘private’ mopoly are one and the same thing.
If you want a meaningful analysis then compare free-enterprise vs. monopoly.
You’re tedious in the extreme. No, my categories are not wrong. It’s not all black and white. Monopolies vary from one another, just as democracy varies from monarchy, just as communism differs from fascism, and various forms of socialism from either of the prior, each requiring different forms of analysis. There’s no liberty involved. It is wertfrei analysis, so I am not sure why you’re trying to argue that Stranger is “advocating” anything.
-Jon
Because wertfrei analysis poses the danger of functioning as a legitimizing tool due to its utilitarian and subjective nature. It certainly can be useful, but by itself it is not enough to make a case for or against anything, hence the need to delve into theories of ethics and justice.
Besides, Stranger is not making any wertfrei analysis. He’s simply twisting the meaning of the words ‘private’ and ‘monopoly’ - so his ‘analysis’ is logically flawed and not praxeological.
Your categories are wrong and calling me names won’t fix your error.
That is off-topic.
No it is not. The owner of the monopoly must still risk his capital to produce a good for which the future sale price may not turn a profit.
How does private property or liberty explain why capitalist enterprise (risk-free labor) are widespread while cooperative enterprises (owner-employees) are rare or simply inexistant?
You need economic analysis to explain that.
State capitalism means nothing unless you qualify the ownership of the state.
I’m not talking about cooperatives - I’m talking about joint stock companies
Capitalism works by pooling capital. It just happens that the people whom you call employees usually save money wich in turn is invested in the productive process. There can be no capitalism if there are no savings. Monopolists have no bearing in this process except as destroyers of private property.
Except that :
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He bougth his privileged status from a gang of robbers and murderers(wertfrei description) - the state. He probably payed $1 for $10 worth of infrastructure or something like that.
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He is selling something that people are bound to buy - say water, electricity, phone services, etc.
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The price is not a real price but a tax. The price will be what he and his political partners decide it is (no market - no prices).
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Lastly…he faces no competition. If he’s selling wired telephone services and somebody invents, say, wireless telephones the monopolist is not affected. Zero risk.
Juan, you’ve just asserted it. You’ve not really proven it. I’m not even calling you names - your argumentative style is indeed tedious. If you aren’t happy with calling it private, call it whatever you will - mercantilistic, fascist &c. There is still a difference between various forms of monopoly.
BP, I respect that, but it should not hinder economic analysis. The economist should, rather, make it clear what their moral propositions are.
-Jon
What do I need to prove ? That a monopoly is a clear attack on property rights ? Do you want me to prove that ‘humans act’ as well ? x=x ? The only tedious thing here is Stranger’s constant refusal to use basic terminology in a consistent way.
You seem to still be in denial ? The production of A, B, C, etc. can either be done by firms in a free market (free enterprise) or can be done by monopolist producers. You can call these monopolists whatever you want : monarchists, fascists, commies, social-democrats, whatever. From a praxeological point of view they are merely people shielded from competition by political force and the results of this arrangement are always the same.
Are you denying that corporatist/neo-mercantalist policies externalize the costs of certain buisinesses? If so, what planet are you living on? The monopolist is protected and bailed out by the state - and the costs are externalized onto the taxpayers and consumers. The capital they are risking is, at least in part, that which rightfully belongs to other people. Besides, the main risk that could cause them to not turn a profit has been eliminated - competition. The monopolist has a captive consumer base who have no choice but to patronize them if they want that type of product. They are effectively legally gauranteed future profits by the elimination of their competition. This is also how IP laws work.
How is a system in which the state forces the people at large to foot the bill for big buisiness “capitalistic” in any libertarian sense of the term?
You act as though the lack of gradations within the spectrum of monopoly is on equal footing with x = x. Economic analysis is more complex than “private property or not” for in either case a variety of arrangements are possible.
Not really. The way the incentives are structured, whether the owner or nameless bureaucrats get to reap the rewards &c. will all influence the operation of the monopoly. So from a praxeological POV, the result is not the same. It’s inefficient relative to a free market, to be sure, but relative to one another these forms of economic organization are not the same. And no economist I know of assumes they are.
-Jon
I’m still waiting for you to acknowledge that a producer can either operate in a free market or not. Or perhaps logic has been repealed ? Btw, are you using the jargon of physics ? What is it that you are measuring in order to build such a ‘spectrum’ ?
That may be an unproven assertion ? Again, you are just creating categories out of thin air. Your categories highlight irrelevant details while missing the fundamental point.
Or perhaps you’re arguing against a strawman. I know you’re fixated on semantics, but the “jargon of physics” was no more than mere metaphor.
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In the same manner that individuals act so as to attain ends with given means is an “unproven assertion”? I fail to see how whether one gets to keep their proceeds or not is an “irrelevant detail”. No, rather you’re insisting on seeing things solely in black and white. Whether the monopolist functions as private owner of the monopoly they control, or whether they are little more than a temporary caretaker will certainly alter their incentive structure. Dismiss this as “irrelevant”, but it really isn’t.
-Jon
I fail to see the difference between a ‘private’ monopolist and a soviet-style firm manager. Both are controlling resources because of political pull, not because they are the best minds at serving consumers.
That’s rather vague. I’d bet some money that the communist oligarchies who controlled places like Russia engaged in some sort of long-term planning, in order to keep their power. So there were ‘incentives’ for soviet managers to do at least some things right. And there are a lot of incentives for private monopolists to do things wrong. You are comparing two systems that are basically the same, but focusing on ‘nominal’ differences.
The original question for this thread was “Is privatisation of state facilities true capitalism?”
If “true capitalism” means free enterprise (a reasonable guess) and privatization means to convert a ‘public’ monopoly into a ‘private’ one, then the answer is a big NO!
Right. But they will manage them differently, according to how much they’re allowed to keep or not, and to pass on, and so on.
Soviet managers usually got away with various activities by doing things like fudging figures and the like. They were not entitled to the profits their activities generated, unlike a private owner who is. This is a major difference and is not merely nominal. A lot can go wrong in either case. As a matter of efficiency the case where the monopolist is a private owner will result in less inefficiencies. Both situations distort economic calculation, though the lack of ownership only worsens matters.
-Jon
That is, for someone informed in economics, completely incorrect.