To an extent, we can say that all those racists from the early-20th and late 19th century, like Josiah Strong, were onto something: creed counts. Many of the places in the world that stink do so not because of a technical or engineering problem, but because local culture wrecks any progress that seems to happen.

Are we willing to say "progress and prosperity require solving certain social problems," and let go of those who don't? Or are we better off wasting vast sums of money propping up those who will take such support as an excuse NOT to solve said problems, in order to help a small number of those who will be reached by such aid.

Not a comfy question.

While I admire your approach, I find your conclusion bizarre. What has been shown to work the best historically so far has been a mixture of the free market and socialist systems: generally speaking, in the most successful economies, health care, infrastructure, and education, among other things, are provided through taxes by the state, while most else is done through private enterprise.

Whether or not that is the ideal system (for some def'n of ideal) is an open question. The reliance on the free market certainly does have some negatives (the accumulation of wealth in a small percentage of the population, various versions of the "tragedy of the commons", and so on); it's hardly ideally "humane". Not that socialism or anarchic economies don't have their own problems. This is certainly why western economies don't operate under a "pure" system, but in fact use a mix.

Like a lot of people, I have my own idea about what a more ideal mix would be, and why we haven't yet achieved it, but I won't bore you with that.

Free market can be a surprisingly deceptive term. There are some who take it to mean something akin to the wild west, others more narrowly define what is a market problem and what isn't. Some argue, for instance, that a minimum wage is a human rights issue.

Like most things, a market isn't best thought of as either free or not free but rather in terms of freeness.

Another good example is India. To the extent that the markets have been freed (high tech for example) there has been a remarkable growth of wealth. Other markets within the country are less free and, consequently, less capable of producing the wealth that the country needs.

Russ --

>>Or are we better off wasting vast sums of money propping up those who will take such support as an excuse NOT to solve said problems, in order to help a small number of those who will be reached by such aid.

Well there's theory (and ideology) and then there's practice. My wife and I support a foster child program in India that brings education and basic services to kids who otherwise wouldn't get it, and I recently started supporting a micro-loan program in southeast Asia that enables women to operate small, subsistence businesses. Both of these programs can have a transformative effect on their communities. And there's no vast sums of money involved. I personally resent having my taxes raised in support of the "common good" because I don't trust the government to help people as well as I can. Plus, I like being personally involved -- which gets lost when the bureaucracies take over.

Chuko --

Your argument seems to be about the most effective way of managing a state on an ongoing basis. I don't disagree that "pure" free markets have to be tempered by other considerations, but the question here isn't how to manage a particular economy; the question is how you keep the worldwide economy on a trajectory towards universal abundance / the elimination of poverty. European style social democracy may be a stable system (I say may be; there is certainly a case to be made that it is not), but it doesn't provide the economic growth that will get us from point A to point B.

This question is usually asked under the false premise that Free-Marketers or Capitalist's are less caring than are Socialist's.

While this may be true in many cases, it isn't necessarily so. As John Adam's said "Our constitution is for a religious and moral people. It is wholly inadequate to govern anything other." A nation as free as the U.S. will devolve into a less free form of governance the further it moves way from religion and morality. I agree with Adams, it cannot be any other way.

The Myth Of Free Trade And The Secret History Of Capitalism
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T5-ojv5-b3U

If you have an hour to burn Ha-Joon Chang is an economist worth listening to.

Hi Phil, nice to talk with you -

I wasn't necessarily arguing there for European style economic systems; in fact, the US economy also falls under the idea of a mixed socialist/capitalist system - all Western economies do. You said you had an interest in what works; well, so far, this is what works the best, so I think it's a good starting point.

I don't necessarily agree with your statement that "European style social democracy... doesn't provide the economic growth that will get us from point A to point B." Two points here:

1) Several European countries have had a higher median income and faster growth of their economies in recent decades than the US. I won't present this as evidence that European style economies are better for economic growth than the US model, but I do think it calls into question whether the US model is better. In any case, the economic growth rates certainly are very similar, as one might expect in very similar systems.

2) Greater social services in Europe correspond with a lower poverty rate, especially when you include food stamps, health care, and such as income. Reducing poverty was part of your Point B, right?

As far as reducing worldwide poverty, these consideration don't seem very important - you're talking about countries that don't have a functioning banking system which is pretty much a prerequisite to a healthy economy. The micro-loans are a really nifty idea by the way that neatly provide on a small scale this lack in financial infrastructure (in one way of thinking about it.)

A free market capitalist system with an absolutely militant supervision of any rentier-type behaviour happening anywhere will behave better than the present capitalist-oligarchical system.

Consider the basic idea behind Georgism. Collect land-rent and redistribute among the people or use it to run government. An exceedingly simple idea, much better than the present panoply of taxes and regulations. It betters the capitalist system by forcing money out of buying land and sitting on it to using it or using the money to buy some shares or bonds - productive usage.

Wherever patents are being protected, a small fee can make sure that people use those patents to produce innovations, instead of using it to stifle somebody else's innovations.

Rentier type behaviour was appearing in the modern investment banking arena. Allowing these companies to die would have been the best policy.

Is this the proper definition of "Free Market"? Business governed by the laws of supply and demand, not restrained by government, interferences, regulation, or subsidy.

I'd say that's a good definition of a "pure" free market. Per Thesk's comments, above, the term gets tossed around quite a bit and is used to mean a lot of different things. I keep adding weasel words like "more or less" to the phrase, because I don't care if laws against selling child pornography or protecting endangered species from extinction conflict with some people's idea of what a "free" market is.

I'm in favor of relatively free markets -- as free as we can get them. After all, in the example I gave, China is still far from being a model of economic (much less individual) freedom. But a move in that direction transformed their economy and has given more than half a billion people a life that was unimaginable a generation or two ago.

China's success is a model of market and government cooperation. If my definition above is correct, then it is true that "free markets" never existed, since the Civil War in the US, maybe before that.

If what China accomplished is a model, then the model is for government to get out of the way and allow business to take place. Of course, that can easily go too far and then you get toys with lead paint and poisonous baby formula and pet food.

>>then it is true that "free markets" never existed, since the Civil War in the US, maybe before that.

I would take it back at least 80 years earlier; pure free markets were ruled out as soon as the framers included the interstate commerce clause in the constitution.

It's interesting that the first amendment guarantees freedom of speech, while the ICC guarantees that commerce will be regulated. This assumes a dualistic universe, where information is one thing and "stuff" is something else. That dualism made a lot of sense in the 18th century -- sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me -- and even does for the most part in 21st.

Where those two worlds currently collide is in things like patent and copyright. Disney got the copyright rules rewritten a few years ago to keep Mickey Mouse from falling into the public domain. That's where the "partnership" between government and business can be dangerous.

Without copyrighted material falling into the public domain, artists are prevented from developing derivative works and taking them to market. Most of Shakespeare's career would have been impossible had he been operating subject to 21st century US copyright law.

If there is one market that most people agree should be as free as possible, it is the marketplace of ideas. Where there is an unfortunate convergence is between government and business interests who tend to try to gain greater control of the private sector, and a private sector that is made up of less stuff and more information than ever before. Prakash's comments above about rent-seeking are spot on.

When the primary value component of our economy is information, we need the first amendment to be stronger than ever. We don't want to risk having the next market to fall under bureaucratic control be the marketplace of ideas. And to swing it back around, that is exactly why I don't think China is much of a model -- magnificent though their accomplishment has been. The same government that opened things up for trade slammed down on the dissidents in Tienanmen Square.

the US market- based system evolved through the recent 100 years is well suited to inspire and motivate the kind of creativity you're talking about.

THough I'm not sure how requisite creativity is for Kurzweil and others as the singularity facilitator.

That said- here's a question.
What if the intelligentsia and ruling elite (political and financial) saw the path to singularity but it required - apparently temporarily - a major Malthusian population adjustment?
Ie- if we could get there, but only by stripping out most of the social safety net?
Not the "100 people who make it into the bomb shelter" but something along those lines.

I tell you, the way some people say "bureaucrats" all the time, almost makes me think they don't appreciate government. Just because bureaucrats at the pentagon can't offer any accounting for some billions, is no reason to not appreciate your freedom! The truth? You can't handle the truth!

Well, it looks like China is a football for any example. The poison food and toxic toys show the need for government inspectors. The market is more an example of one under government management, than an example of "free markets".

Harvey --

The market is more an example of one under government management, than an example of "free markets".

The point is that their economy grew stupendously, and people were lifted out of poverty, when the government stopped "managing" things quite so vigorously. Unfortunately, to your point, they quit managing some of the things government should legitimately be managing.

Free markets are like free speech -- they don't exist anywhere in a pure an absolute form. I once worked in a country where, working for a private firm, I had to apply for a government license in order to publish an internal employee newsletter. Advocates of that system would talk about how the government "manages" communication and allows for "limited" free speech. The free exchange of goods and services and the free exchange of ideas are much more closely linked than most people realize -- especially as information becomes a bigger component of goods and services.