I suggest we assign a book report on this book:
Posted on 08/29/2015 12:05:41 PM PDT by MosesKnows
I am pondering the pros and cons of competition.
That’s good.
I don't think we should be. The "anti-trust" movement was purely a progressive boondoggle.
In my opinion, a monopoly can only exist for long with the assistance of government. In a truly free market, if the monopoly attempts to fix prices higher than supply and demand would allow, then competition would quickly enter the market and force the monopoly to break up. There is no way to stop this without government shutting down competition.
As to cartels, they are most often international, but even they cannot escape the power of supply and demand for long. OPEC is a good example. The embargo of the 1970's forced prices up for a time, but then numerous competitors entered the market and de-fanged the cartel. In only a few years, the gold price of oil had declined to levels below where they had started. Since then, OPEC has wised up and now is content to make incremental increases to keep the price below the point where competition becomes active. Occasionally, they still miscalculate, as with the recent North Dakota oil boom made possible by world prices that were too high.
Not sure what you mean. Do you mean ethical/moral aspects?
For competition to not slouch into anarchy there need to be consistent rules to the game. This is true in sports. It is true in business. It is true in politics.
Sports is the easiest analogy.
A football game has boundaries.
You play the game inside the boundaries. It is agreed you can’t hit an opponent, gain yards or score points out-of-bounds.
You play the game for a certain time period. When the ball is hiked, a play starts. When the ref blows the whistle the play ends.
Most importantly, each player has the freedom to choose to be a player, or not be a player. But each team also has the freedom to choose who is on their team and who is not.
Thus a team is by mutual consent. Games between teams are by mutual consent.
The same in business. There are rules of the game. Rules of when you have to tell the truth and when you are allowed to stretch it.
As in sports, business requires a willing and able buyer and a willing and able seller coming to mutual agreement on a sale.
A business team and an individual player are free to come to a mutual agreement or choose to not come to an agreement and not have a team relationship.
This discussion could get quite long. But freedom to agree on a relationship and freedomm to not agree on a relaitonship and rules of the game enforced by a referee are the essential ingredients of competition.
For competition to not slouch into anarchy there need to be consistent rules to the game. This is true in sports. It is true in business. It is true in politics.
Sports is the easiest analogy.
A football game has boundaries.
You play the game inside the boundaries. It is agreed you can’t hit an opponent, gain yards or score points out-of-bounds.
You play the game for a certain time period. When the ball is hiked, a play starts. When the ref blows the whistle the play ends.
Most importantly, each player has the freedom to choose to be a player, or not be a player. But each team also has the freedom to choose who is on their team and who is not.
Thus a team is by mutual consent. Games between teams are by mutual consent.
The same in business. There are rules of the game. Rules of when you have to tell the truth and when you are allowed to stretch it.
As in sports, business requires a willing and able buyer and a willing and able seller coming to mutual agreement on a sale.
A business team and an individual player are free to come to a mutual agreement or choose to not come to an agreement and not have a team relationship.
This discussion could get quite long. But freedom to agree on a relationship and freedomm to not agree on a relaitonship and rules of the game enforced by a referee are the essential ingredients of competition.
I have a headache.
I’m going to Walmart for some Jack Daniels and refill my Xanax prescription.
Some truth there, for sure. The problem occurs when the monopoly exists in a high-infrastucture industry. If I, for example, owned all the oil refineries in the US, I'd have little worry of someone trying to compete with me.
So my pricing would not be based on keeping customers, as is the case with competitive industries. I could charge pretty much whatever I wanted, as long it wasn't so high that you would be willing to spend millions to build your own refinery.
I worked in the People’s Republic of China (aka, Red China) for seven months in ‘76-’77. I traveled extensively, from the southern province of Yunnan to the far north in Manchuria.
Throughout the land, I saw precisely ONE design of everything available for sale. The State decided on the official design and only that thing was build. It was true for the few consumer products available, all clothes, food, machine tools, you name it. There was no competition and no choice. The State determined the price. Without competition, there was no incentive to innovate, cut costs, and deliver maximum value to the customer at minimum price. The “service” people in the stores hated their customers and must about spit on them because there were no competing stores to go to. Product design was old, stale, and very pedestrian — that’s what you get without competition.
I’m in a highly competitive high-tech industry. We have very tough competition and we are constantly trying to beat them on features, reliability, superior service and support, and price. It is exhausting dealing with this endless race every day, but I experienced the alternative for real and I tell you from experience there’s nothing like the dynamo of competition.
Now why in the world would you ever ask such a question? Is it out of ignorance? Naive youth? Lack of exposure to communism and the brutality of competitive marketplaces? Just why do you think you have the incredible selection of products on the shelves of every market? As many have said, “Under Capitalism, the bread waits of the people. Under Communism, the people wait for the bread.”
I suggest you rethink your question and report back to us.
True, but let's define what a "fair price" is. It is the price at which supply and demand are in balance. So, if the price is low enough to discourage competition (and there is no coercion involved), then what are we complaining about?
I suggest we assign a book report on this book:
In a modern division of labor economic system in a rational free society, competition is not like in the animal kingdom which is competition over a limited,nature-given supply of means of subsistence.Instead it is competition in the positive creation of new and additional wealth.Economic competition is the process of improving the efficiency of social cooperation under the division of labor, and thereby of promoting the survival of every member of the human species.
Thanks to the law of comparative advantage and the pyramid of ability principle, there is not only room but also actual need for everyone in the competition of a division of labor society,even for those who are less capable than others in every respect.
Monopoly, or the lack of competition, is a result of a political process where a market or part of a market is reserved to the exclusive possession of one or more sellers by means of the initiation of physical force by the government or with the santion of the government.
Let me know what you find.
Are you the “Question Authority”?
Would this observation illustrate your assertion?
Without a modicum of morality, Capitalism can become as oppressive as Socialism.
If you don't share a fear of monopolies and cartels, the question is not applicable.
I understand that competition is good, nay, necessary, but where did you get the notion I didn't want competition?
The point of my question involved education and healthcare and their lack of competition.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
