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The market economy in fact solves many problems of 'helping other people' that we have just become so used to that we don't appreciate its complexity. The fact

The market economy in fact solves many problems of 'helping other people' that we have just become so used to that we don't appreciate its complexity. The fact that food is produced in abundance and is distributed in time to population centres for convenient consumption is a marvel of the modern world. And we're only getting better at it over time. That's helping people.

twelve40 6y ago
that's a great point, but. Just like the moon landing, some degree of food security in the "first world" countries has been achieved many decades ago now. Maybe it's time for some new achievements, like, i dunno, security against mystery viruses, or something else to write home about?
- wincy 6y ago
  It didn’t feel all that secure in March of last year. And I mean, the MRNA vaccine seems pretty amazing that rollout began worldwide in less than a year from a novel coronavirus popping up. But the same people working in agriculture aren’t working on virus research. The market decides where to allocate resources, are you advocating for some sort of central planning in lieu of this? What would a different system look like that doesn’t have the major pitfalls that the Soviet government had, where strange things happened like nearly hunting whales to extinction because they needed to make the 1967 whale oil quota?
CaptArmchair 6y ago
"That's helping people" doesn't really say anything. It's extremely vague. Moreover, it's clear that not everyone helped since abject poverty and hunger are a thing, regardless of where you live. You might be conflating "helping people" with "convenience" whereas what you truly want to say that "market economy" has made products/services "affordable". But, that's, again, not an inclusive statement. Markets only offer access to goods/services to the extent that actors are able to afford them. And clearly not everyone can afford to buy enough sustenance on a daily basis to not go hungry. The same is true for being able to afford to attain equitable prices as a seller. If you can't bring enough leverage to the table, you will have to accept price levels as they are determined by bigger players who dominate market supply. It might mean that you get out priced, and that your business proposition - no matter how good the idea was - simply won't generate revenue because someone else can provide the same thing for less then peanuts. Both cryptocurrency and food are the epitomes of that. Massive amounts of food are being produced to the extent that there's massive amounts of waste across the entire supply chain. None of that happens out of charitable or altruistic intentions. It's not even produced for your personal convenience as a customer. Flooding markets with massive amounts of supply is a strategy aimed to drive the prices down to a point where competitors have to call it quits. The aim/risk is to generate a razor thin margin which is still worth the investment. At the scale of global markets, that's still billions of dollars worth in profits. The same is true for cryptocurrency. The price on cryptomarkets isn't determined by the many hands who hold fractions, it's determined by those who have invested the largest amounts of leverage. And they will use that to influence the prices if the incentive for scalping profit and/or acquiring/controlling a larger share of a scarce/finite resource becomes too enticing. "Market economy" only helps certain groups in certain circumstances. It's definitely not an equitable way of "helping people". On the contrary.
- nyolfen 6y ago
  > "That's helping people" doesn't really say anything. It's extremely vague. Moreover, it's clear that not everyone helped since abject poverty and hunger are a thing, regardless of where you live. this is less true than it has ever been in human history; the only places with true famines in the modern world are those cut off from global markets by war, or dysfunctional states that are cut off from global markets like NK. your statement is either willful blindness or some kind of bone-deep cynicism -- "nothing good has happened because bad things still exist".
  - CaptArmchair 6y ago
    > true famines Beware of the "no true Scotsman" fallacy. Here's some sources about food insecurity in the United States: [1] https://www.npr.org/2020/09/27/912486921/food-insecurity-in-the-u-s-by-the-numbers https://www.npr.org/2020/09/27/912486921/food-insecurity-in-... [2] https://time.com/4477157/hunger-america-history/ https://time.com/4477157/hunger-america-history/ [3] https://www.fns.usda.gov/snap/short-history-snap https://www.fns.usda.gov/snap/short-history-snap [4] https://www.nap.edu/read/11578/chapter/4 https://www.nap.edu/read/11578/chapter/4 [5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunger_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunger_in_the_United_States I could continue on. There are entire libraries filled by countless research and public policy programs with studies and monographs on the subject. And that's just the United States. Hunger is a massive issue anywhere in the world. And I will bring this to the table as an established fact whenever someone praises the virtues of a concept as vaguely defined as "market economics" while omitting the realities. > your statement is either willful blindness or some kind of bone-deep cynicism I'm unwilling to discuss this any further having being called "blind" and "cynic".
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
    - nyolfen 6y ago
      > "nothing good has happened because bad things still exist" https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&q=deaths+by+starvation+over+time&oq=deaths+by+starvation+over+time https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&q=deaths+by+starvatio...
leppr 6y ago
The current Bitcoin narrative and actual usage does nothing for the "market economy" though. It might have some indirect positive effects by forcing governments to adopt more open policies lest they suffer from capital flight and forming of parallel economies, but that's about it. Decentralized stablecoins on the other hand have great potential to amplify the free market economy.

twelve40 6y ago

that's a great point, but. Just like the moon landing, some degree of food security in the "first world" countries has been achieved many decades ago now. Maybe it's time for some new achievements, like, i dunno, security against mystery viruses, or something else to write home about?

wincy 6y ago
It didn’t feel all that secure in March of last year. And I mean, the MRNA vaccine seems pretty amazing that rollout began worldwide in less than a year from a novel coronavirus popping up. But the same people working in agriculture aren’t working on virus research. The market decides where to allocate resources, are you advocating for some sort of central planning in lieu of this? What would a different system look like that doesn’t have the major pitfalls that the Soviet government had, where strange things happened like nearly hunting whales to extinction because they needed to make the 1967 whale oil quota?

CaptArmchair 6y ago

"That's helping people" doesn't really say anything. It's extremely vague. Moreover, it's clear that not everyone helped since abject poverty and hunger are a thing, regardless of where you live. You might be conflating "helping people" with "convenience" whereas what you truly want to say that "market economy" has made products/services "affordable". But, that's, again, not an inclusive statement. Markets only offer access to goods/services to the extent that actors are able to afford them. And clearly not everyone can afford to buy enough sustenance on a daily basis to not go hungry. The same is true for being able to afford to attain equitable prices as a seller. If you can't bring enough leverage to the table, you will have to accept price levels as they are determined by bigger players who dominate market supply. It might mean that you get out priced, and that your business proposition - no matter how good the idea was - simply won't generate revenue because someone else can provide the same thing for less then peanuts. Both cryptocurrency and food are the epitomes of that. Massive amounts of food are being produced to the extent that there's massive amounts of waste across the entire supply chain. None of that happens out of charitable or altruistic intentions. It's not even produced for your personal convenience as a customer. Flooding markets with massive amounts of supply is a strategy aimed to drive the prices down to a point where competitors have to call it quits. The aim/risk is to generate a razor thin margin which is still worth the investment. At the scale of global markets, that's still billions of dollars worth in profits. The same is true for cryptocurrency. The price on cryptomarkets isn't determined by the many hands who hold fractions, it's determined by those who have invested the largest amounts of leverage. And they will use that to influence the prices if the incentive for scalping profit and/or acquiring/controlling a larger share of a scarce/finite resource becomes too enticing. "Market economy" only helps certain groups in certain circumstances. It's definitely not an equitable way of "helping people". On the contrary.

nyolfen 6y ago
> "That's helping people" doesn't really say anything. It's extremely vague. Moreover, it's clear that not everyone helped since abject poverty and hunger are a thing, regardless of where you live. this is less true than it has ever been in human history; the only places with true famines in the modern world are those cut off from global markets by war, or dysfunctional states that are cut off from global markets like NK. your statement is either willful blindness or some kind of bone-deep cynicism -- "nothing good has happened because bad things still exist".
- CaptArmchair 6y ago
  > true famines Beware of the "no true Scotsman" fallacy. Here's some sources about food insecurity in the United States: [1] https://www.npr.org/2020/09/27/912486921/food-insecurity-in-the-u-s-by-the-numbers https://www.npr.org/2020/09/27/912486921/food-insecurity-in-... [2] https://time.com/4477157/hunger-america-history/ https://time.com/4477157/hunger-america-history/ [3] https://www.fns.usda.gov/snap/short-history-snap https://www.fns.usda.gov/snap/short-history-snap [4] https://www.nap.edu/read/11578/chapter/4 https://www.nap.edu/read/11578/chapter/4 [5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunger_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunger_in_the_United_States I could continue on. There are entire libraries filled by countless research and public policy programs with studies and monographs on the subject. And that's just the United States. Hunger is a massive issue anywhere in the world. And I will bring this to the table as an established fact whenever someone praises the virtues of a concept as vaguely defined as "market economics" while omitting the realities. > your statement is either willful blindness or some kind of bone-deep cynicism I'm unwilling to discuss this any further having being called "blind" and "cynic".
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - nyolfen 6y ago
    > "nothing good has happened because bad things still exist" https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&q=deaths+by+starvation+over+time&oq=deaths+by+starvation+over+time https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&q=deaths+by+starvatio...

leppr 6y ago

The current Bitcoin narrative and actual usage does nothing for the "market economy" though. It might have some indirect positive effects by forcing governments to adopt more open policies lest they suffer from capital flight and forming of parallel economies, but that's about it. Decentralized stablecoins on the other hand have great potential to amplify the free market economy.