the neoliberal vision of the future

[Idris2002]

Excuse me...attribution please.

Louis MacNeice

I do beg your pardon.

May I say that you're looking very well for a gentleman of your advanced years?

 

[Jeff Robinson]

Also probably worth pointing out that libertarians, Rand cultists and the like only have a rhetorical relationship with actual neo-liberals.

A key aspect of neo-liberalism being the use of the coercive power of the state in support of e.g. various kinds of primitive accumulation.

Libertarians implicitly accept the need for coercion too. Onan said that all rights are backed by force. Because property has been ossified as a "natural right" any incursion against it is "force" which justifies the use of force in "defence". The relationship between libertarians are neo-liberals is an interesting one. I think the Randists in particular are simply the purest ideogues of capitalism, they argue the liberal captalist position to it's logical extreme, which can make them somewhat embarrising for the practitioners of "actually existing capitalism".

 

[Bernie Gunther]

Sure but I usually get the idea that 'rights backed by force' in their minds is some sort of Lucifer's Hammer scenario featuring them and their guns, protecting their cache of toilet paper and baked beans from the communist cannibal hordes etc.

... rather than secret police death squads and USAF bombing asserting the rights of capital to steal people's shit, ie how it works in the real world.

 

[fredfelt]

Again though, neo-liberals may talk as though they want the state to vanish, but they actually rely on its coercive power for all kinds of stuff.

They just don't want state power applied to restricting corporate profits, they're perfectly happy to see it beating the shit out of dissidents.

Acceptance of this is implicit in the ever increasing lobbying we see from corporations and trade groups.

(I've actually got no idea if more money is spend on lobbying now than in the past - but it seems to be the case)

 

[LLETSA]

Also probably worth pointing out that libertarians, Rand cultists and the like only have a rhetorical relationship with actual neo-liberals.

A key aspect of neo-liberalism being the use of the coercive power of the state in support of e.g. various kinds of primitive accumulation, repression of dissent etc.

Exactly. Those with the power to put large aspects of neo-liberal dogma into practice, even when influenced by Rand themselves, tend to regard Rand cultists as the foaming swivel-eyed oddballs they usually are.

 

[Jeff Robinson]

Sure but I usually get the idea that 'rights backed by force' in their minds is some sort of Lucifer's Hammer scenario featuring them and their guns, protecting their cache of toilet paper and baked beans from the communist cannibal hordes etc.

 

[ymu]

Not really. People will always need stuff. There will always be a market. If there's a market capitalists will be willing to pay labour and resource costs to supply that market. Therefore it's not true to say that there would be 'no consumers left to buy stuff'.

It is true to say that there is constant downward pressure on wages and conditions though. A nation state's power to maintain rights of individuals are diminished in a world with few controls on enterprise.

When nations were able to exercise powerful control over corporations there was a degree of social responsibility required for corporations - such as pension rights, collective bargaining rights, tax returns to the country which they operate. These demands of corporations have been reduced and power of corporations increased. The power has shifted to such an extent that any country which attempts to place demands or regulations on business faces consequences. Ultimately if a state demands higher standards than another state corporations may be able to reduce costs to moving operations to the lower tax state.

This leaves less money available to invest in the future of the state (education, pensions, welfare, infrastructure) and fewer options for the state to control their own destiny. This is the neo-liberal vision of the future. In my mind it's quite bleak but now the world is set on this path I fear it's very difficult to return to a regulated market economy from what's sliding towards a global anarcho-capitalist economy.

Sure, but the existence of a market implies the existence of consumers with money to spend in that market.

In Ford's day, not paying your workers enough to be able to buy a cheap car meant not being able to sell cheap cars because the option to produce them in a low wage economy and sell them in a high wage economy didn't exist. Globalisation changed that, but it still only 'worked' by giving consumers in the 'rich' countries cheap credit to buy stuff with, bolstered by a load of fictitious capital created in various bubbles.

Now the 'rich' countries are running out of consumers who can still afford to buy anything and China and India are scrambling to create their own middle classes who can buy stuff instead.

And when were states able to exercise that sort of control? You make it sound like it was some sort of natural state of affairs until capitalism got out of control. It's wasn't. Thatcher and Reagan took us back to a pre-1930s regulatory framework, dismantling all of the protections put in place following the 1929 crash to prevent it happening again.

Unionisation and collective bargaining rights were enshrined in law as part of the measures taken in the 1930s because it was recognised that the recession was partly caused by massive wealth imbalances that left workers unable to also act as consumers.

 

[onarchy]

Society has become far more specialized and technocratic since the foundation of the United States. The costs of the justice systems are inevitably far more expensive as new and increasingly complex forms of human relations (commercial, familial, civil etc) require regulation.

Actually that's not true. First of all it is only fascists that claim that society REQUIRE regulation (apart from the regulation provided by property rights). Regulation is the means by which fascists wield indirect government ownership. Second, even with regulation if we exclude all non-welfare costs law administration costs typically less than 5% of GDP. But as I said, I strongly dispute that regulations beyond property rights are needed in the vast majority of cases.

Even if that wasn’t the case, the distinction you make between collective funding through taxation for a justice system (needed for the “night watchman state” of the Locke/Nozick variety) and for a welfare state is one of quantity not quality.

That's not true. If the cost of the night watchman state is only 3% of GDP it can be financed purely by voluntary donations to the state, and that IS qualitatively different than a forced tax.

So far you are arguing about degree not principle. If I accept that my fellow citizens have rights not to be murdered or raped etc and I am prepared to contribute tax money for a public justice system that seeks to prevent such infringements, what is the principle difference with me recognizing that fellow citizens have a right not to die of preventable illnesses and me being prepared to contribute tax money to a public health system?

Even if YOU are willing to contribute that does not give you the right to force OTHERS to contribute.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Exactly. Those with the power to put large aspects of neo-liberal dogma into practice, even when influenced by Rand themselves, tend to regard Rand cultists as the foaming swivel-eyed oddballs they usually are.

I very much doubt anyone in power is in any way influenced by Rand, except perhaps for propaganda purposes.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Even if YOU are willing to contribute that does not give you the right to force OTHERS to contribute.

Right, so, let us say that there is an ambulance service. Should everyone who has paid up for this service have to carry a certificate to say so? What if you choose not to pay and are then involved in an accident? Or what if you have paid but your certificate wasn't on you at the time? We wouldn't want to accidentally save the life of someone who had not contributed, now, would we?

And what if you're a rich bastard who is refusing to pay up. PAY UP, rich bastard, or we'll come and take you down.

You see what you don't seem to realise is that your vision of a society is more authoritarian, more restrictive, and more rule-ridden than a society with communal provision. It is communal, universal provision that gives people the space to thrive. In your society there would be no space for dissent or experiments in alternative living because everyone would be furiously conforming in order not to go under.

 

[nino_savatte]

I'd recommend him reading a copy of Mehring's On Historical Materialism, but he'd probably call it "commie crap" without bothering to read it.

I suspect that this is where we differ. People like you and I read and analyse the writings of those we disagree with (at least those writings that aren't so immediately at odds with reality as to be discardable as toilet tissue), whereas Onarchy appears to merely read the blurb and the index, looking for key-words.

Exactly, I often find with right-wingers that they have some sort of aversion to reading the texts written by those whom they consider to be ideological foes. It's as if they feel as though their minds may become polluted as a consequence.

 

[Bernie Gunther]

I very much doubt anyone in power is in any way influenced by Rand, except perhaps for propaganda purposes.

But not everyone got it wrong. In the late 1990s, regulators at the CFTC wanted to regulate swaps. Gramm, Greenspan and others—including senior members of the Clinton administration—did not. Following the Enron debacle, Feinstein took a run at this. But Greenspan and Bush administration officials said no. And it was not an issue of smarts; it was a matter of ideology.

In fact, it was always a matter of ideology for Greenspan, a libertarian champion. In 1963, writing in Rand's "Objectivist" newsletter, he noted, "It is in the self-interest of every businessman to have a reputation for honest dealings and a quality product." Regulation, he maintained, undermines this "superlatively moral system." Self-governance by choice, he said, would be more effective than governance through government. Regulation, Greenspan maintained, was the enemy of freedom: "At the bottom of the endless pile of paper work which characterizes all regulation lies a gun."

Well, it turns out that at the bottom of the system that Greenspan oversaw for years, there was nothing but a pile of bad paper. And testifying to the House oversight committee, Greenspan, one of the more ideological Washington players of the past few decades, essentially said that Ayn Randism had let him—and the entire world—down. It was truly a God that failed.

Alan Greenspan

 

[nino_savatte]

Where's onan? Has he decided to call it quits?

 

[Dillinger4]

Exactly, I often find with right-wingers that they have some sort of aversion to reading the texts written by those whom they consider to be ideological foes. It's as if they feel as though their minds may become polluted as a consequence.

Their essence

 

[Dillinger4]

Alan Greenspan

Rand Paul

 

[Bernie Gunther]

Yeah, it's not really clear how much Rand's stuff influences these people's actions though, as opposed to their ideological posturings.

I mean Greenspan may have been keen on deregulation, but forcible anal sex in dark alleys with mysterious strangers spouting crank economic theories? (another key element in Rand's writings)

Who knows ...

 

[Bernie Gunther]

Might explain a lot actually ...

 

[nino_savatte]

I very much doubt anyone in power is in any way influenced by Rand, except perhaps for propaganda purposes.

Dan Hannan and Douglas Carwell are both well known Randists in the Tory Party. Oddly enough, while Hannan finds Rand's literary style dull and laboured, he loves her ideas.

Here he is in the Telegraph praising Rand's 'philosophy'

Pace, all you Randians, I am one of you. As a political tract, the book was (for once the word is truly apposite) seminal. Its effect on the development of Western political thought has been vast and benign. But, as a novel, it is dreich. Its characters are wooden and interchangeable; its dialogue takes the form of improbable philosophical treatises; its plot is marred by small errors; every twist in the story, every deus ex machina, is so ploddingly flagged up as to be robbed of any dramatic impact.
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/d...las-shrugged-great-philosophy-terrible-novel/

Carswell

Rand ’s ideas are back. Or more accutrately, Rand's ideas never went away. They were simply ignored by that leftist elite that presides over our culture and our institutions. But now the internet means all those quangocrats, bogus academics and Guardianistas no longer call the cultural shots like they did.
http://www.talkcarswell.com/show.aspx?id=601

Like all Randists, these two have one-track minds.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

They're not exactly 'in power', though, are they?

 

[nino_savatte]

They're not exactly 'in power', though, are they?

No, not quite but their book, The Plan: Twelve Months To Renew Britain has formed the core of the Tories' policies since they've been in power. The book, according to Hannan, was heavily influenced by Rand.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Then why get your knickers wet as soon as Onarchy gave his interpretation? Nobody knows so anyone is allowed to interpret as they wish and as the circumstances allow.

"Nobody knows, so anyone is allowed..."

Because, of course, there is a natural right to misrepresent, isn't there?

Schmendrick!!

 

[ViolentPanda]

No they're not -they have to back it up with all sorts of stuff.

Only if kizmet says they do, seemingly.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

No, not quite but their book, The Plan: Twelve Months To Renew Britain has formed the core of the Tories' policies since they've been in power. The book, according to Hannan, was heavily influenced by Rand.

Have they? From what I can tell, the Tory programme is simply classic 'privatise profits, socialise losses', to which can be added 'privatise debt'. Is that Randian? Not really – it's exactly the stuff Randian nonsense is used as propaganda to obscure.

 

[ViolentPanda]

You're welcome to have an opinion on whether altruism is just for suckers, but if you want to claim that it also increases societal output, then you will need evidence. Given the Darwinian approach of Randian 'thought', you might want to have a look at the work on the evolution of altruism, which made a major breakthrough in the 1980s. Dawkins added a chapter on it to the 1989 edition of The Selfish Gene (it was not known when the original edition was published in 1976).

The 'problem' of altruism between individuals with no kinship had puzzled evolutionary biologists for years, because the selfish gene approach could not explain it. Until it could.

The classic example is vampire bats. Individuals who have fed well will regurgitate blood for those who have failed to find food. This increases the overall benefit for the group of bats because the gain for a bat that is in danger of starving to death is greater than the loss for a bat which has fed well. But why would any individual bat, with genes which have survived because they are good at surviving, give away the advantage it had gained in order to save an unrelated individual from starvation?

It turns out that being able to recognise an individual makes the difference. A bat that has been fed by another is more likely to feed that bat when they have fed well and their erstwhile benefactor is in trouble.

So Dawkins (possibly unknowingly) confirmed and added to what Kropotkin had said in Mutual Aid a hundred years previously.
It's a pity people forget that Kropotkin was a scientist as well as an anarchist.

 

[onarchy]

Sure, but the existence of a market implies the existence of consumers with money to spend in that market.

In Ford's day, not paying your workers enough to be able to buy a cheap car meant not being able to sell cheap cars because the option to produce them in a low wage economy and sell them in a high wage economy didn't exist. Globalisation changed that, but it still only 'worked' by giving consumers in the 'rich' countries cheap credit to buy stuff with, bolstered by a load of fictitious capital created in various bubbles.

Now the 'rich' countries are running out of consumers who can still afford to buy anything and China and India are scrambling to create their own middle classes who can buy stuff instead.

And when were states able to exercise that sort of control? You make it sound like it was some sort of natural state of affairs until capitalism got out of control. It's wasn't. Thatcher and Reagan took us back to a pre-1930s regulatory framework, dismantling all of the protections put in place following the 1929 crash to prevent it happening again.

Unionisation and collective bargaining rights were enshrined in law as part of the measures taken in the 1930s because it was recognised that the recession was partly caused by massive wealth imbalances that left workers unable to also act as consumers.

This is an interesting but patently false description of reality. It is based on Keynes' worldview in which he turned economics upside down. Prior to Keynes economics was based on Say's law which states that in a free market the only people who demand anything in the market are producer thes, because only producers have anything of value to offer a potential seller. In very naive words Say's law can be stated as: first you must produce, then you can consume. Stated like this Say's law is pretty damn obvious to anyone with half a brain. It's common sense. But Keynes contested this very basic truth and turned it on its head. He claimed that Say's law was false and that demand needed to be "stimulated." (by the government of course) Ford's crazy ideas about economics was in perfect alignment with Keynes' new Fascist economics.

Ford's scheme of paying his workers more did NOT enable him to sell significantly more cars. He did however discover that paying workers more attracts the BEST workers and they become more LOYAL, and so in the end he made money from raising the salaries, NOT because it enabled him to sell more cars (his workers represented a minor part of the car market) but because it made production more efficient and cut labor rotation costs. That's a valuable lesson but has nothing to do with stimulating the market.

Now, on a gold standard it becomes very obvious to people how economics REALLY works, because on a gold standard salaries remain stable, and prices keep falling. Then it becomes obvious to anyone that the way people get richer is not by raising salaries but by things becoming cheaper. How do they become cheaper? By increasing productivity. Notice that an increase in productivity benefits EVERYONE, not just the factory owners. It even benefits the retired who is no longer working and simply living off his savings. He will experience that his purchasing power increases even if he is not working or is member of a union.

The most obvious example that it is the AVERAGE productivity in the economy that determines the AVERAGE salary is the hair dresser. Many jobs have had tremendous increases in productivity but the hair dresser is absolutely not one of them. There has been virtually zero increase in productivity in this profession in the last 200 years. Despite this and despite the fact that hair dressers are not unionized their real salaries have risen at approximately the same rate as the rest of society. Why on earth is that? To a Keynesian socialist it doesn't make any sense. But once you understand that purchasing power increases by cutting prices, not by increasing salaries it all becomes pretty obvious. Making stuff today is CHEAP because machines are so productive. Therefore even hair dressers experience a rise in living standard.

However, something insidious has happened in the last 50 or so years. Keynesian "stimulation" policies, chronic inflation and chronically too low interest rates has made it "profitable" to borrow money. That is, rather than saving and investing people have been consuming with borrowed money, and even though this is completely mysterious to a Keynesian the result is capital disinvestment. The United States has been living off its accumulated seed capital for a long time, and now time has cought up with this unsustainable spending binge. Now it has become terribly obvious that people must PRODUCE before they can CONSUME. I.e. people are slowly starting to redescover the common sense truth of classical liberal economics.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Now you're here, how about answering my question from earlier: Where does the interest payable on loans come from?

The above analysis, and all your analyses so far, omits this. it also omits the question of how money enters a system to become the medium of exchange in the first place.

 

[onarchy]

Where's onan? Has he decided to call it quits?

I was busy writing a blog article about you and your crew of sociopaths here on this forum. I'm using your behavior as evidence of socialist malevolence, and you guys absolutely did not make the job hard. Thank you, thank you so much for showing the world what socialists are really like. It's been a blast.

Also, while the bullying seemed to disappear for a while after I pointed out the glaring neon light self-contradiction of a bully claiming to be an altruist, things are now back to normal it seems.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Ah, I see you attended the same finishing school of vainglory as jonathanbishop. Well done.

Now how about answering the questions that have been put to you. You've completely ignored my criticism of your previous blog.

 

[DotCommunist]

did you include the part in your article where you got rumbled on half a dozen falsehoods and even attempted to back yourself up with a false ID?

No?

 

[Bernie Gunther]

So Dawkins (possibly unknowingly) confirmed and added to what Kropotkin had said in Mutual Aid a hundred years previously.
It's a pity people forget that Kropotkin was a scientist as well as an anarchist.

Kropotkin was not a crackpot: Steven Jay Gould