送交者: mangolasi 于 2005-4-24, 17:00:28:
回答: Most stupid idea I've ever heard in a long time. 由 slashdot 于 2005-4-24, 15:30:59:
But no pain, no gain doesn't mean gains will certainly follow pains.
"Boom and recession are built-in components of economic cycles" are views of those RBC guys who are not smart enough to be engineers and rocket scientists, thus have to make a living by taking economics. You are dealing with people. All those fancy periodograms, impulse response stuffs are generated by people's behavior (aggregated, yes, but not entirely liveless, psychologically free), not some lab device.
Other schools have different views on whether government should have a role too. Keynes would be spinning off in his tomb (plus, FDR) when you say government should NEVER interfere. Don't tell me he is osolete( I agree). Government interference worked in pulling US out from the great depression. It didn't work in some occasions. Whether it works or not depends on situations. It's not a principle, or, hmm...dogma.
I think a simplified tax code would be better (It gest my vote at least for aesthetic reason). But the ugly tax code in US is not result of government, it's the result of lobbist thus numerous amendments on tax reduction etc. Many are by half-archieved libertarians--not by socialists. They won't archieved their goals fully (as a cold hard fact in life, when you deal with people, heterogenous and envying people). As long as you think people need some forms of government service, and some least form of redistribution (so the poor won't starve to death), some one has to pay tax. Those who don't want will try to lobby. As government are dynamically changing, ugly tax code comes.
"IF a governement not the market can do it, communist countries would've ultimately won", alas, Mr./Ms. Dichotomist, there are more than 0 possibility in the spectrum with pure market and pure planning on both ends. Which point you strike in as the optimal? Not found in a single volumne of "Capitalism and Freedom", "Road to the Serfdom" or "Communist Manifesto". It also depends on each countries economic structure (that's why statisticians are hired) and the culture--some cultures are more egalitarian than the others. And even though you are lucky to get one point, it's not forever--thus they call it policies, not principles. People's tolerance can change. No to mention many countries did not see it the point or how to get there.
And Europe's ailment are not entirely because of its "socialist" agenda. Demography is a biggest one, as a consensus. Innovation is less good(though still very decent), mostly because the culture in less open to foreigners thus less able to brain drain. And UK's employment picutre look more rosy than the American one after a laissez-faire guy took office. Britain's pre-war glory? That's just some abnormality. A such small country with 1/4 of the population of US can be a superpower? That's not because Britain was doing superemely. Just because other big countries were doing so badly.
I am not defensing the legislation proposed--simply think it might scare off people's confidence on investing in the country. As your only right point states, property right does matter. Not as a principle, but as calculation based on human nature of the investors--they don't invest or they even flee this country if they believe you would be behave nastily, and you need their money. So don't use this extreme does unless things go very very bad.
One thing you might be interesting: the socialist UK have a private pension system, and guess what? Now the poor eldly losing money in the stock market are feeling miserable and want helps from the government. Oh, you guys! Didn't we say that you manage your own money and take all the risk when we strike the deal? You said you want to be your own. And where is the individual responsiblity? But they have the votes. Human are envying. You can either change it or deal with it.
And UK doesn't have a constitution, mind you.