Quote Originally Posted by CoccoBill View Post
Government is a company, just like any other, although it happens to be (in theory) owned by everyone, and it has the capability to rewrite the rules of the game. The rules that govern this company, its managers and employees, do not differ, in principle, from those that govern private limited companies, unless the rules are changed to either favor or handicap one or the other. Agree? So just like for the employees of the private company, there needs to be controls in place to make sure the worker does his job properly, regardless of his/her self-interests, and whether they're working for a public or private organization. Working for a company does not equate just dealing with your own cash and personal direct responsibility, the checks needs to be in place in both cases. Actually I'd even go as far to say, having worked both for the private and public sector, that in a public sector job I'm MORE inclined to do what's good for the general population, since it IS my tax money I'm dealing with, whereas in a private company I am less concerned about the future of the company, since if it does go under, another one will replace it and most people won't even notice. Operating a one man shop or acting as a major shareholder in a corporation are special cases.
Maybe government is a company, but it doesn't behave in a system of companies. This is the problem. Even then, government isn't a company because of its mandatory revenue streams. Companies live and die based on getting people to freely choose their services. Bureaucracies don't ever die because taxes are mandatory

This is one of the main reasons I use the evolution analogy. Macroeconomics happens in populations, just like evolution. Extrapolating individual behavior to the whole leaves a lot to be desired. This is why looking at individuals in private companies vs in public companies doesn't tell us much about the difference between markets and government. What sets markets aside is competition. The same is true in evolution. Mutations and environment creates survival of the fittest in biology, and consumers and competition creates survival of the fittest in economies.

It can be said that it doesn't matter what's going on in a single company or bureaucracy. What matters is if there are any competitors. Government does not have competitors. This is a fundamental, inherent reason why government intervention into markets is bad, regardless of intentions or the intelligence of those involved. Why am I allowed to choose what companies to buy food from but I'm not allowed to choose my government? Is it because I need government? Okay, for what do I need government? I think there are several answers to this question, but I think answering the question shows how much we don't need government too

I think there has been far more government intervention and regulation in place for the past 150 years than for the previous 199,850. On the contrary, I feel most of that time people lived in something much more akin to a free market. We've never been as prosperous as we are today, and we have exponentially more and more complex regulations in place every year. Undoubtedly capitalism and freeish global trade have had a key role in the recent (relatively) prosperity boom, but I'd argue scientific advancement being at least, if not way more important. I would also argue that private sector investment into basic scientific research (rather than productization of discoveries) is a very recent phenomena, and had far less to do with the advancements in the past 150 years compared to publicly funded research.
Legal allowance and cultural appreciation of private ownership and innovation are very new. It started changing in very small ways in the Netherlands region in the 18th Century (IIRC). American intellectuals incorporated the improved-upon ideas by British intellectuals (but OMG Adam Smith was Scottish) in the late 18th Century. The 20th Century saw the most epic of epic showdown between capitalism and socialism, capitalism won. The contrast is so stark that West Germany is amazing while East Germany sucks. This isn't a difference of government, but economics. In China, it has only been at the hands of market reforms that it has done what its done


I think the evolution analogy is very important. Both evolution's and capitalism's driving mechanisms are variation and competition within populations