Posted by Jay G. on 03/25/07 19:51

On Sun, 25 Mar 2007 12:38:24 -0500, Adam H. Kerman wrote:

> At 7:01am -0400, 03/25/07, Jay G. <Jay@tmbg.org> wrote:
>>>It exists because movie studios fear backlash from those who do not believe
>>>that the free market should determine which movies people see and instead
>>>would impose something much worse.
>
>>That doesn't change the fact that it's voluntary. If I gave my employees
>>raises as a preventative measure against them demanding even more, the
>>raise was still voluntary because I chose to do so.
>
> Your employer isn't afraid that you could lobby Congress to force him to
> give you a raise; that analogy sucks.

Employers can be afraid of their employees unionizing, and they certainly
could be afraid of workers petitioning Congress to mandate things like an
increase in minimum wage or safer working conditions.

The fear of such things happening, even if such events are very, very,
likely to occur, does not mean that the actions taken by the employer to
prevent it aren't voluntary.

>>>Monopolies are not free markets.
>
>>Monopolies are totally a product of a truly free market. The reason we
>>don't get monopolies in our market is because of federal laws that actually
>>*limit* the free market at work.
>
> The Sherman Anti-Trust Act is a limit on the freedom of the marketplace? You
> have utterly bizarre ideas.

I have utterly accurate ideas of what a free market economy actually is.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_economy

The "free" in free market stands for freedom from government control. A
government that restricts what the market can or cannot do, for example
create a monopoly, is an example of a restriction on the free market. Our
system is a mix of free market economy and controlled economy, since our
society recognizes that a completely free market is not always in the best
interests of the end consumers.

-Jay

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