Free market capitalism is a classical liberal idea that ignited the industrial revolution,
Not even a little bit true. The industrial revolution occurred as a result of widespread theft of common land from workers (the enclosure acts), repression of labour activists (Tolpuddle martyrs), export embargoes (steam engines were pretty much state secrets in early 19th century Britain) and government intervention into the market (protective tariffs on the import of superior Indian cloth to spur British textile manufacture).
Free market capitalism is a classical liberal idea that ignited the industrial revolution,
Not even a little bit true. The industrial revolution occurred as a result of widespread theft of common land from workers (the enclosure acts), repression of labour activists (Tolpuddle martyrs), export embargoes (steam engines were pretty much state secrets in early 19th century Britain) and government intervention into the market (protective tariffs on the import of superior Indian cloth to spur British textile manufacture).
I've always wondered if the underlying spark behind many of these changes was nations running out of natural resources. Under severe resource limitations, your options are either to reduce the demand (Malthusian-style) or make huge leaps in productivity/efficiency. In that light, it makes sense that rapid growths in industrialization would happen in countries with large populations in resource depleted or limited areas (think 19th century UK, 20th century Japan, 21st century China and India).
I don't think so, that situation would actually discourage industrialisation because it would be cheaper to hire labour than to buy capital. The Black Death is an example of the reverse and it's commonly thought to have changed the material conditions in Britain and paved the way for the industrial revolution by giving serfs more power when they entered into agreements with their lord, where before the terms of their tenancy were dictated to them because there was a surplus of serfs and only so much land to go around.
I don't think so, that situation would actually discourage industrialisation because it would be cheaper to hire labour than to buy capital. The Black Death is an example of the reverse and it's commonly thought to have changed the material conditions in Britain and paved the way for the industrial revolution by giving serfs more power when they entered into agreements with their lord, where before the terms of their tenancy were dictated to them because there was a surplus of serfs and only so much land to go around.
The timing for that seems off since the plague did most of its damage hundreds of years before the Industrial Revolution.
Free market capitalism is a classical liberal idea that ignited the industrial revolution,
Not even a little bit true. The industrial revolution occurred as a result of widespread theft of common land from workers (the enclosure acts), repression of labour activists (Tolpuddle martyrs), export embargoes (steam engines were pretty much state secrets in early 19th century Britain) and government intervention into the market (protective tariffs on the import of superior Indian cloth to spur British textile manufacture).
I'm not sure I understand your line of reasoning. I can understand that restriction of common land would force people to cities if cities had better prospects, though that ignores a discussion of why that land was common and not privately owned to begin with. We can get into it if necessary, but suffice to say that property rights are the keystone of capitalism and there's a marked difference between common land and private land, though your explanation makes it seem that the Crown was confiscating private lands. I can understand suppression of labor activists impeding development of standards, but that doesn't change what begot the grievances in the first place. I can understand intellectual property monopolies having the same effect, but those are not part of liberal thinking, either. You even mention government intervention on the market hindering things - I totally agree.
Further, while these factors surely did effect the start of the Industrial Revolution, they effected it only Britain of the time. They had not effect (though similar factors may have) in the rest of the world, which the revolution clearly and quickly spread to.
Finally, they do not point to a key source of industrialization. Workers denied land or other opportunity would starve as they have done so before. Steam power monopolized and never given to someone to capitalize on will rot in a basement, as many inventions have done so before. Labor activists can't protest without factories. Taxes, fees, tariffs and embargoes are worthless without the objects of their oppression.
The Industrial Revolution was caused, maintained, and expanded by the orders of magnitude increase in production possibility provided by increases in technology, logistics, and construction. Regardless of the fact that human rights were mishandled, lives destroyed, and full potential not realized, it could not have been done without a marketplace where ideas and technologies can be exploited for profit.
Morality is an entirely separate issue and can be discussed as such.
The Industrial Revolution was caused, maintained, and expanded by the orders of magnitude increase in production possibility provided by increases in technology, logistics, and construction.
And not by liberalism, which was non-existent at the time.
But they teach in school that England mandated the industrial revolution...
Had a prof once say that Benjamin Franklin wrote his auto bio because he was vain and loved himself. This was also the only reason he wrote it and all other answers were not accepted on the test.
The Industrial Revolution was caused, maintained, and expanded by the orders of magnitude increase in production possibility provided by increases in technology, logistics, and construction.
And not by liberalism, which was non-existent at the time.
(Classical) Liberalism is widely held to be have been conjured forth by John Locke and others like him and it studies the effective oppression of democracy and the absolute importance of liberty. It's not much resemblance to the liberalism of today. The conclusions of those studies ultimately lead to capitalism and the so called Austrian economics. I think you'll find parallels between the arguments in classical liberalism about the tragedy of the commons and pushes to consolidate those lands prior to the industrial revolution. Free thinking and liberty lead to scientific advancement; scientific advancement lead to the technology which spurred the revolution.
Also, ZEROibis, I have absolutely no doubt that Franklin was the most vain of the founding fathers :P. It's quite possible to write an autobiography to both enshrine yourself and to record history. The two goals are actually symbiotic.
-edit: It's the Austrian school of economics, not Hungary... I'm thinking of programming notations
Economic and political liberalism were not being implemented in public policy until ~80 years after the invention of the spinning jenny. You are simply wrong to say that "Free market capitalism is a classical liberal idea that ignited the industrial revolution". There are no two ways about this. You are wrong.
Economic and political liberalism were not being implemented in public policy until ~80 years after the invention of the spinning jenny. You are simply wrong to say that "Free market capitalism is a classical liberal idea that ignited the industrial revolution". There are no two ways about this. You are wrong.
That seems a fair timeline to me:
1704: John Locke died
1764: Spinning Jenny
1776: Wealth of Nations
Late 1700's: Steam Engine
~1760-1840 Industrial Revolution
It's also important to note that liberal ideas don't need the government to accept them to work. I don't think that just because you refuse to find public policy implementations (like consolidation of common land), that you can say that liberty had absolutely no effect. Black and white interpretations are both wrong headed and incendiary. They do nothing for a conversation.
Also, ZEROibis, I have absolutely no doubt that Franklin was the most vain of the founding fathers :P. It's quite possible to write an autobiography to both enshrine yourself and to record history. The two goals are actually symbiotic.
-edit: It's the Austrian school of economics, not Hungary... I'm thinking of programming notations
Except that he wrote it for his son and not for publication... lol
Still one of the best ones I heard which was also declared a fact was how he made it for profit. You know from all that money from the book that would be published like 30 years after he died rofl. Yea he totally made bank on that deal! Also I think the first publication was in french and that version was translated into English and then sold here of which a later french version was then translated from the English one back into french again now that I think of it even a German version was in that cycle too if I recall correctly.
I've never understood the notion of punishing many for the deeds of a few, except in small groups where unit cohesion is important, such as the military in basic training.
Also, why, given these results, with this sample, can you (or the large chunk of people who feel that aiding the poor will lead to negative results [not saying that's you]) come up with the generalized statement that there will be more freeloading if you were to offer people this sort of help?
puzlThe Old FirmJoin Date: 2003-02-26Member: 14029Retired Developer, NS1 Playtester, Forum Moderators, Constellation
It is so easy to call it stealing money from one person to give it to someone else, but that is to call all taxation and collective programs stealing, which is completely ridiculous and divisive.
Even the purest of libertarians would argue against free-market roads, for example, so most of us agree that taxation is needed to some extent and that a common interest must be pursued in order to keep our societies moving forward.
I think, in general, that there is often a major idealogical opposition to any common good the nurturing of any kind of 'entitlement' culture even if it can be empirically shown that such a common good will benefit the many to a great degree. The debate is rarely about effective progress as much as it is about an idealogical opposition to an equitable society.
The situation has reached fever-pitch in the US, where the wealth of the nation continues to aggregate among the most wealthy at the cost of the general welfare of the wider population even as the very same people most disenfranchised by such shifts in welath distribution are often the most vocal supporters of it
I believe the heart of the issue is that wealth and power are positive feedback systems if, and only if, wealth and power beget one another. In the US (and other countries I am sure) wealth and power are so closely related it's hard to separate them at all, making this feedback cycle extremely effective.
Damned if I know how to fix it in a way that doesn't require "Cultural Revolution" levels of purging.
Oh dear - that $15,000 had to come from somewhere ... that's the flaw in the give out money plan. This is the question that Keynes and Hicks essentially pondered.
Oh dear - that $15,000 had to come from somewhere ... that's the flaw in the give out money plan. This is the question that Keynes and Hicks essentially pondered.
There is a private road in Texas which will soon be the fastest road in the US. I have long waited for a private interstate system where it takes less than a million years to drive places b/c of this nations joke of speed limits. High quality high speed interstates built for actually driving long distance, finally a way to get somewhere in a reasonable amount of time without going by air.
Yeah, well, I consider Anarcho-Capitalism to be on the fringe of libertarianism and Austrian economics in general, but my point still stands. Most libertarians admit that there are common assets and goods that need to be maintained by the public for the betterment of society. Substitute roads with something else if you are the type of libertarian that believes that roads should be completely privatised.
Yeah, well, I consider Anarcho-Capitalism to be on the fringe of libertarianism and Austrian economics in general, but my point still stands. Most libertarians admit that there are common assets and goods that need to be maintained by the public for the betterment of society. Substitute roads with something else if you are the type of libertarian that believes that roads should be completely privatised.
I don't understand, are you saying an-caps aren't libertarians? Refusing to admit public goods exist is an impurity in libertarianism?
hey, this is Iona and a new guy here. Well, about the topic, this is little strange for me. Free Money is not making people lazy, drug addicted, etc., Maybe those guys has a high moral value. But, on an average, free money will make people lazy and make them to try bad habits like alcohol, women, etc., As they get the money free, they don't know the worth of it and spend only on the pleasures just my opinion
I see. The pure will of John Locke caused the industrial revolution, not actual material freedom. Holy shit.
You can't just discount the complexity of a network as vast as human civilization with a simple quip. You seem to think that you can legislate freedom, and I don't believe that's the case. It's honestly frustrating because I don't see anyone on this thread talking about killing people and burning their bodies, but you'd think that we believe the other side wants to do just that from the way we're arguing.
I'm going to preface the next statement because I want it to be absolutely clear, this is not an excuse for atrocity, it's an objective and realist point of view regarding government and the consent of the governed.
The thing about freedom is that it's something that is given up by the oppressed, not taken by the state. Consider any of the most heinous acts committed against man by man. While you may be incapable of fighting back once they have you tied down, the events that led up that point and any aggression against you was allowed by you. An aggressor has already taken action, it's up to the oppressed to decide how to react. You may chose not to react out of ignorance of your own personal responsibility, but that's what I'd like to change.
This makes logical sense to me. To consider that it is not the responsibility of an oppressed person to defend himself is to consider some subset of humanity to be incapable of such thought or such action. The subset cannot be the full set of humans because that means we're nothing more than simple automatons. We know we're more than that, it's an absurdity. In the final analysis that kind of thinking means that there is a subset of humanity that is superior to all others. To me, that is a much less moral point of view than believing in personal responsibility in the maintenance of freedom.
And if we're responsible for our own freedom, how can legislation of any kind have started the Industrial Revolution?
I see. The pure will of John Locke caused the industrial revolution, not actual material freedom. Holy shit.
You can't just discount the complexity of a network as vast as human civilization with a simple quip. You seem to think that you can legislate freedom, and I don't believe that's the case. It's honestly frustrating because I don't see anyone on this thread talking about killing people and burning their bodies, but you'd think that we believe the other side wants to do just that from the way we're arguing.
I'm going to preface the next statement because I want it to be absolutely clear, this is not an excuse for atrocity, it's an objective and realist point of view regarding government and the consent of the governed.
The thing about freedom is that it's something that is given up by the oppressed, not taken by the state. Consider any of the most heinous acts committed against man by man. While you may be incapable of fighting back once they have you tied down, the events that led up that point and any aggression against you was allowed by you. An aggressor has already taken action, it's up to the oppressed to decide how to react. You may chose not to react out of ignorance of your own personal responsibility, but that's what I'd like to change.
This makes logical sense to me. To consider that it is not the responsibility of an oppressed person to defend himself is to consider some subset of humanity to be incapable of such thought or such action. The subset cannot be the full set of humans because that means we're nothing more than simple automatons. We know we're more than that, it's an absurdity. In the final analysis that kind of thinking means that there is a subset of humanity that is superior to all others. To me, that is a much less moral point of view than believing in personal responsibility in the maintenance of freedom.
And if we're responsible for our own freedom, how can legislation of any kind have started the Industrial Revolution?
That presumes that everyone starts with an equal amount of power such that the oppressed has the ability to prevent/stop their oppression but fails to employ it. History provides numerous examples of what this isn't true.
That presumes that everyone starts with an equal amount of power such that the oppressed has the ability to prevent/stop their oppression but fails to employ it. History provides numerous examples of what this isn't true.
If that's the case, how have those situations ever resolved themselves? It was either a benevolent dictator or a realization in the power of freedom on a mass scale and the reclamation of those rights. If it's a benevolent dictator, we're back to where we started in that people are basically not equal.
You can't just discount the complexity of a network as vast as human civilization with a simple quip. You seem to think that you can legislate freedom, and I don't believe that's the case. It's honestly frustrating because I don't see anyone on this thread talking about killing people and burning their bodies, but you'd think that we believe the other side wants to do just that from the way we're arguing.
I'm going to preface the next statement because I want it to be absolutely clear, this is not an excuse for atrocity, it's an objective and realist point of view regarding government and the consent of the governed.
The thing about freedom is that it's something that is given up by the oppressed, not taken by the state. Consider any of the most heinous acts committed against man by man. While you may be incapable of fighting back once they have you tied down, the events that led up that point and any aggression against you was allowed by you. An aggressor has already taken action, it's up to the oppressed to decide how to react. You may chose not to react out of ignorance of your own personal responsibility, but that's what I'd like to change.
This makes logical sense to me. To consider that it is not the responsibility of an oppressed person to defend himself is to consider some subset of humanity to be incapable of such thought or such action. The subset cannot be the full set of humans because that means we're nothing more than simple automatons. We know we're more than that, it's an absurdity. In the final analysis that kind of thinking means that there is a subset of humanity that is superior to all others. To me, that is a much less moral point of view than believing in personal responsibility in the maintenance of freedom.
And if we're responsible for our own freedom, how can legislation of any kind have started the Industrial Revolution?
This is just a wall of gibberish. You are saying simultaneously that the government can't really force illiberalism on us because we can still be like, free in our minds, man, but also that the industrial revolution was the result of the introduction of free market capitalism. These are mutually exclusive propositions. Pick one.
This is just a wall of gibberish. You are saying simultaneously that the government can't really force illiberalism on us because we can still be like, free in our minds, man, but also that the industrial revolution was the result of the introduction of free market capitalism. These are mutually exclusive propositions. Pick one.
I think the part I keep miscommunicating is that a free market or the concept of free trade can not be implemented by a government. They exist in the absence restrictions on freedom by law. It's an emergent quality of the network, like intelligence.
To my knowledge, a government can not force two parties to trade freely. That's something each party must understand on its own merit. In that sense, the idea of liberalism is what changed the course of history, not any law or legislation. There are plenty of examples of political theory influencing behavior in the absence of law, so I don't think that point is outlandish.
On the other side (waxing on fantastically a bit here), I feel we too often give government as a whole more credit than it deserves in its ability to effect change. I believe a person could put together a pretty convincing argument relating free market economics to natural selection. That means that a government's attempt to control or guide the market is roughly on par with our current attempts to outpace bacterial resistance to antibiotics. It's in vain; nature always wins in the end.
This is just a wall of gibberish. You are saying simultaneously that the government can't really force illiberalism on us because we can still be like, free in our minds, man, but also that the industrial revolution was the result of the introduction of free market capitalism. These are mutually exclusive propositions. Pick one.
I think the part I keep miscommunicating is that a free market or the concept of free trade can not be implemented by a government. They exist in the absence restrictions on freedom by law. It's an emergent quality of the network, like intelligence.
To my knowledge, a government can not force two parties to trade freely. That's something each party must understand on its own merit. In that sense, the idea of liberalism is what changed the course of history, not any law or legislation. There are plenty of examples of political theory influencing behavior in the absence of law, so I don't think that point is outlandish.
On the other side (waxing on fantastically a bit here), I feel we too often give government as a whole more credit than it deserves in its ability to effect change. I believe a person could put together a pretty convincing argument relating free market economics to natural selection. That means that a government's attempt to control or guide the market is roughly on par with our current attempts to outpace bacterial resistance to antibiotics. It's in vain; nature always wins in the end.
I see, so the government ceased interfering in the market and the industrial revolution followed from this.
Except for the continued intervention that occurred after the industrial revolution was in full swing which I posted about in my very first post.
You're also pushing a ridiculous false dichotomy in presenting "the free market" as natural and "the state" as unnatural.
Comments
This has been widely known since it began by people who don't allow ideology to interfere with the facts. (Friedrich List's The National System of Political Economy, 1841, coined the metaphor "kicking away the ladder" that's been reused more recently by Ha-Joon Chang in the self-titled work).
I'm not sure I understand your line of reasoning. I can understand that restriction of common land would force people to cities if cities had better prospects, though that ignores a discussion of why that land was common and not privately owned to begin with. We can get into it if necessary, but suffice to say that property rights are the keystone of capitalism and there's a marked difference between common land and private land, though your explanation makes it seem that the Crown was confiscating private lands. I can understand suppression of labor activists impeding development of standards, but that doesn't change what begot the grievances in the first place. I can understand intellectual property monopolies having the same effect, but those are not part of liberal thinking, either. You even mention government intervention on the market hindering things - I totally agree.
Further, while these factors surely did effect the start of the Industrial Revolution, they effected it only Britain of the time. They had not effect (though similar factors may have) in the rest of the world, which the revolution clearly and quickly spread to.
Finally, they do not point to a key source of industrialization. Workers denied land or other opportunity would starve as they have done so before. Steam power monopolized and never given to someone to capitalize on will rot in a basement, as many inventions have done so before. Labor activists can't protest without factories. Taxes, fees, tariffs and embargoes are worthless without the objects of their oppression.
The Industrial Revolution was caused, maintained, and expanded by the orders of magnitude increase in production possibility provided by increases in technology, logistics, and construction. Regardless of the fact that human rights were mishandled, lives destroyed, and full potential not realized, it could not have been done without a marketplace where ideas and technologies can be exploited for profit.
Morality is an entirely separate issue and can be discussed as such.
And not by liberalism, which was non-existent at the time.
Had a prof once say that Benjamin Franklin wrote his auto bio because he was vain and loved himself. This was also the only reason he wrote it and all other answers were not accepted on the test.
(Classical) Liberalism is widely held to be have been conjured forth by John Locke and others like him and it studies the effective oppression of democracy and the absolute importance of liberty. It's not much resemblance to the liberalism of today. The conclusions of those studies ultimately lead to capitalism and the so called Austrian economics. I think you'll find parallels between the arguments in classical liberalism about the tragedy of the commons and pushes to consolidate those lands prior to the industrial revolution. Free thinking and liberty lead to scientific advancement; scientific advancement lead to the technology which spurred the revolution.
Also, ZEROibis, I have absolutely no doubt that Franklin was the most vain of the founding fathers :P. It's quite possible to write an autobiography to both enshrine yourself and to record history. The two goals are actually symbiotic.
-edit: It's the Austrian school of economics, not Hungary... I'm thinking of programming notations
That seems a fair timeline to me:
1704: John Locke died
1764: Spinning Jenny
1776: Wealth of Nations
Late 1700's: Steam Engine
~1760-1840 Industrial Revolution
It's also important to note that liberal ideas don't need the government to accept them to work. I don't think that just because you refuse to find public policy implementations (like consolidation of common land), that you can say that liberty had absolutely no effect. Black and white interpretations are both wrong headed and incendiary. They do nothing for a conversation.
Except that he wrote it for his son and not for publication... lol
Still one of the best ones I heard which was also declared a fact was how he made it for profit. You know from all that money from the book that would be published like 30 years after he died rofl. Yea he totally made bank on that deal! Also I think the first publication was in french and that version was translated into English and then sold here of which a later french version was then translated from the English one back into french again now that I think of it even a German version was in that cycle too if I recall correctly.
Take a look at Sweden.
Even the purest of libertarians would argue against free-market roads, for example, so most of us agree that taxation is needed to some extent and that a common interest must be pursued in order to keep our societies moving forward.
I think, in general, that there is often a major idealogical opposition to any common good the nurturing of any kind of 'entitlement' culture even if it can be empirically shown that such a common good will benefit the many to a great degree. The debate is rarely about effective progress as much as it is about an idealogical opposition to an equitable society.
The situation has reached fever-pitch in the US, where the wealth of the nation continues to aggregate among the most wealthy at the cost of the general welfare of the wider population even as the very same people most disenfranchised by such shifts in welath distribution are often the most vocal supporters of it
For example, I think this video gives a very clear picture at how skewed wealth distribution has become in the US.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=slTF_XXoKAQ
If only!
http://mises.org/daily/3416
$32 trillion is enough to give 2 billion people $15,000
Yeah, well, I consider Anarcho-Capitalism to be on the fringe of libertarianism and Austrian economics in general, but my point still stands. Most libertarians admit that there are common assets and goods that need to be maintained by the public for the betterment of society. Substitute roads with something else if you are the type of libertarian that believes that roads should be completely privatised.
I don't understand, are you saying an-caps aren't libertarians? Refusing to admit public goods exist is an impurity in libertarianism?
You can't just discount the complexity of a network as vast as human civilization with a simple quip. You seem to think that you can legislate freedom, and I don't believe that's the case. It's honestly frustrating because I don't see anyone on this thread talking about killing people and burning their bodies, but you'd think that we believe the other side wants to do just that from the way we're arguing.
I'm going to preface the next statement because I want it to be absolutely clear, this is not an excuse for atrocity, it's an objective and realist point of view regarding government and the consent of the governed.
The thing about freedom is that it's something that is given up by the oppressed, not taken by the state. Consider any of the most heinous acts committed against man by man. While you may be incapable of fighting back once they have you tied down, the events that led up that point and any aggression against you was allowed by you. An aggressor has already taken action, it's up to the oppressed to decide how to react. You may chose not to react out of ignorance of your own personal responsibility, but that's what I'd like to change.
This makes logical sense to me. To consider that it is not the responsibility of an oppressed person to defend himself is to consider some subset of humanity to be incapable of such thought or such action. The subset cannot be the full set of humans because that means we're nothing more than simple automatons. We know we're more than that, it's an absurdity. In the final analysis that kind of thinking means that there is a subset of humanity that is superior to all others. To me, that is a much less moral point of view than believing in personal responsibility in the maintenance of freedom.
And if we're responsible for our own freedom, how can legislation of any kind have started the Industrial Revolution?
If that's the case, how have those situations ever resolved themselves? It was either a benevolent dictator or a realization in the power of freedom on a mass scale and the reclamation of those rights. If it's a benevolent dictator, we're back to where we started in that people are basically not equal.
This is just a wall of gibberish. You are saying simultaneously that the government can't really force illiberalism on us because we can still be like, free in our minds, man, but also that the industrial revolution was the result of the introduction of free market capitalism. These are mutually exclusive propositions. Pick one.
I think the part I keep miscommunicating is that a free market or the concept of free trade can not be implemented by a government. They exist in the absence restrictions on freedom by law. It's an emergent quality of the network, like intelligence.
To my knowledge, a government can not force two parties to trade freely. That's something each party must understand on its own merit. In that sense, the idea of liberalism is what changed the course of history, not any law or legislation. There are plenty of examples of political theory influencing behavior in the absence of law, so I don't think that point is outlandish.
On the other side (waxing on fantastically a bit here), I feel we too often give government as a whole more credit than it deserves in its ability to effect change. I believe a person could put together a pretty convincing argument relating free market economics to natural selection. That means that a government's attempt to control or guide the market is roughly on par with our current attempts to outpace bacterial resistance to antibiotics. It's in vain; nature always wins in the end.
I see, so the government ceased interfering in the market and the industrial revolution followed from this.
Except for the continued intervention that occurred after the industrial revolution was in full swing which I posted about in my very first post.
You're also pushing a ridiculous false dichotomy in presenting "the free market" as natural and "the state" as unnatural.