Saturday, February 2, 2008

Common Errors About Free Markets and Free Societies

This is a series of blog posts from the Adam Smith Institute, the leading free market think tank based in London.

1. "Only the guilty have anything to fear from surveillance or police searches."

2. "When the state gives us rights, we have responsibilities to it in return."

3. "The industrial revolution brought poverty and misery for the masses."

4. "Rich people should not be able to buy better healthcare and education"

5. "Prices of essential goods should be controlled so that the poor can afford them."


6. "Nuclear power is uniquely dangerous and should be banned."

7. "True socialism has never been tried."

8. "Big business only cares about profits."

9. "It is wrong to allow bright children to go to special schools. This deprives the ordinary schools of their beneficial influence."


10. "We have to keep universal services in health and education, so that the middle classes will demand their improvement."

11. "The stock market is just a casino."

12. "Brands are basically a con to make people pay higher prices for goods than they merit."

13. "We should create public sector jobs to boost employment."


14. "The state is right to protect people from themselves."

15. "The top rate of tax should be raised so that the rich pay more."

16. "Competition is wasteful."

17. "We should allow the police to hold suspected terrorists for a long period while the evidence is assembled."

18. "Positive discrimination is needed to make good to minorities the effects of past exploitation or discrimination."

19. "Big business does not really produce what people want. It uses coercive advertising to make people buy what it wants to produce."

20. "It is wrong that so few people should own so much of the nation's wealth."

21. "We are using up resources for the future; we should all learn to live more simply."

22. "The free market is unfair because we do not all have equal votes as we do in a democracy."

23. "Many things just cannot be produced by the market system, including such services as defence and law and order."

24. "A market economy offers people no more than a crass, materialistic life."

25. "Proportional representation is fairer than our present electoral system which can give power to minorities."

26. "Government must 'prime the pump' by stimulating demand through increased public spending."

27. "Free market capitalism simply cannot meet society's welfare needs."

28. "A small rise in inflation is a legitimate price to pay for reducing or eliminating unemployment."

29. "We should ban cheap imports made possible by low wages and poor working conditions."

30. "Private equity firms do nothing but make excess profits at the expense of jobs."

31. "In a new form of economic colonialism, multi-nationals are forcing harmful products such as junk food, high tar cigarettes and baby milk onto poor countries."

32. "The fact that capitalism is in crisis is shown by the constant shifts from boom to bust."

33. "It's right that acquitted people should be re-tried when new evidence comes up."

34. "Education is a right, not something to be bought and sold."

35. "No-one should be given an unfair start in life. That is why there should be no inherited wealth."

36. "Welfare stigmatizes the poor. We should all be paid a citizen's income."

37. "We should all boycott multinationals which have children and women working long shifts for low pay in sweatshops."

38. "It's all very well to talk of freedom, but poor people are not free to buy Rolls Royces."

39. "Even though people are richer on average, they are no happier, so we should stop pursuing economic growth."

40. "The free market does not work in practice because there is no such thing as perfect competition or perfect information."



42. "A truly compassionate society would devote a much larger share of its wealth to the less fortunate."

43. "The market cannot protect the environment."

44. "Business should be forced to be socially responsible."

45. "Speculators are parasites who produce nothing."

46. "Getting everyone's DNA on file would allow us to track down criminals and protect society."

47. "A national minimum wage prevents the exploitation of young workers."

48. "A university or college education is a public good that society should pay for."

49. "It's quite right to make racist or homophobic remarks illegal."

50. "Developed countries have grabbed too large a share of the world's wealth."

51. "Capitalism is wasteful, dissipating resources into profit and advertising."

52. "Schooling should seek to make children equal."

53. "Competition means companies selling shoddy goods to keep prices down and make more profit."

54. "The arms trade is immoral."

55. "When people are accused of serious crimes, they should have no right to remain silent."

56. "Maximum working hours are needed to protect workers' health and fitness."

57. "Children should be taken into care at the slightest hint of any parental abuse."

58. "We owe it to our labour force to protect their jobs by limiting imports."

59. "We need a Human Rights Bill to protect our liberties."

60. "Alcohol should be made more expensive and less widely available to combat binge drinking and yobbery."

61. "It is important for us to understand the causes of poverty."

62. "A person's economic or political viewpoint is only the unconscious expression of their class interest."

63. "We need ID cards to help fight terrorism."

64. "Freedom is all very well for the strong, but the poor and the weak come off worse without the state services."

65. "Drug patents should be scrapped so third world countries can access them."

66. "Schools should provide our children a risk-free environment."

67. "Some things, such as health, should not be provided for gain."

68. "Great inequalities of income cannot be justified."

69. "Britain's wealth came from exploiting its colonies, and should be repaid to some degree."

70. "A sensibly planned economy is more efficient than random chaos."

71. "Business is polluting the environment, which we should all enjoy, just for the benefit of the rich."

72. "Scarce resources should be allocated on the basis of need, instead of going to the highest bidder."

73. "If people don't like the policies of their trade union, student union or local council, they have only their own apathy to blame. They should become more active and change things."

74. "Essential services are too important to leave to the private sector, and have to be done by the state."

75. "Democracy is a sham with no real choice because all the major parties basically support the system."

76. "If state industries are opened up to competition, private firms cream off the lucrative trade, leaving the poor and outlying regions without adequate service."

77. "We must subsidize our industries, to compete with foreigners who do the same to theirs."

78. "Government investment is vital to protect industry and jobs."

79. "We should discourage use of private cars by making them more expensive to drive."

80. "We need to control movements of capital across borders to prevent funds leaving the country that are needed for investment here."

81. "Under capitalism the rich waste resources on luxuries."

82. "Competition is wasteful."

83. "Developing nations need tariff walls to protect their fledgling industries."

84. "We must bring in tougher laws and sentences against drug dealers and users."

85. "Curbs on budget airlines are needed to protect the environment."

86. "We should extradite any citizen accused of crimes by overseas prosecutors."

87. "People should not be allowed to adopt children unless they meet the highest possible standards of parenthood."

88. "The gap between rich and poor countries is growing larger, meaning that global poverty is growing worse."

89. "Regional aid is necessary to bring jobs to depressed areas."

90. "The results of globalization and free markets can be seen in the shanty towns of third world countries."

91. "We have to live more simply and restrain our extravagant lifestyles, or pollution will overwhelm the Earth's ability to cope with it."

92. "Genetic modification is dangerous and should be banned."

93. "Some businesses deliberately build obsolescence into their products to force people to buy more when they wear out."

94. "Business doesn't care about consumer safety, and cuts corners by economizing on safe conditions for its workers."

95. "The economy offers too much choice. It wastes resources and confuses people."

96. "Private sector health and education cream off the very best in resources and personnel from the state sector."

97. "We must increase the foreign aid we give if less developed countries are to escape from poverty."

98. "It is more rational to plan for the satisfaction of our future wants and needs than to expect blind chance to do it."

99. "We should switch all our energy to derive from renewable sources."

100. "Nobody should be free to smoke in public places."

101. "We should help third world producers by buying Fair Trade goods."



Note: Some of these topics primarily address the British system. However, the United States like Great Britain has been generally moving away from free markets, just at a slower pace.

I will update the list periodically as new posts are published.

No comments: