Probably one of the scariest sentences I've read by a free marketeer

[laughing dog]

As I've said--welfare is the job of society, not business.

Even Ebeneezer Scrooge knew different by the end of the Christmas Carol.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

Oh they used to, back when there was slavery.

If you read the rhetoric of the Pro-Slavery speakers back then, you will find all sorts of the same stuff you hear from libertarians today: Government can't tell one what to do with one's own property, government can't levy taxes, etc etc. Libertarians are the ideological successors of the slavers, and it would be silly to dismiss them.

I'm fine with dismissing them as long as they are no longer successful in the sphere of American politics. If and when that changes, I will surely take them VERY seriously.

- - - Updated - - -

Do people deserve enough money to live on because of work they do, or because of their inherent worth as human beings? If you think the former, then you are just treating them (or at least their labour) as commodities - which is what the OP was complaining about. But if the latter, then there is no particular reason for those who purchase their labour (whether that's a single employer, or a number of individuals) to make sure the worker has to live on. Indeed if you believe the latter, then you ought to believe that it is up to rest of society to ensure that each individual has enough to live on - and so every bit of money they get from some other source is helping to relieve society of its obligations rather than the other way around.

As I've said--welfare is the job of society, not business.

If a business operates with brazen disregard for the welfare of its workers, then a civilized society can and should force it to change its policies.

 

[Canard DuJour]

Why do I bother? I answered this question and no one bothered to read it.

Wrong. It's just that you made the case so concisely, there's nothing to add without diluting it.

What you're missing is that the reality is that people who simply repeat their assertions haven't been taken seriously for long time, whereas you very much are.

 

[arkirk]

I'll give you a few minutes to ponder what may make human labor different than a gallon of milk.

Could it be that humans have smaller teats than cows and it is far more difficult for a human to make a gallon of milK?

 

[arkirk]

Why do I bother? I answered this question and no one bothered to read it.

Wrong. It's just that you made the case so concisely, there's nothing to add without diluting it.

What you're missing is that the reality is that people who simply repeat their assertions haven't been taken seriously for long time, whereas you very much are.

The freetrader mentioned in the OP simply has a constricted sense of human values and is unable to get his mind around human beings cooperating in the task of making human life more worth living. He relates to a market and not to humanity.

 

[arkirk]

As I've said--welfare is the job of society, not business.

Even Ebeneezer Scrooge knew different by the end of the Christmas Carol.

One of my abiding hopes is that Loren lives long enough to figure this out. I think he has already talked to all three of the ghosts and put them all in their place.

 

[+or-1]

When you begin treating people as a commodity, your society is in trouble.

 

[fromderinside]

The really believe there is nothing that might make labor different than a loaf of bread or a gallon of milk and there policy prescriptions show it.

:shakeshead:

What's different?

Labor can make bread.