Socialism is Not a 4 Letter Word

originally posted by: onequestion
a reply to: Isurrender73
Your describing what standard oil did until the early 1900's.

It's a great case study. Watch some John D docents ties.

Standard Oil is why it is illegal for a corporation such as BP, Shell or Exon/Mobile to sell below cost.

The following is my opinion, since it would be impossible for me to prove at this time.

Unfortunately big oil has become so consolidated the game has been rigged for the most part. And the advent of franchising puts the street price into smaller businesses, which has made most of those laws meaningless.

It appears to me that whatever barrel price is needed to keep the status quo becomes the barrel price. The barrel price is used to trump competition, such as oil sands from oil supplies not owned by the major oil companies, until the major oil companies purchase the now struggling competition.

Oil appears to be a global game now where we are only presented with the illusion of competition. The elitists who own the oil companies seem to be working together at the highest level by controlling the barrel price. With monthly profits in the billions the major players seem to play nice with each other.

And the major players seem to agree that all competition is bad. For the most part they have purchased greener competing technologies, lobbied against them, or sometimes both.

originally posted by: Isurrender73
a reply to: Semicollegiate

I agree with your premise calling the corporations cartels. But a billionaire can undercut a millionaire until the millionaire is broke.

In this example the billionaire increases production to produce enough to satisfy all demand, then undercuts the competitions price leaving the competition so overpriced the consumer chooses the cartel for the lower price.

Once competition is bankrupt the cartel recovers all losses by returning to higher prices.

In an unregulated society the cartel will destroy the competition through nefarious means, or simply undercuting the competition until the competition is bankrupt.

As soon as the billionaire increases prices, the bankrupt company's equipment will be bought super cheap and used to make products at an even lower price than before. All the while the billionaire is loosing millions of dollars, first to put out the first competitors and then to try to under sell the new super low cost competitors. Eventually the billionaire loses.

Also against the billionaire is technology. The billionaire has invested in the current technology. Anyone who designs better technology will under sell the billionaire who will need to get his investment back with his older technology. New inventions are more common in a free market. Corporation are better at improving on some thing, but corporation never (rarely) invent anything completely new or radical. The invention of new technology tends to keep companies small and flexible, so as not to be overly committed to something that could become obsolete.


One of the first things centralization killed was totally new product invention. Centralization standardized production with the help of WW1. Fewer methods of production and final types of products crammed invention into a smaller field, a field that had to match up with big corporation activities. Before WW1, electric cars, steam cars, vegetable oil diesel cars, and alcohol cars were just as common as gasoline cars. Inventions of all kinds could have sprung off of that variety in produced technology.

I realize that today's elitists have rigged the game but it is my opinion all they did was speed up the inevitable. Power in the hands of a few through control of commodities.

The ones at the top have accumulated so much wealth they can outprice anyone that doesn't play by their rules. As long as you buy your commodities from them, at their set prices, they will let you own a small business. Small business owners put forth the illusion of competition, which is good for the commodity owners.

Try to escape the system by creating your own commodities to compete with theirs and they will do everything in their power to destroy you. And if they must loose money in the process, they know they will make it up on the back end.

Without putting some limit on wealth the final outcome, even if it takes 1000 years will always be the majority of power in the hands of a few.

All cartels use centralized government to enforce the cartel rules. Cartels always break up from internal competition or new competition unless prevented by a coercive power monopoly.

a reply to: Semicollegiate

You have confidence in competition.

I have confidence in greed.

Only one of these philosophies has proven itself.

I do agree that technology can be a deciding factor, but at the rate we are going inventors are more likely to be employees than entrepreneurs.

originally posted by: Isurrender73
a reply to: Semicollegiate

You have confidence in competition.

I have confidence in greed.

Only one of these philosophies has proven itself.

Greed fuels competition. Greed is good. Greed is motivation. Greed keeps a corporation from doing stupid things like trying to undercut competition in a free market.

originally posted by: Semicollegiate
Greed keeps a corporation from doing stupid things like trying to undercut competition in a free market.

You have no evidence that this is ever the case.

a reply to: Isurrender73

The government is why it is illegal to sell below cost.

Standard oil reduced the price of a gallon of kerosine from 30 cents 1870 to 7 cents by 1890.

Close study of the actual cases of monopoly, or trusts as they were called at the time, shows regulation put in effect to favor special interests who didn't want to compete with the economy of scale producers in all industries.

originally posted by: Isurrender73
a reply to: Semicollegiate

You have confidence in competition.

I have confidence in greed.

I have confidence in both, they are not mutually exclusive.

originally posted by: Semicollegiate
Close study of the actual cases of monopoly, or trusts as they were called at the time, shows regulation put in effect to favor special interests who didn't want to compete with the economy of scale producers in all industries.

Are you arguing that some producers got so big that others couldn't compete?

originally posted by: daskakik

originally posted by: Semicollegiate
Greed keeps a corporation from doing stupid things like trying to undercut competition in a free market.

You have no evidence that this is ever the case.

You want proof that smart people didn't do some thing stupid.

You are like the deputy that wanted me to prove I wasn't a drug dealer.

originally posted by: daskakik

originally posted by: Semicollegiate
Close study of the actual cases of monopoly, or trusts as they were called at the time, shows regulation put in effect to favor special interests who didn't want to compete with the economy of scale producers in all industries.

Are you arguing that some producers got so big that others couldn't compete?

Didn't want to compete, like I wrote.

Anybody can compete if they are willing to make less profit or wait until new technology makes production costs lower.

originally posted by: Semicollegiate

Greed fuels competition. Greed is good. Greed is motivation. Greed keeps a corporation from doing stupid things like trying to undercut competition in a free market.

Thank you "Gordon Gekko." LOL.

Although, I agree with you, this is what many in the modern Right carry in their hearts as their credo.

When you use the term "free market" what are you referring to? What real world "market" has ever been free?

What country, what time period, and what evidence do you have?

Thank you, in advance.

originally posted by: Semicollegiate
You want proof that smart people didn't do some thing stupid.

Smart people? That wasn't a condition of your claim.

You are like the deputy that wanted me to prove I wasn't a drug dealer.

No your claim is that no one else is doing something. I'm asking that you prove that drug dealers don't exist.

Your argument would sound something like this "Nobody would be dumb enough to do something that can get them into trouble"

originally posted by: Semicollegiate
Didn't want to compete, like I wrote.

Are you sure that they could compete?

Can you show that they simply didn't want to?

a reply to: Gryphon66

When you use the term "free market" what are you referring to?

The relevant concept from the free market is that people are more motivated when they receive all of the profit gained from their actions. Greed is motivation and leads to production, which competition (greed against greed), keeps at as low a price as possible to still make a profit.

What real world "market" has ever been free?

Lack of a free market is never the fault of the free market.

originally posted by: daskakik

originally posted by: Semicollegiate
Didn't want to compete, like I wrote.

Are you sure that they could compete?

Can you show that they simply didn't want to?

They don't have to compete. They can do something else. But what they did was pass laws that makes everything more expensive, like a tax.

originally posted by: Semicollegiate
They don't have to compete. They can do something else. But what they did was pass laws that makes everything more expensive, like a tax.

The point was that someone got so big that they stiffled competition but, despite you arguing that this only happens through government, in these cases you are trying to make them out to be the victims of others who just didn't want to compete?

originally posted by: Semicollegiate
They don't have to compete. They can do something else. But what they did was pass laws that makes everything more expensive, like a tax.

That wasn't the question. The question was, could they compete?

If the answer was no, then, there was a monopoly.

originally posted by: Semicollegiate

originally posted by: Isurrender73
a reply to: Semicollegiate

You have confidence in competition.

I have confidence in greed.

Only one of these philosophies has proven itself.

Greed fuels competition. Greed is good. Greed is motivation. Greed keeps a corporation from doing stupid things like trying to undercut competition in a free market.

This debate is over as far as I am concerned.

What I have highlighted above proves one of 3 things.

1. That you don't know what you are talking about, because standard oil was loosing money to undercut competition, which is why the government intervention to make the practice illegal came to be.

2. You are naive and don't understand what several of us are explaining. And you are willfully ignorant because you are afraid of government control.

3. You are arguing for the sake of argument.

Regardless of the reason I am finished debating you in this thread, and I would recommend the others take the same approach.

Unless you are part of the 1%. Without controling greed you will become controlled by the greed of others.

originally posted by: Isurrender73


You have confidence in competition.

I have confidence in greed.

originally posted by: Teikiatsu

I have confidence in both, they are not mutually exclusive.

One of the main forces of corporate greed is to eliminate competition. Corporate greed will always seek to destroy competition. In the end competition and greed can not coexist.

Either we control greed, or the greed of others will control us.

originally posted by: daskakik

originally posted by: Semicollegiate
They don't have to compete. They can do something else. But what they did was pass laws that makes everything more expensive, like a tax.

The point was that someone got so big that they stiffled competition but, despite you arguing that this only happens through government, in these cases you are trying to make them out to be the victims of others who just didn't want to compete?

The point is that someone was able to produce a product so inexpensively that every working person had more money in their pocket every day. Is that bad? A monopoly is like that, as long as the monopoly must worry about new competition the price will stay down and the supply will stay plentiful.

The govenmrent decided that the extra money in the consumer's pockets should be given to the folks who control the congress.

Actually, no single company or corporation ever had a complete market all to itself. There were always at least a few companies making every non patent protected product.