Radical Ideas about Markets
Kenneth Taylor

13 July 2018

Is the market the key to freedom and prosperity? Don’t markets necessarily lead to economic inequality? Is it possible to make markets work better for everyone? This week we’re exploringRadical Markets for a New Gilded Age.

And we do live in a gilded age, with rampant inequality, the rich getting richer, wages stagnating for the rest. So our question for today is whether markets—so called radical markets—can cure the ills of this new gilded age.

But how could markets possibly be the cure if markets are what got us in this mess? Markets may have given us everything from iPhones and autos to skyscrapers and airlines, but they’ve also concentrated wealth in the hands of the few—to say nothing of pollution and climate change. So we don’t want to overly romanticize markets.

But do we want the government in control? Many of us would take the decentralized power of free markets over the concentrated power of a command economy any day.

Even so, economic power is still highly concentrated today—but instead of being concentrated in the hands of the state, it’s concentrated in the hands of huge multinational corporations. They’re like the robber barons of old except they control everything—including our personal information.

But is the fact that there’s too much power in the hands of corporations really the fault of the market? You could argue that we rely on the market way too much. But what if maybe we don’t rely on markets nearly enough? What if givingmorepower to the market was in fact the answer to the concentration of economic power?

You might just reply, “Break up the corporations! We’ll get more competition and less concentration of wealth!” But that response doesn’t appreciate the true logic of capitalism and the fact that competition necessarily leads to monopolies. After all, capitalism is all about economic efficiency, and monopolies are, if nothing else, ruthlessly efficient.

Of course monopolies also mean less competition, higher prices, and less choice. So how is that “efficient?” For example, before the Depression there were over a hundred American automobile companies. The market decided it could produce more cars more cheaply with just three.

That’s not to say that unfettered markets are all we need; we also need things like antitrust laws. Does that sound like trying to have our market cake and eat it too? If that means having markets that are lightly regulated, well then… guilty as charged.

因此，这显然比让不受约束的市场为所欲为要复杂得多。让我们再深入一点。想想工会。在原则上不反对它们的情况下，我们可以将它们视为一种垄断形式——一种有助于约束集中的公司权力的垄断形式。换句话说，工会是另一种重要的非市场力量。

But let’s not lose sight of the fundamental point: at bottom, either the market is going to allocate things or the government is going to do it. Given the choice between the two, many would take the market over the government almost any day.

当然，政府可以关注公平、正义和公共利益;市场并不关心这些。亚当·斯密的看不见的手是一个残忍的主人。想想自动化是如何取代非熟练劳动力并摧毁整个社区的。或者考虑一下零工经济，它看起来让每个人在任何时候都可以随心所欲地工作，但实际上却变成了为生计而挣扎的原子化工人。

Sound like we need some radicalsolutions,which is what we’ll ask our guest, Glen Weyl, co-author ofRadical Markets: Uprooting Capitalism and Democracy for a Just Society.

Photo byXavi CabreraonUnsplash

Comments(5)

Harold G. Neuman's picture

Harold G. Neuman

Sunday, May 2, 2021 -- 1:34 PM

The first five lines of your

The first five lines of your post are mutually confusing..The gilded age is not, Your other questions are self-defeating. None of your opening remarks resemble reality, in other than a postmodern, abstract sense.. Which is just the problem.
我们不能用抽象来处理现实。我从来没有认真地想过要做其他的事情。我不知道怎么可能有另一种方式来看待这个问题，除了一些超现实的观点——也许是，内格尔的《无处可见的视角》。但是，这是一种脱离的观点，不同于抽象的观点。是的。那么，我们从哪里开始呢?我不知道…

Harold G. Neuman's picture

Harold G. Neuman

Sunday, May 2, 2021 -- 3:03 PM

I have commented on economics

我已经评论过经济学和资本主义。资本主义是饥渴的。愈演愈烈。因此，如果资本主义只会变得更加饥渴，市场不就会变得更加激进吗?回到收益递减定律:当传统的营销方式和手段变得无力时，营销人员难道就不能更激进一些吗?有点像上瘾，对吧?药物的耐受性需要增加剂量才能达到可接受的高度。这既不令人惊讶，也不令人失望。它仅仅是。没有什么不寻常的。 Just emergence.

Harold G. Neuman's picture

Harold G. Neuman

Monday, May 3, 2021 -- 1:11 PM

So, there must be symbolism

So, there must be symbolism and/ or metaphor attending your picture of a shopping cart in a parking garage? I don't get it. Is THIS mass/popular/modern culture or is it that silly notion of post-modernism? Are you philosophers or what?
Look,(as Joe might say) i can get to what you are getting at. Have thought about for several decades. Wasn't until I felt strongly enough about things; at least imagined those were going south, that I spoke up. OK. Joe is older than me. Neither of us are brainiacs when it comes to modern philosophy. We're maybe more interested in what makes semse.
Nothing wrong with that. Ask Sam Harris...

Dwells's picture

Dwells

Friday, May 7, 2021 -- 3:52 PM

I used to think that “options

我曾经认为“期权交易”是最激进的。现在肯定是“全球主义”和/或比特币之类的东西。七十年代的时候，我和迈克同住一间公寓。他在铁路部门工作的时候，节俭地生活了一段时间，积攒了几千加拿大疯子的积蓄。坦白说，我大学主修的是心理学，我对行为观察有偏见。我观察人们的行为和反应。

迈克开始玩转市场。有个地方他可以炒股就在我们住的附近。他会坐在那里，看着头顶上横跨在交易室长长的后墙上的屏幕上的股票行情。几个小时后，屏幕上显示，“敏捷的棕色狐狸跳过了懒狗”。

Mike sought cheap stocks that were trading and moving up/down. He thought he could cash in on the fluctuations and line his pockets. This was an abstraction with the same allure as a pyramid scheme or roulette. Sadly, it didn’t work out for him.

十年后，我遇到了加里。他抽象的选择是“期权交易”。在自驾游中，加里告诉我他是如何赚得一笔可观的利润的。我从来没有听过他的解释，可能是因为我是一个怀疑论者和反赌徒。然而，加里很擅长期权交易。后来，当我跟他谈起这些恶作剧时，他的反应是“贪婪”。

The market is supposed to be a way to share in the accumulation of wealth, but I would never try to do this on my own. As Tommy Smothers used to say, “There are Pumas down in those crevasses.” Using that same metaphor my financial advisor is my personal big game hunter.

I would not trust my government to fiddle with “radical markets” or try to make them even more radical. It sounds like a get rich quick scheme and (yes Dad) “greed”. I’ll stay clear of bit coins, too. Gambling addiction is a terrible thing. I would not want my country or society to risk our collective resources in some market boondoggle. In describing my two examples I used the word: abstraction. Humans are veritable fountains of abstraction. However, our abstractions have unpredictable emergent properties. Hence my reference to gambling. Just saying.

Countries are in the markets much in the same way as I am—via my trusted advisor—seeking to maintain capital with modest returns. My advisor has hundreds of clients like me, and he has done a good job for us. In dealing with markets, I think the proper stance ought to be “conservative” rather than “radical”.

I found a brief, helpful, and quite positive summary of the book—prompting the following additional remarks:

1) I am reminded of the—almost as radical—electoral reform abstractions such as proportional representation. I expect the reaction would entail as much foot-dragging, too. The first-past-the-post abstraction holds us tightly in its grip.

2) Weren’t we still fighting over 18th century market regulation ideas—to combat things like robber barons—in the early 20th century?

3) Often our collective response takes effect well after the disasters are upon us. Consider our response to the COVID19. In another century, all the pandemic preparedness we are creating now will be gone again, won’t it?

4) One of these times we will wait just a little too long. Unless… we discover another way to frame and address such problems. The attachment we have for prior abstractions delays the implementation of new ones. We must deal with that before we go extinct.

Harold G. Neuman's picture

Harold G. Neuman

Thursday, May 13, 2021 -- 12:09 PM

Once upon a time, in or

Once upon a time, in or around 1986, I tried options trading. Had no good reason for this. After losing around 4,000 dollars, I realized it was no more than a scam. Nothing ventured. It is a scam, inasmuch as one gambles with one's money. So, my loss was someone else' gain. Once bitten, twice shy.

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