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by xoa 42 days ago
>I guess all those goverment actions should limit freedom of individuals more and more. Excellent strategy for tyranny.

...what?? Are you ok with murder and theft as well and whine about how laws against that limit your freedom and are "tyranny"? It's a pretty basic tenet of any groups of humans that's it's fully compatible with freedom to have limits on the extent to which people can cause harm to others. As with all complex dynamic things there are very debatable shades of gray at the edges, but total anarchy objectively does not work.

And it's a fundamental to a functional Free Market that costs be internalized, not externalized. Producers and consumers determine value and generate wealth by comparing the total price of production to the utility offered, but that only works if (amongst other things) the sticker price really is the total price (or at least quite close). If a producer is able to stick their costs onto others then their product will be artificially cheap even if they are less efficient, which will warp the market. That's what we are seeing in energy: fossil fuel producers are dumping cost (in terms of, global warming, ocean acidification, and other forms of pollution) onto the present and future world that they don't have to pay, artificially depressing the cost and alternative solutions that would be net more productive. We could for example be far along on the path of wind and solar power, with enough excess to generate net neutral synthetic hydrocarbons using atmospheric CO2 and water that could then be used in applications like jet engines where they might remain superior.

But the whole point is the market would then be able to determine that naturally, the cost would be built into the price so where and when syngas vs electric vs whatever else provided the best value could emerge. That's not "tyranny", to the extent there is tyranny in the market it's in allowing selfish actors to ruin other people's lives with pollution and preventing those harmed from retaliating.

1 comments

No, I'm not ok with murder or theft and I don't understand why you write about it. Also I'm not sure why you compare free market, where you are free to participate against centralised governance where you must participate. I really don't understand this "totalitarian" thinking.
> No, I'm not ok with murder or theft and I don't understand why you write about it

Because you seem to think doing ANYTHING to limit people is tyranny, and preventing someone from being able to murder or steal would fall under "anything".

> I really don't understand this "totalitarian" thinking.

Way to avoid engaging with any of the things the poster said, instead nitpicking their first sentence.

> where you are free to participate against centralised governance where you must participate

Adding regulations to what companies can do regarding pollution is not a "centralized government" ala the USSR. All functioning societies and governments impose rules like this. The person you are responding to is mentioning that the externality of climate change is not properly factored into the free market, and we need SOME form of regulation/rules to compensate for that.

If consumers find company do more harm than good, they will not buy their products and company ends. If company ends due to regulations and decisions based on ideologies, then yes, it wis hat USSR does and pay for it till today.