danw@oliven.UUCP (danw) (11/04/84)
[] >Subject: Libertarian proposal: Avoiding wealth concentration. > > One of the most valid criticisms I've heard of the economic aspects of >libertarianism is that it tends to lead to wealth being concentrated in >the hands of a small minority of the population. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- During the period of US history immediately following the civil war, the Republican party came to power and ruled congress for fifty some years ( they were finally displaced by the new deal socialists) This was a period of rapid industrial expansion. The many social and economic inequalities of the period led to numerous 'muck-racking' accounts exposing abuses. This material documented some of the basic tenants of socialist beliefs, e.g.'Capitalism always leads to monopolies'. The Republican party then as now , is the party of BIG GOVERNMENT and BIG BUSINESS. Their encouragement of monopolies has helped to kept alive the myth that capitalism is flawed and needs to be fixed. To put it crudly monopolies are the result of an incestuous relation between business and government.(The libertarian solution is to get rid of government and the socialist solution is of course to get rid of business.) Large monopolistic businesses are top heavy bureaucratic dinosaur that can only be maintained through government protection. Free wheeling laissez-faire capitalism eats these sort of dinosaurs for breakfast. They are too large, dim-witted and slow moving, to seize rapidly changing market opportunities. This is intuitively obvious. No amount of socialist rhetoric can hide the fact that capitalism works marvelously and feeds the world . Socialists perpetuate their myths for selfish reasons.(While loudly claiming that libertarian philosophy is selfishness incarnate) They wish to use the 'capitalist monopoly' bogey to scare us into the arms of the greatest monopoly ever.... Socialism. Ignore for a moment socialisms' tired old set of lies and listen to what the libertarianism have been patiently trying to tell you : Government is the PROBLEM not the solution. Capitalism is the ANSWER. danw