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Thread: Economics Of The Black Market

  1. #31
    Quote Originally Posted by r3volution 3.0 View Post
    I've seen no indication that you understand what I'm saying, since you don't respond to what I'm saying.

    Here's a post of mine to which your response was "You're certainly adept at muddying the water."

    I'll try one (1) more time to elicit a serious response from you, then I'm joining Occam in the smoking lounge.



    Any response?



    Any response?
    Both of your comments assume that eliminating the state would result in the creation of a universal black market, controlled by violence. You use as "proof" the BLACK MARKET. Based on your fanciful premise, you make the claim that a "free market" can ONLY exist under the protection of the state. In addition, you dismiss my observation that the market operates just fine WITHOUT state interference, and ignore the fact that the gray market operates every day outside the state, and with no violence.
    All modern revolutions have ended in a reinforcement of the power of the State.
    -Albert Camus



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  3. #32
    Quote Originally Posted by otherone View Post
    Both of your comments assume that eliminating the state would result in the creation of a universal black market, controlled by violence. You use as "proof" the BLACK MARKET. Based on your fanciful premise, you make the claim that a "free market" can ONLY exist under the protection of the state. In addition, you dismiss my observation that the market operates just fine WITHOUT state interference, and ignore the fact that the gray market operates every day outside the state, and with no violence.
    No, my post wasn't a series of broad, conclusory statement like you claim.

    I made specific points about how our hypothetical pot dealer would interact with other market participants.

    And about how that differs from violence-free competition between your hypothetical hardware shop and Home Depot.

    As usual, you have totally failed to address what I said.

    This is a waste of my time and of thread-space, so that'll be the end of it.



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  5. #33
    Quote Originally Posted by presence View Post
    In the absence of state enforcement one should mitigate risks by dealing with trusted parties, having clear terms, not talking clients into more than you suspect they can afford, and using collateral wherever prudent. Strong arm violence is not the typical way of most black markets in the absence of "state enforcement"; most thriving black markets are built on trust networks.
    Costs

    Most black markets have very little violence. How much illegalized home improvement is contracted every year in the US without anyone getting shot?
    How many people are shot by the government every year in the course of tax collection?

    Crime, especially organized crime, operates mostly by the threat of violence.

    but you're not describing a black market you're describing a mafia... which is a state
    QED

    when you see the state as a criminal organization... then another criminal organization takes over... of course there is still no free market. your point?
    That a stateless market isn't a free market.

  6. #34
    Quote Originally Posted by r3volution 3.0 View Post
    No, my post wasn't a series of broad, conclusory statement like you claim.
    My apologies. I thought you were making those comments to support your original broad, conclusory statements.

    I made specific points about how our hypothetical pot dealer would interact with other market participants.
    The cupcake baker was hypothetical. My dealer neighbor is not. Your imagined other market participants was hypothetical, to demonstrate the state was required to prevent violence in the marketplace.

    And about how that differs from violence-free competition between your hypothetical hardware shop and Home Depot.
    You hypothetically have my neighbor beat up, and say he has no recourse. What you fail to see is that black market participants understand the risks inherent to their activities. You then claim the superiority of "free market" forces when government goons conspire with big business to drive out small businessmen.
    As usual, you have totally failed to address what I said.

    This is a waste of my time and of thread-space, so that'll be the end of it.
    wutevs.
    All modern revolutions have ended in a reinforcement of the power of the State.
    -Albert Camus

  7. #35
    Quote Originally Posted by r3volution 3.0 View Post
    Right, but that's not even close to being the situation now
    Such sentiments are inherently collectivist. There are people living in conditions of squalor in the US. Are we supposed to believe they have all simply chosen "the path less traveled?" Almost all Americans are educated from the youngest ages in government-run schools where conformity and automatic deference to authority are the only virtues that are instilled. Are we supposed to believe that the average American has made an informed and independent assessment of the objective conditions he accepts, that the American life is really and truly voluntary? Etienne de la Boetie wrote of human servility around five centuries ago:

    Since freedom is our natural state, we are not only in possession of it but have the urge to defend it. Now, if perchance some cast a doubt on this conclusion and are so corrupted that they are not able to recognize their rights and inborn tendencies, I shall have to do them the honor that is properly theirs and place, so to speak, brute beasts in the pulpit to throw light on their nature and condition. The very beasts, God help me! if men are not too deaf, cry out to them, "Long live Liberty!"

    Many among them die as soon as captured: just as the fish loses life as soon as he leaves the water, so do these creatures close their eyes upon the light and have no desire to survive the loss of their natural freedom. If the animals were to constitute their kingdom by rank, their nobility would be chosen from this type. Others, from the largest to the smallest, when captured put up such a strong resistance by means of claws, horns, beaks, and paws, that they show clearly enough how they cling to what they are losing; afterwards in captivity they manifest by so many evident signs their awareness of their misfortune, that it is easy to see they are languishing rather than living, and continue their existence more in lamentation of their lost freedom than in enjoyment of their servitude.

    What else can explain the behavior of the elephant who, after defending himself to the last ounce of his strength and knowing himself on the point of being taken, dashes his jaws against the trees and breaks his tusks, thus manifesting his longing to remain free as he has been and proving his wit and ability to buy off the huntsmen in the hope that through the sacrifice of his tusks he will be permitted to offer his ivory as a ransom for his liberty? We feed the horse from birth in order to train him to do our bidding. Yet he is tamed with such difficulty that when we begin to break him in, he bites the bit, he rears at the touch of the spur, as if to reveal his instinct and show by his actions that if he obeys he does so not of his own free will but under constraint. What more can we say?

    "Even the oxen under the weight of the yoke complain,
    And the birds in their cage lament,"

    ... as I expressed it some time ago, toying with our French poesy.

    ... And now, since all beings, because they feel, suffer misery in subjection and long for liberty; since the very beasts, although made for the service of man, cannot become accustomed to control without protest, what evil chance has so denatured man that he, the only creature really born to be free, lacks the memory of his original condition and the desire to return to it? [The Politics of Obedience]
    (outside of places like Venezuela). If the US gets to that point, then sure, maybe BTC will seriously rival the USD.
    It's so far past the point of absurdity that words fail me. The devaluation of the dollar since 1913 is not just an arithmetical abstraction, it is a real plundering of wealth over a period stretching for more than a century. Americans worked to produce savings. The US government, assisted by the Federal reserve, steadily siphoned away those savings though inflation. John Maynard Keynes said of inflation, "Lenin is said to have declared that the best way to destroy the Capitalistic System was to debauch the currency. . . Lenin was certainly right. There is no subtler, no surer means of overturning the existing basis of society than to debauch the currency. The process engages all the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and does it in a manner which not one man in a million can diagnose."

    But that's not much to hang your hat on. It's almost like saying "if the dollar collapses, BTC might take its place." That's very different from the idea that BTC will itself undermine the USD, without some great external upheaval to help it along.
    Well, these discussions are interesting but talk is cheap. That's the real reason that Bitcoin exists, because talk will never get the thief to stop his thieving - the only thing that can stop the thief is claws and fangs. Underneath its boring, nerdy facade, Bitcoin is claws and fangs.
    Last edited by ClaytonB; 12-09-2017 at 11:32 PM.

  8. #36
    Quote Originally Posted by ClaytonB View Post
    Such sentiments are inherently collectivist. There are people living in conditions of squalor in the US. Are we supposed to believe they have all simply chosen "the path less traveled?" Almost all Americans are educated from the youngest ages in government-run schools where conformity and automatic deference to authority are the only virtues that are instilled. Are we supposed to believe that the average American has made an informed and independent assessment of the objective conditions he accepts, that the American life is really and truly voluntary? Etienne de la Boetie wrote of human servility around five centuries ago:





    It's so far past the point of absurdity that words fail me. The devaluation of the dollar since 1913 is not just an arithmetical abstraction, it is a real plundering of wealth over a period stretching for more than a century. Americans worked to produce savings. The US government, assisted by the Federal reserve, steadily siphoned away those savings though inflation. John Maynard Keynes said of inflation, "Lenin is said to have declared that the best way to destroy the Capitalistic System was to debauch the currency. . . Lenin was certainly right. There is no subtler, no surer means of overturning the existing basis of society than to debauch the currency. The process engages all the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and does it in a manner which not one man in a million can diagnose."



    Well, these discussions are interesting but talk is cheap. That's the real reason that Bitcoin exists, because talk will never get the thief to stop his thieving - the only thing that can stop the thief is claws and fangs. Underneath its boring, nerdy facade, Bitcoin is claws and fangs.
    Fed's bad, inflation's bad, state's bad - got it, agree, irrelevant.

    Fact is, economic conditions in the US white market aren't bad enough to drive more economic activity into the black market than is already there.

    Hence, the black market is the size it is.

    ...pretty simple.

  9. #37
    I do 95% of my services without state interference, I'm starting a month long project Monday that will have no state interference. It's not wanted, or needed.

    You need to get away from your hypothetical life on the computer once in a while and step out into the real world rev.

  10. #38
    Quote Originally Posted by Krugminator2 View Post
    The reality is the market chooses a state over anarchy. Having a state to settle disputes increases trust and lowers transaction costs.
    Needs some revision. To wit:

    The reality is the majority of people choose effective slavery over freedom. Believing the lies that the "state" settles disputes better than individuals serves the interests of those corrupted individuals who are fearful, avaricious, willfully ignorant, and too lazy to act as Freemen, preferring Weakman status for the reasons given.
    freedomisobvious.blogspot.com

    There is only one correct way: freedom. All other solutions are non-solutions.

    It appears that artificial intelligence is at least slightly superior to natural stupidity.

    Our words make us the ghosts that we are.

    Convincing the world he didn't exist was the Devil's second greatest trick; the first was convincing us that God didn't exist.

  11. #39
    Boy, that's some sweet morality..

    ..it has what to do with reality..?

  12. #40
    Quote Originally Posted by r3volution 3.0 View Post
    Boy, that's some sweet morality..

    ..it has what to do with reality..?
    Ya, we get it, you think everything is more efficient with government running it. Or better yet a king or a world government.

    I'll pass.
    "The Patriarch"



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  14. #41
    Quote Originally Posted by Origanalist View Post
    Ya, we get it, you think everything is more efficient with government running it. Or better yet a king or a world government.

    I'll pass.
    You don't.

    ..and don't speak for others.

  15. #42
    Even IF a totally free market has some violence (it will) it would no doubt be LESS violence than the #goonerment #goonsquad system. Goonerments worldwide kill millions of their own people. It's hard to imagine a totally free system that would have that high of a body count.

    This idea that ANY system would be violence free is a red herring. There can be NO SUCH SYSTEM...
    BEWARE THE CULT OF "GOVERNMENT"

    Christian Anarchy - Our Only Hope For Liberty In Our Lifetime!
    Sonmi 451: Truth is singular. Its "versions" are mistruths.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:ChristianAnarchist

    Use an internet archive site like
    THIS ONE
    to archive the article and create the link to the article content instead.

  16. #43
    Quote Originally Posted by r3volution 3.0 View Post
    You don't.

    ..and don't speak for others.
    Oh but I do O Great One. But you're right, I shouldn't speak for others.
    "The Patriarch"

  17. #44
    Quote Originally Posted by Origanalist View Post
    Oh but I do O Great One. But you're right, I shouldn't speak for others.
    Well now I have a different view..

  18. #45
    Quote Originally Posted by r3volution 3.0 View Post
    Well now I have a different view..
    That's for damn sure.
    "The Patriarch"

  19. #46
    Quote Originally Posted by r3volution 3.0 View Post
    Fed's bad, inflation's bad, state's bad - got it, agree, irrelevant.

    Fact is, economic conditions in the US white market aren't bad enough to drive more economic activity into the black market than is already there.

    Hence, the black market is the size it is.

    ...pretty simple.
    I think there is lots of protest but the elections have been coopted. The deep state will not give up their hegemony without a fight. I don't think the Washington is morally above doing a tiananmen square or a JFK like operation if it was necessary to maintain control.

  20. #47
    A person lives in Colorado where pot is legal. He has a legal growing operation. Would he sell on the black market?

    A person lives in Colorado where pot is legal. He has an illegal growing operation. Will he sell to the legal market? Will he sell to the black market?

    You are a consumer of legal recreational weed in Colorado. Would you purchase from the legal weed shop or the black market?

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