What are New Yorkers thinking?

New York City mayoral Socialist candidate Zohran Mamdani won in Tuesday’s Democratic primary and promised government run grocery stores and free city buses. Woot. What a campaign. Wait 4 hours like the BMV or SS office to "buy" food paid for by raising taxes on millionaires and ride in filthy buses instead of a private cab or uber. They probably won't allow bicycles because it would be competition. Competition brings down prices. Government run anything raises prices. But it sure sells to stupid voters. All 8% of them (I heard, haven't verified it.)

I met a friend for coffee at McDonald's today--60 cents for seniors. It was hot, free refills, served within a minute, the store was clean, and the employees were paid far above the so-called minimum wage that Democrats like to moan about--probably $15/hour with free tuition at the university. Good stores will close if Mamdani is hired by New Yorkers, and then where will the illegals go?

Claire Berlinski on free markets

The author of Why Margaret Thatcher matters (2008 Basic Books) attempts to first explain free markets, in explaining why Margaret Thatcher was so passionate about them as a key to a moral society:

“The argument for free markets involves a beautiful, fascinating, counterintuitive theory.  It is one of the great achievements in human thought.  It is also, basically, simple.  A free market is one in which the prices of goods and services are determined by individual sellers and buyers, not by the government.  It differs from a planned or command economy in that no centralized authority makes decisions about resource allocation.” p. 118

Then she goes on to explain how selling a product at gun point or deliberately not fulfilling the order on January 1 that you promised is not healthy free markets and government is needed to ensure that won’t happen. (p. 122)  Since she probably wrote this part in 2006 or 2007 she had no way to know she was predicting exactly what has happened during the Obama reign with the ACA.

Employer based health insurance  (60% of workers, 90% of market) which grew up after WWII was originally a choice by employer and employee which then developed to a jumble of government law and regulation.  The biggest plum for manipulation by Washington was exemption from income tax on that benefit.  If the government had bowed out and let the system evolve, perhaps we wouldn’t have had the messy government built system as a foundation for another failed system—Obamacare.  PPACA was signed into law on March 23, 2010 and the President has been violating it ever since.

Romney’s freedom message

The Clinton Global Initiative gives Mitt Romney a STANDING OVATION for his talk this week on sustaining economies. He begins with inspiration from the Tunisian fruit vendor whose suicide catalyzed the Arab Spring. Romney proposes solutions to despair and fanaticism. How? Job opportunities. The rule of law. Fair trade. Property rights. Prosperity pacts. "The right moral course ... Coupling aid with trade." So worth watching though 15 minutes. [Kelly Monroe Kullberg]

http://www.npr.org/blogs/itsallpolitics/2012/09/25/161766092/obama-talks-of-slavery-romney-of-freedom-at-clinton-global-initiative

Core Values and Principles of Free Enterprise

The Cline Center for Democracy at the University of Illinois is named for one of its very successful graduates, Richard G. Cline and his wife, Carole J. Cline. It has four programs, and I was only looking at the objectives of this one, the Program in Democratic Governance and Societal Welfare. The first objective is to conduct a program of research that refines our understanding of (1) the relative benefits of democracy for societal welfare, (2) how democracies can best be structured and supplemented to enhance human well-being, and (3) how best to achieve optimal institutional arrangements in diverse democratic societies.

From there I looked at how The Cline Center scholars see free enterprise and social welfare. We know what Marxists and Socialists and Progressives want (redistribution of all resources which will be under the control of government for all citizens except the party faithful, who get more; see here for definitions and explanations), but what about the rest of us, especially Christians? None of these economic systems are specifically Christian or non-Christian because all are grounded in material, not spiritual matters.

- Free enterprise conceptions of welfare are grounded in materialism, the satisfaction of material wants and needs, and the promotion of material progress. Correspondingly, the acquisition and holding of property is at the heart of this value. Also related to the materialistic foundations of free enterprise is that social welfare is conceived of in terms of improvements in the level of material well-being of individuals. Therefore, when free enterprise proponents gauge its impact on societal welfare, they examine its impact on levels of wealth, as opposed to, for example, the distribution of material wealth. Equality of opportunity is valued, not equality of condition.

A second value is individualism. Thus, a high premium is placed on a core set of individual freedoms and liberties. This core set of values includes the choice of employment; the use of various forms of property as one sees fit; and the unencumbered enjoyment of the benefits that accrue from fruits of one’s labor or utilization of one’s property. The idea of “individualism” also encompasses the value of individual initiative, entrepreneurship, and the importance of the profit motive or the individual pursuit of self-interest. Free enterprise theory maintains that it is through these mechanisms that free enterprise economies provide for societal welfare. However, to achieve these ends free economies must function in an environment of free and fair competition.