Night Strike wrote:
What can be left to market forces in your opinion? You argue against the market in every single market discussed on this site. The open market should not exist based on your posts as long as there exists anything unfair for anybody. If land use is not supposed to be left up to market forces, then why do you support the forcing of those lands into industrial uses through government taxation? Removing estate taxes means families can keep their farming lands. Instead, because of the massive taxation, farmers have to sell off their equipment and land just to pay off the government debt. Remove the taxes and all that money can be used to continue and expand the farming. Get government involved and their high prices force people out of business.
Most things should be left to market forces. Also, this isn't an "all or nothing" deal.
Some land is just plain and simply better for forest, some for agriculture, etc. Broadly, markets have already laid out some of the sensible allocations, but you don't have to look far to see where it fails. The failure is basically because agriculture and agricultural land is artificially low in value. Our nation is so wealthy that most people don't even think about where food comes from and that strongly alters decisions. This was not always the case, but again, that gets into an involved topic. I am not talking about micromanagement here, but broad classifications are warrented. I used to see acres of farmland along 101, I-5, etc in California. Now, I see houses after houses. These complete alterations of the landscape come with costs only barely understood. Even the basic climate of central California has altered. Sacramento, for example, used to cool down every evening. It would be over 100 every day in teh summer, but you could count on it dropping to 60 at night. Now.. it doesn't. This means more air conditioning, more water use, but also impacts the ecology. Almost no one has really been willing to tackle the issue of water out west. Etc.
Beyond that, basic education (not specialized education) has to be mandated and standard so we have a unified nation; transportation, treaties and such, all need to be governmental; I would also include healthcare. I would set a base wage, but not upper wage. I would absolutely set rules for universal safety of workers, etc. (those are not optional items) AND, I would require that companies do studies to show that the chemicals they produce and put out into the world are not generally harmful. (except where harm is intended, of course).
But, when it comes to making and selling goods... all of that needs to be left up to the market.
