What's The Deal With Education?

Karen

I grew up in small businesses [a pub and shop], and I’ve been in business in a small way I’ve also worked in big companies in the civil service and in factories and as a labourer in construction and agriculture, so I've seen it from many angles.

*

The thing that people should also understood is that laws are regulations - there were regulation on who we could sell alcohol to and when (and cigarettes), we sold food so there were all the laws and regulation surrounding that (hygiene using healthy food etc). Then there are the accounting regulations and tax laws, planning permission etc etc.

Many people don’t even see the regulations that hem in the ‘free market’ and lesson its more malevolent (to me) practices because many of us now see them as prudent, necessary or morally right.

We don’t employ children the way we did during earlier times (in mines, factories and sweat shops) and that was a moral decision it doesn’t make economic sense, why not employ children, they can do many jobs that an adult can and are cheaper. Now remember it was a hard fight in the US the practice wasn’t really questioned until the late 19th century, in the US a first law was struck down by the Supreme Court and when an amendment was tried in 1924 it was rejected by a number of states, it wasn’t until 1938 that a new law passed (that is only 77 years ago, one person’s lifetime). And where child labour can be got away with it still goes on.

It was the same with working hours, paid leave, minimum wage, union rights etc and the argument against all these from business was the same that it put a burden on their profits and their ability to compete in the market.

They are still doing it now with the call for paid maternity leave in the US -

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Paid Family Leave (HBO)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zIhKAQX5izw

And it is the same argument used to demand deregulation.

And then there is health and safety and I’d cite the case of the Triangle Waist Company a small business with around 500 employees and where 146 workers died in a fire because the exits had been locked to stop workers having breaks (the youngest girl was 14 years old).

The owners were ‘indicted for murder’ but were acquitted and although the plaintiffs did win compensation to the amount of $75 per deceased victim the insurance company paid the owners about $60,000 more than the reported losses, or about $400 per casualty.

Actions by workers demonstrating against unsafe conditions were often treated harshly by the law as one socialist explained at the memorial service “every time the workers come out in the only way they know to protest against conditions which are unbearable, the strong hand of the law is allowed to press down heavily upon us. Public officials have only words of warning to us—warning that we must be intensely peaceable, and they have the workhouse just back of all their warnings. The strong hand of the law beats us back, when we rise, into the conditions that make life unbearable”

Change did come and some of it was driven by empathy but some of the drive came from fear of the upper and middle class of lower class revolution.

Also remember that Scrooge was a small business employer and although fiction the story was based in the facts of life in Victorian Britain and there are many places in the world where it could still be set.

What I’m saying that just because a business is small doesn’t mean it is going to be necessarily a ‘good’ and ‘moral’ business.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/apr/24/bangladesh-garment-workers-rights-rana-plaza-disaster

*

Now many right wingers shrug this off and say ‘oh that was all in the past’ the ‘free market’ wouldn’t do that now – but I’d remind people of the fable of the scorpion and the frog, and reply – it’s in its nature.

 

We used to have that separation, and we need to bring it back.

The problem here is that the right wing media and conservative politicians are distorting the standard definition of free market. At its core, the fundamental essence of a free marketplace is one where there is no committee, as someone else advocated in this thread, where they can take a vote and tell you, "There are already enough pizza places on this side of town. You will have to sell something else." There is also no formal authority setting your prices. Unless you are dealing with a regulated product such as drugs or alcohol, you can sell any product or service to anybody, anywhere, at any time, for any price that customers are willing to pay.

When right wingers tell us that labor, environmental, and safety regulations are just one step away from totalitarianism, I dismiss this as nothing more than political scare tactics aimed at those who have limited understanding of such issues. There is no pubic demand for contaminated food or buildings without fire exits. Repealing such regulations would help no one in the long run. They apply to everyone equally, so the competitive playing field is still level. The free market is in no way degraded or compromised.

 

I'd like to just add that when one mixes hyperbole with supposed factual information I find it hard to take the person providing such "information" seriously. Everyone is entitled to an opinion but I only take educated opinions seriously for consideration.

 

Karen

I disagree and I also think this allows for misunderstanding and the manipulation you hint at.

What you seem to approve of is a regulated market, a market that is limited by regulations where ‘you can sell any product or service to anybody’ as long as you comply with the rules and regulations that are currently being applied (oh and there is also the discrimination thing – eg not serving someone because they are black or gay etc).

A regulated market system should be about serving the interests of all, from workers to consumers to entrepreneurs up to and including the taxing of the market to supply infrastructure and welfare.

Thing is that many if not most left wingers are accepting of a regulated market that works in the best interests of everyone.

It is for that reason that I differentiate between a regulated market system and proposed ‘free market’ ideas put forward by neoliberals.

And if you don’t differentiate between them then people can get confused and that means they can be manipulated.

People can be bamboozled into supporting ‘free marketeers’ because they think they are supporters of the regulated system without realising that they are in fact the enemies of that system.

But as I’ve pointed out many people believe ‘socialism’ means hard-line soviet style Stalinism.

In the battle of ideas in the US the neo-liberal/free market crowd backed by a hell of a lot of money have gained a degree of dominance.

 

What most Americans think of as a regulated market is one where changes to prices and service options have to be approved in advance by a government agency. We used to have that system in our airline industry, and still have it for most utility monopolies, and most forms of insurance. When Reagan deregulated long distance telephone service and allowed competition, prices fell about 70%. That's the big success story that made a lot of people consider the word deregulation to be something close to magic. People came to expect similar benefits in other areas such as airlines, and it didn't happen. In some markets, deregulation made everything worse.

Obviously, the UK has had a very different history with economic regulation.

Cynical, manipulative GOP politicians seek to confuse price and availability regulation with other kinds of regulations, in the minds of voters. It would be helpful if public education did a better job of explaining the differences to future consumers.

A truly socialized economy treats nearly every business like a regulated monopoly. There isn't much interest in the US in such a system. We tend to see regulated monopolies as necessary evils. Nobody gets excited about the opportunity to do business with the US Postal Service, for example. Regulated markets tend to produce organizations that are sluggish, bloated, and unresponsive to their customers.

 

Karen

And as I’ve said that is the problem – what most Americans think – is what they have been taught to think – that is why so many think any type of socialism is (or will inevitably lead to) soviet style Stalinism.

What you describe above is basically a ‘command economy’

Command economy – the government controls all aspects of the economy [No market]

Mixed economy – allows private enterprise to run most businesses but with governments intervening in certain areas of the economy, such as regulation, taxation and spending money on public services. [Regulated market]

Free market economy – little or no regulation, little or no tax, little or no public services, the only job of governance is the protection of property. [Free market]

(Of course there are degrees of each)

What has been taught to many people both in America and elsewhere is that either/or black and white viewpoint that misses out the regulated market model – for it is fight between the a command economy or a free market economy.

This is done because it then becomes easier to manipulate people.

EITHER – have the government controlling everything and live in a world where organizations are sluggish, bloated, and unresponsive to their customers.

OR – be ‘free’ in a dynamic, innovative and customer responsive free market

BUT most countries in the world have Mixed economies [the regulated market model] because Command economies don’t seem to work and there never has been and never could be a Free market system because movement toward one increases the power and influence of wealth so much that it dominate the system and the markets (making it un-free).

To me that is the situation we have at the moment ‘free market’ policies have dramatically increased the power and influence of wealth, it hasn’t yet achieved complete dominance but if we carry on this road they will.

 

The GOP and Fox News started talking this shit less than 20 years ago.

Among those of us who are involved in the details of business on a daily basis, we still tend to speak of free or regulated markets only in terms of whether the prices are set by market forces or by a government agency, because that's the extent of the extremes that we've known here. More radical extremes that happen in other places are not anything that regularly comes up in the conversation. Most of us probably haven't thought seriously about radically different systems since our college days.

The biggest problem with government setting prices is that like gravity, the law of supply and demand seems to be a natural law that "fights back" when you try to defy it. Product and service shortages and black market activities are automatic responses that push hard to correct market imbalances that are artificially imposed. A high minimum wage is one example. If it is set too high by law, employers simply refuse to fill the jobs. Those workers end up with zero income, and the work goes undone, to the great frustration of consumers. Who wins in that scenario? Nobody.

 

I'm fine with business regulations that are carefully targeted to address specific, known problems. I hate broad regulations that are imposed for philosophical reasons. Always, the unintended consequences go beyond anyone's worst case scenario.

New York City has become one of those places where you can't do anything without filling out 20 forms for 20 different agencies, and getting approval two years later. The original intention might have been good, but it's just too much. I wouldn't do business there.

Regulation hasn't become intolerable in this state, except for a small number of significant exceptions. I'll give you a big one.

The EPA has a strict ozone limit that is enforced on a county by county basis. If your county has ozone levels above a certain number, no new air pollution permits can be issued for that county, no matter what. No exceptions. If an existing permit is allowed to expire, it can't be renewed.

On the surface, that might sound reasonable and logical, but the rule sometimes actually increases pollution. I know of a case where there was significant ozone drifting across the lines from other counties. Well, there are no exceptions made for that. If another county gives you too much ozone, then you aren't supposed to make any of your own. That means if an existing factory goes out of business, the next owner is not allowed to get an air pollution permit that is identical to the one that just expired for the previous owner. In fact, the new property owner can't produce any ozone at all. If the county's economy is entirely based on manufacturing, this rule essentially produces a job-free zone. So... what do the workers do? Commute to jobs in other counties, producing much more ozone than the local factory used to create! Their cars are not regulated. They can drive as far as they like, no matter what the consequences. The old factory becomes an abandoned building; a hangout for criminals and the homeless.
:wall:

When you go too far down the slippery slope of excessive, mindless regulation, this is where it often leads.

 

[SIZE=11pt]Karen [/SIZE]
[SIZE=11pt][/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]Is this what you mean –[/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]http://www.epa.gov/groundlevelozone/[/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]http://www.epa.gov/groundlevelozone/actions.html[/SIZE]

Under EPA’s Prevention of Significant Deterioration (PSD) program, new or expanding sources of air pollution, such as factories, industrial boilers or power plants, must obtain permits to ensure they use the most effective pollution controls and do not significantly worsen air quality in areas with clean air.

[SIZE=11pt][/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]Can you cite the case you are talking about so it can be examined? [/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]I mean it seems to be factored in at least in Nebraska [/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]Air pollution knows no boundaries. Many factors contribute to the fate and transport of pollutants including local or regional topography, wind direction and speed, weather patterns, type of pollutant, and sources of the pollutant. Due to these factors, it is possible for communities surrrounding a nonattainment area to be impacted by pollution in the nonattainment area. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]The state or local permitting authority or EPA may conduct a computer modeling analysis to help determine how the pollution in the region is being transported and what areas or sources are contributing to the regional pollution. Based on this analysis, the state or local air quality authority may need to work with the surrounding communities that potentially impact the nonattainment area to reduce their emissions. The degree to which surrounding communities or businesses must reduce their emissions will depend on their level of contribution, the type of pollutant, sources of the pollutant, and other factors specific to that region.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt][/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]Can you give me the name of the factory and the when and where this happened so I can examine it? [/SIZE]
[SIZE=11pt][/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]So you see the ozone regulation as excessive and mindless regulation, what would you have in its place? [/SIZE]

 

[SIZE=11pt]Karen[/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]And I’m arguing that this can lead to the type of confusion that is manipulated by neo-liberal free marketers.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]If people as you say actually want the regulated market model BUT also believe this is the ‘free market’ they can end up giving their support to neo-liberal free marketers who are in fact enemies of the regulated market model, wishing to destroy it in favour of a system that would only just serve the interests a few and be detrimental to the majority. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]I mean if you only talk about two views [/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]1] Free - set by market forces[/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]2] Regulated – set by a government agency[/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]Then you are in a way also doing the same thing as the GOP and Fox News[/SIZE]

 

A problem with paperwork and legal definition of terms has negatively impacted major portions of the most populated portions of this state, which is a curved area reaching from Charlotte through Greensboro to Raleigh. For over a hundred years, NC furniture manufacturers opened and closed, merged, changed names, and buildings were bought and sold. Most workers stuck around through several generations of corporate ownership. They didn't care what company name was on the paycheck. In more recent times, the air pollution permits for vacant facilities often expire or get canceled. A new owner has to fill out an application for a permit with the EPA, and the ancient building is then viewed as a new source of VOC pollution, which produces ozone. Ground level ozone is well over the limit in all the counties surrounding our larger cities, especially on the east and northeast sides, downwind of the normal prevailing winds, and is probably never going to get any better. If ten factories close in a smaller town and somebody wants to reopen one of them, the EPA can't legally take the loss of the other nine into consideration in their ruling. It's still considered to be a new source, under current regulations.

Those heavily customized buildings are completely worthless for other purposes, so nobody buys them. You won't find much documentation on this, because prospective owners are told verbally by the EPA that air permits to operate a furniture factory on that site will not be approved. So, nobody bothers to try it anymore. And nobody tries to bring high tech jobs into these little factory towns, because everybody knows they have the worst public schools in the state and the least valuable employees. It's a formula for constantly increasing poverty, longer commutes, and increasing air pollution.

It would be great if regional EPA offices had the authority to look at the details of a specific local ruling and make a determination as to whether it's likely to lead to increased or decreased air quality, especially if an appeal is made. There are relevant computer models available. Data on commuter traffic flow and average driving distance is available from the state DOT. Credit for reducing pollution should be given to companies that create or preserve jobs in places where jobs are most needed, and weighed against emissions from the plant site. Also, in general, air permits should come with the building. Change of ownership shouldn't matter so much.

The EPA can't tell people how far they can drive to work. The only thing they do to try to manage pollution from cars is restrict the construction of new highways, making it more difficult for people to make long commutes. This is a brain-dead approach. It's getting us nowhere. Maybe they need to rethink the whole strategy of how they try to manage regional air quality.

On the other hand, their water pollution rules have worked wonderfully. Creeks and rivers that were nasty in my childhood years are now full of fish, and I'm not aware of any jobs that have been lost as a result.

 

Regardless of whatever you and I might agree to be the very best, most accurate, pure terminology, the Wall Street Journal is never going to give two shits. Most of their readers don't have time to care about alternative economic systems in other countries and times in history, such as North Korea today or the pre-Thatcher UK.

I think we can agree that public education needs to do a much better job getting young people up to speed on basic economic concepts. None of them really want to live in a world dominated by free markets as you define them, which I think of as anarchy, chaos, and a lack of basic civilization. Nobody longs for a time when there were more restaurant poisoning deaths and more fires in theaters that resulted in hundreds of fatalities. Most people want my kind of free market, where they can spend their hard-earned money on the products and services that they choose, at market prices, without fear. If a young person doesn't understand the vast difference between the two, he doesn't deserve a high school diploma.

The most valuable thinking skills enable you to read between the lines and filter out the biases of various information sources. Word games don't work on such individuals.

 

[SIZE=11pt]Karen [/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt][/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]Of course the Wall Street Journal is not going to give a shit it’s owned by Rupert Murdock it’s just Fox News hiding in a business suite. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]I’m just explaining that calling what is a regulated market system a ‘free market’ system breeds the kind of confusion that can be and has been manipulated by neo-liberal free marketers who wish to dismantle the regulated market to favour of something that more favours the interests of a few to the detriment of the many. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt][/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]The regulated market system isn’t an ‘alternative’ if anything it is the norm, both the pre-Thatcher and post-Thatcher UK were examples of regulated market systems it’s just that post-Thatcher neo-liberal free market policies began to increasingly favour wealth (and laid the seeds of the financial crash, the hollowing out of manufacturing and the rundown of social services and programmes through marketisation). [/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt][/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]But if many people believe the vote is only between the ‘free market’ and ‘evil soviet socialism’ then they can end up voting for free marketeers that wish to destroy the regulated market that gives a semblance of what you term ‘basic civilization’[/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt][/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]Again you say ‘free market’ when you seem to be describing a regulated market, I mean how are people to be educated about the differences when someone like you who understands the differences doesn’t point out or even acknowledge the differences. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt][/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]Oh I disagree – words are incredibly important and the definition of what particular words mean is even more important. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]The thing is that the ability to ‘read between the lines and filter out the biases of various information sources’ is something that needs to be learnt and as has been pointed out on more than one occasion in this thread those type of skills are not been taught in many educational systems.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]But we could all help by been clear in what we say and in pointing out the differences in meaning that can sow the seeds of confusion. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]And one of those is to point out that a regulated market economy is not a ‘free market’ economy and in fact neo-liberal free market ideology would wish to destroy the regulated market and replace it with something both you and I believe would be ‘uncivilised’. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt][/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]Actually the extreme free market is usually termed [/SIZE][SIZE=11pt]anarcho-capitalism[/SIZE][SIZE=11pt] and - few anarchists would accept 'anarcho-capitalists' into the anarchist camp since they do not share a concern for economic equality and social justice. Their self-interested, calculating market men would be incapable of practising voluntary co-operation and mutual aid. Anarcho-capitalists, even if they do reject the State, might therefore best be called right-wing libertarians rather than anarchists.[Demanding the Impossible: A History of Anarchism by Peter Marshall][/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]But as I’ve said the free market dream is impossible but there are many wealth backed promoters pushing things in that direction because it has and could even more increase the power and influence of wealth. [/SIZE]

 

Here is an interesting article that seems to indicate that the Swedish experiment with marketdising the education system isn’t going well.

[SIZE=14pt]'It's a political failure': how Sweden's celebrated schools system fell into crisis [/SIZE]

International ratings have plummeted and inequality is growing after raft of changes including introduction of voucher system

“Pisa is the modern measure of a nation’s educational success and between 2000 and 2012 Sweden’s Pisa scores dropped more sharply than those of any other participating country, from close to average to significantly below average.

In the most recent Pisa assessment, in 2012, Sweden’s 15-year-olds ranked 28th out of 34 OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) countries in maths, and 27th in both reading and science, significantly below their Nordic neighbours.

Morale among teachers is low, there are concerns about unqualified teaching staff, discipline in some schools is poor and according to a damning report published by the OECD last month, the system is in need of “urgent change”….Fridolin,[ Sweden education minister] who has a degree in teaching, says not only have scores in international tests gone down, inequality in the Swedish system has gone up. “This used to be the great success story of the Swedish system,” he said. “We could offer every child, regardless of their background, a really good education. The parents’ educational background is showing more and more in their grades.

“Instead of breaking up social differences and class differences in the education system, we have a system today that’s creating a wider gap between the ones that have and the ones that have not.”


[SIZE=11pt]http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jun/10/sweden-schools-crisis-political-failure-education[/SIZE]

 

Maybe I should have used a different example. Murdock has nothing to do with this. He didn't change anything about the WSJ except make its editorials disgustingly partisan. Serious business publications from Bloomberg, Moody's, Baron's, Standard & Poors, Business Week, etc., are all written from the same point of view, for the same audience. They're for people with solid business backgrounds who spend every day dealing with business issues, not for university professors or their students. Similar to content on the CNBC cable network. Their audience is the people who make important business decisions in America. Not the academic world, or the general public.

Some politicians would have us believe that America's best days were when there were no regulations of any kind pertaining to health or safety. That's a lie straight from the pits of Hell. I could tell quite a few horror stories of death and suffering on a massive scale from that period of our history. It's hard to debate a liar, if the audience has no interest in verifying facts. Therefore, Fox continues to have its followers.

To some extent, this could be one of those cases of "two countries divided by a common language". Your car may look the same as mine, but mine doesn't have a boot or a bonnet, and yours doesn't have a hood or a trunk lid. Our regulated markets have a government agency controlling prices and consumer options.

I don't acknowledge the right of the right wing media or the GOP to redefine terms that have been in common use with a common definition in America for generations. A market of any kind is all about consumer options and decision making. Regulations that impact everyone equally play no role in marketplace choices.

It takes a lot more than a few words to accurately and honestly describe a modern economy, even on a very basic level. Those of us who understand it have to do the hard work of educating those who don't. There's no way around it. Changing or clarifying a few terms here and there isn't good enough.

 

Karen

No I don’t believe it is a case of "two countries divided by a common language", you seem to want to call a mixed or regulated market a free market to me that’s like saying there is no difference between a family Honda and an ISIS pick-up with a 50mm machine gun bolted in the back.

I mean look up the definition of ‘Free Market’ in wiki and it clearly differentiates it from a regulated market and a planned economic system –

A free market is a market system in which the prices for goods and services are set freely by consent between vendors and consumers, in which the laws and forces of supply and demand are free from any intervention by a government, price-setting monopoly, or other authority. A free market contrasts with a controlled market or regulated market, in which government intervenes in supply and demand through non-market methods such as laws creating barriers to market entry or directly setting prices.

It is normal to talk of the three economic systems I’ve mentioned (although some add a fourth the Traditional system)

[SIZE=11pt]Free market economy[/SIZE][SIZE=11pt] / Market Economy[/SIZE]
[SIZE=11pt]Command economy / Planned Economy[/SIZE]
[SIZE=11pt]Mixed economy[/SIZE][SIZE=11pt] / Regulated Market Economy [/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]And here is a US teacher giving a basic run down on the systems for her students - [/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZGqPtzAH5k[/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]And here is another called Economic Systems Overview - [/SIZE][SIZE=11pt]Economic Systems, traditional economy, free market economy, command economy, mixed economy[/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIzkUrXWhCo[/SIZE]

[SIZE=11pt]I would argue about points in both videos BUT they do explain the differences between the ‘free market’ and regulated market models. [/SIZE]

But to quote you they are not going to give two shits, so we need to point out the differences. As I keep pointing out there is a lot of money out there pushing ‘free market’ ideas that would not be in the interests of the majority of people.

That sound like you just don’t care what type of market it is as long as it is a market – and from pasted comments I don’t think that is what you mean – you seem to think that it is right and proper to have a regulated market rather than a free market one.

So why not say you prefer a mixed regulated economic system to a ‘free market’ one because saying you favour ‘free markets’ only seems guaranteed to cause confusion.

Yes and No

Yes - it takes a lot more than a few words to accurately and honestly describe a modern economy.

No – I think you can give a basic overview of the different economic systems.

I agree and disagree

Yes we need to educate but one of the fundamental starting points in education is to clarify terms within a discussion.

Which, I’m trying to do at the moment, by pointing out the differences between ‘free market’ and ‘regulated market’ economic models.

 

Again, it's just the age-old clash of academics versus practitioners. Professors speak in absolute terms, while graduates speak in relative terms that reflect their own experiences. I think it's always been that way.

 

Karen

Not sure what you mean?

I’ve met both professors, graduates and may who were niether and some have had absolutist views and other who haven't, but in this context could you please clarify your thinking?

 

I think I've run out of ways to explain this.