[Cyrus]

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You can't use reason with these people. These are the same ones who support minimum wage in the face of all evidence to the contrary, not to mention price controls in general. It's religion for them.

[/ QUOTE ] 1. Minimum wage: What evidence would that be ? Do we get to trot out again the relevant studies?
2. Price controls: I'm not in favor of controlling prices, in principle. There are areas in the economy where competition exists and in those areas price should be allowed to move freely -- with an anti-trust watchdog in place. (I know, I'm a hopeless romantic!) And there are areas where hidden or explicit monopolies/oligopolies operate; in such areas, the answer is not so straightforward. Not to me, at least.

(For instance, I have been into a lot of IPOs in European and non-European countries where the issue was an ex-utility that henceforth would both be a private company and a state-santioned monopoly!)

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These are the same folks who with a straight face will state sheer nonsense such as that Bush's tax cut is bad for the middle class.

[/ QUOTE ] Don't be absurd.

Every individual that gets a tax break, has an immediate benefit. The question is whether or not this is good also for "the whole of individuals", i.e. the economic status of the society. (For example, faced with a significant & growing budget deficit, the government decides to proceed with a huge tax cut. Clever or stupid? Ronald Reagan's administration admitted it was stupid.)


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It's the same people who hate WalMart ... because it's Walmart's fault they are hiring low-wage, low-skilled workers with few opportunities for any other kind of work and are paying them accordingly.

[/ QUOTE ] The antipatrhy towards Wal-Mart is certainly not because they are a job provider!

It's because Wal-Mart uses the worst possible capitalist practices to destroy neighborhoods, chase away long-time inhabitants from their homes, drive small suppliers to the wall, treat low-level employees like trash, strong-arm unions away, and so forth.

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They are convinced the oil companies are immune to competition.

[/ QUOTE ] If you knew how laughable this statement is, you would not laugh.

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These are the same folks who think that nationlizing certain industries is a good idea. Public Power! Yeah!

[/ QUOTE ] OK you are ranting now. Must be that period of the week. Bye.