Recent content by ghotiblue

I admittedly don't know too much about the nullification process, but I thought the whole point was for a state to establish its sovereignty and therefore elect to simply ignore the federal law. If the state is asserting its sovereignty and right to decide for itself when a law is...

I'm not a fan of this guy's idea of the "radical center", but I think he makes some good suggestions for changing the current two-party political structure. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/24/opinion/24friedman.htm I think implementing alternative voting would allow third parties to have a...

I like the example (WDW) to a certain extent, but I would think it could be easily refuted by saying that WDW still has to abide by US law and they are held accountable to the US government. People could claim that were the government not there, WDW could very easily abuse the power it has.

Income taxes. I'm not advocating anyone do this so much as discussing the potential of such a protest. However, I do agree with Thoreau in that if one feels the government to be acting unjustly yet continues to support it, they are also supporting the injustices.

I've been thinking a lot tonight about civil disobedience through refusal to pay taxes in support of a government which one finds to be immoral and unjust. I think it is a terrific way to voice displeasure with government and stand up to an unjust system. However, I also think that it can be...

The Whole Foods Alternative to ObamaCare I didn't see this posted but thought this was a pretty good article that has been getting some attention from lots of people on the left. A lot of them aren't happy with the CEO of Whole Foods, and there is a lot of talk of boycotts...

Don't get me wrong... I'm not arguing for regulation. I want the government out of the market as much as the next guy. I'm just trying to understand how natural monopolies fit in to Austrian Theory.

Of course they could have. But if one person bought up all of those factories and labor, then the only competition is from overseas. A company could continue to grow and force out competition by being the most appealing option to consumers, until they were at a place where they were not worried...

I honestly don't know if I can. I would have to think about it. The closest I can come off the top of my head would be an industry like the auto industry, where the entry costs are very prohibitive and an already established business would have a large advantage over any prospective...

I never claimed that Wal-Mart operates under a free market. The original question is not about Wal-Mart at all, but rather a hypothetical question about how the market would respond to a business with a market share large enough to keep would-be competitors from entering the market, due to...

So I guess you disagree with this article on the Mises site, then? The article even states, "In a free market, large suppliers of nearly everything will drive most small suppliers out of business." I just happened to run across this while looking into Wal-Mart a little more.

But buying in large quantites is definitely cheaper (per unit) than buying in small quantities, so even without the government tax breaks, Wal-Mart would have an advantage. Additionally they have extremely efficient distribution techniques that would be difficult or impossible to recreate on a...

This is the way I see it... Big businesses (such as Wal-Mart) are generally more efficient due simply to their large volume of business. As a business grows, they can offer better products at lower prices than their competitors by lowering costs of production in ways that smaller businesses...

I completely understand and agree that under normal circumstances, a monopoly cannot be formed outside of government regulation (at least not one which exploits the consumer), but I have been wondering lately about how the free market would keep large companies from monopolizing resources needed...

Thanks for the replies. I'm thinking I'll start at the source and read "The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money" by Keynes. Any other recommendations?