Comments by "bakters" (@bakters) on "STICK TO BANKS! (And did the National Socialist state raise living standards or benefit the poor?)" video.

@iamcleaver6854 "Today, it is easier to implement then ever." Yes, and it's coming. That way we will hopefully solve the obesity problem... Strangely, that problem mostly affects the poor. How do you guys manage to keep all of this in your heads? We face mass obesity in a market based economy, while centrally planned and tightly controlled economies result in famine with annoying regularity, yet central planning and tight government control is the solution! It's got to be tiring to keep on ignoring the obvious.
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@aleksazunjic9672 "It is far better to use coupons then to have mass starvation." Coupons become currency then. The rich can buy all the coupons and still have access to all the goods. I've seen it myself, it's not a "theory", it's what actually happens. "While coupons are not ideal, they are only solution in case of shortages." Shortages primarily come from destroying the purchasing power of currency. In a reasonably free market economy, there are no shortages, only high prices. If the prices are forcibly kept low, people buy more than they need, which results in shortages. Do you remember the toilet paper shortage from two years ago? If the sellers were free to rise the price of goods, that would never happen. The shops would rise the price to the point, when they can't sell any more, so there would be some toilet paper left, albeit very expensive. You freeze the prices, you are guaranteed to get shortages. Even without any other intervention.
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@kykloskatharevousa7147 "economy based on coupons" Just think about it for a moment. What is a coupon? A government issued piece of paper which can be exchanged for goods. Seems quite like money to me. It's just another currency. When they destroy one currency, they produce another one in its stead. It solves nothing.
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@iamcleaver6854 "we should hand out apples and lean meat" It's been tried. Many times and in various ways. It does not work. Humans crave fat and sugar, because those foods represented what used to be the highest quality food in our evolutionary past. It's just that not everybody is controlled by their cravings to the same extent. Those who can reign themselves in, tend to do better in life. "cannon afford better quality food" Well, they surely can afford eating less.
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@aleksazunjic9672 "Great Irish Famine" Ireland was a colony, tightly controlled by British bureaucracy. If they were free, they'd revolt, so they were not free. The government reacted way too late to effectively solve the issue. Was Bengal similar to that? While perfectly free markets do not really exist, the amount of government control often varies. It is true, that the tighter the control, the less effective the markets become. Your examples rather show, that restricting the freedoms can result in very serious consequences.
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@aleksazunjic9672 "In fact, starvation was constant part of life." That's simply not true. For example, Poland has never experienced famine, as of yet. It may change shortly. Market based economies do not result in starvation. If the food becomes more expensive, people invest more effort into producing food. It only happens when there is a large scale disaster, like war or large scale crop failures (Bronze Age Collapse, for example). Anyway, let's imagine that some climatic disaster happens, crops fail all over the world, then how are you supposed to solve this issue by coupons? Will this piece of paper produce nonexistent food out of thin air? On the other hand, socialistic policies do result in famine, and that's why I'm worried about our future.
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@januslast2003 "Whether a subsidy is good or bad depends on the frame of reference." I agree with that. Libertarian capitalism is an utopia, just like communism, meaning that it works best on paper, but in reality it always fails at some point. For example, capitalism encourages efficiency, which leads to specialization (aka, it's cheaper to buy food, so we stop producing it). That's great, until you factor in the disasters. Those happen both in economies and in nature. From observing nature we can conclude, that while specialist species can thrive under stable conditions, they are the first to die out when the inevitable happens. Another problem is simply force. Libertarian capitalism assumes, that no one will ever use force to get what they want. That no one will ever unite, in order to obtain more force. That's very unrealistic. When we factor that and similar aspects in, we end up somewhere close to the gray area of observed reality.
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@iamcleaver6854 "free food, eat apples" Apples are "free" now? Grand. Hogs like apples a lot, hogs grow fat, humans like fat a lot ... profit! "taxes collected" From what? Last time this "healthy food" idea was tried around here, the stores in schools forced to sell apples and carrots, which no kids wanted, instead of chocolate and icecream, which all of them want, started running at a loss. How can you tax something, which runs at a loss? (Anyway, apples are just sugar and starch. Carrots are sugar and starch too. Starch is a more complex version of sugar anyway. Fortunately, all those starches and sugars can be turned into alcohol... Profit?)
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@aleksazunjic9672 "coupons are evenly distributed unlike mone" Regardless of the distribution model, there will be people who end up having more than you. You know why. You know you hate it. "but [since] it is unavoidable" there is very little you can do about it. Dilat.. deal with it!
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@iamcleaver6854 "I am totally against private charity." Which has been proven by your own leftist "researchers", and it has been publicized only because they thought their "research" has shown something else. "If I am in need" Even a leftist can speak the truth once in a while. It's all about "me", isn't it? "as it milked through taxes for all it is worth" Then the market is not very free, but you don't mind it, because you hate it anyway. Why do you hate it so much? Because somebody else is going to come up on top, not you. That is a true statement, and you know it.
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@iamcleaver6854 "and use the tax revenue to lower prices on carrots and apples" If you do that, then I could buy carrots and apples cheaper than I can grow them. Why would I grow them then? Tell me, please. I do grow both, atm. "if you want to fill yourself with extra calories, do as you will" So, what are you actually solving here? The poor can stuff themselves full with free "healthy" food, then finish it off with what they actually want, because they can suddenly afford it. I repeat, what problem have you solved? ""leftist", whatever it even means. I never said I am." You proposed policies, which are unavoidably lefty. Sorry, but as long as you think what you seem to be thinking, you are a lefty. "Of cause it is about myself." I know. It's just that you guys like to claim high moral grounds. Which usually you do not deserve. "price controls. Taxes don't make the market less free." You want "free" apples and "expensive" candies. That's price control. You propose to do it by means of taxes. You contradict yourself. "The market should serve the nation" How about, "the market should serve the people"? That's easy to do.
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@iamcleaver6854 "the government would pay you for it! The tax revenue" Per hektar dedicate or per ton? In the first case, it's the most beneficial for me to fill some papers, collect my subsidy and do nothing. In the second case the most economical solution is to not even do that. Just "buy" underpriced carrots and sell them at a profit to the gobment. You know what, I have a better idea. How about the gobment takes away my land and plants those apples themselves? Yeah, I know it's been tried, but this time it's gonna be all right... "The people who before couldn't afford to buy healthy food now can." I'll tell you a secret. They always could afford to eat less junk and buy some carrots instead. They could always afford home cooking, which is cheaper than take-aways. They just do not want to do it. "What do I seem to be thinking?" You think that government has the means, the reasons and justifications to force the population. It's totalitarian attitude, where government intervenes into almost every aspect of life. Because that's where it will end up, and unfortunately that's where we are going anyway. "It is hilarious. Most liberals end up calling me a fascist. To libertarians I am apparently a lefty" I don't think it's funny at all. There is no contradiction here. BTW - I am not a libertarian. "If the government ORDERED to sell a product at a particular price" That's what they end up doing. If the stores could make profit by selling cheap, then they would still search for a better price elsewhere, where there are no/less subsidizing. If they don't make any profit from selling cheap, they need to be forced into carrying those products. The only way in which we can combat all that is by total control. The producers need to be tightly controlled, the suppliers, the sellers. Everybody. Just to have some "cheap" apples... Apples are cheap anyways! You go on with your scheme, there will be no apples . I have seen it. In real life!
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@bloodhawk122 "you just make animal feed also cheap" So cheap, that it makes composting it all profitable? Because compost is not cheap... How about burning it all for fuel? It already occasionally happens, that grains are cheaper than any other source of fuel. You want to "make" it a permanent state? Why then would anyone want to produce grains at a loss? Let me guess, total control and judicious use of the penitentiary system? Basically, you can't control prices without overreaching totalitarian systems running at full blast. That's what you want? Good. You may yet be able to experience it all.
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