kapil
The Kapil
join:2000-04-26
Chicago, IL
| O RLY? Now, seriously, aside from the T fanboys, who didn't see this coming?
Allow a company to be a virtual monopoly, take away the regulatory oversight and what do you get? ...ask anyone who lived in USSR....no choice, high prices.
Who is surprised by this?
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pnh102
Reptiles Are Cuddly And Pretty
Premium
join:2002-05-02
Mount Airy, MD
 ·Comcast
| Re: O RLY? said by kapil  :...ask anyone who lived in USSR....no choice, high prices. They had DSL in the USSR?
Heck, did most of the people in the USSR even have access to landline phone service at all?
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Only SHATNER is Kirk. | |
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kapil
The Kapil
join:2000-04-26
Chicago, IL
| Re: O RLY? said by pnh102 :They had DSL in the USSR? Heck, did most of the people in the USSR even have access to landline phone service at all? No...but they did have lots of government sanctioned and owned monopolies. Which resulted in zero choice for the consumer.
You want a car? Call The Car Company. You want Bread, call The Bread Company. Just like now, in the U.S., you want DSL, call AT&T (or Verizon, depending on who owns copper in your neck of the woods)
Don't you see? lack of government oversight has landed us in such a swamp that we will be lucky if we escape it....the mortgage mess from lack of oversight of banks is not that much different from the lack of competition in the communications field due to lack of oversight of telcos.
This hands-off policy of the last 7-8 years has bankrupted this country and lined the pockets of the very few at the top.
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| | Austinloop
join:2001-08-19
Austin, TX
| Re: O RLY? I would take exception to your assumption that the lack of oversight of banks is the cause of the mortgage mess. The blame needs to be shared with those people that took out mortgages that they knew would be a problem for them to repay when the interest rate changed. You have just as much greed from the individual buyers, in some cases, as you do from the banks. | |
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kapil
The Kapil
join:2000-04-26
Chicago, IL
| Re: O RLY? said by Austinloop :I would take exception to your assumption that the lack of oversight of banks is the cause of the mortgage mess. The blame needs to be shared with those people that took out mortgages that they knew would be a problem for them to repay when the interest rate changed. You have just as much greed from the individual buyers, in some cases, as you do from the banks. Yes, nothing can substitute personal responsibility. Individual...and at the corporate level.
A LOT of people knew they were taking advantage of system with holes in it.....but a lot of innocent homeowners got taken for a ride. There are no innocent mortgage brokers or real estate brokers, or lender, or appraisers. And I work in that industry.
Realtors have a fiduciary and ethical responsibility to act in the best interest of their clients. Mortgage brokers aren't fiduciary, but to have a legal mandate to do things legally and ethically. Appraisers are also ethically and legally bound to do things right...lenders have more laws that bind them.
But everyone let greed take over. Lot of that going around these part 8 years.
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| | | | Austinloop
join:2001-08-19
Austin, TX
1 edit | Re: O RLY? Isn't ethics and the entire real estate industry, like used car sales, an oxymoron??
And the above observation was made prior to the past 7 years. | |
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| | | | kcir
join:2005-07-30
Butner, NC | To make matters worse executives of this failing companies are leaving with severance packages in the tens if not hundreds of millions of dollars. WTF is the only comment I can come up with. | |
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pnh102
Reptiles Are Cuddly And Pretty
Premium
join:2002-05-02
Mount Airy, MD
·Comcast
| I blame the banks as much as I blame the borrowers.
It isn't like the banks don't have tools with which they can verify peoples' credit. The banks knew full well that these borrowers were in no position to pay these loans back once the rates re-adjusted but chose to lend the money anyway.
Any "bailout" will simply enrich these banks at the expense of the taxpayers, and only serve to encourage more bad loans.
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Only SHATNER is Kirk. | |
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bogey780
join:2004-03-19
Here
| Clearly you slept through clas the day they taught market economics ad why the USSR had no choice and outstripped demand.
By having central planning dictate what would be produced and for how much it would be sold for, there ended up being a glut of cheap poorly made products on the market. But because that's all people could get they'd always be a high demand because central planners would almost always fail to predict demand because of naive notions on politics and economics.
It had nothing to do with monpolistic practices. Unless you consider the USSRs monopoly on force as counting.
So why you think central plannig can fix this is anyone's guess. | |
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| grandpinaple
join:2006-01-03
New York, NY
1 edit | Re: O RLY? Actually central economic planning is a rather successful method of running the government and there have been multiple examples of this in the past (most of them aren't PC though). The real downfall of the USSR was caused by the lack of incentive because everyone paid according to their need and ability rather than being paid according to what the market decides, that is the socialist/communist versus capitalist philosophy. Also the USSR cared more about buying weapons than caring for its people. So you have pig farms, but no ham, instead you have pig farms and AK47's are what make it to market. | |
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| | bogey780
join:2004-03-19
Here | Re: O RLY? Outside of a small commune I don't see where you could find successful central planning. | |
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| | | grandpinaple
join:2006-01-03
New York, NY | Re: O RLY? The third Reich, China, Japan... | |
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| | | | bogey780
join:2004-03-19
Here
| Re: O RLY? Hey now..to be fair they weren't exactly the same. Those were more fascist/socialist in that the state and industry worked together. China less so... but when it was a strong central planner it stunk. Remember all that wasted Chinese steel from the GLF? | |
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| | | | | grandpinaple
join:2006-01-03
New York, NY
| Re: O RLY? True, but what does it really mean to be a fascist/socialist state. I mean political ideology is separate from economic planning to a certain extent. On some levels fascism promoting national unity may have been helpful, but on the other hand human evolutionary psychology would indicate that humans don't give a rats ass beyond their immediate social circle. Then we have the Japanese example as well to consider, which makes Weimar Germany a valid example.
The Chinese steel example makes sense, but we can offer equal anecdotal evidence against non centrally planned capitalist states (bridges to no where, franchise agreements, etc?). We are also talking about a China that isn't plagued by overly nationalistic ambitions (China in the status quo). Certainly under Mao you could say central planning was a failure. Capitalism was a failure under certain African states. In reality those failures were a result of political climate. | |
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| | | | emptywig
Huh? What?
Premium
join:2002-08-05
Pasadena, TX | Seems to me the Third Reich's planning sucked pretty bad.
wig | |
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