March 6, 2013 The Signal page 13
Opinions
Free yourself from free market mentality By Jack Werner
The market fundamentalists and libertarians have seized the College campus. IHS, “The Morality of Capitalism,” The Students for Liberty, really any of these organizations you see all advocate the same thing — laissez-faire markets. It’s so pervasive that even YouTube videos are showing ads about the wonders of capitalism and markets. So what is all this? And, more importantly, are they right? Let me say right now, before I go any further, that they’re wrong. Totally wrong. So next time you see them trying to “spread freedom,” I want you to think to yourself, “Nope, that’s absolute nonsense.” What do you mean you don’t love the market? That’ll probably be the first question you receive. Of course, this will be followed by a basic lesson in microeconomics about supply and demand curves. And this is wrong why? Simply put: the myth of perfect information. Let me give you an example. Let’s say you’re trying to buy gas for your car. In the perfect competition model (the one with supply and demand curves), you’ll never buy gasoline somewhere that it’s more expensive, because why would you? The price of gasoline is said to stay at equilibrium. But, have you ever bought gas somewhere more expensive, only to slap yourself on the knee and say, “Dammit! It’s cheaper over there!” How come you didn’t know that? Well, frankly, there is no perfect information. It’s a myth. In other words people consistently buy goods well above their “market price.” Yeah, what’s your point….? My point is that libertarians base their ideas on perfect competition and perfect information. It’s why they praise capitalism and markets. Once you
realize that these arguments are based on models, not the real world, libertarianism seems very dangerous. Deregulation! We want Deregulation! That’s the next line you’ll probably hear from the Tea Partyist or Ron Paulian. The best way to dismantle this argument is to point out the ways regulations engendered greater freedom in the market throughout history. Let’s take Ida M. Tarbell, John D. Rockefeller and Standard Oil, for example. From 1882 to 1911, Rockefeller was one of the most powerful men in the entire country. Prior to the federal government stepping in, Standard Oil controlled roughly 90 percent of the refined oil flows in the United States. How’d he do it? Was it just being competitive? Well, I mean, if you think intimidation, back room deals, and sending your own private army to put people out of business is competitive, then yes, Rockefeller was quite competitive. There was a reason he could start business meetings by saying, “Join me or else.” What a great entrepreneur, right? Without Ida M. Tarbell’s compelling History of the Standard Oil Company and the Sherman Antitrust Act, who knows how long Rockefeller would have ruled the free market. Well, that led to lower prices for oil right? That’s good for the consumers! Zing! True, Standard Oil’s practices did lead to lower prices. But, at what market and social cost? Poor working conditions? A large, multinational, corporate empire? If you really believed in the free market, you wouldn’t defend large corporations and the tactics they use to systematically conceal the truth. Perhaps, if you knew what Coca Cola or Nestle Tea did to bring you a bottle of soda for $1.50, you wouldn’t buy it. As prominent intellectual Noam Chomsky said, “Businesses
put enormous efforts into ensuring that uniformed consumers will make irrational choices.” I can’t think of a better argument myself. I don’t know. I’m not convinced. Well, let me try again. Two words: “Big Tobacco.” Beginning in 1952, the first news was published linking cigarettes to cancer. At first, Tobacco CEOs panicked. But two years later, they released the famous “A Frank Statement to Cigarette Smokers.” What exactly did it say? “We accept an interest in people’s health as a basic responsibility, paramount to every other consideration in our business.” Wow! The free market really does care about costumers! Corporate Responsibility! Imagine the surprise then in 1994, when it was revealed that Brown and Williamson Tobacco Corporation contracted a scientist named Dr. James F. Chaplin to genetically engineer tobacco to double nicotine levels from about 3.4 to about 6 percent. This was after decades of informing the public that companies were working for “lowtar, low-nicotine products.” That’s the free market at work. Tobacco companies had no regulation; they advertised to whomever they wanted and created misinformation. My overarching question to the libertarians out there, then: did government intervention in the Tobacco industry help people or not? If it did help, that’s regulation and taking away the rights of business at the max. We’re bombarded with a lot of information nowadays. I’m not sure why people have taken up laissez-faire capitalism again. Maybe it’s all the Ayn Rand and Milton Friedman literature that is reemerging. Or maybe it’s the poor economic conditions since the 2007-2008 Great Recession. Regardless, let’s not turn to an erratic, naive solution. Please, we already did that once, his name was George W. Bush.
The five worst people to meet at a concert AP Photo
An example of ‘the over-zealous fan,’ crowd surfing into a naked coma. By Craig Ismali
Every time I attend a concert, I tend to run into people that are your average, runof-the-mill bad concert-goer. I have seen the concert-goer who yells at the opening band to get off the stage, the person who screams for the headlining band to play their biggest hit right as the band starts their first song, and the fan who hits the open bar in the venue early and often countless times. All these people, while annoying, I can tolerate. But the following five subjects take the annoying quotient and ratchet it up to a level that makes concert-going a sometimes unbearably annoying task. The concept for this article was loosely based off Mitch Albom’s “Five People You Meet in Heaven,” if Mitch Albom was a masochist and paid 25 dollars to have a run in with the most awful people he could possibly meet in heaven. 5. The Shield Boyfriend/Bubble People. “Bubble People” — (noun) People who are
not made aware that purchasing a ticket to a sold out general admission show means giving up your right to a three-feet bubble of “personal space.” The Shield Boyfriend and Bubble People are lumped together in this list because often they are a couple attending the show together. The Bubble People will become fickle if they are shoved, but are so passive aggressive that they will almost never physically push back. That’s where the Shield Boyfriend comes in. He feels it his sacred duty as a man to protect his woman in the crowd. If that’s what the guy has to do to stay out of the doghouse, then good for him; but perhaps next time it’s best to stay out of a rowdy crowd if you are worried about your companion’s well-being. 4. The over-zealous fan. These are the opposite of bubble people. The overzealous fan makes his presence physically known to those around him. This is the guy who just “cares so much about the band” that he has to express it in the most obnoxious ways possible. This particular offender can be seen a) crowd surfing 30 times in one song b) generally not giving a damn about anyone else in the crowd’s well-being and c) finding the tiniest girl in the crowd he can and “accidentally” kicking her in the face. 3. Mosh Pit Mafia. This class of concert-goer keeps busy by beating up invisible ninjas and generally looking like bigger douchebags than NBC when they cancelled “Community.” This group of people is the most likely to step on somebody when they
fall down in the crowd instead of picking the person up (a cardinal sin in my concertgoing handbook) simply because they are too busy being “br00tal” and getting the metal out. They are most likely to be found wearing a metal-core band’s custom basketball jersey and a snapback hat with the label still on the brim. 2. The Guy Who Yells “Freebird.” Please don’t ever be this guy. This joke wasn’t funny 20 years ago, and it certainly isn’t funny now. If I am ever sent back in time, I know that one of my stops will be in 1973 to stop Lynyrd Skynyrd from ever releasing this song. 1. Paparazzi. We’ve all seen them. The people who spend all night looking at the stage through the tiny screen of their old LG Chocolate, recording the show in 30 second clips of dark, lo-res images of little pixels which may or may not be the lead singer. Is this person ever really going to watch the concert over again on their camera phones? This video they had to have is just going to take up space on his or her phone’s memory card until the culprit deletes it to have more room for duck-faced mirror photos. Or worse, they will post the video on Youtube, where decent concert footage will be blocked out by 20 videos that sound somewhere between radio static and New York Subway terminal. Adam Lazzara of Taking Back Sunday has made it a regular part of the band’s set to denounce his support for this type of concert-goer. “What I’m trying to say is ... you spend all day everyday behind this little screen,”
Lazzara said during the band’s recent tour. “So why are you going to pay a lot of money and come here and spend it behind this small, little screen? I’m right here. Be with me!” He said it better than I could have possibly said it myself, explaining with certainty why this is my least favorite type of concert-goer. Each one of these types of concert-goers will appear at different concerts to varying degrees. Some may only have one or two of the types in attendance if it is a particularly well-behaved show. While some shows may entirely consist of this awful cesspool of terrible human characteristics. In fact, you may even have taken one of these stereotypical roles once or twice if you’ve been to enough concerts (please don’t write in and tell me you are a Juggalo), but now that you are aware of your etiquette-breaking past, you can enjoy future shows without aggravating everyone around you.
AP Photo
‘Free Bird’ is not a good song. It was never a good song. Please stop.
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