My Questions

Questions about Objectivism
1

I really appreciate the replies I’ve been receiving my other threads, the ones about Canada & Australia’s responses to the financial crisis and about America’s Gilded Age. I just have so many questions though. I figured that it’d be more practical just to make one thread with my questions, rather than many different threads. I really appreciate the answers you all give me; I don’t know where else I’d be able to get most of them, except out of Rand’s books, which I’m slowly but surely reading.

My questions to you are:

1a. It is commonly asserted by Objectivists that in an Objectivist society, disputes about, say, pollution or fraud would be handled by litigation, not by regulation. That instead of the government imposing fossil fuel limits or checking every product to make sure it does what it says it does, if there is a dispute, then the victim must sue the aggressor and the court system will handle it. How can we do this though, when suing someone, especially a big corporation, is so unaffordable to many people? I mean, I guess if a corporation is screwing over one person, chances are it’s screwing over many people, and there’s monetary power in numbers. But what if the dispute only involves one person, and that person can’t afford to sue his aggressor?

1b. On the same subject… What about companies that are effectively sue-proof? For instance, a company like Disney, which deals with personal injury and wrongful death suits by having very good lawyers and by employing a large amount of people in the towns so that it’s impossible to get a neutral jury.

  1. I firmly believe, as you all do, that coercive monopolies only form as a result of government interference in the market. But I am frequently asked where the evidence for this is. Since there has never been a true laissez-faire society, is there any evidence for this?

  2. Doesn’t the early American auto industry blow this theory of monopolies to smithereens? For instance, GM used its monetary power to buy out Oakland and many other car companies. Wasn’t the early American auto industry almost totally unregulated? If so, how could three (later two) car companies consolidate so much power?

  3. Do corporations have the same rights as individuals? If so, isn’t this a problem since corporations have limited liability and diffused responsibility and accountability?

  4. How would you react to the claim that economic depressions are chiefly caused by “financial markets breaking down”?

  5. If the housing bust occurred because the American government decided everyone needed to own a home and used the Fed to artificially lower interest rates, then why did housing bubbles burst in other countries? Were their governments doing the same things as the American government?

  6. In terms of the economy, was 19th-century America better than today’s America? Or worse? If it was worse, then how can we defend laissez-faire capitalism, since that is the closest we’ve ever come to laissez-faire capitalism?

  7. What about company towns? By company towns, I mean when a company owns all the land in a town and controls who works and lives there. Usually, it was a mining company that set up a town in the middle of nowhere and took steps to make sure that their workers made just enough money not to starve, or gave them the option to earn more but go into debt while doing so. Aren’t these a problematic byproduct of unregulated capitalism?

I apologize for all the questions. Sometimes, I’m just terrible confused. I greatly appreciate any and all replies!

2
  1. Do corporations have the same rights as individuals? If so, isn’t this a problem since corporations have limited liability and diffused responsibility and accountability?

There are a few threads about this: here’s one (and it has a link to another).

Similarly, I suggest using the Search to find info on some of the other topics.

3

I really appreciate the replies I’ve been receiving my other threads, the ones about Canada & Australia’s responses to the financial crisis and about America’s Gilded Age. I just have so many questions though. I figured that it’d be more practical just to make one thread with my questions, rather than many different threads. I really appreciate the answers you all give me; I don’t know where else I’d be able to get most of them, except out of Rand’s books, which I’m slowly but surely reading.

/ and that’s all there is to Objectivism officially, Ayn Rand’s works and how you understand and apply them to your life. Our answers are not endorsed by Ayn Rand for metaphysical circumstances, so double check with her volumes of work and also use your own imagination to figure out how “it would be”. I’ll now gladly provide a piece of mine because I extract a personal benefit in doing so (so thanks for raising the questions!)

My questions to you are:

1a. It is commonly asserted by Objectivists that in an Objectivist society, disputes about, say, pollution or fraud would be handled by litigation, not by regulation.

Yes but all property would also be private and within private land and systems owners be it shareholders, home owners, etc, are able to set rules and internal codes which are a non coercive form of regulation. By means of a contract one would enter one or another system (by means of living or working in or passing by, private land) thus reducing the amount of potential lawsuits which is a very valid point. Everything has its downturn and I also suspected that would be one out of a contractual society.

That instead of the government imposing fossil fuel limits or checking every product to make sure it does what it says it does, if there is a dispute, then the victim must sue the aggressor and the court system will handle it. How can we do this though, when suing someone, especially a big corporation, is so unaffordable to many people? I mean, I guess if a corporation is screwing over one person, chances are it’s screwing over many people, and there’s monetary power in numbers. But what if the dispute only involves one person, and that person can’t afford to sue his aggressor?

That scenario applies a future speculatively “Objectivist” court system under the actual real circumstances. You can’t have both the FDA and the contractual lawsuit society at the same time (other than during transition). People will still want to eat non toxic stuff, private agencies can compete in qualifying products better than a single agency, so long as those private agencies live in a world where money is not also monopolized in another single agency per country.

1b. On the same subject… What about companies that are effectively sue-proof? For instance, a company like Disney, which deals with personal injury and wrongful death suits by having very good lawyers and by employing a large amount of people in the towns so that it’s impossible to get a neutral jury.

Then don’t go to Disney, or don’t become a Scientologist which better describes your example.

It’s like going to a fourth world country on vacations you run the risk of gratuitous police brutality, but you still chose to do it without anyone forcing you. The beaches of Anobon, Equatorial Guinea, or Imperial Beach, ca might seem beautiful but whom do you sue when you find that the sand in the beach has been emanating dumped toxins…

  1. I firmly believe, as you all do, that coercive monopolies only form as a result of government interference in the market. But I am frequently asked where the evidence for this is. Since there has never been a true laissez-faire society, is there any evidence for this?

  2. Doesn’t the early American auto industry blow this theory of monopolies to smithereens? For instance, GM used its monetary power to buy out Oakland and many other car companies. Wasn’t the early American auto industry almost totally unregulated? If so, how could three (later two) car companies consolidate so much power?

  3. Do corporations have the same rights as individuals? If so, isn’t this a problem since corporations have limited liability and diffused responsibility and accountability?

  4. How would you react to the claim that economic depressions are chiefly caused by “financial markets breaking down”?

  5. If the housing bust occurred because the American government decided everyone needed to own a home and used the Fed to artificially lower interest rates, then why did housing bubbles burst in other countries? Were their governments doing the same things as the American government?

  6. In terms of the economy, was 19th-century America better than today’s America? Or worse? If it was worse, then how can we defend laissez-faire capitalism, since that is the closest we’ve ever come to laissez-faire capitalism?

  7. What about company towns? By company towns, I mean when a company owns all the land in a town and controls who works and lives there. Usually, it was a mining company that set up a town in the middle of nowhere and took steps to make sure that their workers made just enough money not to starve, or gave them the option to earn more but go into debt while doing so. Aren’t these a problematic byproduct of unregulated capitalism?

I apologize for all the questions. Sometimes, I’m just terrible confused. I greatly appreciate any and all replies!

Go apologize somewhere else! be proud to have a curious mind, you are not forcing anyone to answer.

  1. Objectivism is not Platonic, don’t believe in a perfect world, in the same way, we can’t expect (perhaps in the future but certainly not in the past) a perfectly anything. The ideology of the Renaissance was after all within the context of Christianity (luckily in its self detriment). In the same way the freer market of the Industrial Revolution was after all within the context of the British Empire with its many monopolies on natural resources but also with its free trade within the Empire. That, in the worst case (the best being 19th c USA)is evidence that the free market produces amazing results.

3.maybe it’s more efficient to have about that number of auto companies in just one country. surely without later regulations new companies or branches would have tapped the compact auto market instead of giving it free to the Japanese and Koreans.

  1. No, intrinsically they can’t have. It is much of a problem in the biggest Corporation of all, the United States of America. But you might have a point here worth exploring in another thread.

  2. with fatigue and exasperation

  3. YES. and as in the above answer, if a developer over develops, in a free market it’d be his fault and a risk he’d probably not take. In Uruguay and in Brazil the international housing crisis has not dropped the value of the square meter because there’s never been too much lending. That sucks in good times, but saves us in bad times. Can’t have risk, growth and protection and ultra safe safety net at the same time - unless you are wise and magical enough to have your cake and eat it too, but I don’t have that secret. B)

  4. sic transit gloria.

  5. Company towns are the hope of the world and the reason of my own life. Just as cruise ships began out of an industry that was famous for being the most detestable of ordeals, a trans oceanic journey on a potential wooden coffin infested with all sort of critters- and ended up being a synonym of leisure and in some cases even luxury, company towns can and are evolving into “planned communities” or Alphavilles interconnected and increasingly (at least in some parts of the World) more accessible.

the starving was because of the isolation and how back warded and adventurous the industry was. in remote places like the amazon (Para to be precise) those company towns like the mining towns of the 19th century america exist today with thinly veiled serfdom. Problem is mate, if you go and ask the workers (difficult going to 19th century but you can go to Asia or Latin America) themselves, not their “human rights representatives”, they’ll tell you they chose to do it, they bless the presence of ANY sort of work in a world of absolute freedom, freedom to hunt and gather your food and medicines from the forest. nice dream for a suburbanite or even an urbanite, but the guys who were born in those conditions, love being exploited in company tent towns. If they drink too much, that’s their own fault for getting in debt, that’s not how the companies make their money. Probably you don’t know the levels of poverty I’m referring to and likewise you are still to realize how great the bazaar or free market is in contrast to the tribe.

4

There are a few threads about this: here’s one (and it has a link to another).

Similarly, I suggest using the Search to find info on some of the other topics.

Thanks. :slight_smile: Admittedly, I didn’t search for the corporations question, but I did search for a few of my other questions and couldn’t find any answers.

Yes but all property would also be private and within private land and systems owners be it shareholders, home owners, etc, are able to set rules and internal codes which are a non coercive form of regulation. By means of a contract one would enter one or another system (by means of living or working in or passing by, private land) thus reducing the amount of potential lawsuits which is a very valid point. Everything has its downturn and I also suspected that would be one out of a contractual society.

But then what would happen if someone was polluting your property, and you don’t have enough money to sue them? Would you simply have to accept that your property has been polluted and that you don’t have the money required to sue the aggressor? Or would this scenario not occur in an Objectivist society?

  1. Company towns are the hope of the world and the reason of my own life. Just as cruise ships began out of an industry that was famous for being the most detestable of ordeals, a trans oceanic journey on a potential wooden coffin infested with all sort of critters- and ended up being a synonym of leisure and in some cases even luxury, company towns can and are evolving into “planned communities” or Alphavilles interconnected and increasingly (at least in some parts of the World) more accessible.

the starving was because of the isolation and how back warded and adventurous the industry was. in remote places like the amazon (Para to be precise) those company towns like the mining towns of the 19th century america exist today with thinly veiled serfdom. Problem is mate, if you go and ask the workers (difficult going to 19th century but you can go to Asia or Latin America) themselves, not their “human rights representatives”, they’ll tell you they chose to do it, they bless the presence of ANY sort of work in a world of absolute freedom, freedom to hunt and gather your food and medicines from the forest. nice dream for a suburbanite or even an urbanite, but the guys who were born in those conditions, love being exploited in company tent towns. If they drink too much, that’s their own fault for getting in debt, that’s not how the companies make their money. Probably you don’t know the levels of poverty I’m referring to and likewise you are still to realize how great the bazaar or free market is in contrast to the tribe.

You’re right. Having lived in a very rich town in the US for all of my life, I admittedly have never come face-to-face with poverty before. Still though, company towns sound like horrible places. You even admit that they exist with thinly veiled serfdom. How can this possibly be good? Would these company towns exist in an Objectivist society? I’m not sure how you can justify this.

5

But then what would happen if someone was polluting your property, and you don’t have enough money to sue them?

Well, this is really an issue with any type of civil suit. If the case is strong, lawyers will often take it on a contingency basis.

More importantly, as far as I am aware, Objectivism does not say that we may not have laws outlawing some specific types of activities which might be commonly called “pollution”.

… company towns sound like horrible places. You even admit that they exist with thinly veiled serfdom.

Company towns are not serfdom: people choose to settle there, and can choose to move. From my experience, company towns are usually a step up from the places the workers lived before they moved to those towns.

Would these company towns exist in an Objectivist society?

They could, if a company wants to set up a town. However, I think company towns are mostly a feature of an early stage of industrialization.

6

But then what would happen if someone was polluting your property, and you don’t have enough money to sue them? Would you simply have to accept that your property has been polluted and that you don’t have the money required to sue the aggressor? Or would this scenario not occur in an Objectivist society?

You’re right. Having lived in a very rich town in the US for all of my life, I admittedly have never come face-to-face with poverty before. Still though, company towns sound like horrible places. You even admit that they exist with thinly veiled serfdom. How can this possibly be good? Would these company towns exist in an Objectivist society? I’m not sure how you can justify this.

Company towns like the ones described would not exist in an Objectivist society simply because people need to be able to read to become Objectivists and the people who work now in South America and back then in North America can’t. However I’m safe to say that the Objectivist stance on such company towns or any other form of perceived exploitation or thinly veiled serfdom like American College loans is that as long as there is no actual initiation of force or fraud, then it’s perfectly alright. Although I’ve always had a problem with the more foggy definition of fraud compared to force.

However, I think company towns are mostly a feature of an early stage of industrialization.

I have to clarify that I understood company town as a more flexible term, or original term for what now is all privately held and infrastrucuted land, such as the vast expanses of Disney World, big gated communities, or more specifically the Brazilian alphaville, a place where now even the lower middle class can live without fear of crime in every major city of the country. It began as a refuge for the rich, the trend is obviously “inclusive” towards the lower sectors, they want as much market as they can get, and poor just as rich people want to live in a safe environment that only a private community can provide. We’re talking surveillance and security here, not police or courts of course.

7

1a. It is commonly asserted by Objectivists that in an Objectivist society, disputes about, say, pollution or fraud would be handled by litigation, not by regulation. That instead of the government imposing fossil fuel limits or checking every product to make sure it does what it says it does, if there is a dispute, then the victim must sue the aggressor and the court system will handle it. How can we do this though, when suing someone, especially a big corporation, is so unaffordable to many people? I mean, I guess if a corporation is screwing over one person, chances are it’s screwing over many people, and there’s monetary power in numbers. But what if the dispute only involves one person, and that person can’t afford to sue his aggressor?

The whole sue-as-a-solution thing sounds much more Libertarian than Objectivist.

The role of a proper government in the Objectivist sense is that it protects your rights. If you are being aggressed against, then your rights are being violated, and government should help – such as in the form of objective laws.

1b. On the same subject… What about companies that are effectively sue-proof? For instance, a company like Disney, which deals with personal injury and wrongful death suits by having very good lawyers and by employing a large amount of people in the towns so that it’s impossible to get a neutral jury.

Being “sue-proof” is a symptom of a broken legal system. In a proper legal system, it should be cheap to sue. The reason it’s expensive today is largely due to the reams and reams of regulations and exceptions. The idea with objective law is that it can be readily understood – so suing and defending should both be cheap. It also diminishes the power of lawyers and even judges.

  1. I firmly believe, as you all do, that coercive monopolies only form as a result of government interference in the market. But I am frequently asked where the evidence for this is. Since there has never been a true laissez-faire society, is there any evidence for this?

The evidence is in the nature of the what it means for a monopoly to be coercive. Coercion requires the initiation of force – which, in turn, can only be done legally with the cooperation of the State. If force is banned, there’s nothing in principle to stop someone from trying to compete against a would-be monopolist.

  1. Doesn’t the early American auto industry blow this theory of monopolies to smithereens? For instance, GM used its monetary power to buy out Oakland and many other car companies. Wasn’t the early American auto industry almost totally unregulated? If so, how could three (later two) car companies consolidate so much power?

I don’t know much about the early auto industry. Ayn Rand writes about the early rail industry in Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, and shows that government clearly caused the resulting monopolies.

  1. Do corporations have the same rights as individuals?

No. Corporations are legal constructs; they don’t have any rights as such.

  1. How would you react to the claim that economic depressions are chiefly caused by “financial markets breaking down”?

I would add “due to the non-stop interference of government.” It’s impossible to have a real market in the midst of massive manipulation.

  1. If the housing bust occurred because the American government decided everyone needed to own a home and used the Fed to artificially lower interest rates, then why did housing bubbles burst in other countries? Were their governments doing the same things as the American government?

Yes, though in different and often less severe ways. Central banks, fiat money and tax or regulatory policies can be used anywhere to create bubbles.

  1. In terms of the economy, was 19th-century America better than today’s America? Or worse? If it was worse, then how can we defend laissez-faire capitalism, since that is the closest we’ve ever come to laissez-faire capitalism?

I would say that 19th century America was improving at a faster rate than the America of today. In some ways, we are still coasting on the glory of those century-old improvements. We defend laissez-faire by noting than whenever freedom is increased in the world, people prosper.

  1. What about company towns? By company towns, I mean when a company owns all the land in a town and controls who works and lives there. Usually, it was a mining company that set up a town in the middle of nowhere and took steps to make sure that their workers made just enough money not to starve, or gave them the option to earn more but go into debt while doing so. Aren’t these a problematic byproduct of unregulated capitalism?

If people live there voluntarily, then it’s fine. If they’re coerced or defrauded in any way, then it’s an illegal use of force, which has nothing to do with unregulated capitalism.

8

  1. I firmly believe, as you all do, that coercive monopolies only form as a result of government interference in the market. But I am frequently asked where the evidence for this is. Since there has never been a true laissez-faire society, is there any evidence for this?

  2. Doesn’t the early American auto industry blow this theory of monopolies to smithereens? For instance, GM used its monetary power to buy out Oakland and many other car companies. Wasn’t the early American auto industry almost totally unregulated? If so, how could three (later two) car companies consolidate so much power?

Hey mate - my first post on here, but the subject matter is near and dear to the heart, so here goes!

We need not look to a true laissez-faire society to find evidence. We need only look to those industries that are relatively free from regulation and government interference in contrast against industries that are heavily regulated and controlled. Before doing so however, I’d like to check your premises behind question (3).

The early auto companies were certainly private, and relatively free form government regulation and interference in the contemporary sense. My question to you however, is: who built the roads and highways? And more importantly, how were they funded? Finally, those first two questions are only important if we agree that the roadways were of critical importance to the massive adoption of the automobile over the dominant transportation of the day: the train - complete with its privately funded railway system.

A quick digression: The history of the railroads in America is well documented - if not tragically misreported and misunderstood. The eastern seaboard of the US was a hotbed of competing railroad interests - private, and generally free from coercive government control. Competition was fierce and consumers enjoyed cheap transportation up and down, east and west, as a result. The modern historical perspective on railroads, however, is tragically the result of what happened when government got involved. The government decided they wanted railroads to stretch across America - Atlantic to Pacific - to help expand the Union. The private railroads of the day refused to expand because it was unprofitable given a myriad of logistical matters that simply made such vast expansion financially unfeasible. The government doesn’t have to worry about such constraints though. They offered the funding - and as we see time and again - such funding attracts the least scrupulous among us. With the government seeking to expand, regardless of consequence for the homesteaders at the time - the “companies” that the government backed to do the expansion pillaged the people as they moved west.

Note: The “real” businesses couldn’t expand west - and therefore didn’t. The government sponsored companies could, because government was picking up the tab - creating moral hazard.

The government got its railroads - and a fall guy: capitalism - unrestrained competition. The anti-trust laws that emerged in the late 19th century are a direct result of the atrocious activities carried about by government fueled “business”.

Digression over.

Auto industry - could those monopolies have emerged as quickly as they did if they had to finance and plan the roadways necessary for their new products to use in the absence of “eminent domain” enacted by the government to boot people from their land? Perhaps - but certainly not anywhere near as quickly is actually happened.

So to answer your question: in my opinion, no, the auto-industry does not blow the idea that coercive monopolies only emerge from government interference. The answer why is buried in the faulty premises behind your assertion that the auto-industry was made possible without any involvement of the government.