Toyota safety crisis prompts 'black box' plan for new cars and lorries
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From: Brent on 3 May 2010 00:14 On 2010-05-03, Harry K <turnkey4099(a)hotmail.com> wrote: > I suspect they quit offering them because _nobody_ would buy them. > They were a very high priced option. I know it was a long time ago, but check the manufacturers' objections to the mandate. They were based on the prior experience. Most everything starts out as a high priced option.
From: Brent on 3 May 2010 08:53 On 2010-05-03, Larry G <gross.larry(a)gmail.com> wrote: > On May 2, 11:41�pm, Brent <tetraethylleadREMOVET...(a)yahoo.com> wrote: >> On 2010-05-03, Larry G <gross.la...(a)gmail.com> wrote: >> >> > On May 2, 9:31�pm, Brent <tetraethylleadREMOVET...(a)yahoo.com> wrote: >> >> >> Not without government aid. Walmart serves their customers better so >> >> they get the business. The moment Walmart cuts selection and raises >> >> prices and makes people wait for goods to come in is when someone else >> >> will show up and drive walmart out of business. >> >> > you need to read up on Standard Oil.... >> > here: �http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Oil#Monopoly_charges.2C_anti-tr... >> >> You confuse pleasing customers and building a better mousetrap with a >> cartel/monopoly. >> >> Here:http://mises.org/daily/2317 > > monopolies are real.... the pure capitalist market will and does > generate monopolies because that is one of the aspects of pure > capitalism that the participants will engage in to beat their > competitors. Yes, that's what government school teaches us, however it's impossible unless that monopoly pleases all of the customers all of the time and maintains lower prices than any would be competition can achieve. So, exactly why is that a bad things? > You can see this in action every time a WaWa or Sheetz moves in next > to a mom/pop place and lowers the gasoline prices lower than the > actual cost. The bigger companies can sustain the loss longer than the > little guy can and as soon as he is gone - the prices not only rise - > they go up even higher if there are no other nearby competitors. And when they jack up the prices afterwards nobody else moves in exactly why? When they jack up the prices why don't customers just get gas elsewhere? Can you even prove they are selling under their cost? Or is it another issue of their costs being lower? (BTW, lots of gas stations are just francises, and are ma and pa even though it looks like big oil, and whatever WaWa or Sheetz is they can't be too big as I've never heard of them) The problem with undercutting competition by selling at a loss is that after 'winning' the endurance contest they can never make up for it with higher prices without inspiring new competition. Of course if takes 5 years of permiting through the government then, well, they can be assured that such practices will benefit them. > At an exit ramp, one company can buy all the prime land and then put > up a station that charges higher rates than if a competitor moved in > across the street. Because customers are too lazy to drive a little further? Again, another unfounded complaint. > For a more complete list of the strategies actually practiced: > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly#Monopoly_versus_competitive_markets Exactly how does having government as a referee make for a free market? Government is not impartial and it's not fair either. >> >> Isn't that what got Ford in trouble with the pinto? The actuarial >> >> calculation? >> > they were doing in with lawsuit money to lives... >> > the gov does it comparing which of the choices causes the least >> > deaths. >> >> Government not consider money? HA! Government care about lives? HA! > govt considers the number of lives lost and the number of people > injured as well as costs. It doesn't care if you live or die. Government cares about government. This is why everything gets sucked into the political system. > every time you take an aspirin or eat a pork chop - the govt has > played a role in the efficacy and safety of those and virtually > anything that you eat. No. It has set a very very very low standard such that those who wish to provide a better quality product cannot or at the very least not indicate that they have done better than the FDA minimum. The low standards are set to allow the giant corporations producing medicore product to not face competitive issues. BTW, Aspirin is grandfathered in. > The nutrition labels on food are there because of govt. I'm sure you'll find that the details of how a nutrition label are put together are for the benefit of those who have the political inside track. Like how the government has decided that GMO foods don't have to be labeled. How it often decides that those companies who do not use whatever new fangled risky cost reduction methods that are the new hotness cannot label their products as such. Yeah, the FDA protects those with the political influence from undo competition of ma and pa's better made product. My favorite example is a company that wanted to sell premium beef in the US but mostly wanted to export to Japan. It wanted to test every cow for mad-cow disease. That should be its right, yes? Nope. The FDA forced it to test only to the standard it set, not exceed it. Not show up the other beef companies. > The interstate highways and their standardized designs and > safety features are there because of the govt making tradeoffs between > lives lost / injure and the costs of mitigating. Ah. There's the costs you claimed weren't considered. US interstate is pretty crappy in terms of the best known road building and safety. Instead they decide to use heavy handed enforcement of low speed limits, too low even for the way the roads are designed in most cases. > Without govt - there would be no public roads. Everywhere you went you > would be paying an entrepreneur whose road design and safety features > would be unique to him and the next road... you'd also pay another > toll on and it would be different. Do I need to go over the private-vs-socialist road system again? Without government, I might be able to pay only for what I use and drive proper speeds. Another bonus is that the government highwaymen wouldn't be an issue any more. Government also decides that to use its roads I have to give up my rights. Remember the fast one they've pulled on most people by creating the illusion that driving is a privilege it grants and therefore can mandate whatever it wants in return for that grant. > Govt has an important role and even though govt can and does screw up > - it does not negate the role and all the things it does that do work > properly. Yes, that's what government schools teach us and it's entirely wrong. Government works for the ruling class and others that can manipulate government. Not you, not me. Sure every so often it does it's job because of fear that the great mass will revolt in most cases. > pure, unadulterated capitalism is anarchy .... go visit Somalia or > Yemen to see what pure Capitalism is about. It's amazing the job government schools have done. The problems in those countries are the direct result of those who wish to impose government at the point of a gun. Outside of the violence of those who wish to be a government Somalia has shown the natural self organizing tendencies of civilization. Now if only criminal gangs and foreign governments weren't trying to impose a government civilization could flurish.
From: Brent on 3 May 2010 11:03 On 2010-05-03, Larry Sheldon <lfsheldon(a)gmail.com> wrote: >>> pure, unadulterated capitalism is anarchy .... go visit Somalia or >>> Yemen to see what pure Capitalism is about. > > There is no capitalism at all in those two places. Actually there is. In periods when someone is not trying to impose a government and wrecks it capitalism starts to peak out and people begin to start making forward progess. Markets can exist even in prison camps. > There is no pure capitalism anywhere, to the best of my knowledge. true. > We came close up until the early 1900's. > Without government support (read "force of arms") monopolies can not > form, much less persist. Because it is impossible to please all the people all of the time if for no other reason. > There is no thing that is so perfect that somebody won't (if allowed to > by the government) make one that is better, or cheaper, or both. true.
From: Brent on 3 May 2010 12:43 On 2010-05-03, Harry K <turnkey4099(a)hotmail.com> wrote: > On May 2, 9:14�pm, Brent <tetraethylleadREMOVET...(a)yahoo.com> wrote: >> On 2010-05-03, Harry K <turnkey4...(a)hotmail.com> wrote: >> >> > I suspect they quit offering them because _nobody_ would buy them. >> > They were a very high priced option. >> >> I know it was a long time ago, but check the manufacturers' objections to >> the mandate. They were based on the prior experience. >> >> Most everything starts out as a high priced option. > > Their objections have nothing to do with the subject. The > manufactureres have fought every safety and/or pollution mandate. False.
From: Brent on 3 May 2010 12:45
On 2010-05-03, Larry Sheldon <lfsheldon(a)gmail.com> wrote: > On 5/3/2010 10:03, Brent wrote: >> On 2010-05-03, Larry Sheldon <lfsheldon(a)gmail.com> wrote: >> >>>>> pure, unadulterated capitalism is anarchy .... go visit Somalia or >>>>> Yemen to see what pure Capitalism is about. >>> >>> There is no capitalism at all in those two places. >> >> Actually there is. In periods when someone is not trying to impose a >> government and wrecks it capitalism starts to peak out and people begin >> to start making forward progess. Markets can exist even in prison camps. > > "market" not equal "capitalism". There are markets in pure socialism. Some form of market capitalism exists even in prison camps. Happy now? It even exists under socialism. It's called the 'black market'. >>> There is no pure capitalism anywhere, to the best of my knowledge. >> >> true. >> >>> We came close up until the early 1900's. >>> Without government support (read "force of arms") monopolies can not >>> form, much less persist. >> >> Because it is impossible to please all the people all of the time if for >> no other reason. >> >>> There is no thing that is so perfect that somebody won't (if allowed to >>> by the government) make one that is better, or cheaper, or both. >> >> true. >> >> > > |