The "Free Market": Caveat Vendor vs Caveat Emptor
Most Libertarian "Free Marketeers" claim that the rules of the market are decided by the market itself. For example, if a seller cheats his customers word will get around that the seller is a cheat and the seller will go out of business. Therefore, it is to the seller's advantage to provide a good value to the seller's customers in order to stay in business. Further, because there are other seller's providing competition, the seller must provide goods and/or services that compete with other sellers either in quality, price, or both.
This is considered a Caveat Emptor which is Latin for "Let the Buyer Beware", since it is up to the buyer to determine the value of the item and if they buy a piece of crap for an unfair price it is entirely their fault.
Sellers spend billions of dollars each year just to try to convince you to buy their product. They also spend billions of dollars on "marketing" to make sure that the message you receive is the one that will convince you to buy their product whether it is a logical decision or not. They spend billions of dollars to figure out how to "push your buttons" to make you buy things you wouldn't otherwise buy.
What this attitude fails to take into consideration are those who are in the "get rich quick" category, such as the "snake oil" salesmen of old. Under Caveat Emptor you don't have to build a dynasty - you just have to cheat enough people to make enough money to a Caribbean Island to sit on the beach drinking Pina Coladas and fornicating for the rest of your life.
My company actually encountered this with a "partner" and lost a lot of money because of it.
In contrast, what if there were controls in place to make sure that the sellers don't cheat their customers? Of course, there is no way in our modern world that this can be guaranteed. What if there were outside rules designed to protect the buyer? What if it were required that if you made claims that you were required to back up those claims? What if you sold me something claiming it would do something, and it didn't? Wouldn't you want your money back?
This is called Caveat Emptor, or "Let the Seller Beware". We need some kind of check/control to make sure that when a seller makes a claim, that the buyer has some guarantees.
A lot of this comes down to communication and organization. Corporations have this already in place. For the balance, we need unions and Government.
Frankly, there are a lot of services that can best be served by being Nationalized - or as some would label it - "Socialism". I would reserve these for "necessary" or "universal" services.
But, competition drives innovation - and so there are many areas that should be left under the Caveat Vendor Free Market model.
Health Care is a perfect example. Under the single-payer model, despite assaults to the contrary Health Care itself is still subject to Free Market competition and it's advantages - it is simply the matter of paying for it that is spread across income lines so that the rich are not the only ones who can take advantage of the private research.
This actually expands the research - more funds are spread across research lines rather than being focused to the whims of a particular patron.
"Obamaney Care" does not interfere with the Private Research, it simply gives Americans more options to pay for it.
But that is only one example.
Bottom line: The single purpose of a Corporation is to make money. Corporations tend to look at the current yearly quarter. For them a "long term projection" is one year only. As a Country, we need to look at 5-year, 10-year, and 15-year projections at the very least. And the purpose of the Government is to make sure that all levels of the economy are solvent, not just a single Company.
