The death of neoliberalism from within • Hacker News Board

Re: The death of neoliberalism from within

#11

Post by marricks » Fri, Jun 03, 2016, 4:09 PM UTC

doctorcroc wrote: post #2

The big question then is what replaces laissez faire economics and how? How do we take the best of the free market while ensuring that governments and public sectors are also robust? I feel like software and technology must have a huge role here, but don't know enough to be able to point out specific solutions.

I think the argument is that what we had before this wave if Neoliberalism, pre 1908s with Keynesian economics is part of the answer.

More regulations on the financial sector, stronger unions, etc. Maybe even a bit more protectionism.

Re: The death of neoliberalism from within

#12

Post by fulafel » Fri, Jun 03, 2016, 4:11 PM UTC

rwmj wrote: post #5

http://stumblingandmumbling.typepad.com/stumbling_and_mumbli... points out that "neoliberalism" isn't a thing, ie. not a coherent philosophy. It's just a name for ad hoc greed by many diverse individuals.

well argued opposing view: http://www.perc.org.uk/project_posts/the-difficulty-of-neoli...

"The reason ‘neoliberalism’ appears to defy easy definition (especially to those with an orthodox training in economics or policy science) is that it refers to a necessarily interdisciplinary, colonising process. It is not about the use of markets or competition to solve narrowly economic problems, but about extending them to address fundamental problems of modernity – a sociological concept if ever there was one. For the same reasons, it remains endlessly incomplete, pushing the boundaries of economic rationality into more and more new territories."

Re: The death of neoliberalism from within

#13

Post by elgabogringo » Fri, Jun 03, 2016, 4:13 PM UTC

Neoliberalism is not a school of economic thought. It's not an actual ideology that anyone associates themselves with. It's a word without any concrete meaning thrown around in order to avoid real discussion.

The free market is not failing. Current markets that are failing are hardly "free." What is failing is a system of government regulation and control that supports wall street and the rich at the expense of the middle class.

The governments and their federal banks created every single problem called out in the article. To turn around, blame free-markets, and propose more government as the solution is disgustingly disingenuous.

The IMF itself is not a proponent of the free market. It exists precisely to support excess government spending and to bail rich bondholders who make donations to politicians. Nothing lassiez faire about that.

The laissez faire solution to an overspending government would be bondholders losing money, currency depreciating, and poor leaders being held accountable - to which the IMF is diametrically opposed.

Re: The death of neoliberalism from within

#14

Post by URSpider94 » Fri, Jun 03, 2016, 4:19 PM UTC

elgabogringo wrote: post #6

kiruwa wrote: post #3

> Two British examples [of neoliberalism], suggests Will Davies – author of the Limits of Neoliberalism – would be the NHS and universities “where classrooms are being transformed into supermarkets”. Without taking a bit of Davies' argument into the article, that seems to badly undercut the argument. I'm not sure I can imagine a segment of society less neoliberal than either of them. (particularly by comparison to ot…

Exactly, there's nothing free-market about government run Health Care or Schools. This is another case of people using words they don't understand.

As a general rule, I'd be very cautious before assuming that a columnist for The Economist doesn't understand what he is talking about. You may disagree with his conclusions, but that's a different matter.

What I believe he's talking about is the introduction of free market dynamics to schools and single-payer health care, two institutions that have been resolutely socialist (in the classical sense of the word) for a long, long time. His belief is that these "modernizations" are destroying the institutions.

Re: The death of neoliberalism from within

#15

Post by elgabogringo » Fri, Jun 03, 2016, 4:22 PM UTC

andybak wrote: post #8

elgabogringo wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly, there's nothing free-market about government run Health Care or Schools. This is another case of people using words they don't understand.

(Disclaimer: I haven't read the article in depth) My interpretation: neo-liberals have tried to bring market forces to bear on the NHS and Universities - and this is the 'overreach' he is referring to. i.e. the fault isn't with the author - it's with those with overly expansive interpretations of market economics.

I'd say your right about the author of the study (which I am not going to waste time reading) and his NHS/Uni examples - but wrong about the author of the editorial - because it's definitely an editorial, not a piece of reporting.

Re: The death of neoliberalism from within

#16

Post by kiruwa » Fri, Jun 03, 2016, 4:24 PM UTC

dragonwriter wrote: post #7

kiruwa wrote: post #3

> Two British examples [of neoliberalism], suggests Will Davies – author of the Limits of Neoliberalism – would be the NHS and universities “where classrooms are being transformed into supermarkets”. Without taking a bit of Davies' argument into the article, that seems to badly undercut the argument. I'm not sure I can imagine a segment of society less neoliberal than either of them. (particularly by comparison to ot…

I think the reference to neoliberalism is in the motivation and direction for policy changes in those institutions in recent years, rather than the institutions themselves being neoliberal.

Is that _really_ the best examples he can come up with? Why not military support structures or privatized municipal services? I'm not sure two examples is sufficient to hold up his claims anyways, but the ones he chose were terrible.

Looking through the link, Davies seems to be arguing that even applying metrics to measure performance is somehow 'neoliberal'. He badly misreads Hayek (enjoying a bit of pointless psuedo-psychoanalysis), rather than reading or understanding the man's arguments.

Whenever anyone attempts to tell you that one group in particular was responsible for the US housing crisis, you can safely assume you're dealing with political ideologue. Davies falls completely into that category.

There appears to be this baseline assumption in certain leftist circles that "capitalism is based in greed, we see greed in western capitalist systems, therefore all examples of greed are due to capitalism". This would be a laughable syllogism if so many otherwise intelligent people didn't seem to take it seriously. Most of his "examples" are springing from this rather absurd belief.

Re: The death of neoliberalism from within

#17

Post by riphay » Fri, Jun 03, 2016, 4:25 PM UTC

We're seeing more and more of these types of articles coming up, but they're all talking about different aspects of the same issue: inability to share growth with wide swaths of the population. In the west, our quality of life has never been higher and products/services have never been cheaper. This has been caused in large part by automation, lean manufacturing, globalization, etc. and each one of these is net positive for society. The problem seems to be that it's become difficult to share these gains with labour in the classical sense; and our society, taxation system, social contract are all based around this meaning of labour.

When I see articles about: - Austerity, - Wage growth, - Universal basic income, - Death of middle class, - Rise of right-wing parties, - Anti-free trade lobbying, - Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders; I read all of them with same lens. I know my knowledge of economics is medium at best, but I'm starting to look twice at ideas such as UBI. Maybe there needs to be a rethink of the Western social contract around labour.

Re: The death of neoliberalism from within

#18

Post by zwerdlds » Fri, Jun 03, 2016, 4:29 PM UTC

elgabogringo wrote: post #13

Neoliberalism is not a school of economic thought. It's not an actual ideology that anyone associates themselves with. It's a word without any concrete meaning thrown around in order to avoid real discussion. The free market is not failing. Current markets that are failing are hardly "free." What is failing is a system of government regulation and control that supports wall street and the rich at the expense of the m…

To be fair, it is the IMF - their inherent mission is to lend, it's even in their name.

Re: The death of neoliberalism from within

#19

Post by kiruwa » Fri, Jun 03, 2016, 4:29 PM UTC

kaoD wrote: post #10

maxerickson wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think free markets are fine. We just need a huge revaluation of capital. Downwards.

Isn't the "death of neoliberalism from within" just the market adjusting itself? I think the situation completely fits what free markets propose. The problem is not that the system isn't working but rather that it is working too well and we're witnessing the painful consequences of self-adjusting markets. Self-regulation is cool on paper but in the end we're talking about real people suffering real consequences and,…

The more severe problem is that there is a rather strong argument being made by the "Mises brand of neoliberal" that the primary cause of these problems is the lack of neoliberalism in the central-banking world.

Their argument is essentially that the economy-wide boom/bust paradigm is driven by the motivations of the central banks. Normally individual industries and companies would experience fluctuation, but it would not be nearly as damaging without the central banks attempting to 'synchronize' the economy.

Re: The death of neoliberalism from within

#20

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Jun 03, 2016, 4:31 PM UTC

URSpider94 wrote: post #14

elgabogringo wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly, there's nothing free-market about government run Health Care or Schools. This is another case of people using words they don't understand.

As a general rule, I'd be very cautious before assuming that a columnist for The Economist doesn't understand what he is talking about. You may disagree with his conclusions, but that's a different matter. What I believe he's talking about is the introduction of free market dynamics to schools and single-payer health care, two institutions that have been resolutely socialist (in the classical sense of the word) for a…

[deleted]