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How we broke the supply chain

prospect.org

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Re: How we broke the supply chain

#11

Post by kibwen »

roenxi wrote: post #5

> Only deviating from free-market fundamentalism—giving everyone health care, for example—could lead to shortages This is true, the symptoms the article is looking at are strong signals of non-free-market policies. Under capitalism, the failure mode is going to be very high prices. If the failure mode isn't high prices then the market probably isn't being run as a free market. Like when there is a crisis and the gove…

I suggest that we stop looking at "the government" as some entity that is separate from capitalism and/or markets. Unregulated capitalism/free markets are unstable systems that eventually produce regulators one way or another; a democratic government is just one form that this takes, but it could just as easily result in a cyberpunk megacorp or a military junta making all the rules. Markets always trend towards the consolidation of power, as a result of economies of scale; any "free" market will result in a winner who eventually uses their power to set the rules to make sure they stay on top.

Re: How we broke the supply chain

#12

Post by standardUser »

xiphias2 wrote: post #10

Inflation (money printing) is the cause of increased demand in goods, not the result of supply problems. If the government sends checks of money to people, they will compete for the same amount of produced goods, and realize that they have to spend the money faster if they want it to preserve its value better.

During the Great Recession, a vast increase in the money supply had no apparent impact in inflation. The idea that printing money is a primary driver of inflation may be outdated. I also think you're ignoring the dramatic and unexpected changes in demand (and some constraint in supply) caused by the pandemic.

Re: How we broke the supply chain

#13

Post by royaltheartist »

roenxi wrote: post #5

> Only deviating from free-market fundamentalism—giving everyone health care, for example—could lead to shortages This is true, the symptoms the article is looking at are strong signals of non-free-market policies. Under capitalism, the failure mode is going to be very high prices. If the failure mode isn't high prices then the market probably isn't being run as a free market. Like when there is a crisis and the gove…

Ahh ha, this is like when I say a Scotsman was rude to me and someone else informs me that it must not have been a true Scotsman, then

Re: How we broke the supply chain

#14

Post by avs733 »

roenxi wrote: post #5

> Only deviating from free-market fundamentalism—giving everyone health care, for example—could lead to shortages This is true, the symptoms the article is looking at are strong signals of non-free-market policies. Under capitalism, the failure mode is going to be very high prices. If the failure mode isn't high prices then the market probably isn't being run as a free market. Like when there is a crisis and the gove…

Exactly

When capitalism fails and something else steps in to fix it, the fact that the fix is happening at the same time as something bad means it must be responsible.

Re: How we broke the supply chain

#15

Post by WillPostForFood »

royaltheartist wrote: post #13
roenxi wrote: post #5

> Only deviating from free-market fundamentalism—giving everyone health care, for example—could lead to shortages This is true, the symptoms the article is looking at are strong signals of non-free-market policies. Under capitalism, the failure mode is going to be very high prices. If the failure mode isn't high prices then the market probably isn't being run as a free market. Like when there is a crisis and the gove…

Ahh ha, this is like when I say a Scotsman was rude to me and someone else informs me that it must not have been a true Scotsman, then

Ahh ha, this is like when I say a Frenchman was rude to me and someone else informs me that it must not have been a true Scotsman, then

Re: How we broke the supply chain

#16

Post by preston4tw »

sayhar wrote: post #4

This is a great article. Rabbitholed a tiny bit on this part: > Big companies got the law changed to enable ocean carriers to offer secret discounts in exchange for volume guarantees. To an article linked in the first article: https://www.hklaw.com/en/insights/publications/2018/12/congr... > The last amendment to the Shipping Act occurred in 1998 as the Ocean Shipping Reform Act of 1998, following a five-year study o…

I relatively recently read a biography on John D. Rockefeller and this reminds me of some of the things Standard Oil did with rail companies to gain a market advantage.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Oil#Monopoly_charges_...

Rabbithole indeed. Here's notes from a meeting of the HoR Judiciary Committee in 1999, "ANTITRUST ASPECTS OF THE OCEAN SHIPPING REFORM ACT OF 1998": http://commdocs.house.gov/committees/judiciary/hju62447.000/...

TIL that ocean carriers have apparently been exempt from antitrust laws since ~1916.

Re: How we broke the supply chain

#17

Post by skybrian »

A little bit of central planning can go a long way. Nobody was in charge of figuring out how to gracefully shed load at capacity, so when demand went up by 20%, the system overloaded and latency went through the roof.

Market fundamentalism (we don't need to plan, the market will do it) obviously screwed up here, but it doesn't follow that everything that the American Prospect hates is actually bad.

Re: How we broke the supply chain

#19

Post by [deleted] »

metacritic12 wrote: post #8

When I first opened the site, I wondered if it was a more technical/wonkish dive, or whether it was a political take. Looking at the root site prospect.org made it clear it's the latter. Don't get me wrong, their thesis can still be right and their fact presented are still valuable, but this is like reading about "is free trade good" in the Economist. I would take away the facts, not the conclusion.

[deleted]

Re: How we broke the supply chain

#20

Post by Sophistifunk »

royaltheartist wrote: post #13
roenxi wrote: post #5

> Only deviating from free-market fundamentalism—giving everyone health care, for example—could lead to shortages This is true, the symptoms the article is looking at are strong signals of non-free-market policies. Under capitalism, the failure mode is going to be very high prices. If the failure mode isn't high prices then the market probably isn't being run as a free market. Like when there is a crisis and the gove…

Ahh ha, this is like when I say a Scotsman was rude to me and someone else informs me that it must not have been a true Scotsman, then

It's the exact same as when some pimply-faced first year uni student tells you "nobody's really tried proper communism"
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