Exploring deeper what Thom was talking about today, I would like to learn more about the concept of "Zero-Sum Economics". Googling has brought me to a wide range of interpretations:

neo-libertarian.com/zerosumleft
coyoteblog.com/coyote_blogl
radio.weblogs.com/
suite101.com/frontier_theory
altruists.org/economics/non-zero-sum

So what is the real essence of Zero-Sum Economics?

Very interesting thread Gnarlie.
Just a quick thought when you think about these issues.
Think of the games of Chess and Monopoly.
Obviously most games such as Chess are Zero-Sum-Games but Monopoly while in the end is suppose to have a "winner" but the winner could have more or less money depending on how the game is played. Both players tend to gain an income from the travels around the board.

Stiffer competition can lead to greater piles of money...

To really understand that there is not a "Zero-Sum Game", I think it is important to realize the value of trade.

Sorry to bring this experiment up again-so just a link: Posted 15 February 2007 09:44

I bring this up as an example that trade is not a zero-sum game. I hope that everyone gets a chance to read it as well as Hi-Teks little journey.

Gnarlodious when we work in the context of me first it's zero sum. When we work in cooperation with each other than we look for win/win/win solutions and if we add to that respect for creation and the willingness to learn from nature herself, than it is far from a zero-sum game. However, as it is, our over all culture is a competitive one, and one that disregards natural processes, so we do a very bad job of considering the interests of all involved, and that tends to limit the abundance available to go around.

eley

Just look at the distribution of wealth since the current admin has been in charge.

eley

It appears that the corporate model of business is an extension of the colonialization trend. Territorial expansion and extraction of resources fuels the corporate business model, with a one-way conveyor of products to the consumer, usually in a foreign country. Even historically, the East India Company exemplified that paradigm, and we know how the War of Independence was fought against the corporate power of the East India Company.

But in a world of depleted resources and limited real estate, the corporate model breaks down. Corporations are not interested in recycling, repairing or sustainability, only the quick profit. Corporations would prefer the government handle less profitable areas of the producer-consumer conveyor, like cleanup and recycling. For corporations, post-consumption should be subsidized by taxpayers. Corporations may be willing to get in on the recycling, but only at the point where it becomes profitable.

Notice there are no value judgments here. I am not saying corporations are bad, only that they are specialized. In a totally closed system, like a moon colony with a population of 5 million inhabitants, the corporate model would not work in its current role.

Quote: Gnarlodious "Notice there are no value judgments here. I am not saying corporations are bad, only that they are specialized. In a totally closed system, like a moon colony with a population of 5 million inhabitants, the corporate model would not work in its current role."
________________________________

In a totally closed system of an earth colony with 6 billion inhabitants, the corporate model is beginning to not work in its current role here either!

Retired Monk
"Ideology is a disease"

We have a grace that we sometimes say before a meal that goes:

Back of the Loaf is the snowy flour.

Back of the flour is the mill.

Back of the mill is the wheat and the shower and the sun and the Father's will.

I think back of the colonial mind set is their's not enough to go around, so we have to dominate and destroy and decide that we are God's favored group, and thus deserve to take what little there is.

Corporate models can and do work that are not based on that mindset. They do it very well. A long term look at profitability is almost always less destructive than a short term. In the case of the philipino babies being murdered again (it turns out) by Nestle by addicting the mother's to formula that they can't afford and have only dirty water to mix with is an example of killing off it's customer base. Not much of a long term stratagy there, but it's profitable in the short term.

eley

Gnarlie, you do realize that there are corporations that specialize in waste disposal?
So why would all corporations be devoting resources to that aspect? Economies of scale would dictate that some corporations would specialize in waste handling.

Is it not the consumer that ultimately decided what products she/he wanted and thus he should have the final decision on how that waste would be handled?

But if you think a variety of Pigovian taxes may be useful in

getting to the correct socially ideal output, then that should be considered...

quote:

Originally posted by Ronald Rutherford:
Gnarlie, you do realize that there are corporations that specialize in waste disposal?
So why would all corporations be devoting resources to that aspect? Economies of scale would dictate that some corporations would specialize in waste handling.

Is it not the consumer that ultimately decided what products she/he wanted and thus he should have the final decision on how that waste would be handled?

But if you think a variety of Pigovian taxes may be useful in

getting to the correct socially ideal output, then that should be considered...

I haven't seen a waste disposal firm yet that gaoes around collecting hydro carbons in the air or arsenic in the water. They aren't known for repairing destroyed ecosystems, either.

If it isn't profitable to recycle something, it isn't done.

Glass bottles used to be returned to the supermarket for re-use. Manufacturers re-used their own bottles. Cheaper environmentally to clean them than make new ones. How much metal from canned goods ends up in the local landfill? Why use metal instead of re-useable standard- sized glass containers? This is good corporate citizenship?

Retired Monk
"Ideology is a disease"

quote:

Originally posted by Ronald Rutherford:
Monopoly while in the end is suppose to have a "winner" but the winner could have more or less money depending on how the game is played. Both players tend to gain an income from the travels around the board.

The winner may have more or less money, depending on the game played out and how long it took the laissez fair economic system to fail i.e. how long it took the winner to strip the wealth off the other players. But the point is the winner has all the wealth that was in the system and the losers have no wealth at all.

I'm curious about someone bringing up the game of Monopoly in defense of laissez fair capitilism. Wasn't it invented during the last Great Republican Depression? (Please forgive the Thom Hartmanism.)

quote:

Stiffer competition can lead to greater piles of money...

Yeah, but in the end for one person (or group of people) - whether it be for Putin, the Kermlin, Cheney, Castro, Exxon-Mobile, Stalin, Bush, Carnegia, Walton, Hilton, Kennedy.

Won't stiffer competition lead to bankruptcy and a smaller economy?

Eat River: Your Monopoloy game comparison is a really simple, basic explanation...and it works.

The basic functions of corporations are to become the winner in the game. Played out to the finish, that is the enevitable outcome. One winner, and everyone else loses.

As long as each thinks they'll be the winner, they won't change the rules of the game.

Retired Monk
"Ideology is a disease"

quote:

Originally posted by polycarp:
Eat River: Your Monopoloy game comparison is a really simple, basic explanation...and it works.

The basic functions of corporations are to become the winner in the game. Played out to the finish, that is the enevitable outcome. One winner, and everyone else loses.

As long as each thinks they'll be the winner, they won't change the rules of the game.

Retired Monk
"Ideology is a disease"

I have seen this happen first hand in the trucking industry. Many trucking company leaders wanted deregulation, thinking they could win the game. But it has been a race to the bottom. With a staggering amount of bankruptcy within an astonishing short period of time. Deregulation and hyper-competition has wreaked havoc on the trucking industry. 20 years ago a person would not have believed that what has happened could happen and so quickly. A once proud, unionized, industry with employees second only to auto mobile industry empolyees in pay are now in some cases working for less than minimum wage. (Truckers are exzept from minimum wage laws.) Professionalism, quality of life, and pride in a person's job are a thing of past. Meanwhile a handful of large muli-national frieght companies (almost everyday there is a new merger in the freight industry) are taking over the industry with shamefull employee pay, abismal saftey records, no pensions or benefits.

It is clear who the winners and who the losers were in the deregulation of the trucking industry - and ultimately everyone will lose.

quote:

The winner may have more or less money, depending on the game played out and how long it took the laissez fair economic system to fail i.e. how long it took the winner to strip the wealth off the other players.

Sorry, the game of Monopoly was an example of not Zero-Sum Games-the best I could think of. Do you know of another one?

Sorry but Monopoly is not a "laissez fair economic system". Participants are required to make moves that any sane person would not be in their best interest. And with random chance that person is expected to purchase the services of another player whether they want to or not.

If it was LFE then players would get to leave the game whenever they wanted or to pass up turns whenever.

You're assuming that people making decisions based on their own interests assure them staying in the game. That they never on their own would land on a Boardwalk Hotel. Neither would a person playing the Monopoly Game.

When a competitor outsources, you can either make the same move if you have the resources, or remain uncompetitive and go broke. St. charles Place can't compete with an Atlantic Avenue.

When a more powerful company can cut your pricing and take away your customers, your own best interest is to file bankruptcy or sell. You've have the profits of a Baltic Avenue instead of Boardwalk. Your competitor will crush you with their sheer wealth.

Landing on the Electric Company is no different than getting stiffed by a sudden increase in energy prices for a Trucking firm or an airline.

"The best plans of mice and men are oft led astray". Just like in Monopoly.

We don't have anti-monopoly laws because it doesn't happen. We have them because it does.

Monopolize the railroads through some good trading, and you increase your profits...everyone who needs to utilize a train has to utilize your railroad.

The game of Monopoly also includes the buying and selling of assets between the players...not just a throw of the dice. Some businesses are not much more than a dice throw. That's why so many new ones go broke every year even with the best of financial planning.

Business has no option but to play the game as it unfolds. Just like in the board game, they can either ultimately sell or file bankruptcy. Players that have been around for years have been forced out of the game. Where is Montgomery Ward? Did they purposely land on Park Place?

Retired Monk
"Ideology is a disease"

After studying this for a while, I think I've figured out that zero-sum economics is what is called a "dynamic attractor" in physics. Sure a win-win economic system can work for a while, but only while resources are available for exploiting. Once resources are all "enclosed", the economy tends towards a win-lose state (zero sum). The end result of zero-sum economics is always a minority of super-wealthy aristocrats and a majority of poverty-stricken workers.

In the Monopoly game, it starts with equality because resources are not enclosed. That means the bank owns everything and all players have equal access to resources. This is the starting state of win-win transactions that settlement and colonization produces, plentiful resources exploited by a lot of people.

But the Monopoly game at some point runs out of available resources, all the hotels and properties are now owned by someone. At that point, access to resources is unequal. This is similar to real-life situations where speculators drive up the value of any commodity by hoarding it. In that context, "shortages" work in the interest of despotic producers by driving up profits.

Yep. Just like in the game. As the resources become more and more concentrated among fewer and fewer players, players are forced out of the game.

Retired Monk
"Ideology is a disease"

And Gnarlie, what do you think happens to most "commons"?
You seem to think based on only resources as the only thing that drives an economy.

As my Economics instructors use to say "2/3rds of capital is human capital".

Land or any resource is just another factor in production and can be substituted one for another..

Gnarlie, there was a discussion before that asked whether Wealth can be produced (grow) or destroyed. I don't remember you saying one way or another.

Ronald:
I haven't done much studying on this before, and my ideas are not based on what I read here or on the internet. What I called the "Economic Attractor" sums it all up. I believe there is a basal state that a system tends towards without intervention. That attractor has been seen throughout history in widely varied civilizations.

No doubt some renewable resources, like labor and green grass, can become available for exploitation outside the inclusion boundary. But in a closed system ordinary people are in no position to use those resources. A perfect example is Europe of the 1700s. Wealthy lords owned every square foot of land. If you were not a landowner you were unable to exploit any renewable resources. There were very few opportunities for non-landed people, three of them were the military, fishing and the merchant marine. Just looking at fishermen, access to fish was impossible to restrict, compare that resource to land-based economies which were easy to restrict. Based on these facts, I believe your economic instructors were wrong. It sounds like they were propagating corporatist ideology.

The salvation of European peasants was the journey to America. The mass exodus broke the stable economic system that had survived for at least a thousand years. With millions of desperate consumers gone, suddenly there was no market for products. Wealthy landowners started going broke, because they had been living lives of excess based on virtual slavery. The entire economy collapsed and Europe ended up moving towards social reforms by 1900.

Weather changes, revolts, overpopulation, famine, plagues and wars can break the established economic order like mass emigration did. That is why a stable economy is so dependent on predictable conditions. The wealthy class of Europe was dependent on government to ensure stable conditions for themselves. But those days are over, the current socialist Europe is a reaction to a long history of economic tyranny.

Gnarlie, I believe you realize that we have a lot of intervention in our economy in all levels and degrees.

Why would you compare what my Economics Instructor say to what Europe is like in the 1700s? He referred strictly to the USA. But now that you brought it up, since that time have people (the average person) got more or less access to the means of production? Is there more or less home ownership now vs. then?

Yes, I do believe there is too much government intervention, and that the federal government is too big.

I don't make a distinction between Europe of 200 years ago and the US today. Of course, I know they are different but some things never change. For example, human greed. Lust for power. The urge to Total World Domination, etc. Society will always sink to the lowest level of those motivations unless government intervenes. The trick is to let the majority have their say without a gargantuan bureaucracy.

And about Europe, There are many more now who own a home and land compared to the era of wealthy lords. It's one of the things Europe learned from the US. That assets held by the common citizen is collective wealth, and it adds up.

I would put it more like a learning experience on both sides. And even today we do talk about each others systems a lot.

I think this is one nice thing about globalization.

Could it possibly be that huge amounts of free land were available in the U.S. for homesteading and that the U.S. insituted such things as the G.I. Bill to enable millions more to purchase their homes?

Intervention to prevent the excesses gave us a middle class. Those days are going, going, gone.
We may have modern dishwashers, and we have an economy that more and more resembles the Europe of the 1700's. A few very wealthy, and growing numbers of poor. Europe had their names for an upper class of wealth and privilege under feudalism. We have ours. By any name, their function in the economy is very similar.

Europe followed our lead in reducing disparities, but not eliminating them. We've reversed our policies and are now very busily increasing them. History has taught us nothing.


Retired Monk
"Ideology is a disease"

quote:

few very wealthy, and growing numbers of poor

And don't get me wrong, I am not saying a wealthy class is bad. In fact, it is necessary for a healthy economy to have a wealthy class and to protect that class from political instability. But the handful of extremely wealthy and powerful that our nation has historically produced, that is detrimental to the national economy. That level of greed needs to come under some government regulation, because it always undermines authority of the government itself.

NewBusiness is a better name for what we need in America...why not call a private business enterprise, regulated by product-focused laws, Zero-sum? I say: hard work + good for others + good for you + money to spare= ZERO. I challenge anyone to want to be anywhere other than zero. Start again.

Sounds like you want to start a monastery.

Retired Monk
"Ideology is a disease"