Healthcare The Capitalist Way

[Era Might]

Exactly, it's all about consumerism. It's the same thing with big government. As long as someone has their welfare, who cares how they get it? As long as someone has their $11 dollar jeans, does nothing else matter?

The reason why local stores don't work is because they're not supported. Why? Because big business runs things. If people supported local business the same way they supported Wal-Mart, the prices would be the same. And there would be the added benefit of building local community, rather than a business beauracracy where you're just a cog in a national machine.

[MIKolbe]

[quote name='Era Might' post='1069396' date='Sep 21 2006, 01:28 PM']


The reason why local stores don't work is because they're not supported. Why? Because big business runs things. If people supported local business the same way they supported Wal-Mart, the prices would be the same. [/quote]

the third sentence contradicts the second.

the answer to the Why? is because the consumer decide. the consumer decides that 'big business runs things', big business does not 'decide' this any more than they 'decide' what brand of OJ i buy. they have an influence, yes, but they do not decide.

[Anomaly]

[quote name='Era Might' post='1069396' date='Sep 21 2006, 02:28 PM']
Exactly, it's all about consumerism. It's the same thing with big government. As long as someone has their welfare, who cares how they get it? As long as someone has their $11 dollar jeans, does nothing else matter?

The reason why local stores don't work is because they're not supported. Why? Because big business runs things. If people supported local business the same way they supported Wal-Mart, the prices would be the same. And there would be the added benefit of building local community, rather than a business beauracracy where you're just a cog in a national machine.
[/quote]That's just silly and emotional. Money that isn't spent on neccesities is spent elsewhere. You are taking one extreme view and magnifying. It isn't about consumerism unless [b]you[/b] want it to be.
What's better? Work 1 hour for a pair of jeans or work 45 minutes.
What's better? Have money enough money to put jeans on all your kids or just 75% of them?

Your assumption and conclusion is wrong. The reason why local stores sometimes aren't supported is because they don't meet the consumer's needs for how the consumer needs or wants to spend their hard earned $$.

I can't afford to clothe me and my family at the neighborhood clothing store or the Mall, but I can afford it by shopping at Wal-Mart or Ross. Does that make a slavish pawn of consumerism or big business? We can afford the necessities and don't have to have two full time wage-earners, two cars, etc., etc.

Work and feed yourself, a wife, and your children for 5 years and then see if you can generate the ideology that large discount stores are the plan of satan.

Edited September 21, 2006 by Anomaly

[Era Might]

[quote name='MIkolbe' post='1069398' date='Sep 21 2006, 03:35 PM']the third sentence contradicts the second.

the answer to the Why? is because the consumer decide. the consumer decides that 'big business runs things', big business does not 'decide' this any more than they 'decide' what brand of OJ i buy. they have an influence, yes, but they do not decide.
[/quote]
Well, by the same token, you can say the government does not choose to be big, the people do. If the people didn't want a big government, they wouldn't support it.

The fact is that when you make something available, and it's easier than something else, then people are going to eat it up. If you give out welfare with no conditions, then people are going to take it. If you establish a monopoly of big business beauracracy, then people are going to use it.

It takes effort to build locally, just as it takes effort to address the root problems behind welfare. People don't want that.


[quote name='Anomaly' post='1069400' date='Sep 21 2006, 03:37 PM']Work and feed yourself, a wife, and your children for 5 years and then see if you can generate the ideology that large discount stores are the plan of satan.
[/quote]
I'm the one being emotional?

There's no "ideology". I have no interest in economics. I'll shop wherever, although for certain things, I prefer local stores (music specifically, but books would be another one).

I'm just indulging the idea that big business is good, but big government is evil. As long as we're waxing poetic about economics, I decided to address that seeming contradiction.

[MIKolbe]

ok, i see.

yes, then, i could agree with you. yes, big government can be an evil as much as big business.

though i think you're analogy is a little off in terms of what the people choose jeans v. government...they choose big business and they choose big government....

I can't choose no government...but i can choose no jeans. (i know i am not taking into account monopolies, but most of those are governmental anyway)

plus the ability and effects of consumer choices normally have a faster impact by nature, than that of politcs and big government.

anomoly.. chill out.. it's just a discussion.

[Era Might]

I'm not saying big business is necessarily "evil". Just that it's kind of inconsistent to praise big business and vilify big government. I probably agree with you in the sense that the ideal is somewhere in the middle. Government should provide something like welfare, but not to the extent that it takes over for private initiatives; it should complement them (aka subsidiarity). In the same way, it's nice if small and local business can still thrive in the midst of the conglomerates. I went to Borders music once, and their rap section was barely a few walls long; the rest of the store was pretty much rock. If I want a good, underground rap selection, I have to go to a local store like Newbury Comics.

Edited September 21, 2006 by Era Might

[Anomaly]

Like it takes no effort to build a Wal-Mart? Do you have any idea what it takes to start up a business?

Government has no competition. Whatever it does is devoid of any type of competition so it has no inherent culture to be efficient.

Business needs to be reactive to competition and efficient. Business is forced to be financially efficient to stay alive. We don't have buggy whip factories any more because people don't want buggy whips. Should we have stated that it was morally wrong to let buggy whip factories go bankrupt because we weren't buying whips? People got other jobs and the economic resources went to other industries or endeavors that generated jobs. That's the nature of capitalism. It adjusts and is reactive to market needs and demands (people's needs and demands).
There is always a need to balance regulation so that competition is protected so that efficiency can be established but not allow monopolies.

[Era Might]

I don't think I've said anything about anything being "morally wrong". Lounge Daddy's point was not about morality, but efficiency.

If big business is not a beauracracy, I don't know what is.

Take public and private schools for example. A private school is one school. All the administrators just have to deal with that one school. Public schools, on the other hand, are usually four or five different schools in one city (more in a big city). Those administrators have to deal with all those schools. Which school has better potential for efficiency and quality? Is a student more likely to get lost in beauracratic foibles in a public school system or in a single private school?

In the same way, theoretically, local business probably has more potential. But, for it to work, it has to have the support of the local community, and so long as big business provides ease, local communities aren't going to take the effort to establish a culture of local business.

[BullnaChinaShop]

[quote name='Era Might' post='1069396' date='Sep 21 2006, 03:28 PM']
If people supported local business the same way they supported Wal-Mart, the prices would be the same.
[/quote]

This is not true because Wal-Mart gets economies of scale in their purchasing of items with which to stock their stores that no independent store can compete with. The more of any given widget you buy the lower the price you have to pay per widget, which in turn allows you to sell that widget at a lower price. Purchasing widgets for 1 store as opposed to 3000 makes a big difference. It is this advantage that has allowed Wal-Mart to offer a wider variety of items at a lower price than independent stores.

[Era Might]

[quote name='BullnaChinaShop' post='1069433' date='Sep 21 2006, 04:20 PM']This is not true because Wal-Mart gets economies of scale in their purchasing of items with which to stock their stores that no independent store can compete with. The more of any given widget you buy the lower the price you have to pay per widget, which in turn allows you to sell that widget at a lower price. Purchasing widgets for 1 store as opposed to 3000 makes a big difference. It is this advantage that has allowed Wal-Mart to offer a wider variety of items at a lower price than independent stores.[/quote]
If we could stop the order of the world for a year, and everyone who shops at a big business shopped instead at a local business, then the deals made with Wal-Mart would be given to that local store, because that local store would be producing the same volume as the Wal-Mart branch which used to exist. The companies that provide the product could still provide at those low prices, because even though they are not providing the volume to Wal-Mart nationally, the volume remains the same, it's just being offered to the thousands of different stores throughout the country that serve the same purpose that Wal-Mart did, only they're each their own individual store focused locally rather than nationally.

But, obviously, it would take a great effort to turn ourselves into a small, local business people rather than big business. We're comfortable where we are, so we just accept the big business monopoly and go along with the plan. Hence, local business does not work.

Edited September 21, 2006 by Era Might

[BullnaChinaShop]

[quote name='Era Might' post='1069438' date='Sep 21 2006, 04:24 PM']
If we could stop the order of the world for a year, and everyone who shops at a big business shopped instead at a local business, then the deals made with Wal-Mart would be given to that local store, because that local store would be producing the same volume as the Wal-Mart branch which used to exist. The companies that provide the product could still provide at those low prices, because even though they are not providing the volume to Wal-Mart nationally, the volume remains the same, it's just being offered to the thousands of different stores throughout the country that serve the same purpose that Wal-Mart did, only they're each their own individual store focused locally rather than nationally.

But, obviously, it would take a great effort to turn ourselves into a small, local business people rather than big business. We're comfortable where we are, so we just accept the big business monopoly and go along with the plan. Hence, local business does not work.
[/quote]


That would only be true all the independent stores cooperated to buy all of a given item at the same time. Wal-Mart buys for 3000 stores at once. To get the same deal from a manufactureer of a product the independent stores would have to band together and order at once, which means they don't really stay independent.

[Era Might]

I think the suppliers would adapt themselves, because they would be shipping the same volume, it would just be spread out. They wouldn't be making less (because the local community would support local business just as it supported Wal-Mart); they would actually be making more, because local business would crop up all over the country.

[Aloysius]

everyone knows that I'm not a supporter of big business or big government in any way. BUT: in this particular instance big business is offering a very great good whilst eliminating our (perceived) need for a very great evil (big government health care)

this is a lot less evil than becoming dependent upon the government for health care... or for that matter becoming dependent upon big-business-insurance companies: $4 perscription meds without insaurance means you can afford them without being dependent on government or big business (except, to a certain degree (but a very very small one compared to what it would be to the state or insurance company) to wal-mart)

btw, I can fully support Era's idealist ideas in here as well. it can be done... and those local stores could all organize a sort of guild system to attempt to mimic big-business's efficiency while remaining local and independent.

[Anomaly]

[quote name='Era Might' post='1069438' date='Sep 21 2006, 03:24 PM']
If we could stop the order of the world for a year, and everyone who shops at a big business shopped instead at a local business, then the deals made with Wal-Mart would be given to that local store, because that local store would be producing the same volume as the Wal-Mart branch which used to exist. The companies that provide the product could still provide at those low prices, because even though they are not providing the volume to Wal-Mart nationally, the volume remains the same, it's just being offered to the thousands of different stores throughout the country that serve the same purpose that Wal-Mart did, only they're each their own individual store focused locally rather than nationally.

But, obviously, it would take a great effort to turn ourselves into a small, local business people rather than big business. We're comfortable where we are, so we just accept the big business monopoly and go along with the plan. Hence, local business does not work.
[/quote]Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.

And if everyone on one side of the world jumped up and down at the same time, we would make the earth go off orbit.

There is not the efficiency to sell to 3,000 customers compared to 1 central customer. One manuf would have to ship out 3,000 seperate orders instead of 3,000. The 3,000 storew would have 3,000 UPS shipments instead of the order coming in on the weekly stock truck with tons of other various items the store sells.

It's not lazy comfort, it's efficient.

I have family and friends who own and run small retail business and/or work for large conglomerates. There is market for both, they just can't both do the same thing.

You don't have the depth of knowledge about business or retailing. Talk to some experienced friends and business owners of various opinions. I've known the guy who is the second generation owner of an independent pharmacy all my life. One of my cousins is the manager for the State of the pharmacies in a large grocery chain store. The commodity service is handled by the large store. If you are really sick, take unusual medicines, or a combination, then you go to the local pharmicist. The local guy also does protesthetics, rents wheel chairs, etc. He expanded his business. My cousin grew up in a rual town and his dad had the local pharmacy. My uncle refused to change what he sold and how he ran the store as the town grew and people wanted different stuff. He lost out to the chain pharmacy. It wasn't the chain's fault, he didn't want to change. As his business grew, he couldn't give the 'personal service' and became a quasi-discount store. If he re-oriented to a different market, he could have stayed in business with the value of his personal service. That's simplified, but it should give you a better idea.

[Era Might]

Yes, they would be making 3,000 separate shipments, but Wal-Mart still has to pay to get that product from their national center of distribution to the local branches. The independent local store would only have to pay extra for their own individual shipment. Wal-Mart, on the other hand, has to pay to get the product to their national headquarters, and THEN they have to pay to get that product to the local branches. They may pay less to the supplier, but they have that extra expense to distribute product among their branches; whereas the independent store is just paying to have the product taken from the supplier to their central location.

So even if the supplier charged more to ship to the independent store, that independent store doesn't have the costs that Wal-Mart does to ship the product to thousands of local branches, and so the difference in savings evens itself out.

Edited September 21, 2006 by Era Might