PK:

“If your answer is “no” to any of these questions, please elaborate and explain to me what I am misunderstanding here.”

What you keep missing is what I keep pointing out. Let me take an example.

Let’s say we got rid of government schools. Does that mean that all of the teachers and administrators would be out of a job? No! Because there are still the kids out there who need to be educated. But since private schools spend their money MUCH more efficiently than do government schools, with generally superior quality, it is very likely the case that there will be MORE jobs. There would likely be smaller class sizes, meaning a greater teacher-to-student ratio, meaning more jobs.

So that would mean that, instead of creating jobs, by running government schools they actually DESTROYED jobs.

It’s really the Broken Window Fallacy all over again. You’d be one of the ones insisting that a new job was created for a glazier, ignoring the tailor’s lost business.

I mean, really, this is BASIC economics here.

Skepterist:

“Its not “they” its “we,” and we are spending our own money. We as taxpayers are providing the means necessary to protect and serve the public for the greater good.”

Long-discredited Socialist nonsense. The decision to spend the money is taken out of the hands of the people who actually worked to make the money. The Congresscritters, the bureaucrats, etc. are the ones making the spending decisions, and those INDIVIDUALS are therefore people who are spending other people’s money. Collectives don’t make decisions. Only individuals do.

“If there is no supply or demand for any of those simple examples, then I don’t know what supply and demand is.”

You don’t know what supply and demand is. The entire basis of supply and demand is based on suppliers having a choice as to how much to supply at each price level, and consumers having a choice as to how much to spend at each price level. That’s how equilibrium is achieved. That is NOT present with government monopolies. Your tax money is taken by force, and you don’t have the choice to go with a competitor.

“That is a gross generalization. There is plenty of accountability, it just takes involvement of the people whom the politicians serve.”

Like I said, at best we can vote a general up-and-down vote on everything. And even then, we’re often not given any better choice.

Example: 70% of Americans want to end the Iraq war, and voted to put the Democrats back in power in Congress to do it. Since then, the Democrats have been every bit as supportive of the war and the powers that Bush wants as the Republicans.

“Aren’t the taxpayers the customers here?”

No, because their money is taken by force.

“The federal government creates millions of jobs, for millions of people.”

Yeah, so did the kid who broke the shop window.

The SkepticWiki entry on the Broken Window Fallacy:

http://skepticwiki.org/index.php/Broken_Window_Fallacy

PK:

“However, you say that private companies can do things much more efficient than the government. The “much” part is definitely not true. I know people who work for Philips and Unilever, and those organisations are every bit as inefficient as, say, a university or a hospital.”

I don’t know the particular one you’re talking about, but understand there’s a difference between a private company and a corporation. Corporations are inventions of government. They’re companies that have a special status bestowed on them by government, and they often receive subsidies or tax “incentives” and this reduces the free market incentives to be efficient.

The prime examples are your local power, phone, and cable providers. Since they’re granted monopoly status outright, they do a lot of things very badly.

The airlines might be another example. Their service sucks, and their prices are cheap. I contend that this is in large part due to the government bailing them out every 10 years or so. Without that, their prices might have to rise, but then they’d also have an incentive to improve their service. Look at the smaller airlines, and how well they’re run since they have to compete with the big guys.

Also, efficiency is a relative thing. There’s no such thing as 100% efficiency.

And thanks for the heads-up about the upgrade.

Skepterist:

You’ve got a lot of gall to call me offensive and then use phrases like “It must be nice to live in your world.” And for your information, I DON’T do nothing. I’m very much an activist who has run for local office twice, supported candidates and lobbying organizations, done a fair bit of lobbying myself, I write columns for a local newspaper, I produce Bogosity, I do lots of stuff for no charge, above running my own business and being a single father to two kids, including one with autism.

And that’s the only part of your post worth even a response. You demand an exact count of things you know there is no exact count for and changes all the time, and you refuse to consider rational, logical arguments.

And then you get all sanctimonious and saying that I don’t do anything, when if you’d bothered to even so much as Google me (I post under my real name, unlike you), you’d see that is far from the case.

The real reason to go back? Revisit the Apollo landing sites and prove to all those mental midgets out there that we really did go there 38 years ago…

The words “you” and “idiots” are your exact words. Now, if you did not mean that paragraph to be offensive, then I think you need to restate it.

But you bring up another question I would like to ask of you: What “real jobs” are being lost? And by whom? In what way does the government (including NASA) compromise jobs?

I probably should just give up, since you don’t seem to want to consider any person’s opinion that differs from your own, but I’ll try one more time…

In your previous post you said, “1) They’re not spending their own money.” That is a very skewed view, and it is wrong. Its not “they” its “we,” and we are spending our own money. We as taxpayers are providing the means necessary to protect and serve the public for the greater good. I cannot personally afford to hire a police officer to roam the streets in my neighborhood, and my neighbors cannot afford to pay all the school teachers’ salaries to educate their children. And no one of us can afford to build a highway from California to Florida. Therefore, the taxes are paid willingly, not stolen, for the betterment of the community and the nation. If you are unhappy about paying your taxes, then perhaps you would be happier living in another state, or another country.

“2) There’s no supply and demand. There’s no competition for government,” Baloney. Have you ever been a school teacher? Have you ever been to an understaffed emergency room? Have you ever needed to call the fire department? If there is no supply or demand for any of those simple examples, then I don’t know what supply and demand is.

“3) There’s no accountability.” That is a gross generalization. There is plenty of accountability, it just takes involvement of the people whom the politicians serve. If we the people would actually pay attention to what our government is doing, at the local, state and federal levels, there would be better control of spending. If less than 20% of registered voters actually take the time to vote (and that’s only in really big elections) then no wonder some people think there’s no accountability. Indeed, who’s fault is it that some people don’t know what the hell is going on?

“4) There’s not even a customer base to speak of.” I’m not sure what you mean by this. Aren’t the taxpayers the customers here? Doesn’t the government provide services to the public? Aren’t we the public?

Have you ever served on a city council position? Have you ever been a police officer or a school teacher, or a garbage collector? Those are REAL JOBS, performed by REAL PEOPLE. They get paychecks, just like everyone else. I think perhaps you need to put down your Economics book and pick up a Government text.

Instead of questioning your comments, I’m just going to say you are wrong. The federal government creates millions of jobs, for millions of people. Those people may be direct employees of the government, or work for contract manufacturers, or are simply privately owned companies that provide the supporting goods and/or services. But they are indeed actual jobs.

Since I can’t afford to go to the moon by myself, I am more than happy to support both my government AND the private companies who can afford to make it happen.

And I can say that without calling you names.

… puts you in league with the creationists and the moon hoax idiots…

this is tantamount to calling the person you addressed an idiot. But let’s let that pass, and get on with more interesting matters.

You assert a lot about economics, but that is not the same as a rational argument. So rather than referring me to your previous posts (which, incidentally, I have read; I’m just not convinced by your assertions), could you answer the following questions:

1. Do you agree that schools, hospitals, police, etc., are products (i.e. services) demanded in our economy?

2. Does the government provide these products/services?

3. If you answered “yes” to both 1 and 2, does this not fulfill your conditions to have at least the ability to create jobs (I’ll quote you again: “To create a job, you actually have to produce a product demanded in the economy.”)

If your answer is “no” to any of these questions, please elaborate and explain to me what I am misunderstanding here.

Reread your last sentence. I made FOUR SEPARATE POSTS debunking exactly what you said in that sentence. It is that exact thing I was talking about!

Oh, and the only people I called “idiots” were the moon hoax people, who aren’t here at the moment.

Is it REALLY to much to ask for people to READ a post before they go mouthing off about it?

If you haven’t noticed, politicians tend to get booted out if they screw up the economy and are rewarded if they handle the economy well. That is the ultimate incentive.

You also said: “To create a job, you actually have to produce a product demanded in the economy.”

You mean like education, police services, fire fighters, public transport, the military, hospitals, etc.?