We’re dominated by anti-State ‘small government’ politics. The idea that a ‘market’ of competing individuals…
We’re dominated by anti-State ‘small government’ politics. The idea that a ‘market’ of competing individuals will always be the efficient way to carry out social transactions.
An ‘economy’, replacing a society. Why this is bananas. /1
https://t.co/0TIPSe9Vud https://t.co/P9tR7LgaOG
Not for any ’Leftie’ reason about fairness and equity. Not for a ‘balanced’ reason of ‘harnessing the economy for social good.’
But because we’ve forgotten why WE invented States. Us, the people, as we like to say. And to boot, economies are not even real. /2
Birmingham is a victim of this shift, and shows us why we invented government.
To create economies of scale, for social transactions.
That’s it. We were tired of the bloated inefficiencies and violences of everybody doing everything for themselves. /3 https://t.co/ptBzM8mTBI
This is what mass privatisations in our era are returning us to, these same bloated inefficiencies of dispersed provision. We’ve destroyed the economies of scale that government gave us.
This is the most basic logistics. /4
It’s far cheaper and more efficient to have a single payer - government - provide public services. It’s why we have Medicare. It’s why electricity is now ruinously expensive, when privatised.
These are logistical arguments. Not political. /5
Those who go to war against government don’t believe their own spin about it being in the way of the efficient market.
It’s in the way of them getting very rich. That’s why they oppose it. They don’t behave in market ways, they never have nor do they intend to. /6
Markets, like economies, are political inventions. A way to disguise the replacement of existing social hierarchies, with other ones.
Humans NEVER act in ways, socially, that look like a market. Never, ever, as separate individuals maximising individual return. /7
They form teams, based on imitative rivalry, to create status. In battle with other teams. They imitate one another, inside these teams.
It’s why all markets go ‘viral’. Like housing. That’s all monkey-see, monkey do. We want what others have. We act socially. /8
Which leads to brutal inefficiencies, and then violence. That’s why we - yes us, humans - invented government. To be relieved of those inefficiencies, and that violence.
To have economies of scale, in our societies. To ease our burdens. /9
The economy is a con. Explicitly designed to strip away all existing leadership, and replace it with a fantasy ‘invisible hand’ i.e. a society that runs itself.
Societies never run themselves. People act socially, they battle for status. /10 https://t.co/7A3UJ0dYnT
It’s why small government politics has led us to prohibitive costs of living, and continuing violence globally.
The only State-funded thing that still receives enthusiasm is defence spending. To deal with the violence stripping away States causes. /11
The default state of society is always violence. Not because we’re violent, but because we desire, and when desires clash, it leads to violence.
We invented the State to provide a mechanism of regulating desires.
Without them, we have poverty, and death.
/end