JayB

You can thank the late Milton Friedman and his acolytes for the idea. I think the conceptual hurdles are more formidable than the administrative ones. There's already something like this in place for students working their way through college via the work-study program at most universities. I'm not terribly familiar with the parameters that govern who gets the EIC, but this is more or less a negative income tax that's extended to people who meet certain conditions. In any event, I suspect that most of the administrative machinery necessary to implement this kind of program is already in place.

I can't think of a situation where price controls wouldn't ultimately do much more harm than good, so I can't think of a situation where I'd support them. With respect to the US, the only strict price controls that we have that I'm aware of come in the form of the minimum wage, and I've been clear in saying that it would be a much better idea to use targeted subsidies like the EIC or some other sort of negative income tax to achieve the ends that minimum-wage supporters are hoping to achieve. The single-mom working the till at McDonald's would qualify for a subsidy, the kid working the same job, living at home, and saving up for an iPOD and a new amp for his tricked-out Accord wouldn't. The public, rather than the employer, would shoulder the financial burderns of the policy. With respect to all of the other subsidies that riddle our economy, there's a critical difference between price controls and subsidies, in that the government acknowledges there's a difference between the market price and the price that the government has concluded a particular good/service/commodity should be sold for, and it pays the difference between the two. I'm not a fan of either, but subsidies at least have the minor merit of indicating that whoever is implementing them has not yet completely succumbed to the notion that reality - ergo prices - can be determined by administrative fiat. If you liked Zimbabwe in 2006, you'll love Venezuela in 2015.

is he instituting price controls? Yes. how and where? Exchange rates and selected staples. I'm amazed that you missed the opportunity to sink some assets into the "Bond of the South" that they issued last year to mop-up dollars in an attempt to shrink the glaring disparity between official Bolivar/Dollar exchange-rate and the real exhange rate. As far as I know, the price-controls on staples are only in force in government-owned stores, but as the government assumes more control over the economy as per the aforementioned confiscations, or through involuntary "partnerships," look for them to increase in size and scope. More on "The Bond of the South": http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601086&refer=latin_america&sid=auKaVIzbn2jM

is he instituting price controls? Yes.

Burned hand teaches best. Spare the rod and you'll have another 50 years worth of implosions inspired by Allendesque fables about how it could have all worked so beautifully if only Uncle Sam had left Hugo alone. Let those who support Chavez stay live with the consequences of their rhetoric, and hope that those who don't have the the sense to emmigrate.

What he lacks in discipline he'll more than make up for with ineptitude. The path wander a bit, but of the final destination there is absolutely no doubt. Prices communicate real information about the relationship between supply and demand, which are a function of realities that cannot be eliminated. When food is scarce, the price goes up. Artificially suppress the price and you suppress effective demand, which effectively prevents the generation of additional supplies. Regimes such as Chavez's can attempt to control prices, but since they cannot control the realities and contingencies that generate them, this experiment is doomed. Moreover, once they no longer have the information provided by prices to engage in economic calculations, they won't even be able to tell if a particular enterprise is generating outputs that are worth more than their inputs. Is state-run company X generating a profit or loss? Who knows. Expand this example infinitely and you begin to see the process by which the missallocation of resources that characterizes socialism generates the cumulative depletion of productive resources and structural distortions that guarantee its failure. Look for significant outmigration to commence in 5-10 years once the confiscation party is over and the mismanagement of the oil-bounty has worked its magic.

There's always a holliday during the confiscation phase. Once there's nothing left to confiscate and the price mechanism has been fully supplanted by central planning, economic calculation becomes impossible, as is efficiently coordinating supply and demand, and outright economic decline and mass impoverishment are guaranteed outcomes. There is no escape from this. The only variables that will meaningfully affect the chronology are the price of oil and Venezuela's ability to maintain its production of this commodity. I personally thought that Hugo'd be smart enough to dupe foreign oil companies into sinking enough capital into the fields to prop up production for a while longer before confiscating their assest, but it appears he's feeling flush these days, so he may take a cleaver to the golden goose a bit earlier than I'd expected.

I really was, shocked. Seriously. The state seizing the most valuable and productive private assets? In a socialist country? In South America? I mean, come-ON? Unhead of. I do agree with you that as time goes on there will be quite a bit more economic equality in Venezuela. I am not convinced that this will be the result of increases in the average person's standard of living, but a certain kind of equality will be the inexorable conclusion that Chavez brings to Venezuela.

No specific theory, just a general observation/query. It just seems to me that if you've got a group of people who are cunning and devious and powerful enough to orchestrate some of the plots that you've mentioned, these same people would probably be clever enough to leak some morsels of "secret" information out to folks who are a couple of standard-deviations above the norm on the IQ/education/analytical-capability scale and let them put the pieces together in such a way that the "unintended" disclosure of this ostensibly "secret" information actually enabled them to pursue other, more consequential objectives in secrecy. Tactical ruses, strategic head-fakes on the way to the real goal.

The good old Seattle nice-off. Count your blessings, folks.

"Mr Chavez said Venezuela was moving towards "a socialist republic" that required "deep reform of our national constitution". "We are in an existential moment of Venezuelan life," he said. "We're heading toward socialism, and nothing and no-one can prevent it." Mr Chavez demanded an end to the current autonomy of the country's central bank and said he would ask Venezuela's parliament to grant him additional powers to legislate by presidential decree." Shocking, that.

If you're ever in Canada and in need of a climbing guide, I know just the guy....

While we're on the subject, I was hoping if Buckaroo could tell us if he has ever come across a conspiracy theory that he found unconvincing, and on what grounds. I'd also be interested in hearing whether or not he has considered that he may be unwittingly furthering the aims of a larger conspiracy by laying bare the evidence and analysis that have hitherto escaped the general public's notice. It would also be interesting to hear a short story in which Buckaroo relates a scene from his life in which there was no sinister subtext that he was aware of, and all the actors made their motives explicit. This can include inanimate objects, such as the "walk" signal at a crosswalk, live actors like the 16 year-old Asian kid manning the till at McDonalds, or animals. Like the neighbors dog, who always seems to cock his head to the side and perk up his ears suspiciously whenever anyone in earshot utters the word "Zionist."

It's fluoridation. Perhaps he was speaking - "injest." It's okay Tvash, everyone who wields pedantry's double-edged sword gets a paper-cut now and then.

"A little Learning is a dang'rous Thing; Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian Spring: There shallow Draughts intoxicate the Brain, And drinking largely sobers us again."

I'm a sucker for chemical jokes, that's all.

Did you mean elements? No, cuntybahs. As usual, I'm way ahead of you. I filter my drinking water, which takes most additives and impurities out, so I don't have to worry much about whether some future study, as so often happens, connects rat studies with human, or whether some other health affect not previously investigated will crop up in the future. Plus, pure water tastes better. In the case of aluminum; aluminum oxides are bad for you, they just haven't been proven to cause Alzheimers. Non stick coatings, once they begin to flake off (which they always do) are even worse. I cook on cast iron and stainless, which does a better job anyway and is much easier to clean with using less soap. Flouride has mixed reviews as for it's health affects, it not essential to sustain life, nor is it necessary for good dental care if sound dental hygiene and a good diet are observed. I'll take the plain water, and avoid any potential health affects entirely. I pretty much take the same viewpoint with all household chemicals, in cleaners, soap, shampoo, etc. End of story. I just wasn't sure if you were referring to the elementary composition of the water molecules themselves, or if any molecule composed of only hydrogen and oxygen, like hydrogen peroxide, would be permissible under this regimen.

If you are quiet, somewhere off in the distance you can hear someone furiously typing "double blind" into Google, staring at the screen, and blinking. "Never try to reason a man out of something that he wasn't reasoned into."

Sodium is present in 100% of all tumors that have occurred since the origin of life. Naturally the table-salt industry has endeavored to conceal this fact from the public.

Did you mean elements? Drop a kilo of elemental sodium into the bathtub with you and let me know how you feel afterwards.

I nominate Foraker to dispense the vitrolic, hyper-verbose tongue lashing in my stead since I too busy to do so today. Must include the word "flocculent."

Now that we've commenced, or perhaps consecrated,the thread drift...I've been to quite a number of resorts, and can't say that I know what the "resort scene" is exactly. I just go there, put my stuff on, and hit the best terrain and snow conditions that I can find, and then drive home. If I'm actually staying someplace, my experiences off of the lift have no impact at all on my skiing experience, unless I stay out too late or drink too much, which I normally only do if there won't be any fresh snow to hit in the morning. The price can be a bit steep sometimes, but if you take advantage of the deals and prioritize your spending, it's manageable.

Dave_Schuldt.

You've got a point there, but his statement/query is roughly analogous to someone logging into boatertalk.com and announcing that they want to get into WW kayaking but they don't like the pool scene and they can't be bothered learning how to brace or roll on flatwater before getting into creeking. That'd probably also elicit a bit of unsolicited advice as well, I imagine.

If the economy were a highway, the free market side wouldn't be for a system with no lanes lanes, no speed-limits, etc - they'd be for a set of rules which optimizes everyone's ability to use their own judgement to get to wherever they want to go as quickly and as safely as possible. If you extended this analogy to socialist thinking, there'd be a central committe determing who could drive and who couldn't and a minder in every car to insure that everyone went where the state wanted them to go. Since you couldn't have an efficient market without the rule of law, which translates into regulations, I am not opposed to any and all regulations - just bad ones. A regulation that made it legal to drive any vehicle backwards on the highway so long as it weighed at least 5 tons would be a bad law that would be both dangerous and inhibit the flow of traffic. I think that laws that extent, say, an OB/gyn's liability for 18-years after the delivery are just about as asinine as my example. If an OB/gyn is negligent in his duties, a 6-year claims-window should be more than enough time to establish liability/responsibility. I do think that bringing things like price and performance information into the public domain, and coupling that with an insurance model where individuals, rather than corporations get tp deduct health-insurance premiums against their income, and most insurance couples high-deductibles with tax-free savings accounts that let you store money in them for life - would provide the information necessary to make the health care market work more like a real market, and that this would bring health insurance costs down considerably. Couple this with mandatory coverage, subsidies for poor people, and outright coverage for children, the elderly, and the indigent/insane that aren't otherwise covered, and I think we'd be well on our way to dealing with some of the biggest challenges that the health-care system faces. I think you can boil a lot of the problems with health-care at the moment down to the fact that the price-mechanism is effectively missing. This distorts things both on the demand side and on the supply-side, and the changes that I've outlined above would go a long way towards addressing them. As far as malpractice costs go, the actual cost of medical claims is only one factor. Another factor that drives up insurance-costs is uncertainty. If insurers - whether they be insuring against a freak storm or a spectacular settlement - can't determine the probabilities of a particular event happening well enough, you can be certain that they are not going to err on the side of undercharging the folks that they insure and leave themselves exposed and/or insolvent. I also think that the regulatory environment in a given state makes a difference in what the insured pay. This is clearly true in the case of auto-insurance, and I'd have a hard time believing it's any less true of any other insurance market.