Zero Powers wrote:
>
> >From: Max More <max@maxmore.com>
> >
> >Have you ever traveled to the third world? Do you really think they live in
> >a free market society? (I dislike the term "capitalist"--the term was
> >coined by Karl Marx, who understood nothing about human capital.)
>
> Pardon me while I mount my soapbox...
>
> I believe Mexico, Jamaica and the Bahamas would qualify. I've been there
> and I've observed squalid poverty in each of those places, and they each
> have "free market" societies. Do I believe these places would be better off
> if they were communist? No. Again, that is *not* what I'm saying. I
> realize that poverty has myriad causes, historical, social, political and
> personal. *No economic system* can alone eliminate poverty in today's
> world. I realize that.
Mexico and Jamaica do NOT have 'free markets'. Their markets are tightly
controlled by the government and the oligopolists/mercantilists that
control the government. Mexico has always been a very
feudal/mercantilist economy, not a free market.
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