Americans may be losing faith in free markets

LA Times ^ | 7/16/08 | Peter G. Gosselin

[NormsRevenge]

WASHINGTON -- For a generation, most people accepted the idea that the core of what makes America tick was an economy governed by free markets. And whatever combination of goods, services and jobs the market cooked up was presumed to be fine for the nation and for its citizens -- certainly better than government meddling.

No longer.

Spurred by the continued housing crisis, turmoil in financial markets, spiking oil prices, disappearing jobs and shrinking retirement savings, the nation and its political leaders have begun to sour on the notion that the current market system is the key to a fair, stable and efficient society.

"We're at a hinge point," said William A. Galston, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington who helped craft President Clinton's market-friendly agenda during the 1990s. "The strong presumption in favor of markets, which has dominated public policy since the late 1970s, has been thrown very much into question."

Now, to a degree not seen in years, politicians and outside experts are looking with favor at more, not less, government involvement in the economy.

[NormsRevenge]

“Nobody in this country really believes in unfettered free markets, and nobody really believes in socialism,” said UC Davis historian Eric Rauchway, but economic crises of the past have produced constituencies favoring the reining in of markets and regulation of the economy — constituencies that ultimately grew large enough to produce change.

Consider just a few of the things that are pushing people in that direction now:

The price for a gallon of regular unleaded gasoline has nearly doubled in the last year, while that for a barrel of crude oil has more than doubled, cutting short Americans’ love affair with gas-guzzlers and driving the nation’s trucking, auto and airline industries into deep trouble.

Most mainstream economists assert that these increases are simply the logical outcome of booming global demand meeting limited global supply.

[djsherin]

No kidding. Over half our budget consists of socialist income redistribution schemes and with everyone clamoring to get Universal Healthcare it’s quite easy to see that people have lost faith in the market...

Too bad since the market does everything better, cheaper, faster, and overall more efficiently than Uncle Sam.

[wastedyears]

“Limited global supply”

When Canada has trillions in shale, and we might have up to a trillion in ANWR.

Yeah, sounds really limited to me.

[avacado]

"Now, to a degree not seen in years, politicians and outside experts are looking with favor at more, not less, government involvement in the economy."

Yeah, and some 200 years plus ago some people on this land got pretty pissed off about that and revolted and formed a new nation. And they put the 2nd Amendment in place should such another similar occasion arise.

[NormsRevenge]

Entitlement programs will kill the Golden Goo$e.

New Deal? Hell, Raw Deal .. for future generations!!

[sf4dubya]

Good heavens, they are really turning up the “socialism is good” dial in the media lately.

Pray the good Americans left in this country see through all of this hypberbole.

[bert]

The free market, that is for news papers is quickly making it likely this guy will be out of a job.

To be sure he is a good guy and kept on, he’s allowing his farleft values to surface front and center..

[kms61]

it’s not that free markets don’t work, it’s that sharpies have figured out how to rig them. IMO.

[NormsRevenge]

mighty nice of the Founding Fathers to believe in back-up plans...

‘Yours to keep’ comes to mind too. :-)

[nicola_tesla]

What free market ? It’s not been free in this country at least since the New Deal.

[E. Pluribus Unum]

We don't have free markets.

We have markets run by governments both foreign and domestic.

[PGR88]

Americans are losing their faith in FREEDOM also, so am not surprised.

We think freedom and democracy is everyone coming out every 4 years to vote for the prettiest candidate. WRONG - it is about protecting an individual’s person and property from unjust seizure (and that includes redistributive taxes or rigged markets). Everything else is secondary.

[Osage Orange]

Yeah...please let the Fed's regulate more of it.

/s

[Califelephant]

“...Now, to a degree not seen in years, politicians and outside experts are looking with favor at more, not less, government involvement in the economy...”

Yes, and just as it always has in the past, this expanded government intervention will make things worse, not better.

[Osage Orange]

You want to laugh....?

Go here:

Time for Some Campaignin' http://video.msn.com/video.aspx?mkt=en-us&playlist=videoByUuids:uuids:a32a150d-6b82-49ff-a05b-3bdc2329a9a4&showPlaylist=&from=IV2_en-us_hp&fg=gtlv2

[SAJ]

The sharpies, as right now in the crude mkt, have only been able to figure out how to rig mkts because of the inefficiencies and ineptitude of goobermint regulation.

The ''Enron loophole''? From the Commodity Modernization Act of 2000. The ''swaps exemption''? From a combination of Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999 and the Commodity Modernization Act the next year.

Result: a crazily rigged mkt...until the Regress undo their misbegotten handiwork.

[EBH]

Spurred by the continued housing crisis, turmoil in financial markets, spiking oil prices, disappearing jobs and shrinking retirement savings, the nation and its political leaders have begun to sour on the notion that the current market system is the key to a fair, stable and efficient society.

Oh good Lord! Are people really that ignorant and gullible that they don't see it is the government interference in housing, and oil markets that is causing the economy to be challenged?

[RightWhale]

most people accepted the idea that the core of what makes America tick was an economy governed by free markets

. . . and without a clue what a free market might be.

[threeoeight]

300 can change the course of history if they are willing to make the sacrifice.

[DB]

All of the “crisis” mentioned are caused by government meddling. From demanding banks make loans to the “disadvantaged” through Fanny Mae and Freddie Mac (both government inventions) to not allowing states to decide where we search and recover oil.

[rovenstinez]

Absolutely, people haven’t lost confidence in the FREE Market, but the Government who has NOT submitted itself to the WILL of the people.

[jwparkerjr]

Because they've never seen a free market most Americans have no way of knowing one when they see one, they vanished from the landscape well before they were born.

Isn't it amazing the liberals prescription for almost every problem is more of what got us into trouble to start with! They simply have no ability to observe the outcome of a plan or project and recognize that it's failed or why it's failed. It's just pour money into the same failing plan.

I can not think of a single solitary thing that government doesn't have a hand in to either tax or control.

Unless we find a way to return to the idea of free markets life in America as our fathers and grandfathers knew it will be gone.

[Inyokern]

Losing faith in markets is like losing faith in the sun. Whether or not one has faith in it, it is always going to be there and will always do what it does.

[Fedupwithit]

Wow, what a shock...the people are losing faith in the free markets!!

Is it just me, or does anyone else find it interesting that the front page of USA Today seems to be able to predict the future? There was a headline yesterday stating "Lower Oil Prices Might Bring Back Faith in Market", and VOILA!!!...today the market sprints out 275.

Naw, why would we think that something shady is happening?

[what's up]

"We're at a hinge point," said William A. Galston, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington who helped craft President Clinton's market-friendly agenda during the 1990s. "The strong presumption in favor of markets, which has dominated public policy since the late 1970s, has been thrown very much into question."

Ah yes...Sid Blumenthal's far-left Brookings Institution.

They are always an unbiased source. /sarc

[IronJack]

Now, to a degree not seen in years, politicians and outside experts are looking with favor at more, not less, government involvement in the economy socialism.

[prov1813man]

It just makes you want to start shooting the bastards....all of the “problems” this moron points too are the result of government interference, not a cause for it and these cynical bastards full well know it.

First they create the issue, then they put themselves up as the solution to it.

If you want to know how it’s going to turn out, take a look at the inner cities, public education and union controlled businesses. Democrat bastions all for the past 5 decades and all rotten to the core.

[Devilinbaggypants]

Only the netroots who are mentally challenged have a need for larger government...every single screw up in the economy is directly attributable to our wonderful government...but only the netroots have the stones to ignore that fact and blame it on us! Without us carrying their lazy @sses they'd be in deep deep do do. Imagine what it would be like if we could only get that lazy @ss mokney off of our backs!

[Colinsky]

All we have to do is put the DMV in charge of oil and gasoline, and the Post Office in charge of the financial markets, and let Amtrak solve the housing crisis. Paradise!

[Teacher317]

Americans are not happy with the current system. The author says we’re not satisfied with free markets. This logic assumes that the current system is a free market... a premise that is quite debatable.

[avacado]

"300 can change the course of history if they are willing to make the sacrifice."

If the USA turned into ObamaMarxistLand and taxes were 70% or more on everyone, the economy totaly government controlled, I bet 98% of the military would join the citizen militias and over power what's left of the US Government.

It seems that liberals are pushing toward that point. No wonder they are so against the 2nd Amendment.

Benjamin Franklin

QUOTATION: “Well, Doctor, what have we got—a Republic or a 
Monarchy?” “A Republic, if you can keep it.” 

[expat_panama]

“Nobody in this country really believes in unfettered free markets..."

"Unfettered" means "unshackled" or "unchained".   In other words, "free".

This guy's an idiot.

[mjp]

abolition of the free market leads to central planning + universal price controls, which leads to anarchy of production, shortages, and economic chaos which ends up with totalitarianism + progressive impoverishment.

[Paladin2]

Americans losing faith in LA Times.

[Gritty]

the nation and its political leaders have begun to sour on the notion that the current market system is the key to a fair, stable and efficient society.

I thought the reason for free markets was for the efficient use of resources and capital.

The slogans of "fair, stable" are emotionally embodied in the precept, "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need!".

[Publius6961]

Americans may be losing faith in free markets

Well, D'UH!

If you regulate, constrain and micromange it, whatever results may surely fail...

But a "Free Market" it ain't.

Talk about a self-fulfilling prophecy!

Sort of "Why don't you just drill where there ain't no oil? and be quick about it!"

[tessalu]

America does not have a limited food supply, and we can produce all that we need. It is the globalists that are trying to grab control of the whole world. These high prices are no accident, and are not caused by drought or any other such cause. Our freedoms are slipping away.

[Wonder Warthog]

"Most mainstream economists assert that these increases are simply the logical outcome of booming global demand meeting limited global supply."

Which just proves that "most mainstream economists" are idiots. The current energy supply problems are directly due to continued INTERFERENCE in free markets by the "greens" and liberals by the ever-increasing morass of local, state, and federal regulations and NIMBY-ism, starting with Jimmy Carter, and continuing 'til today.

[LomanBill]

Ex 20:3-5

 

3 "You shall have no other gods before me.

 

4 "You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. 5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them;

 

Hmmm, given the above text of the 1st and 2nd amendments, maybe folks have been putting their faith in the wrong place.

 

Seems that, for many, The Market has clearly become an object of worship - an idol.

 

Maybe the New Secular Order ain't all it's cracked up to be.

 

Maybe it's not even new.

 

Meet the new Baal, same as the old Baal.

 

 

[LomanBill]

>>1st and 2nd amendments,

 

LOL.  Should be:

 

1st and 2nd commandments,