Barr and Nader join forces to advocate more Govt regulation of business:
www.sfgate.com:80/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/05/17/EDLD17LEO9.DTL
Dear Dr. Mike;
The House bill is designed to get car manufacturers to make available to independent car repair shops the information that only car dealer repair shops have available regarding specialized computer codes and tools for car repair. The intent of the bill is to make avaialable independent car repair places who can do the repair of the computer oriented car systems. More car repair shops gives more competition gives a price break for consumers. Currently according to the article repair costs are some 34% higher because the only shops to go to for car repair are the car manufactuere dealer controlled repair shops. In additon with the closing of literally thousands of car dealerships the choices of where to go for specialized car repair becomes even more difficult.
Economics in two easy sentences. Prices rise as the demand exceeds the supply. Prices fall when the supply exceeds the demand. Hence more car dealers who can do the specialized car repair gives more competition gives price drops for consumers.
Where does the Barr Nader advocacy of more governmment regulation of business come from which you said? Am I missing something here?
Ron Getty - SF Libertarian
Hostis res Publica
Morte ai Tiranni
Dum Spiro, Pugno
Ron - Are you suggesting that free markets and forced competitive markets are the same thing?
d
Dear David;
A free market in car repair would have any independent car repair place or any automotive car dealer being able to do the necessary car repairs. A free market car repair does not have car owners being forced through no choice of going to a more expensive car dealer repair shop because the car maunfactuers in this case in actuality control a monopoly and do not have any competiton for the monopol by controlling the parts and codes needed for a car repair so they can charge whatever they want as often as they want whenever they want at wwhatevere car dealerrs they want to and even restrict the authorized card ealers so there are even fewer choices and higher car repair prices.
Unfortunately getting to the point of having a "free market" in car repair must come at the point of the government gun aimed at the heads of the car manufacturers and their car dealers car repair literal monoply. Now of course car buyers could avoid like the plague buying cars at the dealers of the cars where there is no choice on repairs and buy from dealers of car manufactuers where there are choices.
Or the car manufactuerers seeing the hand writing on the wall could of their own "free volition voluntarily" agree to expand the choices of car repair shops where the special codes and equipment are available before Congress acts accordingly forcing a "free market competiton" for car repairs.
Therefore the phony " free market" in auto repair is not a "free market" and is no better than the guvmint forcing competition. The car manufactuerers and car dealer repair shops worked a deal out to split the take from forced auto repairs at whatever prices they could extract unwillingly or otherwise you car she no work - sorry about that.
Considering all the benefits the guvmint has given car manufacturers and the UAW over the decades with its protective tariffs and special loans and special tax credits and so on its pay back time.
But comparing true free market vs. forced government market ain't no comparison as their isn't one because the free market ain't free when it's a private enterprise Big Business in bed with the Big Government and Big Unions doing a three way with the car buyers and tax payers being the ones getting screwed.
Ron Getty - SF Libertarian
Hostis res Publica
Morte ai Tiranni
Dum Spiro, Pugno
Of course, the real answer is to repeal the DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) to once again make it legal for independent vendors to reverse-engineer these codes.
As is ALWAYS the case, the only true monopoly is a government-granted one, and Ron is correct that these auto dealers have a monopoly on repairs, because it is illegal under the DMCA for independent auto repair shops to reverse engineer these codes or purchase such reverse-engineered codes from someone else.
It's like how inkjet printer companies have started putting chips on their ink tanks (not combined tanks/printheads like HP does -- just plain old ink tanks) so that onwers of their printers cannot buy generic ink. Reverse-engineering these chips would be simple and cheap, but thanks to DMCA, it's illegal, and that's precisely why the printer companies have started using these chips.
I wonder if Barr and Nader would team up to pass a law forcing printer companies to share their ink tank codes with generic ink sellers.
Again, the Barr/Nader solution is the wrong one. Simply repeal the DMCA, and all sorts of problems will be solved -- the car code one, the ink tank one, and Adobe will no longer be able to throw Russian programmers in jail for coding.
Rob
One of the problems overlooked here in both positions: outsourcing. As long as the corporate cartels are able to manipulate supply and demand by forcing dependence on foreign markets, there is no way for a free market to operate like Ron proposes.
Ron - I think we may have a difference of opinion on your definition of force. When you say car owners are 'forced' to go to expensive dealer shops are you suggesting the manufacturer, dealer, government or some other entity has them at gunpoint against their will? Or that they are locked in by their warranty contract and simply afraid of voiding it? Assuming the latter, I don't see how that is any less of free a market scenario and I wouldn't regard that action as a real definition of force if the buyer has signed an agreement to return to the dealer.
I like Rob's point about repealing dmca though. Certainly if an independent dealer highered a russian programmer to reverse engineer someone's property, that's in their just rights (current illegitimate laws aside). But even if the big 3 are intentionally encrypting data on cars to block outsider repairs, that's in their rights as well, agreed? Otherwise any encryption on anything is potentially illegal as it blocks a jilted 3rd party from accessing the data competitively
As far as I can tell, there is no real auto monopoly in this country(yet), otherwise you wouldn't have new car companies like Tesla springing up. And there are 10's of thousands of independent car shops about that are working on all sorts of cars. So even if there was the force would not necessarily be on the consumer as they have the choice not to buy, unlike a new carmaker that is barred from making cars.
So in my view, the Barr/Nader bill is just yet more regulation on an already crumbling domestic auto industry.
David
btw - i suspect many, if not a majority of new car owners desire repairs at the dealer, judging from conversations with friends. Just a hunch, I can't back this up with numbers.
Dear David;
It's use of force when to get the servicing the repair upkeep and maintenance on a car which is as always going to be needed and can't be avoided and the only way to get the proper servicing is through a warranty which dictates who you have to go to to get the necessary repairs upkeep and maintenance asnd pay what they charge because they have no competition then this is use of force as the car buyer has no option other than to decline to accept the warranty service and rely on local car repair shops who in todays computerized world of new cars DO NOT have the necssary codes or tools to do the repiars. This is use of force and is not free market competition by any definition of free market.
As afra as Tesla goes it also was in line for government money not private investor money - hello bailout funds. Thus Tesla is not just a free market company taking its lumps and bumps in raising PRIVATE CAPITAL to succeed.
While there are 10,000 of independent car repair places if they do not have the computer codes and specialized tools they can not do the repair work and thus do not provide competition for the computerized car motors of today.
Yes car buyers can buy used older models which do not require the necessary computer codes and tools.
They also give up up the specialized braking and air bags and hyvrids and so on to have a better driving experience and hopefully less costly use of costly gas.
Repealing DMCA has its merits and should be replealed along with copyright and the patent office. For a nice series on doing exactly that I am giving you this url to review several articles about this topic and very well written and very thought provoking.
http://www.lewrockwell.com/tucker/tucker-arch.html
Unfortunately the copyright and Intellectual property and patent repeal articles are strung through out but these are the titles of the articles to click through to:
Special note start with the one at the bottom and work your way up. The last one sets the stage and the rest are building on it as unfortunately Lew Rockwell does not have the means to re-order the articles by date. The click throughs may work direct form this page if not go to the lew rockwell url above and you'll go to Jeffrey Tuckers archived articles.
The 100-Year Sentence
Crimes vs. Vices
Leonard Read, Open-Source Hero
Another 'Market Failure' Argument
Simony and Copyright
The Mercantilism of Our Time
Patents Kill…Literally
The Glorious Inventor Hoax
Fallacy Run Amok
Property and Competition
The Book and Music Killer
The Evil of Patents
Property in Ideas
Does Monopoly Create Wealth?
Monopoly Kills Creativity
Generosity or Resentment
Beware of Copyright
Government Monopolies Undo Civilization
Ron Getty - SF Libertarian
Hostis res Publica
Morte ai Tiranni
Dum Spiro, Pugno
Ron - Sounds like we have a fundamental disgreement on the definition of force, at least in the libertarian context. In fact, I could argue that your solution is more of an example of force as you are advocating government take tools and codes from one company to give to another - under the moral cause of increasing competition. I don't understand how you can legitimately justify that as free market.
Also, I agree that tax breaks and bailouts are bad but these days they are happening on a broad scale it would be difficult to find an entity that has not 'benefited', including consumers. Isn't this different from a direct barrier to entry? Either way I don't see these associative evils as valid excuses to justify yet more regulation in an attempt to perpetually level the playing field. Where does that game end?
best,
David
Dear David;
It's not Llibertarianism it's an extension of the government and the Big Three being in bed with each other and doing a bunch of mutual back scratching with the consumer and the taxpayers paying the price. Now the government is saying okay we had a good time now lets do this instead - let's spread the wealth among car repair companies AND we will protect the source code so it's not a total give away.
I never siad it was free market because the Big Three are not free market companies and have not for decades been free market companies they have always been private enterprise companies which is what happens when Big Business and Big Government join forces or as it is more commonly known Fascism. Fascism is not free market.
So therefore whatever happens when the government and private enterprise have a falling out of a sorts too bad. The pols are just feathering their beds at the expense of the car manufacturers and the UAW.
And I never said and the proposed bill never says anything about more regulation its about involuntarily redistributing the wealth and does nothing to level the playing because if you believe by simply providing the codes and the tools to independent car repair places makes for competition and leveling the playing field without some kick back or spiff or strings of some kind from the car repair shops to the car manufacturers - well I have this bridge in Brooklyn you might be interested in. 
Ron Getty - SF Libertarian
Hostis res Publica
Morte ai Tiranni
Dum Spiro, Pugno
Dear David;
BTW I forgot to include that Tesla Motors had put themselves in for $350 million of bail out money.
Some free entreprise free market company hunh?
Ron Getty - SF Libertarian
Hostis res Publica
Morte ai Tiranni
Dum Spiro, Pugno
Dear Ron,
You asked:
Where does the Barr Nader advocacy of more governmment regulation of
business
come from which you said? Am I missing something here?
I get the reference. LOL.
Seriously, the something you may be missing is that the car owner can freely
choose not to buy a car that restricts his choice of repair shops.
No force is involved. Could I freely choose not to pay my IRS bill? No way.
This illustrates the difference between Govt (force) and free markets
(consent).
Cherchez le gun.
Warm regards, Michael
Ron - At this point, I'm not entirely clear on what your position is on topic. We may have to agree to disagree on this one. But just to clarify my position for the record -
- I'm not in favor of the proposed bill based on the information in the article as it adds regulation and any assumed advantage for the independents or consumers is at the expense of someone else. If the big 3 are in violation of their contractual agreements they should be sued in civil court by those wronged.
- I don't have evidence that the big 3 to be part of a federal fascist association - any more than you are I are part of it as well - based on your arguments. For instance if you received a tax rebate check or any other welfare type payment in the past your right there in the poo pot with GM, Tesla and everyone else. It's just a difference of scale. In fact comparing myself to GM, I would say I am relatively less regulated than GM based on the thousands of regulations they have to adhere to that I do not. How this balances out with government contracts GM receives to a potential net positive position... I have not idea how to calculate that. (If they go chapter 7 my position will probably change as they will essentially be a government entity like AIG)
- When you said - "Unfortunately getting to the point of having a "free market" in car repair must come at the point of the government gun aimed at the heads of the car manufacturers and their car dealers car repair literal monoply."
I'm not convinced there is a monopoly in the car repair business, yet alone that government needs to use force to ensure a free market. I think you are just assuming it is more proper to completely unbundle future services from the sale of a good. No one is forcing car owners to return to the dealer for service. This sounds like misplaced entitlement to me. If I'm in the market for a new car, the cost of repairs and warranties is a big factor so I'm going to take that into account - before the sale. Some people forget about that and that sucks for them. But if I can't get my car computer serviced at my preferred shop and price, then I have the option of selling the car and buying another one that will. If there aren't any available, then I'll buy a bike instead.
In any event, calling Bob Barr to get the G-men to step in and provide my terms just smacks of leftist ill.
d.
Dear David;
Libertarian speaking wise if The Big Three and Big Government hadn't cut various deals for protectionism in one way or another the necessity of having such a bill in the first place would be moot. But unfortunately the government giveth and taketh and it don't care whometh it hurteth.
But absent that the government needs to entirely bug out of providing any so called private free market entity any directions or regulations of any kind for any reason under any circumstances and that ain't gonna happen as long as there is such a thing as government doing what it does best as John Lennon siad - anything the government touches turns to - bull dust.
Ron Getty - SF Libertarian
Hostis res Publica
Morte Ai Tiranni
Dum Spiro, Pugno
Ron,
I understand what you are saying. With all due respect it doesn’t seem we are not going to advance Liberty by giving government the ultimate weapon expecting them to use it for the benefit of the people. It will always be perverted. And anyone who thinks Barr and has a snowballs chance in hell to get this passed needs to wake up and smell the coffee.
So I’m with David on this one. No sense in spending too much time tilting at windmills with no chance of political gain while cluttering our Liberty message at the same time.
Best regards,
Mike
Please excuse the bad grammar….another try.
Ron,
I understand what you are saying. With all due respect it doesn’t seem we are going to advance Liberty by giving government the ultimate weapon expecting them to use it for the benefit of the people. It will always be perverted. And anyone who thinks Barr and has a snowballs chance in hell to get this passed needs to wake up and smell the coffee.
So I’m with David on this one. No sense in spending too much time tilting at windmills with no chance of political gain while cluttering our Liberty message at the same time.
Best regards,
Mike
Dear Wine Mike;
First of all smack that bad grammar with a wet noodle that'll make her head spin and set her on the right course to goodnes and decency and then she'll start being a good grammar setting an example for all of us.
As far as perverted goes that was the Libertarians at the national convention who elected Barr the Libertarian presidential candidate to respresent the face of Libertarianism. A lot of good that did for Libertarianism.
However that aside the bill in question has been around something like a decade in one form or another and never got nowhere anyways. So the bill itself is a moot point. And I'll stick with John Lennon as he was quoted: Everything the government touches turns to cat scat.
However as far as allowing the politicians to do something for consumers and taxpayers the best thing they could do would be to dissolve the federal government and fire all the federal workers and cancel all the government contracts and shut the FED down and so on but that ain't gonna happen neither either in a snow balls chance in the middle of the Sun.
Ron Getty - SF Libertarian
Hostis res Publica
Morte ai Tiranni
Dum Spiro, Pugno
No arguments there Ron…:>)