Antibiotics

[FBM]

The FDA makes it prohibitively expensive and time consuming to bring any new drug to market, making it impossible for any company other than "Big Pharma" to get a foot in, and that's the fault of "capitalism"?

Big Money and Big Gummit go hand-in-hand. Look at the military industrial complex.

[JimC]

The FDA makes it prohibitively expensive and time consuming to bring any new drug to market, making it impossible for any company other than "Big Pharma" to get a foot in, and that's the fault of "capitalism"?

Big Money and Big Gummit go hand-in-hand. Look at the military industrial complex.

However, potentially at least, there may be good reasons to careful evaluation of new drugs for unexpected side effects, which may inevitably add time and expense. Perhaps it is excessive, due to bureaucratic inefficiency, which hopefully could be improved, but you simply have to have some form of regulation to avoid disasters like thalidomide.

Anyway, that really isn't the issue. Big Pharma puts up with the expense and delays from the FDA for drugs that it thinks will make it big money. For a variety of reasons, that doesn't apply to the development of new antibiotics. Even Seth conceded that this was a case where some form of government intervention was necessary to achieve a better outcome for society than the free market operating alone could achieve.

[FBM]

I'm thinking that there's a happy point somewhere in the middle. I don't claim to know where that point is, exactly, but I have a vague suspicion that Big Pharma has a profit motive for all those lobbyists it keeps in Washington.

[Hermit]

The FDA makes it prohibitively expensive and time consuming to bring any new drug to market, making it impossible for any company other than "Big Pharma" to get a foot in, and that's the fault of "capitalism"?

Yes. Once upon a time it was not prohibitively expensive and time consuming to bring any new drug to market. Then Thalidomide came onto the market...

[Seth]

Seth

I do not think anyone is arguing to abolish capitalism or the free market. What we are saying is that we need to balance the extremes. Total capitalism and a total free market (or total Libertarianism) do not work, and people end up getting hurt.

The free market is fine and good, but must be balanced by regulation, and by other factors when those other factors are required. I am not normally in favor of subsidies, but in this case they would seem to be appropriate. A subsidy towards researching new antibiotics might be the thing to get Big Pharma back onto the track of developing what society desperately needs.

The only regulation free markets require is police-power regulation to prevent the initiation of force or fraud. Everything else is a contractual and civil matter between the parties to the transaction. If a merchant sells you a product, it's up to you to examine the product and determine if it suits your needs, and whether you need warranty coverage or any other amendments to the purchase agreement. If you want the seller to assure you that the product will do what it advertises, then it is up to you to demand that certification from the seller (or manufacturer) before you purchase the item. This gives you legal rights to make a claim if the product does not perform as advertised. But if you do not care to make such arrangements, however formal or informal, then caveat emptor.

The sort of regulation I'm discussing that is impermissible and unnecessary in a free market is government regulation intended to achieve particular social goals of the current administration through the practice of favoring and disfavoring particular things in order to influence or sway the marketplace in one direction or another. An example are the regulations on liquor that ban mail or courier delivery of liquor to a consumer's home. Or taxes that burden one industry but favor another because of some social programming interest of the government.

Libertarianism free markets espouse the right to freedom of contract and the absence of government interference in private contracts expressed in Article I Section 10. Thus, any two individuals or corporations may contract between themselves to do any lawful thing and the government should have no power to intervene in that contractual relationship sua sponte unless that contract initiates force or fraud on others.

As for government subsidies, Libertarians doesn't say subsidies are wrong, merely that they must be voluntarily funded by those who support the purpose for the subsidy. This fits with the general Libertarian principle that coerced taxation is theft and that all taxes should be paid only by those people who volunteer to do so because it is in their rational self interest to do so.

This system requires a taxing authority to present a valid and convincing case to the electorate as to why the tax is needed and a commitment to spending the revenues on that needed project. Colorado has been doing this since 1992 with outstanding effect. In order to impose a new tax, or increase an existing tax, the taxing authority must submit the tax to the voters for their approval. This law kept Colorado from spending itself into bankruptcy as has happened in California and other places, like Detroit.

It's not rocket science. It requires the government to make a good case for the law to the public and then ask the public if it wants to approve the tax.

Libertarianism takes it one step further by making payment of such an approved tax voluntary as well. Presumably if the public approves the tax in a general election they are willing to pay it, so it's assessed as necessary (point of sale or other collection mechanism) automatically but every person has the right to opt out of paying the tax altogether or on a case-by-case basis. This acts as an ongoing real-time referendum on the tax policies and activities of the government. In this way, if the electorate decides that the government is wasting the money or is not using it for the purposes advertised they can simply stop paying the tax, which cuts the amount of revenue collected by the tax and thus keeps the leash on government spending in real time.

Government can avoid having budgets cut by popular resistance to paying for them by providing only those services the public wants, and by providing those services in a manner that satisfies their customers, just like any other business. If you don't like the way the county planning commission is doing its job, you can refuse to pay them your taxes. If you don't like the regulations put forth by the building and zoning department, you can refuse to pay the taxes that fund them. If a sufficient number of people object to what they are doing, they lose their revenue and have to shut down or cut back operations and reformulate their role in the community so that they are providing a service that the public is willing to pay for.

I'd do the same thing with both Congressional and presidential paychecks by tying their paychecks (paid weekly) to the average of taxes levied with public approval versus revenues actually collected from those who pay the taxes. If an average of 50 percent of all taxes levied are being collected, then legislators and the President's salaries are cut to 50 percent of the authorized amount.

On the other hand, if 110 percent of the levied revenues are being collected from taxpayers voluntarily, then they get paid 110 percent of their salary.

The mechanism of incentive and disincentive should be clear to anyone.

[Blind groper]

Seth

Some of what you are saying, I can agree with. But a voluntary tax??????

No way. That assumes everyone will act responsibly, and that is the most naive thing you could suggest. Very few people will pay a voluntary tax, and the whole system collapses.

It is like suggesting that theft is a crime, but without policing. Everyone must volunteer not to commit theft. Yeah. Riiight!

[Seth]

Seth

Some of what you are saying, I can agree with. But a voluntary tax??????

No way. That assumes everyone will act responsibly, and that is the most naive thing you could suggest. Very few people will pay a voluntary tax, and the whole system collapses.

If the system collapses because people refuse to voluntarily pay a tax then the system needed to collapse and be rebooted anyway. Government by, of and for the people means exactly that, and if the people aren't willing to finance the pork dreams of politicians they should not be forced to do so.

It is like suggesting that theft is a crime, but without policing. Everyone must volunteer not to commit theft. Yeah. Riiight!

It's not like that at all. It's like politicians asking permission to collect money and then convincing the taxpayers that what they are doing with it is a good investment for taxpayer. If the taxpayers don't see the benefit in action, they can stop funding it.