Agit8r
Gold Member
- Dec 4, 2010
- 12,141
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I've heard it said that our country was founded on the premise of "spontaneous order" in economics--which is portrayed as meaning that sovereign collectives (aka corporations) have the right to rule over the individuals.
This is then attributed erroneously to Adam Smith. Unfortunately for the propagandists, there are those of us willing to call BULLS*** on there lying @$$es.
Here is what Smith really had to say about corporate ownership:
" The only trades which it seems possible for a joint stock company to carry on successfully, without an exclusive privilege, are those, of which all the operations are capable of being reduced to what is called a routine, or to such a uniformity of method as admits of little or no variation. Of this kind is, first, the banking trade; secondly, the trade of insurance from fire, and from sea risk and capture in time of war; thirdly, the trade of making and maintaining a navigable cut or canal; and, fourthly, the similar trade of bringing water for the supply of a great city.
...
To establish a joint stock company... for any undertaking merely because such a company might be capable of managing it successfully; or to exempt a particular set of dealers from some of the general laws which take place with regard to all their neighbours, merely because they might be capable of thriving if they had such an exemption, would certainly not be reasonable. To render such an establishment perfectly reasonable, with the circumstance of being reducible to strict rule and method, two other circumstances ought to concur. First it ought to appear with the clearest evidence, that the undertaking is of the greater and more general utility than the greater part of common trades. and secondly that it requires a greater capital than can easily be collected into a private copartnery.
...
Except the four trades above mentioned, I have not been able to recollect any other in which all the three circumstances, requisite for rendering reasonable the establishment of a joint stock company, concur. "
wow... bummer for Wal-Mart and all the other "unreasonable" corporations that subvert the free market from what it was intended to be!
This is then attributed erroneously to Adam Smith. Unfortunately for the propagandists, there are those of us willing to call BULLS*** on there lying @$$es.
Here is what Smith really had to say about corporate ownership:
" The only trades which it seems possible for a joint stock company to carry on successfully, without an exclusive privilege, are those, of which all the operations are capable of being reduced to what is called a routine, or to such a uniformity of method as admits of little or no variation. Of this kind is, first, the banking trade; secondly, the trade of insurance from fire, and from sea risk and capture in time of war; thirdly, the trade of making and maintaining a navigable cut or canal; and, fourthly, the similar trade of bringing water for the supply of a great city.
...
To establish a joint stock company... for any undertaking merely because such a company might be capable of managing it successfully; or to exempt a particular set of dealers from some of the general laws which take place with regard to all their neighbours, merely because they might be capable of thriving if they had such an exemption, would certainly not be reasonable. To render such an establishment perfectly reasonable, with the circumstance of being reducible to strict rule and method, two other circumstances ought to concur. First it ought to appear with the clearest evidence, that the undertaking is of the greater and more general utility than the greater part of common trades. and secondly that it requires a greater capital than can easily be collected into a private copartnery.
...
Except the four trades above mentioned, I have not been able to recollect any other in which all the three circumstances, requisite for rendering reasonable the establishment of a joint stock company, concur. "
wow... bummer for Wal-Mart and all the other "unreasonable" corporations that subvert the free market from what it was intended to be!
