Diary of a Capitalist

2007-02-02T16:04:00.000Z

This article comes from TCS Daily. Onle of my new favorite sites. I have included my comments in italics.This is the first request for comment from the Ideological Affirmation Task Force. It covers the ideology of Libertarianism, though not in detail or in an enhaustive way.IATF RFC Number 1, version 0.2: Who We AreEconomic Principles1. We weave a thread of self-reliance into a sturdy fabric of

2006-06-26T14:30:00.000Z

I'm writing this on my tablet PC at work. This is my first day in this new job. It's been a long time since I ported here. Mainly because I've keen incredibly busy recently. I've graduated, well, almost anyway. l actually graduate on the 13th. I neatly don't have anything to talk about at the moment though. I've never used a tablet pc before, but I want one now! I'm looking to buy a laptop anyway

Litter or be fined!

2006-03-24T16:50:00.000Z

A man was fined £50 for throwing away his junk mail. He was charged for dumping his domestic refuse in a public bin! This is insane! Mind you, with the NHS spending £9m on art in the last two years when it has a £900m deficit they need every penny they can get.P.S. One single hospital spent £70,000 on a large polished rock and hired an art director for £41,000pa when it alone has a £30m deficit.

I do still exist

2006-03-14T01:33:00.000Z

I haven't seen anything recently that has made me want to post, but I do still exist, I promise. Currently I am a student, this means that cashflow isn't really a word I know much about. This means that I am certainly not a rich person, and disposable cash doesn't really exist. I haven't really made this point before, and although I hadn't realised it until now, I think it's woth mentioning that

intollerance

2006-02-22T13:15:00.000Z

The intollerance of organised religion to other faiths is not shown on the personal level any more clearly than by this video. I am not an anti-religious person, I believe in freedom of religion, that everybody should be free to worship or not in their own way, free of persecution. I do however find it hard to see how organisations preaching hate for other beliefs can exist in a free society as

Economic Winter

2005-12-21T12:15:00.000Z

I’m looking out of my window at the trees lining the road, I hadn’t consciously noticed it, but the beautiful green display that used to sit atop the little mound of earth separating the house from the main road has slowly disappeared. Now all that is left is the bare trees looking almost dead. As it happens I like winter, it has beauty of its own, not as obvious as the summer, but it’s there

Chinese textiles

2005-12-21T11:46:00.000Z

I have mentioned the hurtful impact of trade restrictions before, but this article from the BBC demonstrates their negative impact perfectly. Workers in the Chinese countryside who have taken it upon themselves to use a skill of their own to lift themselves out of poverty are being stopped by the same people who pretend to want to help.China is about to become the worlds 4th largest economy, for

walk a mile in their shoes

2005-12-07T14:44:00.000Z

It hit me today that it is impossible to judge someone’s situation until you have lived through it yourself. It’s very easy to look at the guy on the street corner begging and assume that he is there because he’s drunk, high or just plain lazy. The truth is often not as simple as this; many people become homeless for many reasons, often not through their own actions. We should not , therefore,

Finally the Xbox 360 is here!!!

2005-12-02T11:03:00.000Z

Finally, the Xbox 360 European launch has happened. I still have mine on pre-order, so I should get mine soon. Of course by soon I mean several weeks (If not months as some message boards would suggest). The shortages of the new system are slightly annoying I must admit, but the way some people are talking about it you would think that it was on purpose. The reason people are able to complain at

Choices

2005-11-27T19:44:00.000Z

Recently I’ve been playing a lot of poker online, and a bit of bricks and mortar style in a local live tournament. It’s a great game; my favourite version is Texas holdem’ although I am learning seven card stud and Omaha. The game of poker comes down to odds, it’s a long term game played over your entire life, not a single hand or session, the result of this is that sometimes a player will “

My Birthday

2005-11-07T17:06:00.000Z

It’s my Birthday today. I’m another year older, and supposedly another year wiser. A lot has happened over the past year, so I guess in a way that’s true. Anyway, since this is my blog. I just thought I would mark the occasion.

Caves of Steel

2005-10-22T10:26:00.000Z

I am a huge fan of Isaac Asimov, he was a great author. I’ve just started to read caves of steel, his first robot book. I’m about three chapters in and I’m pretty sure I’ve managed to pin down the central theme of the book. Asimov made no secret of the fact that he was a socialist, in caves of steel he builds an image of Earth as an overpopulated planet inhabited by giant cities built on the

Pakistan earthquake

2005-10-11T09:26:00.000Z

There is an article on the BBC news website this morning explaining the problems in the earthquake stricken area of Pakistan. The major theme of the article is complaints about a lack of government action to help the survivors,"Most of the people here are cursing the government for still not providing proper attention and we agree with their feelings," said Ayub, a medical student helping the

Amsterdam

2005-08-26T09:52:00.000Z

I got back from Amsterdam last night. It was a good trip, several things struck me about the place, one was the different way that they serve beer over there, most people use half pint glasses and they don’t fill them up! The public transport was spot on; it was easy to use and seemed to run on time. I’m sure there are plenty of people who would claim that this was because a state run system can

Goodbye Adi

2005-08-22T13:44:00.000Z

I have been away from this site for a little while now, I’ve been quite busy since I finished my placement year, and simply haven’t been able to find the time. I am going to Amsterdam on holiday for a few days tomorrow followed by a trip to visit relatives in the States. This means that I won’t be back in front of my keyboard until October when I become a full time student once more.There are

Home grown terrorists

2005-07-18T07:36:00.000Z

My image of suicide bombers used to be desperate people, perhaps born into a world where all they know is the honor of martyrdom, people who feel that the only way to speak out is to cause horrific violence for their cause. In Palestine where families hold parties for their children before they cross the border into Israel to blow innocent people apart, in Iraq where insurgent forces’ most

Anti trust

2005-07-10T20:07:00.000Z

Ok, here I am sat down in front of my computer at home with a glass of the finest Lindisfarne mead just about to head off to the pub to get some of those southern comfort and coke's. But first I though I would vent some rage. It amazes me how people can look at the persecution of a minority group and radiate with joy at the fact. The anti trust laws both in the states and in Europe are designed

London attacks

2005-07-08T08:06:00.000Z

Yesterday’s attacks on London are a terrible remainder of the determination of a minority who are bent on destroying the values that we hold dear. The victims of the attacks were innocent people, and we can never forget that the true horror is the human tragedy that faces the victims and the relatives of those who have died. I hope that this murderous act is not used as a political toy; I for one

African Poverty

2005-07-04T09:03:00.000Z

Why is the continent of Africa so poor? Historically, the continent did not contain land as fertile as that found in more temperate regions of the globe, this meant that subsistence farming carried on, and still continues today, while other continents were able to develop farming which freed people from producing food to allow them to produce other things. Today though, there is more than enough

negative income tax

2005-06-30T10:41:00.000Z

As I have made clear on this blog, I am not in favor of redistribution of wealth, however, I am a supporter of Milton Friedman’s’ ideas. He developed the idea of the negative income tax, such a tax works by first imposing a flat tax, which I believe would be a much better option than our current progressive tax. This flat tax however does not give a personal allowance; a person’s entire income is

railtrack

2005-06-29T10:47:00.000Z

Did the government steal the shares from railtrack owners by forcing the company out of business? I personally don’t think that they did. Certainly their dealings may not have been in the best interests of the shareholders (but when are they) and their actions may well have caused the collapse of railtrack, but in order for them to be at fault, then they would have to have done something to

tax breaks for the rich

2005-06-28T08:53:00.000Z

“Tax breaks for the rich” the new cry from the socialist journalists against the new proposed tax breaks for buy to let properties. Never mind the fact that the people who benefit from buy to let are those people who can’t afford to buy their own home, I should know, I’m one of them. Being a student, it is all to clear how much richer my landlord is than I am, but does his wealth hurt me?

Global warming 2

2005-06-24T07:52:00.000Z

As an update to yesturdays article, I'll bring you attention to this article. It contains some interesting figures, however, only some of these are referenced and I have not had time to check out those references. the article is obviously biased as it comes from an organisation who wish to "dispel the myths of global warming".I also stumbled accross this article (PDF). It's from the EPA (

Global warming

2005-06-23T08:14:00.000Z

During the renaissance in Europe, the religion of Christianity was abused by the political powers to coerce their people, to control their lives. One could not do anything that was not allowed by God, such as own an illegal book, and if one did then there was a very real risk of being tortured to death or burned at the stake. The religion was the ethical basis for all of the atrocities committed

Canada and health

2005-06-22T09:36:00.000Z

Milton Friedman, in his book “capitalism and freedom” highlights the problems of government monopoly. All monopolies are bad, he says, but in certain situations, and for a certain instance in time it is sometimes the only option, what we must do is choose between evils, they are, private monopoly, publicly regulated private monopoly and public monopoly. While he does not believe that a private

Orwell would be proud

2005-06-20T07:53:00.000Z

I was watching Big brother last night before I went to bed, and apart from all the usual mindless stuff that goes on in the house; there was an interesting incident with the shopping. Maxwell removed a chicken from the list and added several cans of cider. When the shopping was delivered, Maxwell and Anthony took the cider and hid it; of course this made the other housemates angry. Whilst I don’t

cheap DVD players!

2005-06-17T08:12:00.000Z

I was watching an episode of an American sitcom last night, I can’t remember what it was called, but that’s not the point, the father in law had won some money at bingo and the couple were trying to scam money from him by breaking things around the house and taking more money than they needed to replace the object. Towards the end of the show the guy decides to break the DVD player, his reason

It's not my fault

2005-06-15T12:11:00.000Z

Another fantastic article from Walter Williams has appeared on capitalism magazine. He talks about the new seatbelt laws, but he refers to the wider issue very well, “Each year, obesity claims the lives of 300,000 Americans and adds over $100 billion to health care costs. Should government enforce a 2,000-calorie intake limit per day? There's

pay as you drive

2005-06-13T10:28:00.000Z

One of the problems with privatizing the road system is the collection of payment for usage, without a system of paying specifically for each use; there is a significant neighborhood effect from one person’s economic choice benefiting or damaging another person. Up until recently the only way to collect funds for road usage was a system of tollbooths, this would clearly extend journey times,

government waste

2005-06-08T08:24:00.000Z

While reports of government waste are of no surprise to anyone, there are people who still believe that the government is more efficient and fair than private business. They believe the reports of waste to be hype; this is probably because they do not know why waste is a particular problem for government.Firstly, lets start with waste in private business, when a company spends more on materials

immoral?

2005-06-07T11:04:00.000Z

As promised, this is my reply to Jason’s comment. Firstly, there seems to be contention over the use of the word immoral, I use that word, as do many libertarians in reference to taxation for two reasons, the first is to make my standpoint on the issue clear, the second, because I believe that by definition it is immoral. Immoral simply means “contrary to moral principles”, most if not all of my

Fairer tax

2005-06-06T08:07:00.000Z

The main problem with income tax is that it is progressive. This is unfair for two reasons, firstly, that tax is immoral because it goes against the individual property rights, but secondly that it is a tax voted for by the majority but imposed on the minority. Most peoples' argument for why tax may be fair is that it is possible to vote in a democracy, and is therefore possible to vote for a

ASBO

2005-06-03T20:23:00.000Z

I've just heard about the case where a pub landlord was given an ASBO (antisocial behaviour order) for a sign which he put up in his own car park. The sign had pigs on it, and said "free porking here". He was given an ASBO and ordered to take the sign down because some people said it caused offence to them and their religion. This is awful; it shows a total lack of regard for property rights. The

More Money Please

2005-06-03T08:28:00.000Z

The AIDS epidemic has once again come to the forefront as Kofi Annan declares that we need to do more to stop it. He is right, something does need to be done, but it seems to me that Kofi has once again taken the usual UN stance of “more money please”.The root cause of the AIDS epidemic must surely be the poverty and lack of education that comes with it. If it isn’t then why did AIDS not take

pro-life?

2005-06-02T15:15:00.000Z

I've just heard an analogy for pro lifers to ponder over. If life truely begins at conception, then imagine an IVF clinic that accidentally sets on fire, everyone manages to escape the building, but there are still several hundered fertilised eggs in storage in liquid nitrogen tanks, should firemen enter the building to attempt to rescue these several hundred lives, or not?

.xxx

2005-06-02T12:32:00.000Z

I think the idea of the .xxx domain name is a fantastic idea, but I don’t like the idea of regulating it. It would be a fantastic way for adult sites to generate traffic as it would be much easier to find them, and there would be no ambiguity over the content. It would be the same as having .blog for web logs for instance.Forcing adult sites over to the domain, however, would be wrong, I believe

Slavery

2005-06-01T12:11:00.000Z

Slavery is defined as:“[an] institution based on a relationship of dominance and submission, whereby one person owns another and can exact from that person labor or other services.”Socialism is defined as:“Any of [the] various theories or systems of social organization in which the means of producing and distributing goods is owned collectively or by a centralized government that often plans and

Non

2005-05-31T12:25:00.000Z

Whilst exiting a bookstore yesterday I noticed the headline that France had voted “non” to the European constitution. It was only this morning that I realized that it was ridiculous that I had not actually read any of the constitution, given its potential importance to my life. My only real argument against the constitution before reading it was that it represented centralization of government.

Teenage freedom fighter

2005-05-26T07:43:00.000Z

A teenager who is being called “W” for legal reasons is going to take his local council and police force to court over new anti-yob laws. The specific complaint is over “dispersal areas” where police can send home anyone under the age of 16 between 21:00 and 06:00. The idea behind this is to stop young offenders being able to prowl these areas at night. Local councils say that the laws have had a

BBC

2005-05-23T08:51:00.000Z

There is a strike at the BBC today, thousands of workers have walked out in protest against job cuts. Like any public institution the BBC is funded through taxation, in this case in the form of the licensing fee. The act of charging a license fee has made it possible for the BBC to produce non-commercially viable programming without the interruption of adverts. There is a question, however, over

Big is not always better

2005-05-20T12:56:00.000Z

Thanks to the sleepy man I read this article today. The author makes the very valid point that most people do not realize that big government also means reduced freedom. Some people do not miss this freedom or simply do not realize that it has been removed. People seem to have a fascination with asking what the government can do for them; they do not want to assume the responsibility that comes

Starbucks

2005-05-19T08:00:00.000Z

I went to see ‘A’ last night in Leicester. I’ve liked them for a while, especially because I always associate songs from the album Hi-Fi Serious with Project Gotham Racing for the Xbox that is one of my favorite games. One of their songs ‘Starbucks’ is about the hypocrisy in the music industry. People are always saying how hard it is to be a ‘rock star’, the early mornings, late nights,

All's fair in love and football

2005-05-18T12:14:00.000Z

What’s all the fuss about Manchester United? Mr. Glazer has gained his controlling share of the club and will before long own it in its entirety. The bid is highly leveraged and there will be a not too small debt to pay off once the process is complete. The fans are worried about rising ticket prices along with everything else. The problem here is that people do not see that they have a choice.

Living under capitalism?

2005-05-17T12:30:00.000Z

Last night on Channel 4 there was a program about the 1987 crash. The comment was uttered twice that at the time, people though that it signaled the “end of capitalism.” How can something end when it was never there in the fist place? This shows an extreme misunderstanding of the political climate of the time. People often believe that we live in a capitalist country; this is wrong, very wrong.

The ideal still unknown

2005-05-16T12:48:00.000Z

“No politico-economic system in history has ever proved its value so eloquently or has benefited mankind so greatly as capitalism – and none has ever been attacked so savagely, viciously, and blindly. The flood of misinformation, misrepresentation, distortion, and outright falsehood about capitalism is such that young [and now old] people of today have no idea (and virtually no way of discovering

Health Service Reform

2005-05-13T08:15:00.000Z

It seems as though Patricia Hewitt has got some good ideas, but unfortunately doesn’t know how to implement them properly. Use of the private sector in medical treatment would be very beneficial to this country, it would allow the private hospitals to expand and improve the service to patients. It is also correct that the government should under the current system pay the cost, why? Well, because

Tax

2005-05-12T12:30:00.000Z

Tax is the method most commonly used to fund government spending. Capitalists, although firm believers in laissez-faire government, do realize that even this minimal government needs funding. However, capitalists also deplore taxation as a means to obtain this funding*. Why do Capitalists not believe in taxation? Supporters of tax often cite the benefits of government spending as reasons for

Freedom

2005-05-09T09:41:00.000Z

Freedom is central to capitalism, but what is Freedom? Dictionary.com defines it as: The condition of being free of restraints. Liberty of the person from slavery, detention, or oppression. Political independence.Exemption from the arbitrary exercise of authority in the performance of a specific action; civil liberty: freedom

old new Labor

2005-05-09T09:32:00.000Z

So, we have a Labor government. That’s no surprise really; the real surprise is the accuracy of the exit polls. Although we are in for another four or five years of tax and spend, the impending slowdown in economic growth should highlight to most of the population the problems with this policy. Had another party been elected, then the coming economic problems would be blamed on them, rather than

General Election Today

2005-05-05T09:50:00.000Z

Today is the day of the general election in Britain. The nation will decide who it wants to lead it through the next four or five years through a democratic method developed over hundreds of years. The shame is however, that most of the people in the nation will probably not even bother to vote, and those that do will probably not understand the policies for which they are voting. Most of my

Anti-capitalist video

2005-05-04T12:31:00.000Z

While searching the Internet for anti-capitalist literature I came across this video. It’s very well done and I recommend giving it your full attention. The main problem is, however, the arguments that are directed against capitalism, are in fact not capitalist at all. For instance, the “game” with children in the Kindergarten who suddenly have their toys taken away and given to one child who

Flat tax

2005-04-29T12:30:00.000Z

This is probably a subject that I will come back to several times, but I want to state my support for a flat tax in the UK. As a capitalist I do see tax as immoral, however, as a practical person I can see the potentially drastic level of harm that would come from a sudden withdrawl of government spending. Instead what we need is a steady withdrawl of government spending to a reasonable level and

NHS

2005-04-27T20:09:00.000Z

I had to go to the doctor today. As I live in England and don't have medical insurance (why have it when I am being taxed more for the NHS than medical insurnace would cost me, as we will see later) the doctor was proided by that wondeful institution we call the NHS. Now I'm sure that that last statement was read as sarcastic, and that you realise that the NHS is not a capitalist institution, so

Kanye West

2005-04-26T19:57:00.000Z

Kanye West is one of my favorite artists at the moment. One of his songs, Jesus walks, is one of my favorites. One of the lyrics in the song caught my attention today though," To the victims of Welfare for we living in hell here hell yeah"What does Kanye mean by 'the victims of welfare'. I can't imagine he means the tax payers whose liberty is eroded to fund the welfare, it is quite obvious that

Day one

2005-04-26T19:44:00.000Z

What is capitalism?I hope by reading this blog the average reader will be able to answer this question. I am not going to provide a dictionary definition. I will say this, however. Capitalism is the economic and political ideology which holds a its forefront individual freedom and liberty. At least that's what it means to me.In this blog I am going to comment on news reports and events in my own