In Defense of Anagorism

political economy in the non-market, non-state sector

Quotebag #102

“That’s why I’m concerned over the irony of the net generation, which has spawned a number of anti-Wall-Street movements and sentiments, to see people in this generation intuitively picking up trading practices that carry on every bit of foul legacy that offline traders have practiced before the net generation. It seems the more things change, the more they stay the same.”—Rick Falkvinge

“The invisible hand, in markets or in cultures, is way overblown. Its more of an invisible pinky finger.”—Poor Richard

“Productivity is the Achilles heel of capitalism because it forces ever more destructive competition; enrichment of the ‘winners’ and impoverishment of the ‘losers.’ Productivity does not lift all boats.”—susan the other

 East Frieze detail representing the battle of Troy, Achilles against Memnon. Reproduction of the Treasury of Siphnos - Delphi, Archaeological Museum of Delphi CC-BY-SA-2.5 Marsyas ( http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Marsyas )

“One can also imagine ‘Marketplaces’ for public education, police protection, etc. The possibilities — and the rents — are limitless!”—Lambert Strether

“Just because they do not do so in the contemporary fashion of entrepreneurs it does not mean they are stuck in their ways or useless.”—Gianpiero Petriglieri

“the prevalence of financial services firms in the U.S. has an adverse effect on youngsters, offering a ‘gateway drug’ into more pernicious pathological states of materialism, obsessive greed, financial status anxiety and moral degeneration, which in turn can lead to criminal behavior and outright pathological pyschosis.”—craazyman

Comments

2 responses to “Quotebag #102”

  1. Poor Richard Avatar

    Since I wrote the above, I’ve realized that there is a very real and powerful invisible hand — the unconscious 90-98% of the brain that makes us do all the counter-productive, maladaptive shit we do. It does some brilliant stuff like recognizing faces, enabling us to follow moving objects with our eyes, and hitting tennis balls; but it also makes us do shit that seldom works in the modern world, like zero-sum competition.

    1. Poor Richard Avatar

      It gives us all kinds of false computations of self-interest.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *