At least they tend to lock horns. To the extent that the two collaborate, we should be suspicious.

In my experience, government incentives are generally misguided and force mis-allocation of resources. That is to say the government is distorting the market to favor activity that wouldn't otherwise be attractive to a business.

More on the issue: https://www.wired.com/2013/07/we-need-to-stop-focusing-on-ju...

To take your example regarding pharmaceuticals, instead of mandating a particular regime of testing and efficacy, why couldn't the government require products that have not passed that particular hurdle be labeled as such?

Henry Ford's Sociological Department did unannounced visits to employees' homes to ensure they were "model Americans" and probe for union ties.[1][2]

Walmart "locking in" janitors.[3]

There are a lot more examples of negative environmental and financial impact, I picked these two as they are examples of controlling human freedoms.

[1] Negative source: https://jalopnik.com/when-henry-fords-benevolent-secret-poli... [2] Positive source: https://www.thehenryford.org/collections-and-research/digita... [3] https://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/18/us/workers-assail-night-l...

Fortunately, working for any particular corporation is voluntary. And thankfully, it seems that sunlight has disinfected these specific extreme practices. Hadn't heard of either.

Off-topic: This is the first I've encountered explicit citation of negative/positive sources. I like it.

If you picture eliminating the state altogether, including its enforcement of property rights and contracts, then I concede that the powers attendant to wealth would no longer involve a de jure state. I think that the powers of concentrated wealth would remain nonetheless. Wealth would hire private guards to exclude others from their mines instead of using the law enforcement apparatus of a state, for example.

So, "competition"? Cartels in general are unstable because of these internal competitive forces.

I get that corporations with large market share can set prices in the short term. But every resource has a substitute. Even oil. So even price-setters have to operate within limits or risk their power being marginalized.

I am picturing the elimination of the state. And I agree that one can enforce his own property rights.

OPEC is frequently divided against itself in terms of production targets; ExxonMobil is not. In a world without states there's no antitrust regulation preventing ExxonMobil from acquiring a market share equivalent to present OPEC, then exercising that pricing power with more effective discipline.

I am picturing the elimination of the state. And I agree that one can enforce his own property rights.

An entity that answers to no higher authority and enforces its own territorial claims with force is a de facto state. I understand and sympathize with many arguments for personal liberty over the power of the state. I don't understand the implication that unbounded private power is more trustworthy. It's an affront to liberty for the State of Delaware to exist and enforce its laws at the point of a gun, but it's ok if a corporation or family can acquire a Delaware-sized, Delaware-shaped parcel of land and enforce its decrees at gunpoint within those borders? That may not fairly represent your point of view. I have previously had arguments where self-proclaimed anarchocapitalists affirmed that it's fine for a small group of people to wield power equivalent to a state government as long as it's not called a state.

Since "acquire" implies voluntary vacation of the premises by those who previously owned and occupied it, yes, exactly. I don't see a particularly problem with that scenario.

For smaller, more common examples, look at the history of company towns and union busting.

Companies these days exert control by manipulating the power of the state because the state usually won’t allow them to exert control more directly. Nothing says it must stay this way.

A market economy is more efficient than a command economy. A market with only one capitalist is a de facto command economy.

The follow-on question is: what do we do about it? Attempts to artificially "correct" inequality for the sake of correction are universally disastrous. Progressive taxation and redistribution are, I think, reasonable, as is universal basic income, and sound government has a huge role to play. But the goal should be to provide basic services and create opportunity for the bottom 50%, not wrest control of wealth from the top 1%.

The goal of actually stamping out inequality is a fool's errand.

Now of course wealth tries to subvert that, and particularly in the anglo-saxon countries, the US first among them, it has been particularly successful.

To avoid corruption you need the state and the collection of the most powerful corporate/private actors be of similar size, and they must be as isolated and independent as possible. This way you get a balance of power, rather than one corrupting the other.

The problem in the US is the isolation/independence part. Money in politics and revolving doors has corrupted the balance.

“Limited government” is an idea sold by people who want government to be weaker so it’s more easily corrupted.

What we should strive for is the middle way. Just the right amount of government.

Your assertion isn't self evident. A government could have great power within its defined scope of power and little power outside that scope.

There is also a reasonable argument that as the scope and strength of government power increases so does the desire to corrupt and control that power.

Which is more dangerous a corrupt but weak and limited government or a corrupt strong and expansive government?

Why? Also, is that borne by history? Was the US federal government more corrupt when it was more limited?

If the government has power. If is an authority in the eyes of the people. In those cases we should care about the integrity of the government.

If you have $10m, and you invest that really really really well, you might be making 10 to 30% on that capital. Maybe more if you're an entrepreneur investing strategically. That's fine.

But let's say you're worth $1bn, and you compound at 10% per year.. you're making money hand over fist. Add smart use of debt to that, and that's probably too much rent seeking to be healthy.

Basically, once you pass a few 100 million, I think it gets really unfair. Below.. it doesn't really matter. No one will live in poverty because someone owns $100m -- it's meaningless in the grand scheme of things. But wealth is a snowball that doesn't grow fast enough on the low end, and too fast on the high end.

The only way to fix that would probably be a global wealth tax, but I don't see that happening anytime soon.

If you can find an example of a government's commitment to free markets directly resulting in the starvation of tens of millions of people your argument would be much more credible.

EDIT: This is re: the comment below. We've reached HN's maximum allowable comment depth.

It's surprising that people already seem to be forgetting how incredibly horrible communism was when implemented.

For another simple example, look at the Fortune 500 of today vs 20 years ago. Very few companies remain, it’s still very much fluid.

To my eyes, your statement seems to be completely false.

http://archive.fortune.com/magazines/fortune/fortune500_arch...

1998, 2017: 1) GM, Walmart 2) Ford, Berkshire Hathaway 3) Exxon, Apple 4) Walmart, Exxon 5) GE, McKesson 6) IBM, United health 7) Chrysler, CVS 8) Mobil, GM 9) Altria, ATT 10) ATT, Ford

Wow, outstanding ! As you can see there are a number of companies that are new, dropped lower ranking, moved up in ranking, and completely disappeared.

We could keep going even further back a decade and the changes will be more visible. There’s a few companies who are entirely gone from the top 10, and I can guarantee that none of them wanted that outcome.

So to you, I say, got any more nitpickings?

You could have a contrived round robin system where 100% of people eventually end up with 100% of the wealth.