Comments on: Government Created Monopolies

By: The Liberty Papers

The Liberty Papers — Tue, 28 Feb 2006 00:54:53 +0000

A Final Word On Monopolies

About two weeks ago, we had quite a spirited debate here about the question of monopolies in a free market system, and specifically the question of whether Microsoft, or any other supposed monopoly was a problem that libertarians and classical libera…

By: Eric

Eric — Thu, 16 Feb 2006 21:46:52 +0000

Heh, good question. I have a serious problem with a corporation having the rights of individuals.

My bigger point is to ask how we can view today’s monopolies as good when they are, to a large extent, enabled by government intrusion into the market?

By: Doug

Doug — Thu, 16 Feb 2006 21:42:58 +0000

There’s no question that government intrusion into the marketplace creates distortions, which is why I am in favor of the elimination of all government interference in the economy. Let the market operate on its own, but part of the point I’ve been trying to make is that it is entirely possible and indeed likely that a free market economy will result in the creation of industies that are dominated by a single, highly successful company. Whether it would deserve to be called a monopoly is a question for economists, but the effect would likely be the same.

If that’s the case, then do you agree that there is nothing wrong, from a libertarian point of view, with the existence of such a dominant company/monopoly.

There is one interesting question that the very first item on Coyote Blog’s list raises — are corporations, which are entirely creatures of the state, legitimate from a libertarian point of view ? I’ll leave that for others to respond to before commenting further.