Investopedia defines a free market as
A free market is a market economy based on supply and demand with little or no government control. A completely free market is an idealized form of a market economy where buyers and sellers are allowed to transact freely (i.e. buy/sell/trade) based on a mutual agreement on price without state intervention in the form of taxes, subsidies or regulation.
Here we go
WEEKLY ADDRESS: Ensuring Our Free Market Works for Everyone
Hello, everybody. One of America’s greatest strengths is our free market. A thriving private sector is the lifeblood of our economy – it’s how we create jobs, expand opportunities, and give everybody a shot at success. It’s what has made America the strongest country on Earth.
The most essential ingredient in a healthy free market is competition. But right now, too many companies are engaging in behaviors that stifle competition – like blocking new competitors from entering the market or limiting the information and options that give consumers real choice. As a consequence, the rest of us pay higher prices for lower quality products and services. Workers receive lower wages than they otherwise would. Small businesses and entrepreneurs can get squeezed out of the market. And none of that is fair – or good for our economy.
And some of that “unhealthy” behavior arises from government instituting regulations that pick and choose winners and losers. Some of it arises, shockingly to Obama and other liberals, from competition which lets the consumers choose the winners and losers. For instance, I used to shop at Kroger for groceries and stuff. They closed down due to too much theft and low profits from high (required) acceptance of food stamps. Across the street is a super Walmart. I won’t shop anywhere else now. Great prices and immense selection. I like cherry tomatoes for salads. The nearest Food Lion and Lowe’s Foods have a small selection, and often not a good selection. Walmart typically has 5 different types. They’re produce and fruits selection is giant. If they drive competitors out of the market with great prices and incredible selection, that’s the free market.
Here’s how Obama’s free market strategy works
The deck should not be stacked in favor of the wealthiest individuals and the biggest corporations, against working Americans. That’s why my administration is doing everything we can to reverse this trend and promote more competition in the marketplace. In addition to enforcing the rules on the books, I’ve directed federal agencies to identify anti-competitive behavior in different industries, and find new and specific ways to promote competition.
Huh. That’s approaching a command economy, where the government dictates everything. Right now it’s stuck in a crony capitalism mode.
One industry that’s ripe for change is cable TV. Right now, 99 percent of cable and satellite TV customers rent set-top boxes from their providers. According to one survey, this costs households an average of more than $230 per year. We spend some $20 billion to rent these devices. While we have almost unlimited choice in what we watch on television, from traditional programming to online content, there’s next to no competition to build a better, user-friendly product that allows you to easily access all this content in one place. So most consumers just rent whatever the cable company offers. Because we have to. That means companies have little incentive to innovate. As a consequence, we need multiple devices and controllers to access content from different sources. That makes no sense.
So my administration has encouraged the FCC to remove the barriers to competition that prevent new players from offering innovative cable box options to consumers.
Interestingly, quite a bit, if not most, of the problem with set top boxes arose from government regulation and intervention. Now, government intervention and regulation is required to fix the problems that government regulation and intervention created.
Now, it’s not that I disagree with this “encouragement” from Team Obama. I’d love a set top box that allows me to limit the channels I see to only those I want, rather than having to scroll through a ton I don’t. And one that uses virtually no power when the power button is pressed (current boxes use a lot of what is called Vampire Electricity).
What I don’t want to read is a guy yammering on about the free economy while instituting more regulations.
We know this works. For years, Americans had to rent our telephones from the phone company. This was a while ago, but when the FCC finally unlocked competition for home phones, the marketplace was flooded with all kinds of phone options with new features, and at different price points. Consumers suddenly had many options. And the whole industry moved forward as a result. The same can happen with cable boxes, and in dozens of areas of our economy – all of which can make a difference in your everyday life.
The bottom line is, competition is good for consumers, workers, businesses, and our economy. So I’m going to keep doing everything I can to make sure that our free market works for everyone. Thanks, and have a great weekend.
He’s dead correct. When the regulations were removed, choice exploded. In the wired sector, this was more about long distance calling, and the ability to purchase your own phone, leading to cordless. Then to mobile phones, and people ditching the limited number of home phone providers, then the use of home and business phones over the Internet. This was more about removing regulation, rather than implementing more government regulation to override other government regulation. Competition is good. Government should get out of the way. And Obama should stick to talking about things he knows, like fundraising and golf.
Crossed at Right Wing News.
Most cable providers have monopoly agreements with the local governments in the areas they serve, but they do have competition, from satellite television providers. Cable television is a nice luxury, but that’s just it: it is a luxury, and not a necessity. (Full disclosure: I have cable service, for both my television and internet.)
Here in the Keystone State, if you cannot pay your electric, water or natural gas bills during the winter, those utilities are still prohibited from turning off those utilities to your home until after the season changes, because such may be necessary to heat your home. If you don’t pay your cable bill, the cable company can shut it off, because it is not defined as a necessity.
Our esteemed host wrote:
I don’t know how your cable service works, but Blue Ridge Communications, my cable provider, allows you to set a channel as a favorite, and you can scroll through your favorites and skip all of the others. That option works only when you are actually flipping through the channels; on the onscreen guide, you still see all of the channels listed.
If you are concerned about “vampire electricity,” the simplest thing is to simply have all of your devices plugged in through a power strip, and turn off the power strip. The downside of that is, or at least would be for me, is that the cable box has to reboot, and that takes several minutes here.
Russia, Uganda, Cameroon, Costa Rica, Thailand, Nigeria, all have fewer regulations on markets than the US. Let’s emulate them. Why aren’t US entrepreneurs flocking to Nigeria and Russia?
The objective of every business is to ELIMINATE competition and become a monopoly.
Businesses hate “free markets”.
Child labor. Pollution controls. Worker safety. Sound accounting and reporting practices. Anti-fraud. Contracts enforcement. Corporate taxes. Anti-discrimination. Government subsidies. Drug laws. Prostitution laws. USDA, FDA, EPA, FCC… eliminate all these! Make America Great Again!
On first glance, it looks as if the most regulated economy on Earth is the healthiest economy on Earth. But that can’t be true ’cause “free markets”, ya know. Eliminate all regulations and taxes and Make America Great Again.
But the truth is, our economy has a critical flaw revealed this election cycle by the popularity of Mssrs. Sanders and Trump. Our economy is tilted, rigged, fixed to benefit the few and not the many. The rewards of productivity are going more and more to the top, leaving the workers behind. And this time, the cons are right. It comes from regulation. Our tax codes, immigration laws, patent and copyright law, trade policies, labor laws, “strong” dollar policies, fiscal and monetary policies all are tilted to redistribute wealth up. These policies did not arise out of thin air but were carefully constructed by Republican and Democratic public servants to benefit their donors. For example, we manage the employment rate by our fiscal (Congress) and monetary (Fed) policies. By keeping the employment rate low, the bargaining power of workers is greatly reduced.
Let’s deregulate Wall Street!
No wait…… We tried that it was ugly
Obama saved GM and the entire US auto industry
John,
Obama did not save anything. He altered the bankruptcy process in order to benefit the union and in doing so greatly harmed investors and white collar workers. This was a violation of the law and did not work well for anyone but the union. Your comment about Wall Street was likely meant to be about the latest crash. Congressman Frank caused the economic collapse of the entire world, not Wall Street.
Jeff,
Our economy is far from healthy and certainly is not rigged to benefit the wealthy. Our low unemployment rate is false, if it was true, then the Fed would have raised interest rates. As it is, they are considering negative rates. Also, Obama has been feeding one trillion dollars per year into the market to basically prop it up and allow low information, marginally intelligent people to think that everything is ok. Look at other things, labor participation is at is lowest ever, food stamps are highest ever, any jobs are at minimum wage, the list goes on. If you read about the great depression, people thought that everything was improving and that they were ok, when the reality was completely different. Obamacare and regulations are killing us. You mentioned drug laws, that was a joke, right? Our drug laws significantly limit our freedom. Many countries allow their citizens to buy what they desire, even narcotics and they have less drug problem by far. It has been proven time and again that socialistic, totalitarian countries, such as we are and becoming worse every day, end badly.
dave,
Since you hate America and its citizens so much, why do you still live here? I think I KKKnow. Don’t you make over a million a year treating Medicaid and Medicare patients? Sounds like the Obamaconomy is working for you!
How does Obama feed 1 trillion into the market? The Fed (monetary policy) controls interest rates and money supply and Congress controls fiscal policy. IF Obama was funneling $1 trillion into the stock market, who would that benefit?
We agree that the economy does not work for the working classes, but you ignore the fact that the economy IS working for the wealthy.
I hope, for your patients’ sake, that you’re a better physician than economist.
dave typed:
Stupid, even by right-wing standards.
Jeff,
So much bluster. So, much that you don’t know. So much that you exaggerate. The total purpose of your postings is to formulate an argument in which one must defend himself against your stupidity. I don’t fall for it. Just pity you. Your would of hate and misinformation must be horrible. As for moving to another country, no, I want my country freed from occupation.
HAHA David doesn’t look like THAT is going to happen anytime soon does it ?
I stil, get a chuckle over you telling us why you didm’t fight in Nam