Pencils, Invisible Hands and Broken Windows | Mark Thornton

[SeanMauer]

Jobs to China - first it's bundled here with two no-brainers, I suppose that's credibility by association. But right now we are in a race to the bottom. Not everyone is gifted in engineering. Those average people who want jobs better be prepared to move to China and join the work camp. We're supposed to believe it's ethical to promote slave labor to save money on the cost of i-Phones? If we want to conduct a moral civilization we should be willing to pay $1,200 - $1,500 for an i-Phone.

[lonewolf1369]

@SeanMauer then very few people will buy an iPhone so there will be fewer jobs making them. You clearly don't want to admit the basic facts of economics. There is no such thing as race to the bottom, wages are determined by productivity. You can go to Botswana and demand that everyone be paid $30 an hour, it's not going to make everyone rich. We don't even know why we have to keep hitting our heads to keep proving the point to you socialists over and over again...

[SeanMauer]

The invisible hand of Walmart is going to wrap around your throat until you cry uncle and accept $5.00 a day.

[jsem94]

This is a GREAT speech.

[synestheticmonotony]

Bad, BAD little boy! Haha

Great speech, Mark. 

[PrivateAckbar]

I'm not just a libertarian, I'm classically liberal to the core. Every single one of my childhood friends is now a Socialist and I never fell into it. The invisible hand should make perfect sense to anyone who is ever going to be free.

[shamgar001]

It's a strange title if you're a beginner. If you've watched a few Mises videos before, you knew exactly what it was referring to.

[blapgatify]

I like Mark. This talk is a great resource for the economics n00bs (including myself).

[fnyklr]

But why aren't the assembling jobs more high paying? And designing Apple products are not jobs for the masses in USA. It is very few people that have the mental capabilities for designing Apple products. You will never have a middle class if it requires PHD just to have a job.

[jrikus]

@fnyklr He didn't explain that part very well, but i believe he was referring to the value added of the iphone being $490. So Apple employees and owners would have 490$ of created wealth to spend in the economy on other goods and services which would create more demand and jobs to service them. The value added from the chinese laborer was $10. While lots of americans would want that $10 job, its because of regulations and taxes that it would force the cost of iphones over $1000.

[fnyklr]

@jrikus It is something about this labor arbitrage that does not feel right. I am all for free trade if something makes more sense to make somewhere else. Such as it does not make sense to grow bananas on the north pole. But the Chinese are not "better and brighter" assemblers. The only reason is the price for a human being is much lower over there for a number of reasons. It seems that the price of a human in the US will converge towards the price of a Chinese factory worker.

[peterheirmanster]

Broken window doesn't work as there is VAT (up to 21%) in Europe. The more you break windows the more the Government makes.

[PrivateAckbar]

@peterheirmanster Any money the government makes is consumptive. The government can never put money back into the production of private sector, at best it can use it ineffectively, at worst it can use it effectively, regulate a market and in so doing break peoples rights and decrees production.

[PrivateAckbar]

@peterheirmanster I should say any money the government steals.

[capgains]

the old hazlit example at 21min. It's almost like no one really gets it

[zalida100]

Great video - Thanks very much.

[yogiudo]

great lecture

[candon1972]

10:35- No regulation on flip-flops:) .. free the gold and silver, like the flip-flops!!...

[outforsushi]

how does the broken window applies to tariffs?

[outforsushi]

@outforsushi answering my own question... that we may save some jobs at the cost of other jobs that a consumer would've money to spent, but now can't because the good that has tariff now cost more

[outforsushi]

@outforsushi Thanks for linking the broken window to tariffs. I never thought of it that way and it felt like a light bulb appeared above my head when I answered my own question

[zalida100]

@outforsushi Go read bastiat. org/en/twisatwins. html (If it interests you).

Another classic is "The Law" by Bastiat. If you like his style of writing, you'll love this. bastiat. org/en/the_law. html#SECTION_G004

Your conclusion ref: tariffs is exactly correct. Good on ya.

[drewmandan]

@outforsushi It's the seen and unseen idea. You can "see" the jobs that are saved by tariffs, but you can't "see" the jobs that are lost due to higher input costs making products more expensive, making people buy less, leading to less hiring of the people that make the products.

[FrameByFrameStudios]

Mark Thornton - THE BAUS!

[piecharthosen]

this is vastly different than the crap they taught me in high school (yes crap). if i had learned this in high school...ugh i would be more cynical, but seriously, i would be more aware from an earlier age.

[NateForLiberty]

Chuck Norris sucks.

[KeepGoing11235]

Wonderful talk. Should be the first lecture given to highschool students, college students, and...bureaucrats. Oh and especially voters and everyone else.

[SuperSneakySteve]

Chuck Norris can make a pencil all by himself.

[TWSceptic]

Yes very well spoken. Obama and his advisers should see this, maybe they'd finally get it.

[needtoalwayslearn]

@TWSceptic Those guys are too smart for any common sense.

[carcabe]

@TWSceptic They'd get it and then keep on doing what they do. It's about control and power. It's about bringing down people that they feel inferior to and are jealous of. None of Mr. Thornton says is new. Voters want somebody to take care of them and put their betters in their place. It's about envy and jealousy.

[SouthernCross33]

@TWSceptic If you believe Obama and the scum around him don't get it, you are seriously deluded. They get it all right, their agenda is the destruction of the US

[TWSceptic]

@SouthernCross33 I think you are the one deluded. Just because you overestimate their understanding of economics doesn't mean people who do recognize that are wrong.

It is well known fact that Obama wants both free markets and big government at the same time, because he simply believes that is the only way the system can work. Their is no agenda for destruction, however there is a stupid policy which will lead to destruction.

You need to cut back on the conspiracy tapes.

[SouthernCross33]

@TWSceptic So you believe the ppl around Obama and the govt, the real ppl who weild the power from the shadows are totally clueless about money matters and the running of a country and the financial sector? And you say i'm deluded. Can't you see a deliberate agenda to bankrupt the US and weaken the US's military capablities with all these wars based on neocon lies.Llike Wolfawitz's insiting that Iraq had WMD's, even though he was told numerous times Iraq didn't have any.

[SouthernCross33]

@TWSceptic Also what about the Patriot Act, the TSA bs, the bailouts of known criminal financial cartels. Now you have this new bill where the govt can arrest without charge, detain indefinately without legal representation or ever seeing a courtroom. The US is descending rapidly into some type of communist dictatorship. The Prez can give the order to assassinate an American citizen anywhere in the world with no input from anyone or congress. Welcome to tyranny,welcome to terrorland

[godfather89]

@SouthernCross33 Its not Communism/Socialism its Corporatism, the merger of State and Corporate Power. ;)

[sophiah88]

@SouthernCross33

BINGO!

[Dualspec]

Amazing presentation.