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Originally Posted by tobster1911
While that was nice with you congratulating yourself on you European (I never understood why this is considered superior) outlook and all, I wanted to pull this portion out.
You say you are FOR co-ops, groups buys, credit unions and labor unions because they are FOR the people. You seem to think that that means they are not competing against anyone. I purpose that these thing just shift the competition not eliminate it.
Co-op's & group buys = Lots of people getting together to LOWER the price on items. This means that the PERSON selling is at a disadvantage. That is a competition. Also these things are MEANT to COMPETE with large stores.
Credit unions = COMPETITION with banks an Credit Cards ect.
Labor unions = COMPETITION against corporations. I know you don't consider that these are people but if I have money in that company or purchase anything from them, you are competing against me.
Do you get my point. Your view that you are somehow doing away with competition is false. You are simply shifting the competition to something more palatable like a faceless corporation.
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Markus, I don't know anything about Richard Dawkins. I'll have to look him up.
Tobra and others, I regret if have an impression of me as arrogant. Sure, I think my understanding of some of these issues is more 'aware' than yours. And you think the same thing about your understanding. As with most of these discussions, if and when they occur in person, a very different impression is made. I think your impression of arrogance would not survive a face-to-face.
Okay, Tobra. Competition. It is not out of arrogance that I say I have been, and am once again in, the private sector and that I have an MBA. Yeah, I think I understand competition. And part of what I'm saying here is that I can do without a great deal of that competition. You mention banks and credit unions. Good. I do my personal banking with a credit union. That makes me a part-owner. I get better service (I currently have an account with a bank, and that relationship is incredibly frustrating. You should have heard my conversation with that rep this morning. It took me twenty minutes to get him to admit I am, in fact, current on my payments. SHEESH!). I also do not pay a return on stockholders' iinvestment money as part of my fee structure. Quite frankly, for personal banking, banks cannot compete with credit unions. Ultimately, I see a good chance of credit unions absolutly dominating the personal banking business and forcing commercial banks to do corporate banking exclusively. VISA and MC are different companies. I have VISA cards in my wallet that have my credit union's logo on them.
Labor Unions v. Corporations. You are mistaken. These organizations do not compete. they are not in the same market. labor unions are groups of people who provide labor inputs to a company. They are no more in competition with that company than are the companies that supply them with steel or fabric or IT services. Competing with you? ARE you kidding. In your investment portfolio there are companies. Those companies have workers. Those workers are doing the work of earning the dividends you receive. The notion that they are competing with you is wacky, Tobra. You might opine that they earn too much money in wages. But the fact remains that they do the work of earning the profits you receive in the form of dividends. This notion that those workers are your enemy is truly, truly misguided.
Co-ops and group buys. Volume buying gets discounts. distributors offer those discounts. Nobody is taking their money away. They offer them. corporations buy volume and get discounts. Are they doing something wrong? Both the co-op and the corporation are getting group buys and that works fine with distributors. The difference is that corporations have to pay their stockholders. I don't need those stockholders and don't want to give them my money. I would prefer to shop at a co-op where prices are cheaper. Same cashiers. Same stockers. Same trucks delivering. Same distributors. The only difference is the invisible group of stockholders I don't care to fund.
It's funny, though. The competition is still there. It's just that laws need to be kept in place otherwise corporations would be displaced by the non-profits. In the long run, as those legal barriers fall, corporations will struggle more. And eventually lose the battle.