Justinian
04-20-2009, 05:32 PM
Here's a pretty rough and extremely incoherent piece that I jotted down a couple weekends ago in about 17 minutes. I later outlined it in a little green pocket notebook I have and plan on amending/supplementing it.
"Not our own view, but somebody else's, of what we ought to like or dislike would determine what we should get. And since authority would have the power to thwart any efforts to elude its guidance, it would control what we consume almost as effectively as if it directly told us how to spend our income."
~F.A. Hayek
Although it is necessary and undoubtedly useful to ponder the generalizations present in political and economic freedom, it is easy to get lost in the brush without some examples to bring them back into reality.
When F.A. Hayek wrote the quote above, he was speaking generally of a centrally-planned economy like that present in the former USSR. All aspects of the economy were centrally planned. The confusion for many people arises by the erroneous thought that it is only under this system of total control that the effects of socialism manifest themselves. Of the many industries recently to come under the direct control of the US Central Government, let us concentrate on one example in an attempt to demonstrate how even piecemeal socialism or control brings about unfavorable consequences, i.e. music. It may be beneficial to briefly digress into a history lesson.
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) as we know it today has its roots in the Federal Radio Commission (FRC) and the Radio Act of 1912, which gave regulatory powers to the Secretary of Commerce and Labor. This five person council was given the exclusive power to grant and deny broadcasting licenses. Here's the kicker: while not given any specific power of censorship, programming was not allowed to broadcast "obscene, indecent, or profane language." Leaving aside the self-evident subjectivity built into such language for now, many of the tenets of this regulatory body were later built into the FCC some 20-30 years later. As these bodies had exclusive control over who and what could be broadcast, it effectively created government-owned monopoly control over something expressly protected under the government's own contract with the people, namely the First Amendment to the US Constitution. Since this body now regulates the economics of the media, F.A. Hayek was prescient when he said, "That a government which undertakes to direct economic activity will have to use its power to realize somebody's ideal of distributive justice is certain."
With this new monopoly granted to a virtually unassailable institution, the far-reaching effects immediately made themselves manifst in many, if not all, facets of culture related to music. To further pinpoint the example we are working with (music), it may be helpful to examine American music prior to the FRC and FCC. In a recent broadcast on NPR, an author told the story of early bluegrass being a spontaneous outcropping of different immigrant groups working on railroads co-mingling. The Italians with their fiddles and guitars, the Germans with their accordions and horns, and Africans with their harmonicas, percussion, and soulful singing created a new form of music which rapidly spread. There was no FRC or FCC in the way of the spread of it. It simply did.This and other similar stories show the potential of unimpeded competition (and the subsequent cooperation) and innovation in music.
Fast-forward to the present day where a litany of rules, laws, and regulations exist to prevent widespread dissemination of such new, radical ideas. many have made the argument, especially among our generation, that the radio stations and/or record companies are to blame. After all, it is through their greed and immense wealth that competition is crowded out. But remember: who hands out the licenses to the radio frequencies? Who creates a nearly impenetrable barrier to the so-called Freedom of Radio? To ask the question is to answer it. The FCC (aka the US Central Government) provides the music industry so vilified with a cartel-like existence. It is only through Leviathan that competition is effectively quashed. When the freedom to exercise one's will in the marketplace for music is made prohibitively expensive and complicated, what use is this freedom?
Imagine, if you will, a United States devoid of the FCC. What would this world look like? The stifling control of Leviathan being gone, it is easy to see a country where all of the complaints ever-resent with pop music would be null and void. You or I could just as easily start a radio station as the gigantic record companies could. We would be able, like Herbert Henry Dow, to break the monopoly by enforcing our own price standards as opposed to the arbitrary standards set by record companies with no competition. The only thing that mattered would be the quality of your programming and the marketability of it. Contrast that with attempting to raise enough funds now to begin a radio station in the present, and the consequential necessity to charge high prices, and the point becomes all too clear.
Add into the mix the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and the cartel for pop music not only has control of existing stations, but can petition Leviathan to further its hold using its vast store of money. In addition, the RIAA along with the FCC further crowds out competition with lawsuit after lawsuit designed to stun us into submission to their rule. It is a monopoly or a cartel, plain and simple. All that the government has done, rather than act under its contract with the people as the defender of freedom of expression, is destroy the individuals' chances of finding a profitable, satisfying niche as a musician.
"While people will submit to suffering which may hit anyone, they will not so easily submit to suffering which is the result of the decision of authority. It may be bad to be just a cog in an impersonal machine, but it is infinitely worse if we can no longer leave it, if we are tied to our place by the superiors who have been chosen for us. Dissatisfaction of everybody with his lot will inevitably grow with the consciousness that it is the result of deliberate human decisions."
~F.A. Hayek
I obviously got my inspiration while reading The Road to Serfdom by F.A. Hayek.
tl;dr: the government has ruined music.
"Not our own view, but somebody else's, of what we ought to like or dislike would determine what we should get. And since authority would have the power to thwart any efforts to elude its guidance, it would control what we consume almost as effectively as if it directly told us how to spend our income."
~F.A. Hayek
Although it is necessary and undoubtedly useful to ponder the generalizations present in political and economic freedom, it is easy to get lost in the brush without some examples to bring them back into reality.
When F.A. Hayek wrote the quote above, he was speaking generally of a centrally-planned economy like that present in the former USSR. All aspects of the economy were centrally planned. The confusion for many people arises by the erroneous thought that it is only under this system of total control that the effects of socialism manifest themselves. Of the many industries recently to come under the direct control of the US Central Government, let us concentrate on one example in an attempt to demonstrate how even piecemeal socialism or control brings about unfavorable consequences, i.e. music. It may be beneficial to briefly digress into a history lesson.
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) as we know it today has its roots in the Federal Radio Commission (FRC) and the Radio Act of 1912, which gave regulatory powers to the Secretary of Commerce and Labor. This five person council was given the exclusive power to grant and deny broadcasting licenses. Here's the kicker: while not given any specific power of censorship, programming was not allowed to broadcast "obscene, indecent, or profane language." Leaving aside the self-evident subjectivity built into such language for now, many of the tenets of this regulatory body were later built into the FCC some 20-30 years later. As these bodies had exclusive control over who and what could be broadcast, it effectively created government-owned monopoly control over something expressly protected under the government's own contract with the people, namely the First Amendment to the US Constitution. Since this body now regulates the economics of the media, F.A. Hayek was prescient when he said, "That a government which undertakes to direct economic activity will have to use its power to realize somebody's ideal of distributive justice is certain."
With this new monopoly granted to a virtually unassailable institution, the far-reaching effects immediately made themselves manifst in many, if not all, facets of culture related to music. To further pinpoint the example we are working with (music), it may be helpful to examine American music prior to the FRC and FCC. In a recent broadcast on NPR, an author told the story of early bluegrass being a spontaneous outcropping of different immigrant groups working on railroads co-mingling. The Italians with their fiddles and guitars, the Germans with their accordions and horns, and Africans with their harmonicas, percussion, and soulful singing created a new form of music which rapidly spread. There was no FRC or FCC in the way of the spread of it. It simply did.This and other similar stories show the potential of unimpeded competition (and the subsequent cooperation) and innovation in music.
Fast-forward to the present day where a litany of rules, laws, and regulations exist to prevent widespread dissemination of such new, radical ideas. many have made the argument, especially among our generation, that the radio stations and/or record companies are to blame. After all, it is through their greed and immense wealth that competition is crowded out. But remember: who hands out the licenses to the radio frequencies? Who creates a nearly impenetrable barrier to the so-called Freedom of Radio? To ask the question is to answer it. The FCC (aka the US Central Government) provides the music industry so vilified with a cartel-like existence. It is only through Leviathan that competition is effectively quashed. When the freedom to exercise one's will in the marketplace for music is made prohibitively expensive and complicated, what use is this freedom?
Imagine, if you will, a United States devoid of the FCC. What would this world look like? The stifling control of Leviathan being gone, it is easy to see a country where all of the complaints ever-resent with pop music would be null and void. You or I could just as easily start a radio station as the gigantic record companies could. We would be able, like Herbert Henry Dow, to break the monopoly by enforcing our own price standards as opposed to the arbitrary standards set by record companies with no competition. The only thing that mattered would be the quality of your programming and the marketability of it. Contrast that with attempting to raise enough funds now to begin a radio station in the present, and the consequential necessity to charge high prices, and the point becomes all too clear.
Add into the mix the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and the cartel for pop music not only has control of existing stations, but can petition Leviathan to further its hold using its vast store of money. In addition, the RIAA along with the FCC further crowds out competition with lawsuit after lawsuit designed to stun us into submission to their rule. It is a monopoly or a cartel, plain and simple. All that the government has done, rather than act under its contract with the people as the defender of freedom of expression, is destroy the individuals' chances of finding a profitable, satisfying niche as a musician.
"While people will submit to suffering which may hit anyone, they will not so easily submit to suffering which is the result of the decision of authority. It may be bad to be just a cog in an impersonal machine, but it is infinitely worse if we can no longer leave it, if we are tied to our place by the superiors who have been chosen for us. Dissatisfaction of everybody with his lot will inevitably grow with the consciousness that it is the result of deliberate human decisions."
~F.A. Hayek
I obviously got my inspiration while reading The Road to Serfdom by F.A. Hayek.
tl;dr: the government has ruined music.