Comments on Murray Rothbard's
Critique of Georgist Principles
Harry Polland and Fred Foldvary
[Reprinted from an online exchange, 8 October 2009]
Harry Pollard:
It is assumed that this equilibrium price is optimum when there is no
restriction on the production of, and movement to market, of the goods
under control.
Fred Foldvary:
In a free market, there is no control other than the actions of those
with the property rights.
***
Harry Pollard:
Insomuch as there are restrictions and movement of goods, so the
price mechanism has less control.
Fred Foldvary:
The market is not a mechanism. It is not a clock. It is consists of
dynamic human action. The restrictions on a market are those imposed
by government, not the conditions of supply and demand.
***
Harry Pollard:
The land Market possesses the ultimate restrictions – not only
can no more land be produced, but what there is cannot be moved to
market.
Fred Foldvary:
The fixed amount of land is not a restriction of the market, but only
a restriction on the supply of that particular resource. The resource,
not the market, is restricted.
***
Harry Pollard: When downtown Los Angeles land prices soar, we can’t
ship in some cheap desert land to compete and bring prices down.
Fred Foldvary:
If somebody in Moscow wants to hire me and I an not willing to
go there, I am not restricting the market, but only my own suppply.
There are many supplies and demands that are inflexible, but that does
not restrict the market, because the market is the freedom of persons
to engage in economic activity, and freedom here means the absence of
governmental restrictions
***
Harry Pollard:
I would say again that land is not under price mechanism control,
though anything with a price may show signs of a hunting action.
Fred Foldvary:
Harry, keep saying it, but free marketeers will not be convinced,
because:
- The market is not a clock mechanism.
- Control means governmental restrictions.
- Hunting is the same as market dyanamics.
- The laws of supply and demand apply to fixed supplies too.
- The land problem is one of subsidies, not the price mechanism.
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