From: Jim Choate <ravage@EINSTEIN.ssz.com>
Date: Sun, 4 Oct 1998 23:48:56 +0800
To: cypherpunks@EINSTEIN.ssz.com (Cypherpunks Distributed Remailer)
Subject: Another question about free-markets...
Message-ID: <199810050453.XAA01444@einstein.ssz.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
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Milton Friedman won the Nobel price in 1976 in economics. One of the
questions he asked was:

Do corporate executives, provided they stay within the law, have
responsibilities in their business activities other than to make as much
money for their stockholders as possible?

His answer was 'no', they have no responsibility outside of those two
considerations (ie the law, stockholders expectations of profit).

Now in a free-market, by definition, there is no law. What then is the
responsibility of businesses other than the pure unadulterated pursuit of
profit? If this includes lying, denying consumers information, etc. what
harm is done, they have fulfilled their responsibility to their shareholders
(potentialy quite lucratively) and broken no law. Within this environment it
follows that a primary strategy for such executives is the elimination of
*all* competition. And since there is no law other than the measure of profit
all can be justified.

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