>From: billbartlett at dodo.com.au
>Reply-To: lbo-talk at lists.panix.com
>To: lbo-talk at lists.panix.com
>Subject: Re: "Punishment"? Re: Centralization
>Date: Sat, 6 Jul 2002 13:04:10 -0700
>
>Justin Schwartz wrote:
>
> >>Why not just remove the incentives for making bad shoes?
> >
> >How? Btw the profit motive is also an incentive to make good shoes.
>
>No. There is no profit motive incentive to make good shoes, or good
>anything else. Quite the opposite. Competition however is an incentive for
>the capitalist to make somewhat better shoes than maximising profit would
>otherwise dictate.
If you are saying that the profit motive does not provide an incentive to maximize quality at the expense of everything else, including profits, of course. But optuimaztion is good enough to provide tremendous improvements in quality, and thus profit is an incentive to make good stuff at cheaper prices than your competitors. As Detroit has found to its sorry and cost.
>
>I assumed that was roughly the logic behind your advocacy for a market
>economy with no profit system? Keep the market competition, dispense with
>the profit motive.
>.
No. There is no market system without the profit motive. What I would dispense with is private property. There would be profits retained by the workers, if their firms made any profits.
jks
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