Actually the oil from Saudi Arabia is an example of a free market working. It is an example of fair trade, they have something in excess that the world demands, and they trade it.
If a country has something as a natural resource, what seems to be the problem?
What about the two oceans that are on both sides of the USA?
It is interesting that you now are upset about the terrible treatment of the Native Americans, being that then we took advantage of them with liqour and now they take advantage of our weakness of gambling. I can't tell you how many Indian casinos around the USA.
Of course that is what happens when you have war between people. There are winners and there are losers.
Of course, this is changing the topic of fair trade by the introduction of past wars.
Monopolies are created by people like Bill Gates, and they were broken up in the early part of the 20th century, but is that not disturbing the free markets and market forces, the same forces you seem to support?




It is fair when both markets are working under the same rules producing products. If one market has the advantage of producing the product by having an advantage of more natural resources where it may come from the ground (oil) or in education (literacy).

That is exactly why I believe the income tax is negative and that is also why when the percentage of taxes on the higher end are lowered, there are more revenues for the government. Such a sliding scale of percentage of income taxes are repressive as far as I am concerned and hinders the economy.
And a progressive income tax is what you are referring to where the definition is a tax is based on a percentage of income that varies directly with the level of income.



You suppose they exist? People will prefer not to work as much to earn more money being that they are taxed at a higher rate, and being that is the way it will be, they will more than likely not wish to earn more money, depriving the economy. Hardly a free market economy to me.

Yes, and this is coming from someone who surmised that early church living was completely communal, a subjective view at the least. I just was mocking the idea of someone imposing their morals on Geppi or anyone else in that thread. Changing the topic again, something you do a lot and accuse me of, eh?
When you decide to get back on the topic we were discussing, please feel free.



And your plan causes high unemployment here in the United States and continues the trend of wealth being concentrated in the few and a permanent welfare class which could grow as this country goes slowly down to second class status as this country becomes less of a producer and more of a consumer? Of course, if you have no money you can not purchase; therefore, you can not consume, and in time the USA becomes a third World country.



But morality is all realative and might makes right, right? Back to the topic, in the tax arena, why should those who create wealth be forced by the government to give wealth to those who do not create wealth?
For the government to impose income taxes is NOT an example of laissez-faire.

Prove it. The new job creation numbers are also not based on a survey of every firm either. So there may be more jobs created.

Really Sam, you're grasping at straws here. It's beneath you.

Sam, we've brought elements from our Cheney discussion into this topic, effectively changing the topic here as well. Also, I used that thread as a citation (in this case) as an example of how folks differ on what is and isn't immoral. It's no different than citing a source from cnn.money.com or msnbc.com. It's relevant because it is support for an assertion. You don't want to discuss that thread because you are taking contradictory positions re: moral absolutes, which means at best you are troll and at worst you are an idiot. I know you aren't stupid, so I'll assume that you just enjoy playing agent provacateur, something that's pretty easy to do when you don't feel the need to have enough intellectual integrity to hold the same position from thread to thread.

You claim to reject my point, then restate yours in your typical tortured prose. That doesn't prove anything. Explain why my analogy is bad, just saying you reject it out of hand leads nothing to the debate and makes you seem closed minded. You aren't closed minded are you Sam?

Since you're always telling me to educate myself, try educating yourself on the early industrial era in this country. Say from 1840-1920. Since you're such a big fan of anecdotal evidence, try looking up Triangle Shirtwaist Fire. Then tell me there were no sweatshops.

Sam, opinion or not, it can shown to be false. Yes you have every right to hold that opinion, no matter how illogical (the positions aren't mutually exclusive so holding one doesn't imply holding the other) or empirically false (the fact that we get cheap goods with out personal risk every single day).




No Sam its not laissez-faire in either case. I remain convinced that your type of "fair" trade, would damage the well being of Americans (and the world) in both the long run and the short run. Nothing you've said has convinced me otherwise, and your dismissal of the advantages held by the United States in world trade, convinces me that your idea of "fair" is really, "what Sam perceives as best for America", which in addition to being wrong, is hardly "fair".