What's the confusion?
| Monday, Sep 14 2009 11:51 PM
Last Updated Monday, Sep 14 2009 11:53 PM
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I just read the Sept. 3 letter to the editor, "Confusion over capitalism." If I didn't know better I would think I was reading "The Communist Manifesto" by Karl Marx.
It seems to me that this reader wants the state to make all decisions for the people. We don't have, and I pray we never will have, a command or centrally controlled economy in this country. I, for one, would not want to live under a system where the state decides what I buy, how I buy it, who I buy it from, how much it costs and so on.
In fact, I would say that many of the problems we face today in many sectors of our economy can be traced directly to government involvement in the free market. The housing market and health care are only two of the countless examples, and I use these because that's what we are hearing about lately.
The housing crash was in large part a result of government mandates to expand home loans to people that couldn't afford them. This is not the only reason but a big one.
In health care, the free markets could bring prices down if the markets were truly free. Right now in California every insurance plan has to cover maternity care and birth control. Well, we don't all need those, do we?
Many of Congressman Kevin McCarthy's ideas are free market-based. A true free market, not the state, is the answer to our troubles.
SCOTT HALLAM
Bakersfield
