Market participants are by their very nature biased towards greed. There is no such thing as a self-regulating market. "Caveat Emptor", "let the buyer beware," is not an admonition that has lost its relevance, although it was coined over 2,000 years ago. Safety, quality, financial probity and fair dealing are not the primary goals of business enterprise: profit is. There is no element of conscience in markets: the concept that there is "policing" of markets by "forces" that inherently act as limiting mechanisms because of consumer vigilance and "transparency" is a myth. Therefore: government intervention in markets is both necessary and desirable,and without government, anything approaching a "fair market" is impossible.
The underpinning of all markets is not "supply and demand", the underpinning is a government and legal system that: 1) guarantees enforceability of contract; 2) recognizes the right of redress; 3) defines legal parties; 4)protects from fraud; 5)ensures product safety and efficacy; 6)sets and enforces standards for the legal description of property, financial instruments, market transactions and general business and accounting practices;7)protects the public from predatory, unfair and discriminatory business practices; 8)is able to adapt and flexibly address new situations and needs for rules, laws and regulations,in the markets as the markets themselves change, and 9) works to promote the general welfare of the people, not stateless corporations.
The governmental and legal system of the United States over the past thirty-five years has systematically undone or ignored all of these responsibilities except the first three. The privatization of government services under the guise of "efficiency", the deregulation of as many sectors of the economy as possible, under the same rubric, and the packing of courts with conservative, one might even say reactionary, pro-business and anti-regulation judges has completely changed America's regulatory,legal and economic system. Creating a low wage, low protection,"Laissez Faire" economy where fraud and exploitation are the rule not the exception.
Courts are the referees of the American legal system and serve only a secondary purpose. The legislators framing and passing laws are the power in a country supposedly "ruled" by law. The triteness and ho-hum banality of this statment, does not make it less true. In fact, it is this triteness of process that makes law-making an almost invisible process in America. Without vigilance, legislation can and will be manipulated by the powerful at the expense of the weak. Clearly the economic catastrophe we are enduring now is the result of skewing the laws and legal system to favor the interests of entrenched corporate wealth and the bloated oligarchy of privilege in America.
It is now time that we voice our discontent with our government for so egregiously failing us. We can no longer avoid the responsibility of reforming the political and economic basis of our lives. Stripping corporations of their "personhood" should be our first legal priority. This would immediately stop the fiction of corporations as "beings" with the same rights of "political representation" as human beings and materially effect their ability to legally lobby and contribute to political campaigns.
The fiction that markets are, in some form, forces not based on legal frameworks and have some mystical "hidden" capabilities that are beyond the rule of law and in some manner have magisterial powers must be exploded. We must educate ourselves to the true nature of markets and the necessary power of the government to moderate extreme and abusive economic behavior with law, regulation and enforcement.
We must put people not dollars first. The dream of every American to have a fulfilling and free way of life is being suborned to the whims of "free market policies" and the lackey like worship of "economic efficiencies" that characterize our governance and even the basis of current political debate. The corrosive effects of greed, cronyism, corruption and the lack of a clearly defined set of national priorities that put people first are crushing the polity of the United States of America.
Tax policy and corporate nationality must be addressed in order to rationalize the governance of markets and their participants. We must demand that corporations and those that materially benefit from their activities pay taxes proportional to the benefit they receive from being under the legal and governmental aegis of the United States. Our current governmental policies towards corporations leave us in the position of the towns-people in Blazing Saddles; watching with perplexed horror and fascination as corporations, acting the role of the Sheriff, tell us that if we don't do exactly as they say, they'll kill themselves.
Markets are mechanisms, legal constructs, that are in themselves morally neutral. It is the participants in the marketplace that give them their moral bias and the government that sets the rules. It is now the time for Americans to demand political and social accountability from both market participants and the government that we elect to represent us. It is not too late, but we must act now!
Stop the legal process that allows both jobs and profits to be exported from the country. Hold our government accountable by direct action, demand our political representatives start representing our interests. Demand the legal and enforcement responsibilities of the government be put to use to benefit the people, not the corporate "aristocracy of wealth" that has bought our political process. Corporations are not people, demand that the government significantly legislate a change in the legal status of corporations and strip them of political rights they should not have. Stand up and be counted, organize, write, vote, march,shake the foundations of the established political parties, don't wait, demand that these changes be made now!