Comments (41)

• Nat

  This reminds me of a recent trip tp China.

  There is a state owned restaurant in Guangzhou (of all places!). You can tell it is state owned because all of the employees must wear their government employee badges. The service is VERY slow and the food reminds one of the reality show "Fear Factor".

  This is a stark contrast to the other nearby restaurants, where there is a team of waiters to wait on you, and the food is very good.

  Published: November 15, 2005 8:27 AM

• Douglas McKnight

  The idea that markets ignore beauty and creativity is ridiculous. I recently attended a presentation by Liberty Property Trust of an office building that they just acquired and plan to renovate. After the leasing agent spent about five minutes discussing rental rates and broker incentives, the interior designer went on for half an hour telling us how his changes to the lobby and other common areas would cause them to “pop.� This is a big real estate investment trust selling their building to predatory real estate brokers, analysts and investors, yet they felt it was worthwhile to give their artiste the floor for most of the presentation.

  Published: November 15, 2005 8:29 AM

• Alan R

  "We have Venice, Manhattan, Paris, and a pyramid in the desert! " No one who has been to Venice, Manhattan, Paris, or Egypt would mistake these faux "creative themes" in Vegas for any of those places. Vegas itself is a poor example of capitalism since the city wouldn't exist except for the subsidized water that major dams provide at tax payer expense to the "capitalists". "Many people go to casinos exclusively for the free drinks." Yes, these people are known as alcoholics. And I suppose somehow casinos provide for the "most urgent needs of the consumers" to fart away real wages on "entertainment". I think it speaks volumes that Americans now think that what used to be considered vice, and was almost exclusively an activity of the idle rich, is now mistaken as capitalism, or in Canada, as socialism. No wonder our kids isn't learnin'. Their college money is going down socialist and pseudo-capitalist ratholes. And Mises.org has wasted space on a trivial essay.

  Published: November 15, 2005 9:23 AM

• Curt Howland

  Beauty, attractiveness, is only important in sales. Without competition, beauty is a pointless waste of effort and energy.
  
  
  No effort at external esthetics is required for a prototype, for instance. "Hey, it's ugly but it works." However, the second one gets attention to external esthetics because now that the idea is sold, it's time to sell product.

  Published: November 15, 2005 9:29 AM

• Curt Howland

  Alan R., I agree with you that the subsidizing of electricity and water to Lost Wages is abominable. It is theft, plain and simple.
  
  
  What has been created in that environment, however, is what is being discussed. The principles of sales and competition hold true, even in that distorted market.
  
  
  There is one substantial element you're ignoring that makes Las Vegas a glorious place: Going there is voluntary. Those who do not gamble have that much more of their capital left over for things they consider more important. Such as your child's college money.
  
  
  How about we discuss "farting away" your hard earned money for four years of partying and a useless piece of paper from a government-subsidized college?

  Published: November 15, 2005 9:44 AM

• iceberg

  ... I think that Las Vegas is not exactly the example one wants to use to demonstrate the potential of a free market. In truth, it's perhaps the opposite. The modern Las Vegas owes itself not a free market, but because the external conditions were unfavorable towards investment. If gambling and prostitution were unregulated everywhere, its doubtful that anything like Las Vegas would arise in the free market, and instead smaller pockets of popular gambling locations would be numerous and uncountable, unlike today.

  Yes, a free market might or would provide extraordinary gambling destinations, but I think that Las Vegas is the effect of unnatural accumulation of capital due to federal-recognized tribal monopolies.

  (See the rest here)

  Published: November 15, 2005 10:37 AM

• Andrew T

  The last and only time I was at the Niagara Falls Casino, I believe there was an admission fee as well just to enter the casino.

  Increased leisure time, the ability to "fart away" wages on entertainment, is one of the greatest benefits of market competition. Competition drives businesses to invent new technologies to make life easier, so we don't have to work as hard so we have more leisure time. There are plenty of people who can manage to save for their kids’ education, retirement, and still have money left over to spend on their leisure time however they choose. Whether one form of entertainment is more worthwhile than another is up to the consumer. Is it less of a vice to spend money on sporting events, computer games, or five-star restaurants?
  

  Published: November 15, 2005 10:37 AM

• Tom Woods

  Far from a "trivial essay," this was one of the most enjoyable pieces I've read in recent weeks. If you're morally opposed to gambling, you are still capable of seeing the larger picture the author is painting here, since it obviously holds true across the board. I thought the casino example was an especially vivid and helpful one.

  Published: November 15, 2005 10:54 AM

• billwald

  People who are sufficiently ignorant to think they can beat the house don't care about decor. The wife and I eat at "Indian" casinos because of the good, cheap buffets. The people who sit for hours at the machines look like zombies.

  Published: November 15, 2005 11:05 AM

• William Tanksley

  People who are sufficiently ignorant to think they can beat the house don't care about decor. The wife and I eat at "Indian" casinos because of the good, cheap buffets. The people who sit for hours at the machines look like zombies.

  I don't think you're right about the zombies not caring about the decor; and I think the casino owners would agree with me. I suspect that the zombies enter their state of gambling bliss because of the decor. It gives them a feeling of wealth and potential reward, which increases the stimulation of the actual rewards when they come.

  I'm pretty sure that the owners didn't spend the decoration money to entertain the people who only come for the cheap food.

  -Billy

  Published: November 15, 2005 11:21 AM

• Harry Valentine

  Ontario is not the only Canadian province that owns and operates state casinos. The proliferation of state casinos in Canada has given rise to addictive gambling, a phenomena that can be expected in a nation that embraces socialism and economic regulation to the extent that Canada does.

  While state officials tout all the social benefits of state-owned, state-run casinos and lotteries, they nicely avoid letting the population find out about the dark side of this practice.

  Published: November 15, 2005 11:47 AM

• Aaron Singleton

  I don't understand why people can't see the argument that is being made here. It has nothing to do with the virtue of gambling or whether or not Las Vegas is "really" a free market. These things are irrelevant to the discussion at hand.
  All the article was doing was making a broad comparison between how businesses are run under a "socialist type" system versus a "market-based" system, using a specific example. The point being that markets are far better regardless of whether or not they are perfectly free from government influence.

  Far too often in these comment forums, people seem to think that "pure" free market conditions must exist before we can use an example to defend the market or attack socialism. If that were the case we would be completely unable to discuss these issues at all. In a world saturated with government at all levels, everything is tainted by it to some extent. That does not prevent us from recognizing the virtues of market conditions to the extent that they do exist.

  Also, "the most urgent needs of the consumer" does not mean "urgent" in the emergency sense of the word. It is not what some (Alan R.) would consider to be the most or least essential needs that matter to the market, but rather those for which consumers are willing to pay the most. Since many casinos are immensely profitable, consumers are obviously willing to pay for them regardless of what the rest of us may think of their choices. Isn't that the whole purpose of Liberty in the first place -- so we don't have to live under the tyrrany of other people's priorities and desires, but are free to pursue our own?

  Published: November 15, 2005 12:18 PM

• SteamshipTime

  The article is excellent, and not trivial. Personally, I hope to never set foot in Las Vegas, and there are doubtless a number of externalities there, as everywhere. Otherwise, the article succinctly illustrates the socialist calculation problem.

  There was a very funny commercial for the Wendy's hamburger chain that depicted a Soviet fashion show, featuring a stereotypically large, uniformed Russkie female announcer, and a group of elderly generals continuously clapping in slow cadence. The setting was a dark, grim room full of unhappy-looking babushkas.

  The theme of the commercial was choice, as Wendy's prepares their sandwiches to order. The announcer enthusiastically begins, "First choice, business-vear!" Out comes a matronly Russian woman in gray sleeveless dress, gray hose and gray bandana. "Next choice, svim-vear!" Same model in same garb, carrying a beach ball. "Next choice, evening vear!" Same model, same get-up, sporting a flashlight.

  Published: November 15, 2005 12:24 PM

• Paul Edwards

  I agree Aaron:

  "Far too often in these comment forums, people seem to think that "pure" free market conditions must exist before we can use an example to defend the market or attack socialism."

  We can be critical of firms that actively endeavor to invoke or promote the coercive state for their own advancement or survival, but most of us just try to do the best we can with the hampered market we are given. It’s to the point where even the firms who pay off congress with "contributions", are to varying degrees, victims of extortion.

  Published: November 15, 2005 1:07 PM

• Paul Edwards

  That was funny Steamship, same model, same outfit, but with a flashlight!

  Regarding the point you make about this article illustrating the calculation problem, i hope you don't mind if i dispute that a little bit. My take is that it only demonstrates a state run enterprise's lack of incentive to compete in the market, rather than its inability to calculate.

  The significant point is that there is in Canada a market from which these casinos bid for factors which have prices, and they sell their product also on the market for a price. This is in fact, not socialism, as Mises would define it but merely a state enterprise operating in the market. It's bound to be a looser because it is run by the state. But it doesn't suffer calculation problems.

  The calculation problem exists only where there is no market and no prices in factors of production. The two situations that provide this is where the state takes over all ownership of production (and strictly speaking, does no commerce with outside markets), and also in the extremely hypothetical situation where a private firm monopolizes through whatever liberal means, all stages of production, and all lines of production. The key to obtain the calculation problem is that there are no factor prices, not that the state is running a few utilities or other enterprises.

  Published: November 15, 2005 1:35 PM

• ithaca libertarian

  I agree with Alan R., this article is trivial at best and slanders our good friends to the north. "Socialist Canadian commies?" The last time I checked, Canada was not communist, and what are we comparing it to, the great capitalist USA? Gimme a break, the only difference between the US and Canada is that their governments spend relatively more than us on health care while ours spend relatively more on "defense". Granted, the overall tax burden is higher in Canada, but the difference between the two countries isn't what you think.

  It has already been pointed out that Las Vegas does not constitute a free market, but the author has continuously made comparisons between the situation in Ontario and that in a "competitive free market". Based on this approach, I could pull out a few anecdotes about visiting casinos in Quebec and Atlantic City and claim that "socialist" Quebec is much better than "capitalist" New Jersey (whose casinos are, in my own subjective opinion, crap).

  The article could have used some background research beyond a trip to Niagara Falls. The casinos are not in fact run by the government, but by an American consortium led by the Hyatt Development Corporation. Assuming Hyatt isn't secretly run by a bunch of "commies", then chances are the Ontario casinos do maximize profits. As for the two casinos, the first one was temporary and was supposed to be shut down after the second one opened, but proved to be too popular. What can you expect when you prevent competition? The real problem is that the government controls the SUPPLY of gambling services, and as such will restrict supply in order to generate monopoly profits. So Ontario ends up with a gambling "price" above the natural price while Las Vegas has a gambling "price" below the natural price (due to water subsidies, etc).

  So how is the situation of cheaper gambling better than the situation of more expensive gambling? Neither reflect the natural state of order. One provides all these lavish benefits (free booze!) on consumers attracting more people to gambling than what would naturally occur, while the other results in a price where some people who would normally gamble choose not to do so. If you're going to make this comparison, please find a competitive market first!

  Published: November 15, 2005 1:47 PM

• John Christopher

  So the author knows what he likes in a casino and consequently he likes Las Vegas and dislikes Niagara Falls. Fascinating...
  The article is trivial because the author substitute his tastes for the market's tastes. Just because Canada is socialist (hard to argue with that) and Las Vegas is capitalist (hard to agree with that), and because his tastes are best met in Vegas/capitalism than in Ontario/socialism, he concludes to the superiority of capitalism over socialism. That must be a joke.
  Canada is socialist not because the author's tastes are not met. Canada is socialist because the market participants cannot express themselves freely because of government violent intervention. Guess what, under a true capitalist system, our friend Vedran Vuk could still dislike the casinos in Niagara Falls because most people over there (the market) would prefer pay their drinks rather than sleep at the Casino hotels.
  My advice to the author is to re-write the article without any reference to his personal tastes; they are absolutely irrelevant. Also, I would really drop the idea that capitalism is right because capitalist products are closer his tastes.
  A better proof of his point, otherwise intersting, would be that more people fly from Ontario to gamble in Las Vegas than visit the Niagara Falls casinos.

  Published: November 15, 2005 2:08 PM

• The Truth

  Let's get your facts straight:
  The two casinos are vastly different, both in theme and services. Fallsview is more "Vegas strip" while Niagara is "downtown Vegas".
  Beer is $4.50 CDN, or about $3.75 US. (You must have bought beer at a strip club instead) Yes, Canada does charge for alcohol, its a federal law, eh? I have no clue what you call nutria, but the buffet receives nothing but praise from what I hear.
  Giveaways. OPEN YOUR EYES! they just gave away a Mercedes, $10,000 each week in October, and are ALWAYS giving stuff away.
  As for your poker experience, you obviously have NO idea what you saw. One person acting as brush, one Pit manager, 2 supervisors, seven dealers(tables), three closed due to operational needs, sorry about your wait.
  Dealers are rotated on a regular basis to maintain the game pace and alertness, collusion is almost a thing of the past.
  Why you so bitter? Lost a few bucks? Couldn't get comped for your $5 blackjack action there, BIG SHOOTER? If you don't know how to play with the big boys, play for free on the internet.
  The casinos may not be perfect, but they are a heck of alot more fun to be at than hanging out with a stick in the mud as yourself!

  Published: November 15, 2005 2:59 PM

• tz

  Detroit v.s. the Windsor Casino just across the border would be a better comparison, but I've visited none of them so I don't know. From what I've gathered, the Windsor casino is better than those in Niagra Falls, and is competetive in some ways with the Detroit casinos, or at least they are trying to be so.

  It may be that Niagra Falls Canada simply suffers more from a monopoly (the only casinos are on their side and don't need to compete).
  

  Published: November 15, 2005 3:00 PM

• Adam

  Jeez, you poke a socialist in the belly and he forgets to laugh. If the article was so trivial, why did you respond? Most trivialities don't require laborious retorts. Try laughter. But you go get 'em. Also, this "water subsidy" argument as de facto proof that there is NO capitalism (since the argument is so hard to believe, and all) seems strained. I KNOW you're not making that claim since in Canada people presumably work for private enterprise (since the socialist/commie argument is so hard to believe, and all) and take those wages to be spent on the casinos, which, socialist or not, wouldn't be there if such wages weren't. So is there therefore NO socialism (or, since I have little interest in your preferred advertising, whatever you people call whatever it is you do up there)? Are we condemned to never speak of socialistic or capitalistic modes? Weak. I ask that you try again, this time actually engaging the conversation, not a trope in which you attempt to weasel out of one. Think of a sliding scale of collectivism-free marketeerism. Think in grays, shades, decimals. Yin/Yang binary thinking is usually employed for its convenience to whatever YOU believe in. I'm guilty too. It's really not that hard to grasp. In order to garner more responses, let me pre-empt and agree with your declaration that my post is also, quite trivial.

  --Adam
  

  Published: November 15, 2005 3:06 PM

• Vedran Vuk

  Thank you all for your great and even not so great comments. But here is a few things that I must clarify:

  1. Yes, a private company does actually operate the casino but this does not remove the element of subsidizing, government control, and lack of competition. Plenty of subsidized "private" companies have done horrible things. Some of the best examples are railroad companies. Companies operating without government intervention had the most success in the railroad business. ("How Capitalism Saved America" by Thomas DiLorenzo explains further).
  2. The preferences that I mentioned were lower prices, better service, and better aesthetics. I thought everyone could agree with these but I guess some people prefer higher prices. I will have to completely re-learn economics now.
  3. Yes, Atlantic City casinos may be worse but the difference is that these casinos will be driven out of the market eventually. Think of the many casinos that have gone out of business or have been destroyed in Las Vegas. There is constant improvement. Worse casinos are driven out of the market eventually. Things like the US postal office or Amtrack continue long after the profit and efficiency has stopped. Similarly government run casinos will not seek improvement like competitive casinos.

  Published: November 15, 2005 4:16 PM

• plowman

  Regardless of what people think of the article, I LOVED the artwork! Slap a Mises.org in the lower right-hand corner and start selling those bad boys for $8 a pop in the mises store. Somebody should do a whole series of side by side comparisons of socialism vs. capitalism.

  Published: November 15, 2005 7:22 PM

• Cameron

  Alan R. and Ithaca: I do not agree that this essay was a waste of time. You Americans don't know what you are talking about. I am a Canadian, living near Windsor, and your defense of my country is not welcome. You have no idea what it's like living in this leftist rathole. I work at a DCX plant in Windsor where I have to put up with irrational unionists every day. I disseminate free market literature to a few friends here and there, and we stand around and bad-mouth the union (supposedly biting the hand that feeds us, Ha!) but I hate it. I feel the imminent threat of persecution every day. I feel like I'm living in Russia. It does not offend me to hear my fellow countrymen called 'commies.'

  And as for the essay being a waste of space, I appreciate the little attention we get from you American libertarians. Living separate from you, in this hyper-collectivist hell-hole, I feel like I'm living in Yellowknife, waiting for the year's supply of toiletries. We libertarians don't even have a movement started yet. We need all the 'slander' - as you call it - that we can get.

  Try to remember us up here. You are blessed to live where you do. I'm doing all I can, but it's a lonely road.

  Published: November 15, 2005 7:55 PM

• The Economist

  The government casino do suffer from a calculation problem, as any other government enterprise does regardless of whether they interact with the open market, because their primary motive is not profit. Government enterprises are created because profit is considered to be harmful to the real social welfare of the economy. However profit is how the entrepreneur determines if he is succeeding at interpreting the preferences of his clients. Profits go up if he succeeds and go down if he fails.

  Since the government company is not interested in profit, its managers can only make guesses at what the clients want, making sure to keep the bosses, the government, satisfied first and foremost. This stifles risk-taking and creativity in favor of safety.

  Published: November 15, 2005 9:23 PM

• The Economist

  One more thing about Las Vegas. There is no better example of the triumph of capitalism than Las Vegas. What started as mob money-laundering operation taking advantage of loopholes in the corrupt government of a hellish patch of desert miraculously reinvented itself, following liberal reforms, into a major world capital of entertainment and tourism.

  Published: November 15, 2005 9:30 PM

• amanda Busch

  dude ved hahah thats pretty kick ass... i took time and read that.. its really good

  Published: November 15, 2005 10:37 PM

• Marco Saba

  Just a question:
  central banks to avoid taxes put the FACE VALUE of banknotes in the LIABILITIES side of the balance.
  Why the casinos don't put the FACE VALUE of fiches in the liability side of the balance?

  Published: November 16, 2005 4:41 AM

• SteamshipTime

  "One more thing about Las Vegas. There is no better example of the triumph of capitalism than Las Vegas. What started as mob money-laundering operation taking advantage of loopholes in the corrupt government of a hellish patch of desert miraculously reinvented itself, following liberal reforms, into a major world capital of entertainment and tourism."

  I have a hypothesis that over the long-term, criminals simply cannot compete with the market, which is why it behooves us to have as few criminal laws as possible.

  Criminal gangs run into the same problem as dictators: eventually, they consume everything there is to consume and chase all the producers away.

  Legalized gambling, legalized prostitution, and legalized alcohol have virtually shut down the Italian mob. When I get some time today I'll elaborate.

  Published: November 16, 2005 6:56 AM

• Vince Daliessio

  Anyone who has been to a state-run Off-Track Betting (OTB) facility knows exactly what the author is talking about. I have never been in a more depressing place of "business". ontrast this with even the scrappiest casino in Atlantic City (no examplar of government-free capitalism, but close enough)- everyone there is having a much better time. As for other forms of state-sponsored versus privatized gambling, we blogged on an example of what happens when the two compete;

  http://www.libertyguys.org/articles/detail.asp?ArtID=208

  Published: November 16, 2005 8:02 AM

• Vince Daliessio

  Anyone who has been to a state-run Off-Track Betting (OTB) facility knows exactly what the author is talking about. I have never been in a more depressing place of "business". Contrast this with even the scrappiest casino in Atlantic City (no examplar of government-free capitalism, but close enough)- everyone there is having a much better time. As for other forms of state-sponsored versus privatized gambling, we blogged on an example of what happens when the two compete;

  http://www.libertyguys.org/articles/detail.asp?ArtID=208

  Published: November 16, 2005 8:03 AM

• Allan Thompson

  "Commie" Casinoes?

  Yes, our Canadian govermnent would be better off to adopt an unfettered free market system in everything including casinoes. The intellectual arguements are correct and the examples vivid.

  However, our government is not Communist by any stretch of the imagination. Like governments everywhere ours is given to delusions of grandure. In this case the thinking is that they can do some social good by limiting the effectiveness of casinoes. This social planning does share some common ground with those in China or the former USSR.

  Your current government shares much with the National Socialist ideas popular in Germany in the 30's. Persecution of executives, the war in Iraq and the gowth of government spending all point to the fact that the US government is hardly lasser fair free enterprise!

  But your calling my government "Commie" and my calling yours "Nazi" would not be helpful to the discussion of which govenment is best and which direction each country should go. I would have expected articles in Mises to avoid name calling. It does not help your case.

  Published: November 16, 2005 11:57 AM

• Curt Howland

  Steamship, the "Mob" also has expenses that raise their cost of doing business. Competition puts downward force on expenses, crowding out the activities that constitute the Mob in the first place.
  
  
  Unless, of course, there isn't any competition because of the illegal nature of the business. It is easy to understand why drug prohibition has continued in the US if one remembers that politicians and bureaucrats can be bought.

  Published: November 16, 2005 12:08 PM

• mikey

  Another fun fact about Canada: we like to throw our grain farmers in jail for the awful crime of selling their wheat to the highest bidder.

  Published: November 16, 2005 2:14 PM

• Paul Edwards

  The Economist:

  I think it is ok to define the calculation question how you like, and if you define it as occurring “…because their primary motive is not profit�, then you are correct by definition.

  This is not, however, the Austrian or Misesian definition of the calculation problem, which is what I am talking about. From the Misesian perspective, it is irrelevant that a particular enterprise is unwilling to condition their actions based on profit. They fail to do so for other reasons; not because they are unable to calculate. In contrast, a socialist state economy truly cannot calculate because there can be no prices with which to calculate when all productive factors are owned by the single state. For this reason alone, they could not calculate even if they desperately wanted to.

  Incentive isn’t the problem. Even if they sent their managers to the gulag if they failed to eliminate shortages in some areas and over supplies in others, they still could not calculate.

  Published: November 16, 2005 2:17 PM

• John Christopher

  Sharing the conclusion or the general idea of an argument is not enough to agree with the argument. The way you get there matters too.
  I am still troubled with the fact that the article only relies on a bad personal experience with Niagara Falls casinos to prove their failures. Is that the right methodology? Mises specifically noted that "There is no standard of greater or lesser satisfaction other than individual judgments of value, different for various people and for the same people at various times. What makes a man feel uneasy and less uneasy is established by him from the standard of his own will and judgment, from his personal and subjective valuation. Nobody is in a position to decree what should make a fellow man happier". (http://mises.org/humanaction/chap1sec2.asp section "on happiness").
  In his comment the author writes: "The preferences that I mentioned were lower prices, better service, and better aesthetics. I thought everyone could agree with these but I guess some people prefer higher prices". Well, I cannot agree with that (see Mises quote). What if differences between the Ontario and Vegas casinos were due to local preferences rather than to government management? Aesthetics; by which standards? I think the whole thing of introducing personal tastes, however mainstream they might be, in an economic analysis just weakens the argument. I would have liked to know what are the levels of regulation in Vegas and Ontario. Any tax incentives? How frustrated are gamblers in Ontario: do they lobby every day for Niagara falls to become a Vegas? How comes government in Canada does not want to maximize tax revenues in those casinos?
  Cameron, don't move to the USA, you will be disappointed and distressed by how much government there is there; even in Vegas! I have lived in the US and in Canada, currently in Toronto, and those two countries could merge seamlessly, but for the Queen on Canadian bank notes. The idea that Canada is communist and the US is capitalist is over the top!

  Published: November 16, 2005 4:10 PM

• moshe

  Casinos, lotteries, etc ... are like a "tax" on people who can't do math and/or refuse to believe that the numbers don't add up in their favor. Unless one is an expert "card counter" and/or they find ways to cheat the house without being caught, they're just fooling themselves into believing they're going to win. Compulsive gamblers seem to resemble drug addicts or alcoholics in their behavior.

  
  There's no such thing as a purely "free market". There's always going to be some idiots who will rig the system in their favor, whether it's the government, mafia, unions, or any "special interest" groups in general. Just happens that the government has more guns than anybody else (both figuratively and literally).

  
  People are going to believe whatever the hell they want. They just happen to become dangerous when they actually have the power and resources to follow through on their sordid ideas.

  Published: November 16, 2005 6:53 PM

• Cameron

  I've always thought the only real difference between rulers in Canada and rulers in China is that the rulers in Canada have a normal sense of humanity and genuinely desire to do good for the people. The rulers in China have no sense of humanity. The rulers' sense of control and management of the people and culture is the same. When cross-border mail-order shopping appeared to spin out of control, the rulers didn't seek the cause of our dissatisfaction and fix the problem. They lowered the tax/duty threshold from $40 to $20 to discourage us from satisfying our wants with American goods. What do you call that? I have a few friends here who enjoy using the word communist to describe Canada. It is not uncommon.

  Published: November 16, 2005 9:15 PM

• Vince Daliessio

  JC:

  Your point about value being subjective according to Mises is true - however, it is also objectively true that relative to Vegas casinos the publicly-owned casinos (OK Socialist if you don't like Communist)they, well, suck. Go to a decently-run (private) horse race track, then Drop into an OTB parlor sometime. Take your Zoloft first.

  Published: November 17, 2005 9:33 AM

• Paul Edwards

  Ha! Now that was funny, Vince. Sometimes it just seems even from the subjective perspective, things can become so lousy it starts to seem objectively rotten. Do old-style outhouses really smell bad? It may be subjective, but nine out of ten who responded replied they don't care what anyone else says, they really do stink. And they can give you nightmares as well :)

  Published: November 17, 2005 12:21 PM

• Steven Kane

  I'm not sure if I would be so quick as to call the casinos in Las Vegas a representation of capitalism. In order to own and operate a casino in Las Vegas you have to get a license from the state, greatly increasing the entry barrier into this industry. Futhermore, overall, the industry is still highly regulated, even in Vegas.

  Published: November 17, 2005 11:03 PM

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