Well they spent money on two aircraft carriers, where the planes they brought off America were not suitable for the ships so they had to modify the planes. We certainly didn't see a massive improvement in weaponary in the field until we'd lost a lot of people.
The welfare state was bloated, of that there is absolutely no doubt. Borders were deliberately abandoned and I stand by the amount of money given to the E.U..

It is in the interests of companies to develop new products that people want so they do research and develop. If they produce goods that do not last, people will stop buying them. If they produce a new model of something that people prefer, they will buy it and perhaps give their old model to someone who wants it. Contrast this with the one model of car available in Soviet Russia, the empty shelves and other shelves stacked with goods nobody wants – produced because some 5 years plan said people would want them.

I would not describe uncontrolled immigration as free market. It is a political policy – another great ‘plan’ of the pseudo-socialist EU. It works against what would be normal free market activity if the workforce were indigenous, organised and received decent wages. I do agree that the Capitalists do take advantage of this and exploit the cheap labour, the answer is to stop uncontrolled immigration.

I think ‘trickle down’ works compared to socialist countries, peoples’ standard of living in general gets better over the years in Capitalist countries – the reverse in Socialist countries.

Certainly monopolies are a problems and cartels and there is a role for governments to mitigate their effect. However, it is still possible for new enterprises to challenge monopolies; look how Dyson shook up the vacuum cleaner market, how Betfair challenged the big bookies, peer to peer lending taking business from the banks. In Socialist economies the only choice you have is the state offering – usually inefficient and poor quality.

Small businesses such as a greengrocers can be destroyed by a supermarket opening nearby. But the good ones find a niche and provide a service and quality that the supermarket cannot match. The state run greengrocers of course would sell stale goods, have shortages and not really give a damn about customer service or what the customer wants.

People in Capitalist countries choose to take out a student loan or a mortgage – they can choose to buy their own property. People in Socialist Russia were are allocated a flat in a concrete tower block – those that were not literally enslaved, of course, in some forced labour camp.

mother-in-law is an anagram of woman hitler

There is no reason why uncontrolled immigration is a political policy as opposed to being a free market in operation.The political policy may (and usually is) simply a mechanism or reasoning for bringing a freer market in labour into (greater) existence.

As an example,the immigration into the UK of EU nationals precisely reflects the broadening of such a free (freer) market in the supply of/demand for goods services and labour from one operating within the UK to one which is more EU wide.Free market capitalism in action,not "pseudo-socialism".Tariffs and import/export controls by states on goods ,services and labour,reduce the free market.That's why lifting them more was known as "free trade".

A poster may be opposed to immigration but it is difficult to argue that having no immigration controls (which very few on here accused being in favour of have ever actually advocated) would not lead to a broadening of a free market in relation to labour.

Unrestricted immigration doesn't work against a free market at all.In a free market,wages reflect supply and demand. Restricting immigration is anti-free market. The solution to low wages is a higher minimum wage and enforcement of it,which again is a restriction on a "free market".

You spoil an otherwise interesting post by not being able to resist a prejudiced "one-sided" pop at the end.People in various regimes have ended up in labour camps.Not something to be admired,wherever it happens/happened.Think Stalin,think Hitler,think Franco.Think quite a few non "socialist" and "socialist" others.To think it is a uniquely "socialist" thing that is a uniquely automatic consequence of "socialism" is simply factually wrong.As a random further example,"we" worked about 20,000 "Africans" to death in forced labour camps in S Africa at the time of the Boer war.I was not aware the UK was a socialist rather than a capitalist country at the time.

I wasn't taking any personal position on free markets generally.

Just responding to your proposition that uncontrolled immigration wasn't free market but instead a political policy.Also your suggestion that free movement of labour within the EU was pseudo-socialist thing as opposed to being free market capitalism in action.

Better a cuttlefish than a sea urchin with its head stuck in the sediment at the bottom of the ocean

And (rightly) slagging Stalin (because its a "socialist" country) while (wrongly) ignoring Hitler and Franco is like... only noticing one fractured water main out the the three squirting water at you from different directions

Glad to hear you are not biased towards failings on the left in any way as opposed towards similar failings on the right.

Am presently reviewing the effects of lack of immigration controls on the extinction of homo neanderthalens.

Did have a thought actually. Could it be possible a few homo neanderthalens remain even now,having survived the onset of "modern man", 40,000 years after they were thought to have become completely extinct?

Edited by leggedstruggle (14 Aug 2015 7.38pm)

mother-in-law is an anagram of woman hitler