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Economic Loops

Market forces establish the market context of incentives and disincentives. It should be clear that these incentives and disincentives result in actions.  Typically, the focus is on buy-actions, sell-actions, and investment-actions. But this is a very small subset of the impact of the market context. Indeed, any action that is influenced by the market context can be said to be an economic action.  The relationship between market context and action is statistical in nature.  There is ultimately a probability for a given action associated with a market context that can be seen to occur over a population affected by the market context. These actions potentially impact the market context.  A government action for example can change a law which can then change the incentive or disincentive in place.  A boycott action or a strike-action can greatly impact supply or demand.  Further, it can create new incentives and disincentives based on its impac...
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Market Context

The concept of a market as an exchange of goods and  services is perhaps the most familiar concept from economics. Here's the Wikipedia definition: In mainstream  economics , the concept of a  market  is any structure that allows buyers and sellers to exchange any type of goods, services and information. The exchange of goods or services, with or without money, is a transaction. In my view, there is a danger with the concept of market that leads us to miss the full impact of market forces. By definition, market forces shape price, supply, and demands for goods and services.  But their impact is far larger than this. Market forces lead to a range of incentives and disincentives for a wide range of actions that are independent of the exchange of goods and services.  For example, does a worker arrive early or late to work?  What time does the market open?  I would label this set of incentives and disincentives that derive from market force...
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Market Forces

The Oxford Dictionary defines market forces  as: the economic factors affecting the price of, demand for, and availability of a commodity. From this definition and operational definition, I would put forward that capitalism is the set of market forces and their effect. When people talk about capitalism as an ethical system or as a property of democracy, they are cluttering up the term.  With all these assumptions, to say something bad about capitalismi is equivalent to saying something bad about democracy, freedom, or civil liberties.  Likewise, if someone focuses on the problems of capitalism, it leads to the viewpoint that the political system can be blamed for the "evils" of capitalism which leads one to an emotional support of the apparent alternative of capitalism: economic rights, government programs for the poor, or other attempts by government to limit inequality. My argument here is that the political debate prevents viewing capitalism and market force...
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An Operational Definition of Capitalism

What is the definition of capitalism?  When I review the common definitions offered, I find that they often include assumptions that strike me as unnecessary. The Cambridge Dictionary offers : an  economic   system   based  on  private   ownership  of  property  and  business , with the  goal  of making the  greatest   possible   profits  for the  owners The definition mentions "private ownership".  All economic systems that I know about include public goods which are shared such as the air and government-owned goods such as a government building.  Further, all goods that are owned are not owned without restrictions.  There are often rules about their use, limitations on when they can be used, circumstances where they can be taken away, etc.   If it turned out that a majority of goods were highly regulated, does that mean that the economic system is no longer b...
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