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Comment by nickpp | Hacker News Reader

Nobody's denying the contribution of the govt $$$ to the creation of the PC. But I've seen computers build by governments. They were slow, huge, power hungry, expensive behemoths. They sucked.

We're a long way from there. And free market brought us all the way here.

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Are you aware of the fact that Sillicon Valley was created by the US Government?

Are you referring to the fact that SV was initially founded by the defense industry -- which was in turn all funded by the gov't -- in its early days?

Yes.

Ever heard of NASA?

What about the internet? The highway system?

Same thing with the internet. Government spending got us super expensive connections between a handful of universities. Free markets took that and brought it as what we know as the fast, cheap internet to our doors. Although regulations in the telecom/cable/ISP markets are working hard to impede that.

Yes, govt made the highways. Did not really repair them afterwards (at least around here) but it was definitely a good thing.

However, when judging by the bottom line, the number of good products created by govts is incredibly small compared to the amazing breadth and diversity coming from the open markets.

That logically makes me trust the market system overall and to prefer a small, limited government role.

But I am afraid we are moving into quite the opposite direction...

What kind of role do you think the government should play? Should we continue to privatize things like prisons? Seems it would be difficult to incentive rehabilitation when prisons are paid per bed filled. On the other side, should we privatize the military? the fire department? the courts? the police? why not?

A role as small as possible, but not smaller. Specifics depends of the domain, and there you need a domain expert, which I am not.

I just believe that as a general strategy, we should be continuously attempting to reduce govt power and involvement while allowing the free markets to work.

I am worried that we are doing the opposite, where our current response to pretty much any issue is more govt regulation/intervention instead. A middle way would be great.

> I just believe that as a general strategy, we should be continuously attempting to reduce govt power and involvement while allowing the free markets to work.

Sure, I can agree with that. But what if the lack of government power is what is preventing free markets from working? Things like anti-monopoly legislation. I mean, I'll give you that the reason these things exist is because private companies use the government to enforce their monopoly. But how do you plan on opposing that without using some sort of anti-trust action?

They both were built in the name of defense and national security during the cold war. You are not suggesting that we be in a permanent state of wars to promote gov't funding of R&D?

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