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Then you must know about the shops on Hennepin, Lyndale, Nicolet Mall, Lake St, and Lagoon. You don't know about all the shops on these streets? Or on Excelsior in St Louis Park? Well perhaps driving around blind you miss them, me I ride my bike in the area, it the area I live in too. Heck, you don't know Muddy Waters? Or Penn Cycle? Loon Grocery? Those are just the ones my bad memory can come up with right now. Oh and the Wedge, of which I am a member.

You go downtown and you hardly can find any independent places, it's chains everywhere, and lest we not forget how awful the suburbs are!

I don't go downtown much but when I do more than likely I'm going to Natcam, National Camera Exchange. With 6 stores in the Twin Cities it's huge. NOT!!!

I really don't know anything about your business statistics...maybe they're a sign that Europe is following in our footsteps, which is sad, but what I'm talking about is only what I see when I walk down the street right now.

They're not my statistics they're the European Commission's or someone else's. As for walking I don't walk much, I ride my bike more.

Instead you've got an offie on every corner, with chippy or a kebab shop next to it, bakeries, grocers, butchers, you name it... We just don't get that here. Hardly saying it's perfect, but it's one of the biggest motivators for me to want leave this awful city and move over there!

While we don't have as many shops such as bakeries here as Germany had when I was there we do have them. Actually that is something I loved about it there. There are 2 big motivators for to leave, well three, here. One, it's too far away from either the Atlantic or Pacific. Two, the growing season is too short, at least without a greenhouse. And the third reason is I had to leave close friends when I moved up here. Normally I don't have trouble meeting new people but here I have. One person I did meet, born and raised in MN, told me that instead of the motto saying "Minnesota Nice" it should be "Minnesota Ice". Maybe it's just where I've been but I've had bad luck meeting people here, which is why I now spend hours online daily and don't get out much any more.

Falcon

Let's take a step back for a minute. Imagine that I don't. Explain to me what a competitive free market it is

A free market "describes a market without economic intervention and regulation by government except to regulate against force or fraud."

and how the competition within it produces companies that provide effective services to their customers.

If those who are in a market do not make a product or provide a service people are willing to pay for somone will introduce competition and do so themselves. That applies whether it is profitable or not. Since the original post is about health insurance, let's use that. During the debate up to the House's vote on their bill there was mention of health co-ops. I didn't know it but not far from me there is a Health insurance coop. Health Partners has existed for almost 50 years.

Being a member, willingly and voluntarily, of 2 coops though neither being a health coop I know how they work. The members, owners, set the policy of the coop. Now there are three main types of coops I know of. One type is the employee or worker owned coop. Basque coops in Spain like the Mondragon Corporation are huge employers. A second type is the supplier owned coop. An example of it in the US is the Organic Valley Coop. The dairy farmers who supply dairy products to the coop are the owners. And the third type is the buyer owned coop such as the two I'm a member of, Lakewinds coop and The Wedge.

All of these types of coops meet the requirements of the free market, a willing and voluntary exchange.

There are a couple of reasons why I don't think you'll see a functioning free-market health-care system.

1) The cost of catastrophic care is high enough that people will need insurance.

I didn't say there wouldn't be insurance. Insurance is part of the plan. Right now most people can't buy insurance on their own and have to get it through their employers. This is because if an employer offers health insurance the employer will get a tax break, but if an individual buys health insurance they do not get a tax break. With a free market system everybody can get insurance and have a tax break. Allow people to choose what type of insurance coverage they want and can afford. If a family wants comprehensive coverage they can pay more for insurance but if an individual only wants catastrophic coverage they can pay out of pocket expenses to see a doctor. For major expenses the insurance will cover it. And if they want coverage for a disability they can buy short term disability insurance. With a plan like a Health Savings Account they can pay for regular expenses. Obviously those who choose such a plan will pay less for insurance than the family who buys comprehensive coverage.

2) Insurance doesn't work very well in the free market due to game theoretic reasons.

There's this thing called person responsibility I happen to believe in. When I've gone grocery shopping I've compared prices. With a freemarket in health care I'd also compare prices. When I can I shop for what I consider the best deal, which may be different than someone else's best deal.

3) Doctors in certain specialties have essentially monopolies in their local areas, forcing their salaries to absurd levels.

Encourage people to go into those specialties and introduce competition. As I say above, if I can shop for a service I can get the best deal.

4) Most importantly, society is not going to let anyone die from lack of healthcare. And so, many people will free-ride off of this and not get health insurance.

What do you think socialized medicine is? It's exactly like that. I don't now but I used to watch my health and try to live as healthy a life style as I could. Because I tried to take care of my health I should have been able to pay less for insurance. Under socialized medicine I wouldn't have that choice, I'd pay the same as the person down the street who eats 5 days a week at McDonald's or the corner greasy restaurant. Under a freemarket though if I wanted to I could join a local healthcare coop. As I'm already a member of two coops, Lakewinds Coop and The Wedge I probable would join one.

Those are some reasons why I think a France-style healthcare system would be cheaper and provide better heath-outcomes then a perfectly free-market one.

And under a system like France's I end up paying for the person down the street who eats at McDonald's 5 days a week even though I eat health food.

"Instead most of the money was simply given to banks, those banks aren't lending money instead their using the money to buy other banks."

No, it was given in exchange for equity, as I said...

Read the name of the program, Troubled Assets Relief Program. It was approved by congress to buy troubled assets from banks, not to give money to banks and that exactly what it should have done. If people wanted the money to go to banks then it should have been named something more appropriate. Heck congress wasn't even happy with what was done to the money.

Falcon

http://www.wedge.coop/is4c/

while i grow organic produce for myself, i'm not going to fool myself into thinking it would work on a commercial scale.

So, there are no organic farms? Funny, Willing Workers on Organic Farms has 80 farms in Haiwaii where people can volunteer to work. Local Harvest list 269 organic farms in my area. My coop, The Wedge, which is 5 minutes walk for me is supplied by a number of these organic farms. The same with my other coop, Lakewinds.

the method you are reffering to is rotation planting, and you would require 3x the farm land. in effect you would be cutting down an aweful lot of the eco system your attempting to protect.

Other than using nitrogen fixers I didn't say anything about any methods in the post you replied to, I did mention in other posts that organic farmers use companion planting though. And using companion planting can increase the yield of a given amount of land can produce.

Look, capitalists just aren't going to ask the government to ban a cheap, useful, industrial commodity. If hemp were as useful as its proponents say, there would be an industry producing products from it. No law will get in the way of that. Look at the immigration situation in the USA - plenty of laws and even more who turn a blind eye to the law. If hemp were as useful to industry as cheap labor, you can bet your last dollar companies would be engaged in its production on an industrial scale, regardless of the law, just like they import cheap labor on an industrial scale, despite the law.

Hemp is in many products, from clothes to food. There's a hemp store about 15 minutes walk from where I live that sells clothes and other things made from hemp. In the opposite direction another 5 minutes walk takes me to a coop, The Wedge, that has hemp salad dressing as well as hemp bits that can be sprinkled on salad and other food much like bacon bits or croutons are. Even Target and Walmart sale items with or made from hemp. Just because you and others don't know these are available does not mean they aren't. And the government doesn't want people to know, because if they did then more people would become informed about the uses of hemp. This could start a mass of people to demand hemp be more widely available, even farmed, in the US. As it is now, Canada has already gotten a head start on farming hemp. More can be found in Google's Industrial Hemp directory.

Check out any new gadget article on Slashdot. Nobody talks about buying it locally.

I have and do talk about buying locally. I have stated at least a few tymes that I am a member of two local coops that support both organic and local producers, Lakewinds Coop, and The Wedge Coop.

And you don't need herbicides if you don't need crops...

Make that "you don't need herbicide at all" and you'd be right. Hebicides areen't needed to grow crops otherwise people wouldn't of been growing crops for thousands of years.

You do need herbicide if you want to grow large acres of cropland.

First see above. Secondly organics farmers grow large acreage of crops without herbicides, herbicides are a BIG NO NO in organics. Maybe not the thusands of acres "conventional" farmers use but organics farmers do farm on large farms. Actually in my neck of the woods an organic farm is under threat because an oil company wants to run a pipeline through the farm. Five Questions With Atina Diffley of Gardens of Eagan Farm. Actually through four organic farms. August/September '06 Newsletter.

Communism is superior to capitalism in small economies as it reduces duplication of effort. In larger economies it generally fails because it does not motivate improvement via competition and because the consolidation of effort simplifies totalitarianism unless checked by an outside force.

How ca competition exist without "duplication of effort"?

I don't see any economies willing to share or divide their power for the good of humanity

I see some and am a member of two, Lakewinds Coop and The Wedge Coop. There are something like 7 coops in the region I live in, each supports local businesses as well as small and organic farmers. Each also gives aide to local nonprofits whether in education, working with the environment, or with those working to help the poor.

Hampden Park Co-Op

I've never been to Hampden Park Co-Op, but I live within five minutes walk from The Wedge .

There are so many variables: packaging, pasteurization, additives (do your organic ones add vanilla flavor?), etc.

Though the milk I get is pasteurized, because I love to make cheese I wish I could find unpasteurized milk locally, it isn't homogenized nor does it have additives. On top of that, it comes in reusable glass bottles which have a deposit on them.

I especially love the organic foods packaged in plastic, unrecycled paperboard, along with unidentified inks, all displayed under harsh flourescent light, in a store with artificial flooring, carpets, etc.

I am a member of two coops, Lakewinds and The Wedge , both of which I joined because they support local businesses and because they support organics. Both sale items in bulk, ie they have bins containing items that you use plastic bags to fill which reduces packaging. I used to not like plastic bags but found out at The Wedge that it actually takes less energy and petroleum to produce plastic bags than paper bags takes. Only if they're use plastic bags based on cellulose instead of petroleum, actually I'd like to find out if petroleum based or cellulose based plastics use more petroleum.

I mean, if they really cared, they'd do more than just take everyone's money.

As a member of a coop I get a 10% discount at Lakewinds once a month and 10% discount on every purchase at The Wedge because of a disability. Then every year I get a check from each coop depending on how much I spend there which is somewhere around 1%. While some items at the coops can be found at regular grocery stores cheaper other things are cheaper at the coops, and many items won't be found at other stores. The flooring is basically the same found as at other stores, mostly linoleum with rugs or tiles in selected places.

Where the flip do you live and shop?

There are all kinds of chicken. I can't speak for the OP, but I tend to get this chicken, which is in the neighborhood of $6.50 per pound. Given how little chicken I eat, I'm comfortable paying a bit more to know how the meat is produced.