Daily Archives: 9 June 2022

“every company should be free to support what they want”

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That’s part of the typical response of Floridians regarding Governor Ron DeSantis’ (R) veto of the Tampa Bay Rays’ training facility being built with taxpayer money, at least as reported by Fox News.

After vetoing the funding, DeSantis said Friday that he doesn’t “support giving taxpayer dollars to professional sports stadiums” and that “it’s inappropriate to subsidize political activism of a private corporation.”

Most Floridians agree with the first part of DeSantis’ statement that taxpayer money shouldn’t be spent on a private sports facility.  Many—most?—disagree with the last part.

Governor DeSantis wants everyone to be free and have freedoms. I think that every company should be free to support what they want.

Certainly. And companies are. But they should express their views, support the causes they choose, on their own dime. Taxpayer dollars have no business being spent on a private company’s individual activism.

Government Industrial Policy

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This one EU-style. Which fits, since Europe has such long experience with the failure of economies, especially industry-driven, when dictated from the top. See, for instance, France, Germany, Italy of the last century, and France and Germany today.

One company’s (Apple, but the principle is much broader) phone charger, and the cell phones dependent on it, would become illegal throughout the EU if proposed legislation goes through. The legislation is

aiming to set a common charging standard for mobile phones and other portable electronic devices….

And

The planned legislation…is aimed at reducing electronic waste and improving consumer convenience.

Government is dictating to consumers how they will achieve the convenience Government says they want.

Never mind that if consumers want only a single charger across all battery-operated electronics (for instance), if they want a form of convenience (and not the form dictated to them by their Betters), a free market will let them drive their economies in that direction.

Sadly, the EU elitists in charge Know Better, and European citizens do not operate in a truly free market.