The Best Defense is a Good, Um, Defense
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Consider the following defense of Starbucks:
The problem I have with this "everybody wins" defense of corporate capitalism is that the researchers are implicitly accepting consequentialism rather than economic liberty as a legitimate analytical framework and policy criterion -- merely because, in this one instance, it happens to favor a laissez-faire position. That is a myopic and very dangerous tack.
The only basis required to "legitimize" Starbucks is the right of any private company to compete against any other private company for private customers.
Central planner wannabes, anti-corporatists and other "big is bad" malcontents notwithstanding, Starbucks simply has -- or ought to have -- the right to "destroy" every mom-and-pop coffee shop on the planet -- assuming that they do it exclusively by offering a better* good or service at a better price, without any rent-seeking, artificial barriers to entry, or other abuse of government power.
(*"Better" determined of course by the market -- i.e., better able to satisfy customer tastes and preferences.)
FULL DISCLOSURE: I loathe Starbucks coffee. Good thing I'm not a central planner wannabe, eh?
Ever since Starbucks blanketed every functioning community in America with its cafes, the one effect of its expansion that has steamed people the most has been the widely assumed dying-off of mom and pop coffeehouses. Our cities once overflowed with charming independent coffee shops, the popular thinking goes, until the corporate steamroller known as Starbucks came through and crushed them all[.]A libertarian cites this research approvingly. I do not.
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Each new Starbucks store created a local buzz, drawing new converts to the latte-drinking fold. When the lines at Starbucks grew beyond the point of reason, these converts started venturing out -- and, Look! There was another coffeehouse right next-door!
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In its predatory store placement strategy, Starbucks has been about as lethal a killer as a fluffy bunny rabbit. Business for independently owned coffee shops has been nothing less than exceptional as of late.
The problem I have with this "everybody wins" defense of corporate capitalism is that the researchers are implicitly accepting consequentialism rather than economic liberty as a legitimate analytical framework and policy criterion -- merely because, in this one instance, it happens to favor a laissez-faire position. That is a myopic and very dangerous tack.
The only basis required to "legitimize" Starbucks is the right of any private company to compete against any other private company for private customers.
Central planner wannabes, anti-corporatists and other "big is bad" malcontents notwithstanding, Starbucks simply has -- or ought to have -- the right to "destroy" every mom-and-pop coffee shop on the planet -- assuming that they do it exclusively by offering a better* good or service at a better price, without any rent-seeking, artificial barriers to entry, or other abuse of government power.
(*"Better" determined of course by the market -- i.e., better able to satisfy customer tastes and preferences.)
FULL DISCLOSURE: I loathe Starbucks coffee. Good thing I'm not a central planner wannabe, eh?
Related Posts (on one page):
- The Best Defense is a Good, Um, Defense
- The Strange Case of "Barista v. Barrister"
- When "Free" Becomes Too Expensive
Posted by Kip on
3 January 2008
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