Dear Jason,

        It could be merely rhetoric, but quotas and property rights are not the same thing.  Establishing quotas on fishing is essentially a government (or quasi-government) function, which is usually the anti-thesis of so-called "free markets" and private property.

       This is because a quota tells you how the property can be used.

       But in any case, certainly government managed fishing resources make sense in order to protect them.

       Hmmm, do you see a conflict in your belief in property management and your belief in the free market?  This particular article would seem to demonstrate one.  Am I misreading it?

patrick

J.S.

We need to focus on the root causes of problems.

J.S.

We need to focus on the root causes of problems.

By W. Joseph Stroupe
    Asia Times

    Friday 25 August 2006

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Global_Economy/HH25Dj01.html

   Jason,

        By your definition, quotas are indeed a form of property rights, so is Marxist-Leninist governance.  Usually, when economists talk about property rights, they are careful to differentiate between "private" and "public" property rights.  I am sorry, but you use the term in ways that may be clear to you (and others in your circle), but is not always clear to the rest of us.  If you wish us to understand you so that we can agree or disagree, it would be helpful to make distinctions for us dummies ! (okay, maybe just me, smile).

        The danger of a non-specific definiton of property rights is it becomes hard for us to tell if you favor democracy, feudalism, marxist-leninism, fascism or a theological state (all of which may have strong or weak governments).  (Anarchism seems to be out!  As does most libertarian forms for government, since those are by definition, weak, no???)

        I have read your articles, and frankly, find them so general that I am not really clear on what specifically you are advocating.

        One of my biases is to prefer specific reality based definitions and prescriptions and to distrust broad generalizations (not just yours (smile)).

        Your definition of "free market" principles seems to be somewhat different from what our politicians use as definitions.  Which is of course, fine, but it is helpful if you clarify which free market definitions you favor and which you oppose.  Again, your writings generally seem too broad to be clear (for me anyway).  But I appreciate your clarifying these points (at bit).

thanks,

patrick

Lobsters are not caught like fish, so it is hard to understand how the Maine lobster fishery is supposed to be a model for the fisheries of true fish.  There are indeed coastal communities, each with their harbors and docks, and their set of lobster fishermen; the fishermen have their own respective colored floats, which bob at the top of lines connected to the traps on the sea floor; they also display one of the floats on the mast head, so everybody knows everybody else's colors.  So it is pretty transparent, and everybody is pretty vulnerable: everybody's property and effort are out on display for anyone who is paying attention to see.

In fact, it is rather like that thought-experiment about farming in Iowa, in which Iowa farmland is common land and is not privately owned.  Apparently, according to the rules of that experiment, the farmers stake out some land at the beginning of each growing season; and in the course of the season, each of the farmers respects the staked-out pieces of planted ground that each has taken and is trying to raise a crop on.

That looks very much like the lobster fishery, but not really like the fish fisheries.  If you fly to NYC from Europe, with good visibility, it is amazing, how many fishing boats you can see, out in the North Atlantic off of North America: not only US and Canadian fishermen, but also Norwegians, Basques from Spain, Portuguese, and so forth.  (Probably the Basques had discovered America long before Columbus, but kept it a commercial secret.  Their fishing boats are pretty much the same design as Columbus's caravels, the Nin~a, Pinta and Santa Maria.)  There, the fisherfolk move in and out and round about for long periods, not vulnerable to community displeasure so long as they can move; they catch what they catch by means of nets and long lines, not temporarily abandoned in-place traps.

On the Canadians, especially the fishermen of the Maritime Provinces and Quebec: They are a notoriously impoverished bunch of people, so I am quite unpersuaded that they are managing their fisheries well.  Have they figured out a way to collect nice scallops?  Good for them.  But it does not matter, really, does it; we should all be boycotting Canadian seafood, in protest against their slaughter of young harp seals.

On Monterey: We have the Monterey Bay Aquarium's guide to seafood stuck with a magnet to our refrigerator.  It would tickle me to learn that Young Jason is a member of the Aquarium.  It would tickle me even more to learn that he has adopted a sea otter, or a sea lion, or perhaps a cute bed of kelp with a winning smile.

Leon Panetta is presumably no longer adoptable, but it would indeed especially tickle me to know that he and Young Jason meet regularly for margaritas.

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.