You'll be laughed off by any economist if you argue that that increasing competition and low barriers to entry leads to disastrous consequences. Why is a free market good if there's no competition? Why not have everything planned by the state instead?
It’s not that there is no competition, it’s that there is artificially increased amounts of competition due to government intervention. Who do you think is more likely to take make more risky investments? Someone who has to use their own money to make decisions or someone being funded by the government to make a certain investment? This is a classic example of how government programs can change incentive structures (which the government wanted in this case), but may not have been the most rational decision if you had to put your money on the line.
As a matter of fact, "reducing competition" and "increasing barriers to entry" is the go-to argument for any libertarian when complaining about state intervention. The Cato Institute flipped the switch this time since they couldn't find anything else to blame the government for
Using state intervention to try to “increase market competition” is actually a point Libertarians say is something that almost never works. They even criticize many classic economics examples of government intervention to increase free market competition.
A famous example libertarians use is this: if a large corporation makes you pay more than another company they say you will be accused of monopolistic pricing. If you charge less than the local shop you will be accused of predatory pricing and trying to run the other company out of business. If you charge the same, they will accuse you of colluding with that other company.
So what libertarians do support is everyone going about their business and no one getting special privileges and funding from the government.
This isn't comparable at all. It's more like the government building more homes, since supply is being increased and not demand.
I also don't agree with you, though debating the government's role in the subprime mortgage crisis is its own can of worms.
Even if we assume the government was responsible for incentivizing subprime lending, this situation still isn't comparable because the crisis was caused by investment in a special type of asset known as the mortgage-backed security which were backed by loans given to people who wouldn't be able to pay them back, and not the people being able to pay them back per se. This is a financial issue, not an economic one.
It is the same in one sense because the government is funding people who would otherwise not be able to afford to get their foot in the door, just like paying corporations who would not be able to make such a financial decision as investing into the telecom stuff as they did otherwise. Both of these were meant by the government to have a positive benefit to society, but they both had unintended consequences.
Also, most people get mad when the government spends our tax money to give corporations and make them even richer. However, this the funding was probably actually a from the Keynesian idea of supporting certain industries to stimulate growth rather than increasing market competition. But most people just see the situation similar to how many Libertarians do, as just blatant corruption.
That isn't what barriers to entry is. Barriers to entry is anything that prevents new entrants (companies) into the market. For nearly every situation, lower barriers to entry is a necessity for productive and allocative efficiency. You'd have to start arguing against the very fundamentals of all economic thought if you don't think this is true.
The idea was that the cost of getting a mortgage prevents many people from getting housing because it won’t be paid off by people who don’t make enough. This is a barrier to entry into the housing market.
Hell no as in they aren't respectable. Go look at any of their articles: they will always conclude, in every single one of them, that the free-market capitalist solution is the correct approach. This is because they're funded by private multinational conglomerates so they can influence policymakers. They don't do this work for fun; they are affiliated with no university.
They are respected among many economists, and there are many economic schools that do support free-market capitalist solutions to most things.
Even according to mediabiasfactcheck, they report its factual rating at high.
https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/cato-institute/. Although the site says it is slightly right wing bised because the site weighs economic policies more than social policies when making their rating.
Of course that's their argument. It's the anarcho-capitalist argument for everything the government does. They will never admit to any sort of inefficiency within free markets.
They are not anarcho-capitalists. But libertarians don’t think everything in a free market is perfect, hence why they believe a government should exist. I don’t know whether they are right on this issue and it just feels wrong because it emotionally impacts me, but I have no actual knowledge on the subject so can’t comment. Is what they’re saying actually wrong?
The idea that we should eradicate a basic labor regulation and instead have children wait for the benevolence of the private sector first is a radical viewpoint...
Did you not read the article I sent? They already addressed this point, that if the amount of money without the children can’t sustain the lives of the family, then the kids will end up working illegally and often in even more dangerous jobs. As I said, I’m not sure if they’re right and unless you have done a lot of research into this subject, neither are you. I just don’t have the knowledge to be able to argue one way or another.
Their ""research"" is still slanted to support the neoliberal agenda. Of course no one would take them seriously if they refused to give any methodology for their conclusions.
From what I know, libertarians only agree with neoliberals on the idea of free markets generally lead to increased efficiency and prosperity, but on most other things they diverge in many ways (especially social issues and other economic issues).