Minister denies market monopolies

Competition is a basic tenet of having an efficient free market economy.All red tape should be eliminated so that Serbs can engage in entreprenurial endeavors in all fields for this will be of the utmost benefit to the consumer in the long run.

Michael your assumption about me not living in Serbia is correct but your negative assessments of basic economic principles need reflection.Books are the clue as to which civilizations have progressed the most since the time of the caveman.Try reading some once in a while and I suggest you do not answer me directly because frankly you would probably be a student at the bottom rung of my economic classes.Maybe you consider your economic training at the Groucho Marx School of Economics sufficient credibility to engage in economic dissertations but I assure you that they do not work in any country which has developed into a first world class economy.

That is odd the street sellers of CD's have returned to their old places in Belgrade in the last year or so so I'm not sure where these 'results' are coming from.

Its not for the minister to decide either whether there are monopolies in Serbia or not. That will be the job of the monopolies commission although obviously his statement is applying pressure to that committee. I wonder if this has anything to do with Monopolist Miskovic's campaign contributions to DSS. Surely nobody would be that obvious.

And as for the 100 days in government. Can these guys count? Havent we been marking 100 days in government for weeks now?

There was a good cartoon by Corax I saw yesterday - in one half of the picture Kostunica was shaking hands with a book tucked under his arm labled '100 days'. The person he was shaking hands with in the other half of the picture was his own reflection.

Better that the government gets on with actually doing something rather than trying to pat itself on the back.

bganon, you represent the part of Serbia that I cannot comprehend: all the people I know in Belgrade are somewhat like yourself (in that they are obviously educated and they think critically to the point where they can actually acknowledge that most of the issues here are fairly complicated and without an obvious solution), but it appears that very few who work in the media here are like that and that basically none of the people who operate in the sphere of politics are like that. Is it fair to suggest that the obvious negatives of joining any political party in this country (all of which basically boil down to the fact that when the power ultimately shifts you will be out of a job irrespective of your ability) outweigh, in the minds of those with significant intelligence and ability, the chance to alter this country for the better?

For Bubalo to suggest that, as this article reports, that there are no dominant monopolies in this country is plainly ridiculous. Perhaps it is because not so many people here pay for purchases with credit cards that he can hide the fact that a certain company beginning with the letter D appears on my own credit statement next to practically every single purchase that I make.

Finally, on the issue of the 100 days of governance, my question would be what of the first 90 days after the election of non-governance - and even more pertinently, what of the past 30?

Tough question. I have never joined any political party and dont have that partisan (communistic) habit of supporting one (or two) parties and sticking to them forever. In a democracy that is a trait I find mindless and very sad indeed.

Look at Bubalo for example or Aleskander Popovic, two of the best DSS ministers but both were ‘politically’ abused, the former in the monopoly question and the latter involved in anti NATO rhetoric. Privately both men would probably admit they do this through gritted teath.
Look again at the Tomislav Nikolic in parliament fiasco. One day the entire caucus of DSS are told to vote for him the next they go with the Democratic Party. Can you imagine these politicians are of high principle? Not that other parties are much better but DSS have really made a habit of shaming themselves publicly in recent months. And for my money all those that ignore this and still claim they are the best thing since sliced bread, well they are either easy to manipulate, plain stupid or both.
The same could be said of DS supporters who showed stupid, dumb loyalty to their party whilst Neda Arneric was getting a suntan in Bodrum and somebody else was using her voting card in parliament.
The lesson in democracy it seems to me, is that all of us have a responsibility to change parties when the party we sympathise with is behaving badly. That is a lesson that seems lost on some people in the Balkans.
In answer to your last point, my sentiments exactly. Whilst politicians have been enjoying themselves on holiday or were arguing who gets what after the Nikolic flirtation charade, the rest of us were waiting as usual. It seems we in Serbia eternally wait for one thing or another – either the Russian fleet to arrive, for Mladic to be located, to join the European Union etc. And there is always somebody who witlessly does the politicians job for them and justifies the delays.

luciano, I suspect that you don't actually reside in Serbia, because if you did you'd soon realise that the first two assumptions in the book you're quoting from (let's call it Economics 101) - that consumers are rational, and that producers operate first and foremost with respect to profit maximisation - don't apply here. In fact, I would say they actually don't apply anywhere. Except in your book, of course.

If you are trying to tell me that you teach economics and that the specifics of economic text books apply in reality then that proves that academia is well removed from reality. You will encounter no argument from me regarding the fundamentals of economic rationalism; my question, however, is how well do you think these fundamentals apply when systematic corruption renders invalid the first two basic assumptions at the beginning of every single economics text book?

That is odd the street sellers of CD's have returned to their old places in Belgrade in the last year or so so I'm not sure where these 'results' are coming from.

Its not for the minister to decide either whether there are monopolies in Serbia or not. That will be the job of the monopolies commission although obviously his statement is applying pressure to that committee. I wonder if this has anything to do with Monopolist Miskovic's campaign contributions to DSS. Surely nobody would be that obvious.

And as for the 100 days in government. Can these guys count? Havent we been marking 100 days in government for weeks now?

There was a good cartoon by Corax I saw yesterday - in one half of the picture Kostunica was shaking hands with a book tucked under his arm labled '100 days'. The person he was shaking hands with in the other half of the picture was his own reflection.

Better that the government gets on with actually doing something rather than trying to pat itself on the back.

bganon, you represent the part of Serbia that I cannot comprehend: all the people I know in Belgrade are somewhat like yourself (in that they are obviously educated and they think critically to the point where they can actually acknowledge that most of the issues here are fairly complicated and without an obvious solution), but it appears that very few who work in the media here are like that and that basically none of the people who operate in the sphere of politics are like that. Is it fair to suggest that the obvious negatives of joining any political party in this country (all of which basically boil down to the fact that when the power ultimately shifts you will be out of a job irrespective of your ability) outweigh, in the minds of those with significant intelligence and ability, the chance to alter this country for the better?

For Bubalo to suggest that, as this article reports, that there are no dominant monopolies in this country is plainly ridiculous. Perhaps it is because not so many people here pay for purchases with credit cards that he can hide the fact that a certain company beginning with the letter D appears on my own credit statement next to practically every single purchase that I make.

Finally, on the issue of the 100 days of governance, my question would be what of the first 90 days after the election of non-governance - and even more pertinently, what of the past 30?

Competition is a basic tenet of having an efficient free market economy.All red tape should be eliminated so that Serbs can engage in entreprenurial endeavors in all fields for this will be of the utmost benefit to the consumer in the long run.

Tough question. I have never joined any political party and dont have that partisan (communistic) habit of supporting one (or two) parties and sticking to them forever. In a democracy that is a trait I find mindless and very sad indeed.

Look at Bubalo for example or Aleskander Popovic, two of the best DSS ministers but both were ‘politically’ abused, the former in the monopoly question and the latter involved in anti NATO rhetoric. Privately both men would probably admit they do this through gritted teath.
Look again at the Tomislav Nikolic in parliament fiasco. One day the entire caucus of DSS are told to vote for him the next they go with the Democratic Party. Can you imagine these politicians are of high principle? Not that other parties are much better but DSS have really made a habit of shaming themselves publicly in recent months. And for my money all those that ignore this and still claim they are the best thing since sliced bread, well they are either easy to manipulate, plain stupid or both.
The same could be said of DS supporters who showed stupid, dumb loyalty to their party whilst Neda Arneric was getting a suntan in Bodrum and somebody else was using her voting card in parliament.
The lesson in democracy it seems to me, is that all of us have a responsibility to change parties when the party we sympathise with is behaving badly. That is a lesson that seems lost on some people in the Balkans.
In answer to your last point, my sentiments exactly. Whilst politicians have been enjoying themselves on holiday or were arguing who gets what after the Nikolic flirtation charade, the rest of us were waiting as usual. It seems we in Serbia eternally wait for one thing or another – either the Russian fleet to arrive, for Mladic to be located, to join the European Union etc. And there is always somebody who witlessly does the politicians job for them and justifies the delays.

luciano, I suspect that you don't actually reside in Serbia, because if you did you'd soon realise that the first two assumptions in the book you're quoting from (let's call it Economics 101) - that consumers are rational, and that producers operate first and foremost with respect to profit maximisation - don't apply here. In fact, I would say they actually don't apply anywhere. Except in your book, of course.

Michael your assumption about me not living in Serbia is correct but your negative assessments of basic economic principles need reflection.Books are the clue as to which civilizations have progressed the most since the time of the caveman.Try reading some once in a while and I suggest you do not answer me directly because frankly you would probably be a student at the bottom rung of my economic classes.Maybe you consider your economic training at the Groucho Marx School of Economics sufficient credibility to engage in economic dissertations but I assure you that they do not work in any country which has developed into a first world class economy.

If you are trying to tell me that you teach economics and that the specifics of economic text books apply in reality then that proves that academia is well removed from reality. You will encounter no argument from me regarding the fundamentals of economic rationalism; my question, however, is how well do you think these fundamentals apply when systematic corruption renders invalid the first two basic assumptions at the beginning of every single economics text book?