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From: tdh@frog.UUCP (T. Dave Hudson)
Newsgroups: net.politics.theory
Subject: Re: Risk vs. Reward
Message-ID: <162@frog.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 13-Mar-85 18:51:10 EST
Article-I.D.: frog.162
Posted: Wed Mar 13 18:51:10 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 16-Mar-85 03:46:36 EST
References: <792@utcsri.UUCP> <1184@amdahl.UUCP> <458@ssc-vax.UUCP> <118@ubvax.UUCP>, <507@ssc-vax.UUCP>
Organization: Charles River Data Systems, Framingham MA
Lines: 18

Risk is neither a prerequisite nor a justification for profit.

Profit can be present without notable risk, given the correct inference
from consumers' desires to their behavior and an awareness of the lead
times required for competition to interfere.  With alacrity, high profits
are possible.  Without it, profits tend toward the prevailing market rate
of interest.  (Some consider this rate as an oportunity cost.)

It remains true, however, that you cannot have your cake and eat it too.
You cannot long have a system that denies the fruits of speculation but
requires the incentive of the acquisition of those fruits, of whatever
kind they may be, in order to continue to work.  You cannot have a system
of objective laws if subjective criteria are used within them.  You cannot
expect people to plan according to objective laws if the laws aren't.
You can't have the profits of one kind of planning if you've made that
planning impossible.

					David Hudson