If trading at a speed faster than some arbitrary limit you just made up is such a bad thing, why don't you start an exchange that operates under these conditions? Seems like a definite win to me. "Individual investors" would apparently find your market model more lucrative and flock to your solution. More money for you, more money for "individual investors" and less money to HFTs. Seems like a huge win for society.

So why don't you start such an exchange? This question isn't rethorical. There are literally hundreds of exchanges/trading facilities being started every year all over the world. Have you stopped to consider for even one second why almost none of them were operated along your ideas, and why every single one of those that were failed miserably? Could it, just possibly, be that you don't quite understand how HFT works and exactly who they are extracting money from?

You could argue that "the free market gave a dumb corporation a 400 million dollar bitch slap in less than a hour" is funny, but actually it,s insightful. It's the perfect example of how companies could and should be punished for doing stupid things.

And here's an even better example: the flash crash of three years ago. In a few minutes some algorithms went haywire and stock prices dropped dramatically, in some cases down to 1 cent. Clearly that was wrong. The free market fixed this issue in six minutes. That's pretty fast, if you ask me. The government is still, three years later, thinking about what to do about it. Really!?

It is factually incorrect to say that taxes in Sweden are 30%. They are way over 50% for everyone, and the marginal rate is way over 70%. This is partially hidden in "employer fees", so you can't see them on your pay slip. However, they are obviously paid for by the employee in the end, in exactly the same way that VAT is ultimately paid by the consumer, not the retailer, even though the retailer is the one transferring the money to the state.

We do pay more for services in Sweden, but it is true that when tuitions and health insurance are included the difference shrinks.

That's such a wonderful idea. I bet it would work in other places as well. In fact, I bet it works in most places. It clearly deserves a name. I will henceforth refer to this concept as a "tekram". But I may have it backwards.

After about 300 years. No, not a joke, unfortunately.

Could it just possibly be a combination, i.e. higher taxes and better knowledge about the ill effects both contribute to decreasing smoking? On the one hand you seem to argue that the idea that people are sheep who couldn't survive without government is nonsense, but on the other hand you also seem to argue that price doesn't affect demand. This does not strike me as a coherent world view.

True. But unless you are an anarchist, you will probably agree that there are cases where it's preferable to have a democratic government pointing the gun at you, compared to some random criminal or, worse, a king (i.e. a criminal with high standing in society.) This isn't an argument for big government, but it is an argument for some government.

That day happened a long, long time ago. That's why it's important that government is small. But given some form of government and some forms of taxes, we should strive to tax stuff that has negative externalities, not stuff that has positive externalities. Coming back to the subject at hand, energy use has negative externalities and should be taxed. Light bulbs have no or very minor negative externalities, and shouldn't be taxed except to the extent that they use energy.

You're right, that was sloppy wording on my part. What I should have written is that we should tax things that have proven negative externalities. Alcohol, tobacco and energy clearly fall into that category. Bibles and tofu, as much as I hate both of them, don't. The judgement should be based on science, not on morals.

See, the point isn't to ban it outright. That was tried, you know. Failed pretty miserably. The point is that given that we must tax some things in order to have a society, we should prefer to tax stuff we want less of, as opposed to stuff we want more of.

What do you think we should tax more and less, compared to today? (Let's not discuss the overall level of taxation, though. That's a separate matter.)

No, only if you're not an anarchist. If you are not, you agree that there must be some taxes. And given that there should be some taxes, it should be on stuff we want less of, not on stuff we want more of.

What is your view on what should be taxed?

Yes, because price controls always work. No unintended consequences ever. No, sir, never happened.

No, the same should be true for "energy use", not "incandescent light bulbs". It's energy we should tax, not one particular thing that consumes energy but has other positive effects that the replacements don't have. (And, for the nitpickers, energy should be taxed high enough to regulate behaviour, but not "into oblivion", obviously.)

Taxes should indeed be used to modify behavior. High taxes on energy, tobacco and alcohol makes perfect sense. High taxes on labor makes no sense. In this case, taxing energy should be enough to make cheaper sources of light preferrable for consumers.