Meanwhile passengers waiting to
board the train on the platform had to wait, all whom would have been
people who'd arrived by U-Bahn or S-Bahn from West Berlin.

Not quite . When I was there in 1989 pensioners were allowed to exit the
Socialist Utopia in the street outside and there were a lot of Poles coming
through the checkpoint below (and checkpoint charlie too - (for Luko's
benefit that's the Uberganstelle Friedrichstrasse/Zimmerstrasse) . I think
the Poiish Government must have told the DDR to let them pass.

There was a ticket office at Friedrichstrasse station which sold tickets to
the West - in DM naturally, and you could by a ticket for 2,90M at East
Berlin S Bahn stations to Berlin-West.




--

Am 04.01.2012 00:05, schrieb ian batten:
Much of that is down to changes in the technology; e.g. international
telephone calls are not cheaper due to a change in ownership.
Actually, international telephone calls are a prime example of
something that really_is_ cheaper when state monopoly telecos are
broken up or otherwise lose their monopoly.

Why then do international phone companies like Vodafone, T-Mobile or
Orange charge huge amounts for calls from one of their national networks
to another of their national networks?

Why had the European Commission to intervene against the market
forces to drive down the roaming charges and charges for international
calls?

(I had found out, to my surprise, that an SMS from Paris to Germany
did cost me less than an SMS from Germany to Germany! Thanks to the
intervention of the European Commission ordering lower international
tariffs).


Cheers,
L.W.

Am 04.01.2012 10:14, schrieb Roland Perry:
Most of the fall in costs has been due to competition, and facilitated
by new technology. Where there's no competition, the new technology is
still expensive.

Nonsense.

"Lüko Willms" wrote in message

Am 03.01.2012 18:56, schrieb Graham Nye:

Why would Recliner want to deny writing that?

I don't care for the motives, only for the facts: he did deny it.

It's an entirely reasonable thing to have written in its context,
which was discussion of a state-owned railway company.

I have the opposite opinion thinking that it is absolutely
ridiculous. As you might have noted.

It is you who has sought to move the goal posts by introducing
discussion of one-person owned businesses,

No, that was again this Mr. Recliner (or who ever) who claimed that
once there is only one owner of a company, that turns this company
into a monopoly which is to be fought.

Lüko, I know that English is not your native tongue, so perhaps you're
confused by the English language terms "ownership" and "monopoly". The
ownership of a company has nothing to do with whether it's a monopoly.
So, the fact that a single shareholder owns a company doesn't make it a
monopoly, and the fact that it has many shareholders doesn't mean it's
not a monopoly. What makes it a monopoly is when there is a lack of
competition.

So, DB is clearly a German nationalised company wherever it operates,
but that does not, of itself make it a monopoly. Arguably, it has
something close to a monopoly in Germany, but not when it operates in
the UK or France. In the same way, DOR (the operator of the EC
franchise) and DRS are UK state-owned companies, but neither is a
monopoly.

In strongly socialist countries, the two usually go together, as the
state does not permit others to compete with companies it owns, whereas
in properly regulated capitalist countries, the state tries to prevent
monopolies from forming by preventing market leaders (however many
shareholders they may have) from buying up all the competition. If they
are able to get away with doing that, they tend to become less
efficient, charging more and delivering less than if they had to fear
competitors. That's what happens when you have crony capitalism.

Now please will you answer my question about workers' rights in north
and south Korea? When the Kim dynasty eventually collapses, do you
think the workers in north Korea will complain at being offered the same
workers' rights as those in the south?

Am 04.01.2012 11:25, schrieb ian batten:
On Jan 4, 10:17 am, Lüko wrote:
Am 03.01.2012 20:18, schrieb ian batten:

his usual lies:

and insisting on lying!

if the people were as happy to in the DDR as Luko says,

this name looks similar to mine, so I demand that you quote such a
statement, or you retract it publicly with a word of regret.

From this very thread:

" But I can't let you blur the actual issue we are discussing he
the
railway workers in Berlin, whose social conquests of the past 6 decades
could not be destroyed by the FRG taking over the GDR, what Herr Schnell
now wants to accomplish by dissolving the current S-Bahn Berlin GmbH and
making all their workers jobless. "

The railway worked made social conquests over six decades, which were
destroyed by re-unification. Why would they worry about that, unless
they were happy?

You have to discuss this issue not with me. I only point to what Herr
Schnell is always writing. Take issue with him, not me. I make no claims
about the situation of the Berlin railway workers, Herr Schnell does.
And I report what he says. So discuss the issue with Herr Schnell and
not with me.

It is Herr Schnell who calls the S-Bahn Berlin GmbH the "last
socialistic [sic] company", and which has to be destroyed for that for
regular capitalist conditions to be forced on those pesky workers, not me.


Cheers,
L.W.

"Lüko Willms" wrote in message

Am 03.01.2012 22:42, schrieb Arthur Figgis:
Do you also care about the color of the skin of the shareholdes,
their religion, their sexual orientation, their preferred sports?

The religious views of a shareholder in one UK-based transport group
attracted some public interest in the not too distant past.

Tell me more. I don't anything about this.

I suggest you read up on Sir Brian Souter.

Am 04.01.2012 12:02, schrieb Paul Rigg:
There was a ticket office at Friedrichstrasse station which sold tickets
to the West - in DM naturally, and you could by a ticket for 2,90M at
East Berlin S Bahn stations to Berlin-West.

I am quite sure that Friedrichstraße was the only East Berlin S-Bahn
station where one could buy S-Bahn tickets towards West Berlin in DM.
And only in the "non-socialist currency" area, i.e. the area which acted
as an exchange station for intra West Berlin traffic.


Cheers,
L.W.

Am 04.01.2012 11:20, schrieb ian batten:
On Jan 4, 9:50 am, Lüko wrote:
Am 03.01.2012 18:57, schrieb ian batten:

As Lenin already said: it is very difficult to find a honest opponent
in the debate.
He also said "Hang (hang without fail, so the people see) no fewer
than one hundred known kulaks, rich men, bloodsuckers."

When and where?

11 August 1918. For the full text of the telegram, see http://goo.gl/XOzhq
or http://goo.gl/lTyYP. The full text is, if anything, worse.

Give correct URLs, please.

"It is necessary — secretly and urgently to prepare the terror. And on
Tuesday we will decide whether it will be through SNK or otherwise."


30 August 1918. See The Mitrokhin Archive: The KGB in Europe and the
West (1999) Christopher Andrew and Vasili Mitrokhin, p. 34.

Secondary source. Do you not have something more reliable?

You're not very good at this "refutation" business, are you?

Sure. I do not want to interfere with your business model.

Demanding sources isn't wise when the sources are so easily to hand.

Well, when you throw something in the air, I can't search for it in
the dozens of printed volumes.


L.W.

"Lüko Willms" wrote in message

Am 03.01.2012 23:25, schrieb Charles Ellson:
Anyway, phone services in
the UK are far, far better and far, far cheaper than when the
Post Office had a monopoly.

Much of that is down to changes in the technology; e.g. international
telephone calls are not cheaper due to a change in ownership.

I dare say that _all_ of the price drops was due to a change in
technology (computerization of switches, optical fibers, better
channel division). There are not price drops any more, even though the
competition got stiffer, because there is no more such a leap in
technology.

Both domestic and international calls from the UK are now more or less
free, but only if you use carriers other than BT. If those companies
were not allowed to function, the price drops would not have happened.
BT was compelled to allow such calls to be dialled from BT lines; it
certainly wouldn't have done so voluntarily. So, yes, it was enforced
competition, and not just technology that have made phone calls much
cheaper in the UK than they would have been had BT retained its
monopoly. For one thing, if it still had its monopoly, it would have
been slower to invest in those new technologies.

On Jan 4, 11:19*am, Lüko Willms wrote:


* *You have to discuss this issue not with me. I only point to what Herr
Schnell is always writing. Take issue with him, not me. I make no claims
about the situation of the Berlin railway workers, Herr Schnell does.
And I report what he says. So discuss the issue with Herr Schnell and
not with me.

I'm starting to remember why it's a waste of time arguing with
tankies. Their basic premise --- that the Sovbloc 1945--1989 was a
workers' paradise --- is so obviously deranged that they can't be seen
to say so in terms, and indeed start calling people "liars" (while
demanding apologies when called on it) when it's pointed out that
their arguments lead, inevitably, to that position. But because they
believe it in their heart of hearts they get all upset when counter-
examples are quoted. Which is why under all the bluster, they can't
answer "Yes" or "No" to simple questions like "Were workers in the DDR
in 1980 happy with their lot, and if so why did it req