How is “either agree to BA or don’t get your house fixed” really a “free market”?

Yes, because the contractors hav frely decided that doing business without an MBA is financial suicide, so they freely refuse.

The free market is very, very easy to understand: both parties can walk away if they can’t get terms they want. BOTH parties.

It is no more irrelevant than the rest of the EULA. Until I click on “AGREED,” I still have the freedom to choose other softwares that do the same thing. Furthermore, as Open Source Software agreements do not have such clauses, I have other choices before I purchase the software.

I’m all for the invisible hand, but a lot of people seem to be forgetting that *information balance* is a pre-requisite for the free market.

Absolutely. That is why every software vendor I know will supply you with a copy of the EULA before you purchase the software.

If every contractor has an arbitration clause, then did Patricia Dicorte really have a choice?

And if pigs could fly, would they need a pilot’s license? The fact of the matter is that not all contractors have MBA’s within their contracts. To pre-suppose that they do takes the discussion out of reality and into the realm of the hypothetical.

A lot of us feel the same way about court cases, when the subpoena server comes a-calling. It’s a damn shame to pay the lawyer’s overhead, in those few cases when we can work things out like gentlemen. Or get an arbitrator to decide, quickly and cheaply, that the person bringing the case is doing it solely for aggravation value. It can costs thousands of dollars in time and money, and you are required to pony up under penalty of law.

And you find that less coercive than a mandatory arbitration agreement?

I think you’re missing Nate’s point. If you’ve already paid for the software without agreeing to an Arbitration Clause, then the existence of alternatives is irrelevant.

I’m all for the invisible hand, but a lot of people seem to be forgetting that *information balance* is a pre-requisite for the free market.

Getting back to the original post, I still have the question: If every contractor has an arbitration clause, then did Patricia Dicorte really have a choice?

How is “either agree to BA or don’t get your house fixed” really a “free market”?

In such a case, government intervention to protect consumers is not such a bad idea.

You mean that there are no other alternatives for the software you have purchased? That’s ridiculous and you are making the point for people. Don’t like Windows? Use Linux. Don’t like Photoshop? Use GIMP. Don’t like Office? Use Open Office.

There are always alternatives. If you don’t want to use those alternatives, that is on you – not the supplier of the product or service.

Gee, and who do I call so I can buy a Whataburger at KFC? If you don’t like the deal, go somewhere else.

To answer Ted’s last question, if Merriam Webster-coercion is sometimes good and sometimes bad, and and MBA clause is Merriam Webster-coercive, then we care because it is possibly bad. That seems self-evident to me. We need to determine whether the given level of coercion has risen to a point that is unacceptable, as opposed to blithely saying that it “not coercive” to offer my way or the highway.

Words mean things, so your persistent use of “coercion” to mean something other than “coercion” (which is sometimes good and sometimes bad) leads me to agree with Joe that you’re trolling. If Nate-coercion is sometimes good, who cares if an MBA clause is Nate-coercive? You still haven’t coherently defined your objections.