Why I disagree with Libertarianism

There is, but it doesn't belong in this thread, which was created not to highlight both the virtues and deficits of libetarianism, but explicitly "why I disagree with libertarianism." You shouldn't expect to find middle ground in a venue that doesn't bill itself as pro and con, but rather solely as contrary. Identifying the useful applications of libertarian principles, in combination with the useful noncontradictory principles of other philosophical disciplines, simply belongs in a thread with a different stated purpose.

I'm sure there are some strong poponents of libertarianism here, and I count myself as one of them, but this thread isn't the place to advocate for it, unless I'm simply here to bicker and squabble. I'm not.

 

It does seem to me that if you are selling something as "food", it better not be "poison"- there is an implied warranty there. Ergo, in my mind, the government has a role to ensure food safety. Maybe Food Lion, which sells mainly food, could sell poison on aisle 6?

 

From a western intitutionalist perspective, it might seem that these societies operate without government. There is little by way of hierarchy and formal authority. But actually, they are highly regulated by communal norms and customs enforced by social pressure. It's questionable whether or not a large modern industrial or post-industrial society like the United States could be run like a nomadic hunter-gatherer society.

 

I for one am also for it being a government responsibility. Just offering a more reasonable alternative for those who say private organisations are instead the solution.

 

The idea of libertarianism works really well for the really wealthy and their families. For the rest of us not so well. The concentration of wealth in the US is an end result of decades of increasing libertarianism. Adam Smith’s “invisible hand” creates a race to the bottom for most of society.

 

granite, in an economic sense, at least, post Civil War America was as close to a libertarian society as a modern nation state has ever attained. We saw the greatest economic expansion in this history of humanity, drawing millions of people from other parts of the world to emigrate here. They came because word got home that yes, life would be hard- there was no sense of entitlement on their part, which was just as well because they would have found they were entitled to nothing- but America offered opportunity.

I suspect you overstate that concentration in your mind, but since you say what it is, it's a little hard to tell. But I think to the extent it has happened, and the effect is surely not zero, it is surely not the result of "libertarianisn", because we have had nothing approaching libertarian economics in the USA at least since the New Deal. You are making a completely erroneous, even a silly, connection.

Rather, an accommodating Fed coupled with state and federal governments that spend like a drunken sailors but don't want to pay the political price in terms of taxation, has triggered a massive increase in the price of various assets has been responsible for the accumulation of wealth we have witnessed. For example, those who had and kept stock in corporations back 2008 benefited enormously from zero interest rates and the attendant asset inflation. Various policies, from Dodd-Frank to affirmative action (particularly injurious is that part that attempts to enforce "equal outcome") have favored existing wealth at the expense of new wealth, which is what laissez-faire capitalism promotes.

Need I point out that neither Dodd-Frank nor affirmative action are consistent with libertarian principles? We'd have been better off in the long run by letting the big banks fail in 2008 while letting the owners, and (gasp) even their depositors suffer the consequences of the Great Recession. Recovery would have been slower, perhaps, but it would have been more sustainable. The next financial crisis, when it comes, will be a doozy, and it will not be the result of "libertarianism".

I am sure you would not read it, but John Allison's book "The Financial Crisis and the Free Market Cure" brilliantly describes the pernicious effects of government policies such as those that basically forced banks to make foolish mortgage loans, and gotten the USA into a financial message that with haunt us for a long time. Allision, by the way, was CEO of BB&T bank when the most recent major financial crisis hit the United States.

Please understand something of how libertarian principles apply become you express ill-formed opinions. You could do worse than to start by reading the excellent web site devoted to Austrian economics, Mises Institute | Mises Institute.

 

Regulation by communal norms and customs is entirely consistent with libertarian principles. While I find much lacking in the ideas of late writer Ayn Rand, the best line in her magnus opus, "Atlas Shrugged", was something to the effect of, "Miss Taggart, we don't have laws here, but we do have certain customs".

I agree, a complex "post-industrial" society could not function without a formal legal structure. That structure should, however, be kept to a necessary minimum, as opposed to the Leviathan state we have today.

 

In 1974, I became a professional economist and started tracking income and employment statistics and the concentration of income in the U S, as expressed by the gini coefficient, there was little annual change until post 1980 data showed an abrupt change from the past several decades. What political event happened in 1980? Since then it has been impossible to undo all the damage caused by that election. As for the post civil war expansion, it was accomplished on the backs of children and working people. My relatives worked 10 to 12 hour days and were missing digits from pre-OSHA sawmill equipment. So far neither capitalism nor communism has given a shinning example of economic development without exploitation.
Economist almost unanimously agree there really is a time preference for money and keeping interest rates low by political pressure(Bush, Trump, and RR) really mortgages the future. Bush ran the US economy into the ground and the “R” response...What do you want us to do now?
Spending has not been the issue, cutting revenue by eliminating taxes for wealthy Americans is. A large part of the increase in Federal spending can be traced to the baby boomers and a bulge in SS and Medicare. We knew this was coming and didn’t set aside revenues accordingly. RR tapped the SS excess revenues and washed it into the general budget. Now what? By the way others such as Norway did set money aside.
Perhaps you don’t remember but I do....great grandparents living with the paltry beginnings of SS and no Medicare. Poverty is not pretty.
I watched parents and relatives die of lung cancer while tobacco families accumulated wealth, friends die from opioids while big pharma executives parked money off-shore, fossil fuel companies thumb their noses at science and dump huge amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere....we know the outcome of that. I remember the widespread use of DDT, 245-T and asbestos. I worked with these in college jobs and worry every time I go to the MD.
There really is a community interest that transcends money; Clean air water, and a healthy environment belong to all of us, not just Trump and his donors.

 

Well yes it was "accomplished on the backs of children and working people." Technology and capital creation was far less back then than it is today. It was still the shining example for the world. It is just wrong to focus only on what the shortcomings of the day were compared to our vastly wealthier society today. I too am grateful for that the time when, I understand, the steel mills of America developed by that benefactor of humanity, Andrew Carnegie, pulled a dead man a day out of the mills in western PA (WV?).

While I am not poor today, I very much grew up that way, at least by American standards. And that was a huge improvement over poverty standards of my native Philippines.

But let us focus a moment on what we agree on. I too am very concerned about environmental degradation, and grieve over the impoverished earth we bequeath to our grandchildren. Libertarian philosophy, with its theory of strict liability, is one way to address the harms done by commercial activity. I admit, I'm not so sure that it suffices in a complex society. I do think the laws of WV, that allow fracking to go forward and only then, after damage has been done, allows those harmed by it to collect damages is not a general model for our world.

I'm glad you recognize that communism is not exactly a shinning example of economic development without exploitation. In fact, it has totally lacked accountability or liability- ask the people of Khazakstan. But you seem overly anxious to blame laissez-faire capitalism for the ills of the world, whereas in reality, it has been the greatest engine for wealth the world has ever seen. It is based on a theory of mutually beneficial and voluntary exchange. No other system applicable to a society larger than the tribe can make that claim.

RR made a Faustian bargain with Congress. Although he wanted to reign in the federal government, Congress agreed to fund his military expansion- one of two things that contributed mightily to the fall of the Soviet Union (the other being a collapse in the price of oil) only if he didn't try to drastically reduce the federal government.

As for Social Security- which I expect to benefit from fairly soon- it was a unsustainable almost from the getgo. The government lied. Moreover, it is very wrong for my generation to expect- no demand- that our children's and grandchildren's future must be mortgaged to finance our "golden years".

 

What would you put in its place?Nothing? Then let's hope you have the decency to turn it down when it comes your way "fairly soon".

 

And why should I "turn it down"? My husband's and my various employers have been coerced at gun point, I would say, to "contribute" to this Ponzi scheme. We would certainly be richer today had we not been so coerced.

Since you are such a rude jerk, I will not respond to your supposedly reasonable question about what to replace it with.

 

Cuz you can't think of anything. Enjoy your Ponzi winnings!

 

Problem is government attracts the most greedy selfish and evil people in society and gives them power over the rest of us.

Look at the massive protests on TV this week and how government largely ignores them.

 

Politics attracts the greedy when it becomes a career instead of the civic duty as was intended

 

All I know is we need more libertarians to balance things out.

All this protest on tv a direct result of government run amok bullying too many people.

 

And I think your comment shows no understanding of what libertarianism is all about. Being greedy is not a problem- you are free to be as greedy as you like. It's a matter of how you acquire wealth. In a libertarian society, you are free to do what you want as long as you do not infringe on the rights of others. You show no understanding of that concept.

 

I suggest you demonstrate no understanding of the origins of wealth. Free minds and free markets work well for the vast majority of people.

The increasing disparity in wealth in this country over the past generation or so has more to do with our fiat money system, based on the good faith and credit of Uncle Sam, than it does with the dynamics of liberty. The Fed has created a system in which those who hold certain assets- such as equity in corporations- have benefited enormously. Those who saved money were screwed.

Read www.mises.org - better yet, read von Mises and Rothbard.

 

This kind of logic is like saying if a glass of beer is good in the evening, 2.8 gallons at one sitting would be better. The real cause of income disparity in the US is that we have allowed money without limits in our political system and the economic system now favors the wealthy...surprise, surprise. Unions used to be a countervailing force but no longer. We need economic rules and laws every bit as much as we need rules of the road for your morning trip to the store.

 

Your claims are unsupported by any facts or analysis. I would point out that if government did not have the power to take your wealth, there would be far less incentive for people to try to "buy" politicians. Unfortunately (the Clintons in my mind are the poster children for this) politics- what used to be called public service- is not a means to accumulate wealth.

Of course we need rules of behavior- you are trumpeting a truism as though it were some keen insight. Capitalism cannot flourish in a regime of thuggery. But the rules should favor the creation of wealth, not its existence. High tax regimes favor existing wealth at the expense of the entrepreneur. The rules should be oriented toward the idea that my freedom to move my first ends where your nose begins, and little else. And, of course, vice versa.

 

Agreed, and the solution is publicly funded elections. That's one of the reasons I was supporting Bernie Sanders; he was a strong advocate for publicly funded elections. We need politicians to represent the general population -- not just big money donors.