Day Old Donuts

Being a libertarian or an anarchist allows you to see the world in a different light. It’s no surprise either. By proclaiming or accepting the title of either you are essentially shunning the political norms of society in favor of an explicitly anti-authoritarian perspective. But this new perspective need not be limited to issues specifically relating to politics. The libertarian view of the world can be used to explain how the world works - and how it doesn’t. And unlike other political-ethical philosophies, libertarianism can explain the world in the most simple situations. And it’s those simple situations that allow us to extrapolate facts about the amazingly complex world around us.

Take for instance the business activities of donut shops. Donut shops, at least from my experience, are generally locally owned small businesses. I’ve never heard of a donut shop subsidy, and, though virtually every business receives a subsidy in someway (even if it turns out to be a net loss after taxation), small businesses such as donut shops operate within a fairly level playing field - definitely not a free market with all the business licensing and taxation and whatnot, but definitely not an impenetrable market either.

Commonly, these donut shops will sell donuts that were made the day before at a discount. But this shouldn’t make any sense to the free market naysayers. They have proposed that the power of the State must be used to prevent businesses from acting malevolently toward customers. If they can get away with it, why would any business sell a product at a discount when they could easily sell it at full price? By definition, we can loosely categorize the behavior of all market participants as some combination of moral, amoral (rational), or immoral.

Libertarian Bugaboos

Just as a matter of practicality, anyone advocating anything in a holistic fashion, such as libertarianism, needs to keep things in their proper perspective. Being that libertarians are supposed to be concerned with maximizing liberty, it would seem proper that libertarians focus most of their attention on the things that most infringe on liberty. But many libertarians, in aligning with conservatives, have chosen some ambiguous issues on which to spend their efforts. Arguably, the two worst things for libertarians to be focusing their time on are ending welfare for the poor and steep progressive taxation on the rich.

This needs to be prefaced by saying that I want both welfare for the poor and all taxation, progressive or otherwise, to be abolished as soon as possible. Welfare is detrimental to those it is claimed to help by making those on it dependent on the State. The worst effect of which is to ensure that they actually support the State politically and with little question. The poor are given the impression through welfare programs, that without the State, they would die, which is simply not the case. Most libertarians know that the poor would be much better off in the free market.

Similarly, taxation, in its many forms (including inflation), is the blood of the State. Without being able to tax, the State would be unable to function. Progressive taxation penalizes those who have the greatest income, those who are ostensibly the most productive, to a greater degree than others.

Ending “The War on Kids”

Earlier this week, I discussed “The War on Kids” and gave my take on each of the subtopics therein. But I didn’t really propose any solutions or even identify the root problems. And given that understanding the root is the first step in solving the problem (and because a friend of mine with an equal, maybe greater, hatred of schooling specifically asked me), I’ll share my take on that as well.

There are two groups that dominate mainstream thought: conservatives and utopian liberals. Conservatives are either fearful or powerful. Those who are fearful don’t like outsiders because they are unfamiliar with the outside; they don’t like dynamic social institutions because dynamic social institution pose a risk of promoting immoral activity; they prefer the way the world is as it is because they are comfortable with the way it is. Those who are powerful want to stay powerful. Commonly the powerful will attempt to manipulate the fearful so that they can become more powerful. Liberals, utopian liberals that is, the ones who have sway, are incoherent. They do not consider means in relations to ends and, by this lack of logic, use tired and incompatible ways of achieving their ends. Both conservatives and liberals are, therefore, irrational. Yes, the mainstream, minus perhaps the powerful, is irrational.

Thoughts on "The War on Kids"

Last week I was watching an episode of the Colbert Report and the guest was Cevin Soling, the director of “The War on Kids.” Hearing what he had to say immediately made me intrigued. Nothing he was saying was groundbreaking by my own standards, but the fact alone that he was on TV saying it was awesome enough. He actually challenged the SYSTEM instead of just saying teachers need more money or better tools to discipline kids. So I immediately checked it out and it’s probably the best documentary I’ve ever seen (though I’m by no means a documentary fiend). It was well filmed and edited but nothing extraordinary in that regard. It was even highly biased and at times a little too touchy feely to be taken one hundred percent seriously, however, the topic is so very important and the film took such a sincerely unique and controversial position that it made up for everything and more.

Individualism and Collectivism: A False Dilemma

In most political or philosophical discourse, the concepts of individualism and collectivism are usually pitted against each other. It’s a common libertarian refrain, and one I have argued in the past, that individualism is virtuous while collectivism is not. It is this line of thought that is especially touted in Ayn Rand’s work. But is there really such a conflict. What is actually right or wrong about collectivism? Or what is actually right or wrong about individualism? Most of the things libertarians value can be described as being collectivist if you look at it the proper light. In addition, the bashing of collectivism is a constant hampering to the libertarian cause as it inaccurately makes us look like misers and misanthropes who don’t care about other people. The way libertarians portray libertarianism should be indicative of the way we expect a libertarian society to exist. This includes strong community and charity or whatever else that we would not expect to deteriorate just because people gave up violence and theft.

The extreme position in favor of individualism is really set up nicely by Rand. In each of her novels, the hero is a hermetically sealed, emotionless, handsome or beautiful genius with no consideration for other people. Yet they are always successful and prosperous until the “collective” comes to raid their joys. How successful would a hermetically sealed individual actually be in the real world? My guess is not very.

The Really Really Big Bubble is Growing Bigger

In “The Incredible Food Machine” I explained how financial/speculative bubbles emerge. To put it simply, financial bubbles start when interest rates are manipulated to misrepresent reality -- when lenders and borrowers are LIED to about fundamentals of the loan market. That the manipulation of interest rates causes misallocations of resources away from their most desired use is a very concise version of the Austrian Theory of the Business Cycle. But if you take a step back you can see that it can be even simpler and more dangerous than that.

Lying itself causes bubble behavior. It’s the specifics of the lie that determines the type of bubble. Lying about the interest rate creates speculative bubbles. I think these may be the least vicious, however, because they usually don’t last very long and, therefore, can’t cause very great damage.

Here’s what I mean. If you tell a child that there is a guy named Santa Claus who gives gifts to all children every year on the precondition that they are “good,” and they believe you (not a difficult task), you will have an effect on his behavior. This might include a change in how children act all year round (but the time preferences of children are usually low so the behavioral changes will usually only occur just before Christmas.) Children often write wish lists to Santa as a means of getting what they want. This is economic behavior. They are utilizing a means, the letter, to achieve an end, the gift or, more accurately, the joy of using the gift. The lie (that Santa exists and accepts requests) has directed economic activity that is of no value. That is, the letter doesn’t ACTUALLY result in the achievement of ends. The letter is not productive. It’s a waste of time. The kid could have done something else with his time other than write the letter.