“Contentious Issues in Classical Liberalism” was the theme of this year’s Mont Pelerin Society. This gave me a chance to explore a major puzzle: Sociologically, immigration clearly deserves to be on the agenda. After all, many people otherwise sympathetic to human freedom and free markets support even more immigration restrictions than we already have. Intellectually, however, it’s hard to see why.
Tag: property
Don’t Advocate Against Property Rights
Libertarians who support the Big Government “border security” welfare program don’t understand property rights. Property rights are the foundation of all rights, so if you don’t understand and support property rights, how can you credibly claim to be libertarian… or to value liberty at all?
Scott Adams Defends Socialism
On a recent podcast, I noticed a bit of pro-socialism dishonesty from Scott Adams. I wasn’t really surprised, because he is a government supremacist, after all. And you can’t really have a state without embracing socialism.
Education Entrepreneurs Are the Only Ones Who Can Disrupt the Status Quo
It shouldn’t come as a surprise that most of the organizations I highlight in Unschooled are independently run. Disruptive innovation may originate with individual ingenuity, but it is fueled by consumer demand and value creation within the private sector.
The Weakest Generation
As it turns out, sharing a downtown loft with a horde of dysfunctional roommates, taking an Uber every time you need to travel, and using Postmates instead of going grocery shopping doesn’t exactly create functioning adults. There is plenty of blame to go around. Helicopter parenting, participation trophies, a lack of real-world experiences and work (whatever happened to summer jobs?), and the systemic failures of higher education have all played their part. Let’s talk a bit about the last one.
The Art and Science of Physical Removal
That said, it is the even smallest potential for “libertarian socialism” that causes me to distance myself somewhat from Hoppe. That one-in-a-thousand leftie who just wants to live peacefully in a commune with his or her buddies down the road – so long as their chosen lifestyle and preferred economic models are kept among themselves and other willing participants who are free to leave at any time – is not and should not be considered a problem.
Schools or Bars?
Someone was showing me a satellite photo of a place where I used to live. A place where I honed a lot of my outdoor skills. Now the entire area behind my former house, which used to be wooded, has been replaced by a gigantic high school. Yes, I get that nothing stays the same. But there are good changes and bad changes. This is a bad one.
Laws Are Creating Immigration Issue
Imagine you have an antique car in your back yard behind a privacy fence. A neighbor climbs your fence, sees the car, and decides something must be done about it. How he decided your property is his concern is a mystery. Clearly, he’s a bad neighbor who doesn’t mind his own business. Then it gets worse. He doesn’t ask about the car, offer to buy it or to help you get it running. Instead, he hires the local crime boss to force you to build a shed for the car, paint it pink, give it square wheels, and pay an annual ransom for the privilege of owning it. Or else it will be taken from you and you’ll be punished. This is how government solves problems.
The Noble Crony: Big Business on the Politics of Business
There are major policies where the business community prevails over the popular will. Indeed, there are major policies that would be helpless political orphans without the patronage of business elites. But happily, business has both prudence and justice on its side.
Tortured “Complexity”
When someone is about to start doing some mental contortionism in order to try to justify statism, they’ll often make the statement, “it’s a very complex issue“. No, it really isn’t. They’re lying to try to appear deep and smart and to justify the unjustifiable.