The Great Libertarian DilemmaDecember 26, 2007
In the end, every argument descends to this fundamental philosophical question — Is it more important not to obstruct the best of us, or to help the worst of us even we fail. I don’t believe these two options are mutually exclusive, but at the core of every political disagreement I have ever had is this question, and it is simply a matter of priority. The great dilemma is how to win this argument. The key assumption here is that we are only interested in results. A common and frustrating sentiment I hear from those I disagree with often involves very heartfelt concern for certain individuals in difficult circumstances that require “something” be done, and therefore any policy that claims to be in their interest is automatically deserving of support. Those people must be challenged. Intent is irrelevant, only the effect matters. If we do not impose barriers to the advancement of our most capable citizens, it is almost guaranteed that most of them will succeed. On the other hand, even if we try to help the most disadvantaged citizens there is no guarantee it will add any value to any of their lives or the country. Ultimately, everyone should hopefully agree that the most perfect solution is the one for which disadvantaged people most likely to benefit from aid are given the opportunities they need to advance, while little or no disincentives are imposed on the rest. Therefore, in order to answer this question we need to know two things:
I won’t pretend to provide hard numbers as answers to these two questions, but simply forcing our logically challenged friends to consider them is the first step. The major flaw in socialist reasoning is that they always forget to answer the first question. The only way to begin the process of correcting their thinking is to make them aware of the total effect of their policies. The first question only needs to be asked when we are in the business of re-distributing opportunity through forced government action. I believe it is only possible to create a system with fully funded charities to give assistance to those who need it and without government imposed disincentives using the free market solution. Socialists never consider that without government intervention many wealthy people may very well have helped the disadvantaged voluntarily. Of course not everyone would, but there is absolutely no evidence that more good is achieved by forcing all wealthy people to fund government programs than would have been achieved by voluntary cooperation through charities, even if the amount of money raised was much less. Wealthy people hate taxes primarily because they are perceived as ineffective. You lose twice, when you are taxed to fund a program and when the program fails to deliver on anything it promised. Such a plan is generally opposed by people who believe that the world is inherently unfair and it is the responsibility of government to correct those inherent inequalities by force. But what they fail to consider is whether government interference causes more problems than it solves. People need to ask that question before they support any policy, regardless of intent and no matter how charming the politician may be. There is no evidence that it’s necessarily required for government to intervene at all, but if that’s your modus operandi than at least understand what you are proposing. The next step is to take this out of the theoretical realm and get some hard numbers… No related posts.
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[...] The great Libertarian dilemma [...]
There are two kinds of libertarians. Those who prefer it because they believe it maximizes societal “goodness” and those who believe it because they think that the alternate (forced wealth redistribution, forced charity, etc.) is immoral. This author ignores morality and assumes that societal goodness is what should be maximized. The kind of behavior tolerated by a society that accepts this axiom is limited only by what is fashionable. When tough times comes, people will look for scapegoats and convince themselves society would be better off without Jews or homosexuals or gypsies or Christians or whatever. What a “good” society is will never be agreed upon by all members of a society and this is why there are constant political arguments. Before we can agree whether libertarianism or socialism better meets our societal goals, we must first define what our goals are.