Are libertarians our enemies?

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Why is everyone leaping from one extreme to the other? Libertarianism isn't "no government". That's anarchism.

How's it survival of the fittest if everyone survives? You seem to be ignoring, or just ignorant of, the fact that libertarians tend to be some of the more prominent supporters of a universal basic income. There's a piece on it practically every other month in Reason. And sure, the pot-smoking Republicans in libertarian drag may be skeptical of something so dirty-hippie-socialist-sounding, but mention Milton Friedman's negative income tax policy (which is functionally equivalent to universal basic income - everyone from billionaires to homeless people gets the same monthly living expenses stipend from the government every month, and only income in excess of that is taxed) and they're all about it.

Sure, that's the libertarian ideal. But the reality of the situation is, the free market did nothing to help oppressed people who are assured that said free market is supposed make things better.
I always have to ask: just how is the free market able to purposely accomplish this? Is the free market somehow a living, sentient thing? Because I can assure you it is not (though libertarians within the evangelical movement are convinced that the free market is guided by God himself).

Either an individual has the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, his life his own to live – or it is proper for some people to order others around at gunpoint, making them the means to some allegedly higher end. Everybody reading this lives in some kind of "mixed economy," with a mix of freedom and controls, precisely because of these conflicting values in our societies … but logically, it's one or the other. Liberty or authoritarianism.

I think the OP was using "libertarian" in the widest possible sense. Well, I haven't met anybody on the pro-liberty side (libertarian, Objectivist, constitutionalist) who was opposed to the existence, as such, of a "safety net" for the benefit of those unable to support themselves. In fact there's obviously a demand for such a thing: not only might disaster befall anyone, no matter how well prepared, but also nobody wants to see his neighbors starving on the streets. We just think that the State is singularly unqualified to run it. It has been consistently demonstrating its inefficiency, incompetence, and corruption for generations.

In light of recent events I can't help noticing that in Detroit, Baltimore, and many other American cities, the welfare-state party has been running things its way for fifty years or more. How's that been working out? Has it resulted in racial harmony, integration, general prosperity?

http://m.fayobserver.com/opinion/nation ... l?mode=jqm

Thank you.

I can't comment on Baltimore, as I am admittedly ignorant about it's history, but Detroit has economically and socially gone down hill because the people of that city had been betrayed by the auto industry, who had outsourced off shore, leaving workers destitute, which in turn caused a chain reaction of small business failures that had depended on the money of said auto workers, thus leaving even more people unemployed.

Maybe if you're the kind of moron who believes every type of falsehood attributed to straw man libertarians, which would encompass a depressingly large chunk of WP.

I don't see any logical reason it would be either full blow liberty or authoritarianism. You must keep in mind that modern democracy is the power structure bringing the most freedom ever allowed to the population on a national scale, having emerged after many millenias of authoritarianism. Getting rid of governmental powers would not give more freedom, it would rather allow other powers to take control, must likelly armies or corporations, giving rise to new much more authoritarian governments.


A inefficient, incompetent and corrupted state that sent humans on the Moon in the case of the US. There is simply no organisation, either public, private or religious, that was never caught with such problems at some measure.

True enough and some of them would be unable to work but even if they were willing and able to work, what if they're unable to find work. Then some plutocrat would accuse them of "refusing to work" even as they frantically seek employment.

Some employers are reluctant to hire disabled workers but others are willing to exploit them. I've seen this myself. I've seen disabled workers paid a quarter of minimum wage because no one else would have them. This wouldn't go away under a totally free market.

If anything, a totally free market would only exasperate the problem, as employers would pay workers only what they perceive said workers are worth. And if the history of pre-pro labor legislation is any indicator, that wouldn't be very much. And the most vulnerable, such as the disabled, would be paid the very least.

What is it with this bizzare assumption that we've ever had an actual free market...

In a free market, you have to treat your workers well enough that they're better off with you than by setting up on their own. Actually, that's the case anyway, it's just that it's a lot easier for them to set up on their own *when the state is not getting in the way*. It's really quite simple.

As far as welfare goes, how much poverty exists because the state criminalises alternatives? You're also ignoring the extent to which state intervention drives up the cost of living, thus making it a lot easier to slip into poverty.

There is an awful lot of straw in this thread...

Be that as it may, you seem to be ignoring or ignorant of the fact that those aren't the sort of libertarians who are apt to gain power or influence public policy.

It's those "Pop/pot Libertarians" that I'm worried about... Also, even the "Maximum freedom, minimum government" ones who run the Libertarian Party website are pretty distressing. If you read their plat form they're all about doing nutty s**t like dismantling the OASDI system and privatizing education--basically rolling social policy back to the 19th century.
There's a reason why we stopped expecting that family, friends, and charity could adequately address all the social welfare needs in the country. Because we witnessed and finally acknowledged the failure of this approach more than a century ago.


The libertarian party position is absolutely ridiculous.

Right now, I'm finishing a BSW degree and getting ready (hopefully) for grad school. I'm all about finding practical, evidence-based solutions for social problems and I'll be the first to admit that our system needs to be reformed.

BUT, that's it. WE NEED REFORM. We don't need to dismantle or abandon the system.

Speaking of negative income tax, we already have that to a limited degree in the earned income tax credit. I think it's a great approach/solution for supporting BOTH low wage workers AND LOW WAGE EMPLOYERS. It stimulates the economy and promotes positive, productive participation in society/the economy.

Here's the problem... Modern "pop libertarians" don't really seem to give a s**t about programs like this and they certainly don't want to pay taxes to support it.

The main message I hear from "pop libertarians" goes something like "taxes are theft! leave me alone and let me do my thing while you do yours!" While this may sound like a fine idea, let me say once again, functionally, it translates to social darwinism.

So, if you're a libertarian who supports some kind of universal income, etc., I'm certainly willing to concede that you aren't a social darwinist. However, you need to realize that your position is not likely to have much influence on the majority of modern American Libertarian/Republican/Randian/Right wingers who dominate half of American politics.

Also, as a social scientist, I gotta say, universal basic income will never, ever, ever, happen in the United States. However, a libertarian dismantling of the social safetynet is a real possibility in the next few decades, and that would hurt a lot of vulnerable, innocent people (like many who frequent this forum).

I'd say that there's an awful lot of willful ignorance of history in this thread...

Do you think the progressive movement of the early 20th century rose up in reaction to HOW GREAT everything was during the gilded age?

Thanks.
Anyone want to see what communism/socialism does, feel free to move to North Korea or Cuba.
Also, libertarian is an umbrella term with different categories, and I don't know which definition a lot of people are going by in this thread, but it's bizzare.

Yes, and let's not forget, we've already tried the libertarian approach to the social safetynet (in the 19th-early 20th centuries). It was not better than what we have now--not by a long shot.

But the gilded age wasn't libertarianism in the true sense, that is, government is supposed to be there to intervene when fraud or abuse takes place; and fraud and abuse is exactly what was happening in the gilded age. That's why Mark Twain called it the Gilded Age--the appearance of being prosperous and good while underneath the surface a tremendous amount of corruption was manifest.