Six differences between liberals and libertarians [op/ed]

[Surlethe]

Linka

libertarians are liberals who like markets.

This is a succinct way of suggesting that libertarians and liberals share similar personalities and outlooks. There is just an intellectual difference concerning markets and government.

I will be speaking on the subject of markets vs. government in a number of upcoming talks. The first one will be at Campbell University in North Carolina on Thursday, March 18th at 6 PM. I assume this is open to the public. If you have a group in your area that would like me to speak, let me know (you can leave a comment).

Below is a sketch of some of my thoughts.

1. Since I was once a liberal and am now a libertarian, I might count as evidence for Will's thesis. I don't think that my personality or outlook changed as much as my intellectual framework.

2. I think that most liberals I know would say that they like markets, "but..." The "but" is that they think of markets as serving some basic human needs, but not higher human needs. For liberals, the market is to government as the saloon is to the art museum. People do need to visit a saloon now and then, but the art museum represents the higher form of civilization. To stretch the metaphor a bit, liberals think that the saloon needs to be regulated, by sophisticated art patrons.

3. Liberals are more confident about social science and technocratic expertise. Libertarians are more confident about decentralized trial-and-error learning.

4. I think that liberals have a more romantic concept of democracy. I keep going back to Daniel Callahan's statement on p.215 of Taming the Beloved Beast:

In the end, government must answer to the public, forcing an accountability that is absent in private sector medicine.

To me, government is a mechanism that diffuses and dilutes accountability. If government does something wrong, does a bureaucrat get fired? Does an agency go out of business? Do legislators suffer financial losses?

If I shop for a coat, the store is accountable to me. If government decides on a policy, my affect on that policy is at best very indirect. Will my vote be determined by that policy, or by my feelings about the elected officials based on other factors? Even if I vote on the basis of a single policy, will others vote the same way? Will the elected officials understand what the voters want? etc.

5. I think that liberals see markets and government as representing different facets of human nature. The market is where we go to channel greed, aggression, and the desire to outwit and take advantage of others. The government is where we go to channel compassion, kindness, and community spirit.

The libertarian view instead sees a common human nature at work in markets and government. With Adam Smith, we see bread on our table coming not from the benevolence of the baker but from his self-interest as filtered through the mechanism of the market. We see the government as an arena where rent-seeking is just as aggressive as in the market--except that the forces of competition are weaker for government-generated rents than for rents that can be temporarily captured in the market.

I think that compassion, kindness, and community spirit are best channeled through voluntary activities, such as charitable organizations. I tend to think of government as a particular form of charitable organization, one which is rendered corrupt and horribly inefficient by the fact that it obtains its funding via coercion rather than via voluntary donations. Charitable organizations themselves are far from perfect. But I think that, dollar for dollar, I get more community benefit out of my charitable contributions than out of my taxes.

6. I think that liberals view the market as a somewhat barbaric and unfair mechanism for allocating resources. They view government as a mechanism for restoring fairness and justice.

To a libertarian, the market mechanism is civilized. When people buy and sell in the market, they are making voluntary, mutually beneficial exchanges. In contrast, government is an arena where one side wins and the other side loses.

When I shop for a coat, if I do not like the way a coat fits or how it looks, or how much the seller wants me to pay, I do not buy that coat. I buy a different coat, perhaps in a different store. The shopping process leads to peaceful, mutually satisfying trade.

On the other hand, look at how the issue of health care reform is going to be resolved. It is like gang warfare, where the Democrats and Republicans are going to rumble, and at least one side is going to be very unhappy with the outcome. For me, it is the democratic process that is barbaric, and it is the market process that is comparatively peaceful and civilized.

[/quote][/quote]

Interesting thoughts, but I think that he's entirely off for five reasons that (tellingly) he did not cite as differences between liberal (progressive) thought and libertarian thought. At least, these are the reasons I am a progressive and not a libertarian.

1. Progressives view the market process as an inefficient allocator of resources because, broadly, of transaction costs, information costs, frictions in adjustment, wealth asymmetries, market power, rent-seeking, and collective ignorance/incorrect valuation (as in the case of short-run price trends used to predict house prices during the bubble, leading to overvaluation and incorrect pricing of MBSes). Hence, progressives feel that government intervention can make market outcomes better in situations beyond the typical libertarian "protect property rights and intervene only in natural monopolies and externalities" creed. (Progressives also tend to view externalities as significantly more extensive than libertarians.)
2. Progressives view income and wealth asymmetries as inherently limiting freedom and creating coercive situations because wealth asymmetries permit resources to be bid away from more valuable to less valuable uses - e.g., luxury consumption. They also view wealth asymmetries as leading to rent-seeking and inefficient income allocation.
3. Progressives view the government as an instrument of collaborative effort in society, rather than as a coercive parasite on society. In other words, democratic government is a product of social interactions, rather than some exogenous entity that is only responsive to incentives. Progressives also view the government as in principle capable of (relatively) efficient operation, instead of the horribly inefficient morass that libertarians see it as.
4. Utilitarian progressives do not consider harm caused by inaction to be less reprehensible than harm caused by action. This is an oft-unstated moral difference between utilitarians and rights-first libertarians -- a libertarian considers money taken by coercion to be wrong (i.e., taxes) even if it is used to do good because it is harm caused by action, whereas money taken by inaction (e.g., someone forced to work for low wages because high search costs prevent him from finding a better job) is not wrong.
5. Elitist progressives view people as largely inherently unable to make rational decisions, so they need to be parented by a (more) rational government - c.f., smoking and seatbelt laws. Unlike the morally relativist libertarian view (people value what they spend on, so limiting or changing their options decreases welfare), this persective says that people are sometimes (often) better off when their options are limited to better ones.

By the way, there are plenty of different strands of libertarian thought, and the arguments are often surprusingly subtle, so don't go making snide comments and jokes that paint libertarians with a broad brush. Much like ignorant, dismissive, and vacuous posts about fundamentalists, one-line anti-libertarian posts ("THEY R SELFISH & H8 EVERYONE") are retarded and contribute nothing to the discussion, so don't make them.

[Darth Wong]

Libertarians are not "liberals who like markets"; they are liberals who worship markets.

[Alyeska]

Libertarians are not "liberals who like markets"; they are liberals who worship markets.

Bingo. Most Libertarians who supposedly support civil rights issues are willing to sacrifice civil rights on the alter of Free Market.

[Stark]

Libertarians are not "liberals who like markets"; they are liberals who worship markets.

It's interesting that his entire thought process in that section is predicated on personal experience. He doesn't FEEL different and now he's a libertarian, so obviously it's not REALLY that far apart. He then describes 'libertarian' by defining his own beliefs (including ridiculous shit like 'trial and error learning' which I guess translates to 'cycles of failure that ruin the lives of poor people fuckem').

[Surlethe]

Libertarians are not "liberals who like markets"; they are liberals who worship markets.

Bingo. Most Libertarians who supposedly support civil rights issues are willing to sacrifice civil rights on the alter of Free Market.

What do you mean? Affirmative action? In my experience, libertarians are divided on imposing affirmative action on private corporations. But they're divided because half think that markets will automatically lead to the elimination of private segregation anyway, so (in their minds) they aren't sacrificing civil rights on the altar of the Free Market, they're bringing about civil rights more efficiently and without coercion. The other half are willing to admit that (some forms) of affirmative action policies actually improve outcomes.

It's interesting that his entire thought process in that section is predicated on personal experience. He doesn't FEEL different and now he's a libertarian, so obviously it's not REALLY that far apart.

Classic individual confirmation bias. It's like people who think that atheists are all angry at god, and simply can't conceive of not thinking there's any god at all.

He then describes 'libertarian' by defining his own beliefs (including ridiculous shit like 'trial and error learning' which I guess translates to 'cycles of failure that ruin the lives of poor people fuckem').

Is that really how you'd represent the argument he's implying? Seriously.

[Darth Wong]

1. Since I was once a liberal and am now a libertarian, I might count as evidence for Will's thesis. I don't think that my personality or outlook changed as much as my intellectual framework.

What? By this bizarre deductive logic, a Christian who became an atheist is evidence that christianity and atheism are based on similar thinking, just because the atheist doesn't feel like a completely different person afterwards. Even if liberals and libertarians are related, this kind of "evidence" is nothing of the sort.

2. I think that most liberals I know would say that they like markets, "but..." The "but" is that they think of markets as serving some basic human needs, but not higher human needs. For liberals, the market is to government as the saloon is to the art museum. People do need to visit a saloon now and then, but the art museum represents the higher form of civilization. To stretch the metaphor a bit, liberals think that the saloon needs to be regulated, by sophisticated art patrons.

That is the dumbest description of market vs government solutions I've ever seen. It's not a matter of "higher" or "lower"; it is matter of different solutions for different situations. The market is great for providing consumer products. You would not, however, want for-profit private sector police departments.

3. Liberals are more confident about social science and technocratic expertise. Libertarians are more confident about decentralized trial-and-error learning.

Given libertarian insistence upon the superiority of "free market" medicine despite reams of empirical evidence to the contrary, I would say that libertarians have very little confidence in trial-and-error learning. Instead, he reveals his attitude in his previous point: by suggesting that there is a hierarchy of quality, and that the market is superior to the government as a general rule.

4. I think that liberals have a more romantic concept of democracy. I keep going back to Daniel Callahan's statement on p.215 of Taming the Beloved Beast:

In the end, government must answer to the public, forcing an accountability that is absent in private sector medicine.

To me, government is a mechanism that diffuses and dilutes accountability. If government does something wrong, does a bureaucrat get fired? Does an agency go out of business? Do legislators suffer financial losses?

To me, the market is a mechanism that diffuses and dilutes accountability. If consumers encourage wrongdoing by continuing to patronize businesses which engage in harmful practices, do the consumers suffer? Are they punished in any way? Do they suffer personal financial losses?

If I shop for a coat, the store is accountable to me. If government decides on a policy, my affect on that policy is at best very indirect. Will my vote be determined by that policy, or by my feelings about the elected officials based on other factors? Even if I vote on the basis of a single policy, will others vote the same way? Will the elected officials understand what the voters want? etc.

If I have an MP, my MP is accountable to me in the next election cycle. If a company decides on a harmful environmental or social policy, my effect on that policy is at best very indirect. Will my next purchasing decision be determined by that policy, or by my short-term interest in cheaper prices or other factors? Even if I purchase on the basis of an unethical policy, will others change their purchasing habits the same way? Will the corporate executives understand or care what consumers think is bad for society? How many people think Wal-Mart is bad for society, but keep shopping there anyway?

5. I think that liberals see markets and government as representing different facets of human nature. The market is where we go to channel greed, aggression, and the desire to outwit and take advantage of others. The government is where we go to channel compassion, kindness, and community spirit.

Alternatively, perhaps liberals simply think certain kinds of social needs are better served by the government than the market or vice versa, and it has nothing to do with "channeling" certain parts of the human heart. That's quite frankly a bizarre approach. I wonder if this guy was an English Literature major in school. If he was indeed a liberal before becoming a libertarian, this suggests that he was a rather irrational one.

The libertarian view instead sees a common human nature at work in markets and government. With Adam Smith, we see bread on our table coming not from the benevolence of the baker but from his self-interest as filtered through the mechanism of the market. We see the government as an arena where rent-seeking is just as aggressive as in the market--except that the forces of competition are weaker for government-generated rents than for rents that can be temporarily captured in the market.

On the contrary, the forces of competition for social needs are virtually nonexistent in the market. That's what I'm referring to above, when I point out that different problems require different solutions. Yes, the government is not as good at doing things the market does well, but the reverse is also true for other kinds of services: specifically, those services which can be regarded as needs rather than wants. You can dress up that statement by saying "forces of competition" instead of "good at doing things", but the basic premise is the same.

I think that compassion, kindness, and community spirit are best channeled through voluntary activities, such as charitable organizations. I tend to think of government as a particular form of charitable organization, one which is rendered corrupt and horribly inefficient by the fact that it obtains its funding via coercion rather than via voluntary donations. Charitable organizations themselves are far from perfect. But I think that, dollar for dollar, I get more community benefit out of my charitable contributions than out of my taxes.

That does very little for the millions of people who have no health care in the US. If charitable contributions replace government largesse, then why hasn't charity stepped in to help all of these people? He is treating social needs as a consumer product, and asking what gives him the best "value for money". But the key performance parameter of critical social services like health and human services is not "value for money"; it is consistent and accessible coverage. That's not to say that value for money means nothing, but it is not as important as accessibility.

6. I think that liberals view the market as a somewhat barbaric and unfair mechanism for allocating resources. They view government as a mechanism for restoring fairness and justice.

To a libertarian, the market mechanism is civilized. When people buy and sell in the market, they are making voluntary, mutually beneficial exchanges. In contrast, government is an arena where one side wins and the other side loses.

When I shop for a coat, if I do not like the way a coat fits or how it looks, or how much the seller wants me to pay, I do not buy that coat. I buy a different coat, perhaps in a different store. The shopping process leads to peaceful, mutually satisfying trade.

On the other hand, look at how the issue of health care reform is going to be resolved. It is like gang warfare, where the Democrats and Republicans are going to rumble, and at least one side is going to be very unhappy with the outcome. For me, it is the democratic process that is barbaric, and it is the market process that is comparatively peaceful and civilized.

Again, this analogy is entirely based on the idea that these are consumer products rather than social needs. Social needs are not a consumer product. Moreover, it is not a matter of how "peaceful and civilized" the process is; it is a matter of how socially just and equitable it is. The market is a "one dollar, one vote" system, not a "one man, one vote" system. Rich people get far more influence in the market, poor people get almost none.

However, if we are going to go down this irrelevant "peaceful and civilized" track, he is so wrong it isn't funny. The market is based on Darwinian competition, in which the strong survive and the weak are utterly destroyed. In fact, the process does not work without destruction of weaker competitors, just as Darwinian competition does not work without death and extinction. For him to describe this as a "peaceful and civilized" model compared to heated debate and up/down votes is so dishonest and/or inexcusably stupid that it beggars description.

Interesting thoughts, but I think that he's entirely off for five reasons that (tellingly) he did not cite as differences between liberal (progressive) thought and libertarian thought. At least, these are the reasons I am a progressive and not a libertarian.

1. Progressives view the market process as an inefficient allocator of resources because, broadly, of transaction costs, information costs, frictions in adjustment, wealth asymmetries, market power, rent-seeking, and collective ignorance/incorrect valuation (as in the case of short-run price trends used to predict house prices during the bubble, leading to overvaluation and incorrect pricing of MBSes). Hence, progressives feel that government intervention can make market outcomes better in situations beyond the typical libertarian "protect property rights and intervene only in natural monopolies and externalities" creed. (Progressives also tend to view externalities as significantly more extensive than libertarians.)
2. Progressives view income and wealth asymmetries as inherently limiting freedom and creating coercive situations because wealth asymmetries permit resources to be bid away from more valuable to less valuable uses - e.g., luxury consumption. They also view wealth asymmetries as leading to rent-seeking and inefficient income allocation.
3. Progressives view the government as an instrument of collaborative effort in society, rather than as a coercive parasite on society. In other words, democratic government is a product of social interactions, rather than some exogenous entity that is only responsive to incentives. Progressives also view the government as in principle capable of (relatively) efficient operation, instead of the horribly inefficient morass that libertarians see it as.
4. Utilitarian progressives do not consider harm caused by inaction to be less reprehensible than harm caused by action. This is an oft-unstated moral difference between utilitarians and rights-first libertarians -- a libertarian considers money taken by coercion to be wrong (i.e., taxes) even if it is used to do good because it is harm caused by action, whereas money taken by inaction (e.g., someone forced to work for low wages because high search costs prevent him from finding a better job) is not wrong.
5. Elitist progressives view people as largely inherently unable to make rational decisions, so they need to be parented by a (more) rational government - c.f., smoking and seatbelt laws. Unlike the morally relativist libertarian view (people value what they spend on, so limiting or changing their options decreases welfare), this persective says that people are sometimes (often) better off when their options are limited to better ones.

By the way, there are plenty of different strands of libertarian thought, and the arguments are often surprusingly subtle, so don't go making snide comments and jokes that paint libertarians with a broad brush. Much like ignorant, dismissive, and vacuous posts about fundamentalists, one-line anti-libertarian posts ("THEY R SELFISH & H8 EVERYONE") are retarded and contribute nothing to the discussion, so don't make them.

I don't know about making generalized snide anti-libertarian posts, but I can certainly say that this particular individual's arguments are stupid and make him appear like a stereotypical libertarian moron.

[Stark]

Is that really how you'd represent the argument he's implying? Seriously.

You can't have 'trial and error' learning without 'error', and without 'government' that error means people die and suffer. Not rich people, generally, so poor people suffer to potentially improve the system.

I mean, the whole idea of 'trial and error learning' in areas that would be social policy is so irrelevant and stupid I honestly don't see how anyone could think it's an improvement, but it indicates a preference for 'win and lose' as opposed to 'mitigate and control'. This is a common libertarian thing; they prefer a world where you can either starve to death on the street or make millions to a world where everyone is protected by a safety net that 'reduces' highs of the peaks.

[K. A. Pital]

The art patron versus saloon analogy just blew me away - haven't read anything stupider in days.

I must concur with Stark - this line:

Liberals are more confident about social science and technocratic expertise. Libertarians are more confident about decentralized trial-and-error learning.

Means exactly what he said. Social science and technocratic expertise are used to extrapolate consequences and use government policies for trend-changing action. "Trial-and-error learning" is rejecting the scientific nature of economical science, any predictive power it might have, and instead saying "I wash my hands, whatever happens".

How many people think Wal-Mart is bad for society, but keep shopping there anyway?

Lots of people just have no choice but to shop at large retail chains, regardless of their abusive practices - or maybe because of them - in places like here, at least, we don't even have the fucking luxury of choosing where to buy food (the choice is between large retail chains #1 and #2). You either buy it at a low-cost chain, or you go fucking bankrupt because your wages barely cover food for two.

To deny economic coercion exists is to be fucking blind. Which libertarians are, quite obviously.

[Xon]

Libertarians are more confident about decentralized trial-and-error learning.

To me, government is a mechanism that diffuses and dilutes accountability.

Wow, feel the DoubleThink.

[Patrick Degan]

I think that liberals see markets and government as representing different facets of human nature. The market is where we go to channel greed, aggression, and the desire to outwit and take advantage of others. The government is where we go to channel compassion, kindness, and community spirit.

Alternatively, perhaps liberals simply think certain kinds of social needs are better served by the government than the market or vice versa, and it has nothing to do with "channeling" certain parts of the human heart. That's quite frankly a bizarre approach. I wonder if this guy was an English Literature major in school. If he was indeed a liberal before becoming a libertarian, this suggests that he was a rather irrational one.

What has to be remembered is that, with both conservatives and libertarians, liberalism is all about "feelings", not "logic", with the caveat that their brand of "logic" is actually doctrinaire formulation.

[Akhlut]

How many people think Wal-Mart is bad for society, but keep shopping there anyway?

Lots of people just have no choice but to shop at large retail chains, regardless of their abusive practices - or maybe because of them - in places like here, at least, we don't even have the fucking luxury of choosing where to buy food (the choice is between large retail chains #1 and #2). You either buy it at a low-cost chain, or you go fucking bankrupt because your wages barely cover food for two.

To deny economic coercion exists is to be fucking blind. Which libertarians are, quite obviously.

Anecdote != data, I know, but to illustrate the point: I know damn well I'd much rather shop elsewhere for goods that aren't made by 3rd world quasi-slave labor in a store that is known for the abuse of its workers (and engages them in mild forms of brainwashing, as seen here), but, I also need to eat and purchase clothing. Sure, a $100 pair of boots is going to last a lot longer and feel a lot better then the shitty $25 boots I got at WalMart, but I couldn't afford $100 boots before getting a job (and, even now, that'd be an enormous expense); same with purchasing diapers, as my son needs them and we don't have adequate access to washing machines for cloth diapers.

Further, in some areas, there isn't really anywhere else to shop; back when I lived in northern Wisconsin, there was WalMart, Pamida, and a few local stores selling more specialty goods. The nearest alternative places to shop were an hour away, which certainly wasn't nearly as feasible during bad winters, as the highway might well be closed.

[Darth Wong]

Does anyone have any examples of his liberal op-eds, before he became a libertarian? I ask this because I've seen plenty of "born again" Christians who use the "I used to be an atheist" line, and every one of them turns out to have absolutely no idea what it means to be an atheist. I wonder if this guy thinks he used to be liberal just because he didn't throw blunt objects at gays when he saw them, or whether he's just lying through his teeth, like a lot of the "former atheist" Christians out there.

In other words, I've heard this little story before, from "former atheist" Christians, and I'm getting a sense of deja vu. None of his arguments betray any real comprehension of how a real liberal might seriously try to argue for social policies. If anything, they sound like classic conservative caricatures of liberals, especially the bit about how liberals trust the government to be a source of caring and compassion.

[Surlethe]

Means exactly what he said. Social science and technocratic expertise are used to extrapolate consequences and use government policies for trend-changing action. "Trial-and-error learning" is rejecting the scientific nature of economical science, any predictive power it might have, and instead saying "I wash my hands, whatever happens".

There are two directions by which one could approach this conclusion. One is through blind faith that consumer and producer surplus actually measure welfare, in which case the conclusion is not a rejection of the scientific nature of economics but a scientific result: if property rights are preserved, markets are free, and externalities are minimal, welfare is maximized. On the other hand, as you say, you have people who cite the economy as such a complex, chaotic, uncontrollable system that it is practically impossible to predict its behavior, and hence very difficult to reasonably control it. Hence, unknown deleterious effects of attempted control would be likely worse than any known positive effects, and then libertarians trot out a laundry list of unintended consequences of government action.

The second argument ultimately boils down to the empirical question of how much predictive power modern economic models have. It can also be rejected on moral grounds - weighting the consequences of lack of action as much worse than likely unintentional consequences of action.

To deny economic coercion exists is to be fucking blind. Which libertarians are, quite obviously.

I'll bet libertarians would also say that economic coercion is morally preferable to government coercion. This is for the reason I cited in the OP: the pervasive moral intuition that action that causes harm, even resulting in a greater good, is more reprehensible than inaction that results in harm. (This is, I believe, the work of Hauser - it is cited in Dawkins, The God Delusion, p. 223-4.) So, according to this strain of thought, economic coercion may be bad, but it is passive; active coercion, even it it ultimately improves situations, is worse.

[Surlethe]

I mean, the whole idea of 'trial and error learning' in areas that would be social policy is so irrelevant and stupid I honestly don't see how anyone could think it's an improvement, but it indicates a preference for 'win and lose' as opposed to 'mitigate and control'. This is a common libertarian thing; they prefer a world where you can either starve to death on the street or make millions to a world where everyone is protected by a safety net that 'reduces' highs of the peaks.

I'm interested in the reasons for the preference. Libertarians would generally think that a society with less taxation and government regulation generally more efficiently allocates resources over the long run, so the more efficient allocation more than makes up for the lack of a safety net after several generations. As far as "trial and error learning", I take it to mean a statement more about the general direction of economy and less about social policy. Libertarians tend to think that socialism is Soviet-style central planning, rather than the softer Western European-style big safety net; many of their arguments make more contextual sense when you realize they're still stuck in a Cold War mindset.

[Surlethe]

Hell, you know what? Let me play libertarian devil's advocate for a few pages in this thread. We might have some fun.

[Rye]

libertarians are liberals who like markets.

This is a succinct way of suggesting that libertarians and liberals share similar personalities and outlooks. There is just an intellectual difference concerning markets and government.

This is actually broadly true. Right-Libertarianism is a 20th century right-wing coloured rewrite of classical liberalism, with its origins in the Enlightenment and notions of autonomy and free will. It is a humanist ideology, much like its socialist cousins, however more recently defined and refined towards Nietzschean and Randian notions of self-empowerment and taking advantage of the weakness of others. Like the Christianity that preceded and influenced it, Right-Libertarianism and liberal socialisms were frequently Utopian with their own quasi-religious eschatologies (a classless, equal society), cults (around central authorities with sole claims to truth), schisms and prophets.

Classical liberalism frequently turned to various forms of socialism as the 19th century showed the suffering caused by unchecked capitalism, imperialism and exploitation. Jeremy Bentham's Utilitarian school is one of the best examples of this, with a clear influence on some of the early British socialists, distinct from the Marxist tradition. John Stuart Mill forsaw an end to growth and therefore large scale capitalism and its rapacious appetites as the workers would own production and people would produce for their own wellbeing rather than capital gains, and the market would set prices so everyone could live relatively comfortably. He envisaged a sort of "market socialism", or syndicalism.

As a result, modern libertarians and liberals come from a similar post-enlightenment background, are usually secularist but have been in different philosophical traditions for around a century. Broadly they are comparable since they both theoretically support the rights to free minds, free speech and free association. They are, at their most agreeable and soundbytey, about power to the people. More specifically, they are at stark odds when it comes to morality & rights, the wisdom of crowds, assumptions about market behaviour and the true nature of equality, society and fairness. Many of these things people will say are reconcilable on an individual level (irrational liberal examples like the stereotypical ditzy hollywood environmentalist), but in practise and observation, the outcomes of the philosophies and the positions they end up taking lead to irreconcilable conflicts of interest. Power to the people through consumer choice and personal responsibility vs power to the people through personal responsibility and looking out for each other, even against social apparatuses that enable greater consumer choice. Neither road to personal freedom, production and comfort is free from bad examples, and what works in one country, or one area of one country, may not work somewhere else.

The IMF and the various socialist forms have often tried the "one size fits all" approach of broad generalisations, and try to apply them to local situations with their own distinct cultures and issues. Naturally, these usually fail to work (hence situations like Afghanistan), and it turns out that the "truth" of a post-religious society working on human respect and autonomy does not actually set you free. Anarchies are some of the worst hells imaginable where the law of the jungle is king. They also produce terrorists and pirates that mess with the operations and citizens of liberal democratic countries, who of course have lists of atrocities, double-crosses and not living up to their own ideals many arms long.

2. I think that most liberals I know would say that they like markets, "but..." The "but" is that they think of markets as serving some basic human needs, but not higher human needs. For liberals, the market is to government as the saloon is to the art museum. People do need to visit a saloon now and then, but the art museum represents the higher form of civilization. To stretch the metaphor a bit, liberals think that the saloon needs to be regulated, by sophisticated art patrons.

This is nonsense. Ironically, it's also thinly disguised class-war nonsense typical of the Marxists complaining about the Bourgeoisie. Markets for basic human needs is precisely backwards; the liberal position is that vital human needs are covered first by an independent and moral system so that nobody who needs goes without. The libertarian position is that vital human needs are good enough reasons to work and that's it. They expect that people alone, either in corporations or voluntary associations will provide for their localities so that productivity can increase and people who work will never go without. The faith this position requires barely needs stating, because as we all know, the gilded age of the industrialists was far from that situation, and we may also add that the growth that such a system demands is both unsustainable once it runs into severe Malthusian problems. Libertarians are quick to hand wave these problems away, as well as positions that are not extensively humanist that cover conservation, environment and non-human utilitarian analysis.

If we are to return to the metaphor, for liberals, the market is to government as the saloon is to the town well.

3. Liberals are more confident about social science and technocratic expertise. Libertarians are more confident about decentralized trial-and-error learning.

Stark covered this. The problem with "trial and error" and the post-religious faith in free will and the wisdom of consumers is that it has several enormous and established failings. Look at America's ridiculous consumption rates. Look at the propaganda from the Cato institute rejecting global warming, or the misinformation about the 19th century on libertarian websites, meaning that anyone successfully marginalised in their parallel world will be at best, stuck in solipsism, unable to trust information because it's all been filtered by rich and corrupt entities in the search of continued growth and consumption-based hegemony. Free will is also a nonsense that makes "trial and error" problematic and inefficient as a teaching method. Not only can it turn into spiralling problems like the recent debt implosion of the worldwide banking sector, but people don't learn from their mistakes if they have enough faith in their ideology. Since society is, at its core, a system of personal "neural" connections enabling mass cooperation, trial and error learning is not without group effects that can lead to things like ghost towns and poverty, as well as "market unpunished" unfairness like only supplying water to the white houses in a racist town.

4. I think that liberals have a more romantic concept of democracy. I keep going back to Daniel Callahan's statement on p.215 of Taming the Beloved Beast:

In the end, government must answer to the public, forcing an accountability that is absent in private sector medicine.

To me, government is a mechanism that diffuses and dilutes accountability. If government does something wrong, does a bureaucrat get fired? Does an agency go out of business? Do legislators suffer financial losses?

If I shop for a coat, the store is accountable to me. If government decides on a policy, my affect on that policy is at best very indirect. Will my vote be determined by that policy, or by my feelings about the elected officials based on other factors? Even if I vote on the basis of a single policy, will others vote the same way? Will the elected officials understand what the voters want? etc.

This is a general problem with human connections and has nothing to do with public/private. See the golden parachutes of the failing bankers. The opposite is also not true, as the banking scandal showed. There is an assumption of "survival of the fittest" in the upper echelons of business, however, the assumption of meritocratic success is at best a vague guideline. In my opinion, and I do stress that this is my opinion, it's more to do with luck rather than skill; who your parents are, who you know, how often your gambles pay off, and the fact that someone needs to be that CEO rather than the post be unfilled. Monkeys and typewriters.

5. I think that liberals see markets and government as representing different facets of human nature. The market is where we go to channel greed, aggression, and the desire to outwit and take advantage of others. The government is where we go to channel compassion, kindness, and community spirit.

The libertarian view instead sees a common human nature at work in markets and government. With Adam Smith, we see bread on our table coming not from the benevolence of the baker but from his self-interest as filtered through the mechanism of the market. We see the government as an arena where rent-seeking is just as aggressive as in the market--except that the forces of competition are weaker for government-generated rents than for rents that can be temporarily captured in the market.

I think that compassion, kindness, and community spirit are best channeled through voluntary activities, such as charitable organizations. I tend to think of government as a particular form of charitable organization, one which is rendered corrupt and horribly inefficient by the fact that it obtains its funding via coercion rather than via voluntary donations. Charitable organizations themselves are far from perfect. But I think that, dollar for dollar, I get more community benefit out of my charitable contributions than out of my taxes.

If you think that voluntary charity can achieve what the NHS has, you're so far up your own ass with faith that you're inside out.

6. I think that liberals view the market as a somewhat barbaric and unfair mechanism for allocating resources. They view government as a mechanism for restoring fairness and justice.

To a libertarian, the market mechanism is civilized. When people buy and sell in the market, they are making voluntary, mutually beneficial exchanges. In contrast, government is an arena where one side wins and the other side loses.

And if it's beneficial to fuck over workers, consumers, patients and everyone else, you'll do it because the market does not assume that long term stability is better than a short term high risk gamble. That isn't civilised, that is a conflict of interest. If you have an area of outstanding natural beauty, you could charge people to see it. So you realise you can get more money if you charge more people. You invest in a road. A car park. A whole retail park. McDonald's. The area of outstanding natural beauty is now a concrete wasteland, but you're cool, you sold when shares were high. Good on you.

When I shop for a coat, if I do not like the way a coat fits or how it looks, or how much the seller wants me to pay, I do not buy that coat. I buy a different coat, perhaps in a different store. The shopping process leads to peaceful, mutually satisfying trade.

On the other hand, look at how the issue of health care reform is going to be resolved. It is like gang warfare, where the Democrats and Republicans are going to rumble, and at least one side is going to be very unhappy with the outcome. For me, it is the democratic process that is barbaric, and it is the market process that is comparatively peaceful and civilized.

When I shop for a coat, I do not frequent the shops that sell brutalised cats and dogs that were skinned alive by unscrupulous chinese businessmen. Others do. The market is only as nice as the pack of cunts working out how to make a quick buck by any means necessary.

[Spyder]

I'm interested in the reasons for the preference. Libertarians would generally think that a society with less taxation and government regulation generally more efficiently allocates resources over the long run, so the more efficient allocation more than makes up for the lack of a safety net after several generations.

What changes in several generations? There's multiple problems with this. First there's no evidence that it actually does this, second unless there's some control over where these resources are allocated we can't be sure this is even desirable and third if you already know what conditions you want to exist in several generations you can regulate them into being today.

Nomatter which way you look at Libertarianism it's nothing but magical market fantasies, broken thinking and completely nonsensical saloon analogies.

[K. A. Pital]

There are two directions by which one could approach this conclusion. One is through blind faith that consumer and producer surplus actually measure welfare, in which case the conclusion is not a rejection of the scientific nature of economics but a scientific result: if property rights are preserved, markets are free, and externalities are minimal, welfare is maximized.

This is hardly a scientific approach - to take a single factor in a multi-factor system. If anything, it's very primitive, faulty thinking - like using Newtonian laws at relativistic speeds. Guaranteed to produce a wrong result.

The second argument ultimately boils down to the empirical question of how much predictive power modern economic models have. It can also be rejected on moral grounds - weighting the consequences of lack of action as much worse than likely unintentional consequences of action.

The predictive power of modern economic models, or modern economic science in general can be not yet advanced enough; but "not yet" means one has to perfect it further and further until you reach a high degree of predictive power and a high degree of control over factors in play. It is hardly reasonable to say that inaction is a reasonable course of action in any circumstances, which is what the libertarians propose.

For them, predictive and controlling functions of economic theory are meaningless or useless, the market "solution" is the absolutely best desireable result in any situation, at any time and place. Market capitalism itself is the end of history, and any attempts to improve our understanding of the economic system by including more factors (like e.g. externalities) are simply ignored by libertarians.

Libertarianism is most certainly not interested in perfecting economic science, or anything like that - it is only interested in installing the "one-time solution" for all time.

So, according to this strain of thought, economic coercion may be bad, but it is passive; active coercion, even it it ultimately improves situations, is worse.

In some (warped) value systems this might hold true; but even a cursory utilitarian comparison would show that it's false. Of course, libertarians never follow utilitarianism in the first place, so in their warped value system, even coercion that improves the situation is "bad".

[Iosef Cross]

There are two directions by which one could approach this conclusion. One is through blind faith that consumer and producer surplus actually measure welfare, in which case the conclusion is not a rejection of the scientific nature of economics but a scientific result: if property rights are preserved, markets are free, and externalities are minimal, welfare is maximized.

This is hardly a scientific approach - to take a single factor in a multi-factor system. If anything, it's very primitive, faulty thinking - like using Newtonian laws at relativistic speeds. Guaranteed to produce a wrong result.

The maximization of surplus is a synonym with the concept of Pareto Optimality. With is defined as an allocation were the possibilities of welfare improvement for some individuals without making some people worse off are exhausted. Traditional economic theory concludes that general market equilibrium are Pareto optimal allocations.

However, Pareto optimal allocations aren't exactly the popular idea of "just distribution of resources". For example, if in a world of two individuals, one individual has all the goods and the other doesn't have anything, this allocation is pareto optimal: If you wish to make the individual with doesn't have anything better off, you must take resources from the other, making him worse off.

This definition is used by economists to mean efficiency and not "welfare maximization". Welfare maximization is a type of allocation were a welfare social function is maximized (in this function each individual utility function has a weight), this allocation is Pareto optimal but usually only covers one point of the Pareto set (the set of Pareto optimal allocations).

Economic theory doesn't say that markets maximize "welfare". That doesn't makes sense. Economic theory says that markets tend to exploit the possibilities of improvement in getting nearer to Pareto optimal allocations. That's because if there is a possibility of Pareto improvement, there is a possibility of turning out a profit.

For example, if we have two individuals, one (let's call him x) has 4 apples and the other has 1 banana (y). If y values the banana as much as 2 apples, while x is willing to trade even 4 apples for the banana, then if we have a third individual, called z, with knows about this discrepancy between what economists call "the marginal rate of substitution of apples and bananas" between x and y. z can make a profit by offering to buy the banana from y for 2 apples and selling it to x for 4 apples. Hence, inefficient allocations tend to be weeded out as individuals discover and exploit profit opportunities. Equilibrium is reached when such profit possibilities are exhausted.

One problem of modern mathematical economics is that a fully satisfactory model of how the equilibrium is reached is lacking, so that we do not have as much knowledge about the properties of these processes as we have of equilibrium states.

[Iosef Cross]

The predictive power of modern economic models, or modern economic science in general can be not yet advanced enough; but "not yet" means one has to perfect it further and further until you reach a high degree of predictive power and a high degree of control over factors in play. It is hardly reasonable to say that inaction is a reasonable course of action in any circumstances, which is what the libertarians propose. For them, predictive and controlling functions of economic theory are meaningless or useless, the market "solution" is the absolutely best desireable result in any situation, at any time and place. Market capitalism itself is the end of history, and any attempts to improve our understanding of the economic system by including more factors (like e.g. externalities) are simply ignored by libertarians. Libertarianism is most certainly not interested in perfecting economic science, or anything like that - it is only interested in installing the "one-time solution" for all time.

I don't know of what type of libertarian that you are talking about. But overall, libertarians tend to know more about economics than people with other political ideologies.

And also, much of modern economic research is moving towards explaining phenomena with tend to give strength to libertarian views. To say that libertarians want to freeze economics in the present state is wrong and bad for their own outlook. Since the direction of progress tends to favor their political views.

[Surlethe]

I'm interested in the reasons for the preference. Libertarians would generally think that a society with less taxation and government regulation generally more efficiently allocates resources over the long run, so the more efficient allocation more than makes up for the lack of a safety net after several generations.

What changes in several generations? There's multiple problems with this. First there's no evidence that it actually does this, second unless there's some control over where these resources are allocated we can't be sure this is even desirable and third if you already know what conditions you want to exist in several generations you can regulate them into being today.

No, the argument would go that, over several generations, the more efficient allocation leads to greater wealth creation. In the end state, that greater wealth more than makes up for any increased human misery along the way. As far as evidence, here's a datum. Consider the US through what Krugman calls "the long Gilded Age", from the 1870s to the 1920s. The median standard of living much improved between 1880 and 1929, and I am fairly certain that the improvements are not due solely or even largely to the first legislative victories of the progressive movement in the 1900s and 1910s.

While I'm wearing my libertarian-devil's-advocate cap, I'll concede the second point. But your third point is ridiculous. You can't wave a regulatory wand and create any economic conditions you want. Seventy years ago, it would be literally impossible to create the economic conditions of today, in large part because of technological innovation. Similarly, you can't magick wealth into existence; it has to be created, and the accumulated wealth of seventy years of economic growth is no small quantity.

[Surlethe]

There are two directions by which one could approach this conclusion. One is through blind faith that consumer and producer surplus actually measure welfare, in which case the conclusion is not a rejection of the scientific nature of economics but a scientific result: if property rights are preserved, markets are free, and externalities are minimal, welfare is maximized.

This is hardly a scientific approach - to take a single factor in a multi-factor system. If anything, it's very primitive, faulty thinking - like using Newtonian laws at relativistic speeds. Guaranteed to produce a wrong result.

It's not using a single factor, but is rather based on the argument that people will always maximize their own welfare within the limits of what they have. Therefore, all else equal, the value an individual places on a good or service is accurately represented by how much he's willing to pay for it (otherwise, if he valued it less, he would not spend the money on it). As a result, welfare is maximized as resources are allocated to the highest bidders. The argument is more subtle than simply measuring welfare by income (but is still fatally flawed).

The second argument ultimately boils down to the empirical question of how much predictive power modern economic models have. It can also be rejected on moral grounds - weighting the consequences of lack of action as much worse than likely unintentional consequences of action.

The predictive power of modern economic models, or modern economic science in general can be not yet advanced enough; but "not yet" means one has to perfect it further and further until you reach a high degree of predictive power and a high degree of control over factors in play. It is hardly reasonable to say that inaction is a reasonable course of action in any circumstances, which is what the libertarians propose.

Not necessarily all libertarians; there is quite a spectrum among libertarians as to reasonable government policy limits. Anyway, I don't think it's obvious that it's possible to perfect economics to a high degree of predictive power, any more than it's obvious that it's possible to perfect weather forecasting to a high degree of predictive power.

For them, predictive and controlling functions of economic theory are meaningless or useless, the market "solution" is the absolutely best desireable result in any situation, at any time and place. Market capitalism itself is the end of history, and any attempts to improve our understanding of the economic system by including more factors (like e.g. externalities) are simply ignored by libertarians.

Libertarianism is most certainly not interested in perfecting economic science, or anything like that - it is only interested in installing the "one-time solution" for all time.

Libertarianism, as an economic ideology, has nothing to do with science. But like all (non-pseudoscientific) ideologies, it draws on science to make arguments that support its view of how the world operates and to make policy recommendations in view of scientific knowledge of how the world works. So, for example, we might differ in how to proceed in industrializing a 3rd world country based on a common economic knowledge of growth as a function of the capital stock. You might argue that government-directed industrialization is the best way to jump-start the country because a sudden improvement in the capital stock would immediately lead to more jobs and greater productivity, whereas I (wearing my libertarian hat, of course) might argue that institution of a noncorrupt judicial system and strict property rights, leading to greater investment in the country, would be superior because while the capital stock would improve more slowly the geographic distribution of capital would be more efficient, and so on.

In any case, most libertarians would support government action to correct externalities (e.g., Milton Friedman: "Obviously there are externalities [from pollution]. There is a role for government and the question is what are the means that you use. And the answers of a free market environmentalist is you use market mechanisms. Instead of setting quantitative limits on pollution, you impose a tax."), so it is not correct to paint libertarians with such a wide brush.

So, according to this strain of thought, economic coercion may be bad, but it is passive; active coercion, even it it ultimately improves situations, is worse.

In some (warped) value systems this might hold true; but even a cursory utilitarian comparison would show that it's false. Of course, libertarians never follow utilitarianism in the first place, so in their warped value system, even coercion that improves the situation is "bad".

I wouldn't call the value systems "warped"; an individual's choice of moral systems is ultimately perfectly arbitrary. And research shows that a vast majority of individuals actually share this notion of morality; a person who can overrule his moral instincts by introspection arriving at utilitarianism is probably rare.

[Samuel]

Consider the US through what Krugman calls "the long Gilded Age", from the 1870s to the 1920s. The median standard of living much improved between 1880 and 1929, and I am fairly certain that the improvements are not due solely or even largely to the first legislative victories of the progressive movement in the 1900s and 1910s.

Except you are comparing a situation with no regulation morphing over a period of time. The proper comparison is one where it is regulated, but regulations are eliminated to achieve higher growth. Are people on average better off at the end or does most of the wealth flow into the hands of the few?

I wouldn't call the value systems "warped"; an individual's choice of moral systems is ultimately perfectly arbitrary.

No, the goals people choose are arbitrary. Methods to achieve them aren't- they must logically follow.

[TheKwas]

I don't know of what type of libertarian that you are talking about. But overall, libertarians tend to know more about economics than people with other political ideologies.

And also, much of modern economic research is moving towards explaining phenomena with tend to give strength to libertarian views. To say that libertarians want to freeze economics in the present state is wrong and bad for their own outlook. Since the direction of progress tends to favor their political views.

Bollocks.

Just about everything Libetarians believe is explained in Econ 101 and a bit in Econ Theory I: You start out with the assumptions of perfect competition and the market works fantastic.

However, once you get into the higher courses, Economic theory is all about studying how the assumptions of perfect competition don't hold in the real economy and how that changes the analysis and creates room for government. Libertarians don't like these additions and continue to assume that perfect competition is the best model for any market.

Fields like "Environmental Economics" wouldn't exist if the Libertarian view was anything near mainstream in economics.

Libertarians are stuck in econ 101, as everything beyond it suggests that a mixed economy is needed.

Go into any representative economics department, and the general belief will be in a mixed market.

[Simon_Jester]

In any case, most libertarians would support government action to correct externalities (e.g., Milton Friedman: "Obviously there are externalities [from pollution]. There is a role for government and the question is what are the means that you use. And the answers of a free market environmentalist is you use market mechanisms. Instead of setting quantitative limits on pollution, you impose a tax."), so it is not correct to paint libertarians with such a wide brush.

In principle, yes, but you're relatively unlikely to see libertarians taking the initiative on this stuff. Most of the libertarians I've talked to will admit, when pressed, that there are such things as "externalities," but they're so insensitive to them that they never notice externalities in action.

I'm impressed when I see a libertarian who can come to a problem and quickly look it over and go "Oh, right. This is an externality problem and a market solution alone will not solve it." It happens so rarely.