Libertarianism in action.

[Ritterin Sophia]

I think the problem with the Libertarian ideal is that like Communism it requires society to try and ignore basic human behavior like greed and apathy, unlike Communism though they can't complain it's never been 'truely' tried since you can simply point to the monopolies and such of the Gilded Age.

[bobalot]

Hey asshole, you didn't bother provide an answer to the problem presented. In fact, you simply reiterated the type of thinking that led to the problem presented.

I wasn't aware my status had been elevated to champion of libertarianism? I'm trying to tell you what they might say in response to some of the things, but I don't know what they'd say to some of the things.

Why did you even respond? When presented with a problem that will be inherent in any libertarian system you gave a vague answer of what someone might say. Nobody here gives a shit about some lame waffle someone might say, we are interested in substantiated arguments.

How the fuck is New Zealand largely socialistic? By what standard? Please enlighten us.

As socialist as the rest of the west except for America (which is almost there, but not quite)? Public schools, public health-care, public roads? Please understand I'm not throwing around socialism as an insult here. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think you can call it a "free market" just because you removed some of the regulations. I've got no clue how things run in New Zea land, but nothing in the OP gives the indication that suddenly the market turned into a totally unrestrained Rand paradise. Vague utterances of "deregulation" is all I've got to work with here.

So you are saying that the existence of a public health care system, public schools and public rules does indicates that New Zealand that is a "largely socialist" country? Do you even know what socialism means?

I'm not going to study up on New Zealand market legislation just so I can tell you that your post isn't a comprehensive rebuttal of an entire ideology.

I presented it as a case of libertarian ideals in practice. Which it exactly what it is. It was expected that market forces would ensure quality rather than a regulatory system. It clearly didn't. If libertarianism cannot be tested or evaluated in practice (even partially), it is a worthless ideology.

All you are implying is there were "some" regulations left, so it can't be called a "free market". This sounds like the bullshit that communists pull when the it is pointed out that the Soviet Union ended in failure.

Communist tard : I don't think you can't can call it "communist" because you implemented some of the ideals of communism, [insert bullshit reasons why the Soviet Union wasn't truly communist]

The "free market" was implemented to large extent when it came to building regulations, and it failed. This is not the first example of the failure of Libertarian ideals in practice.

[adam_grif]

Why did you even respond?

An excellent point.

[RRoan]

I think the problem with the Libertarian ideal is that like Communism it requires society to try and ignore basic human behavior like greed and apathy, unlike Communism though they can't complain it's never been 'truely' tried since you can simply point to the monopolies and such of the Gilded Age.

Unfortunately, a lot of people will say just that, just because the government actually did intervene at some point. Yes, the really extreme ones honestly believe that there was too much government regulation and interference back then, and that if it hadn't been there it would have all worked out perfectly fine. A few of the web sites I go to have a large number of Anarcho-Capitalists, and it's just amazing to me that they can actually believe that stuff.

[Ryan Thunder]

Communist tard : I don't think you can't can call it "communist" because you implemented some of the ideals of communism, [insert bullshit reasons why the Soviet Union wasn't truly communist]

Oh, it was communist alright. Run by utter fucking retards, near as I can tell, but they were definitely communist retards...

[Darth Wong]

I think the problem with the Libertarian ideal is that like Communism it requires society to try and ignore basic human behavior like greed and apathy, unlike Communism though they can't complain it's never been 'truely' tried since you can simply point to the monopolies and such of the Gilded Age.

Unfortunately, a lot of people will say just that, just because the government actually did intervene at some point. Yes, the really extreme ones honestly believe that there was too much government regulation and interference back then, and that if it hadn't been there it would have all worked out perfectly fine. A few of the web sites I go to have a large number of Anarcho-Capitalists, and it's just amazing to me that they can actually believe that stuff.

I wonder how they explain the fact that "market forces" have not punished the big banks yet, despite the fact that public anger at the banks is no secret. The fact is that "market forces" don't do dick when it comes to enforcing The Will Of The People, and no amount of libertarian broken-record preaching will change that fact.

[aerius]

I wonder how they explain the fact that "market forces" have not punished the big banks yet, despite the fact that public anger at the banks is no secret.

Because everyone knows the banks are being bailed out and protected by the government, if it weren't for the government all those bankers would be lynched and we'd have a sound financial system. It's all Obama's fault, fucking socialist! Yes, that's an actual argument I've heard, I need to stop reading the loony pages.

Getting back on topic, people think I'm joking when I tell them they should look to China if they want to enjoy libertarian freemarket capitalism. They got slaves working for a dollar a day, they do this to their environment, there's corruption & bribes out the wazoo, and if you happen to be one of the bigshots you're connected, set for life, and fucking filthy rich. Because you have a million wage slaves working for you in your factories and you have the proper authorities bought off to keep it that way. But if you're not one of those lucky few, well, living on wellfare over here is probably better than being a wage slave over there.

[Crossroads Inc.]

Thething about most Libertarians, is that they don't care about all that nasty stuff... Because for MOST Libertarians, Especially in America, what it's really about is just getting "Da Gov'mnt" off their backs. Which is THEE big thing for me because no amount of Free Economy will be able to do some things the Government does.

Whenever i battle Libertarians, I always bring out the following argument. 'Infrastructure'
Power:
Water:
Sanitation:
Roads:

The tenant at the CORE of Libertariansim is that anything the Government can do, the 'Free Market' can do better. Well I'd really, REALLY like to see someone come in and start their own sanitation and garbage/waste collections company. Sure you can pay a garbage man to take away garbage... But sewage waste? How exactly is a private company going to make money off that? And Power and Water, oh sure, there are easy ways to make money from selling power and water.. But the powerlines? Watermains? Most companies are using pipes and lines that have been around for decades, most of THOSE having been built by...The government. Could any private company make a profit if it had to build its own Power or waterlines across a Whole Country?

And finally, my personal favorite, Roads. Not transportation.. But roads.. Oh sure, you can have Toll roads, and Toll bridges.. But could you imagine any private company building the staggering amount of roads, highways, freeways and intersections? And trying to SOMEHOW charge them all? You could never do it!

Like Communism, Libertarians seek to utterly and totally replace a current form of government with their own ideals. If they seek to do this, they are going to have to consider a replacement for Every Last Thing the current Government does. You can't just abolish an existing system and say "We'll sort everything out later, the Free Market provides" No sorry, we tried that and got the USSR, and we all know how well THAT Worked out.

[muse]

Getting back on topic, people think I'm joking when I tell them they should look to China if they want to enjoy libertarian freemarket capitalism.

And don't forget the poisoned milk and baby food, lead contaminated kids' toys, drywall soaked with formaldehyde and god knows what else. In the west we have government paid inspectors to screen this stuff and keep it off the shelves, in China, I'd hate to think of how many kids were killed by all the poisoned stuff.

[Darth Wong]

Well I'd really, REALLY like to see someone come in and start their own sanitation and garbage/waste collections company. Sure you can pay a garbage man to take away garbage... But sewage waste? How exactly is a private company going to make money off that? And Power and Water, oh sure, there are easy ways to make money from selling power and water.. But the powerlines? Watermains? Most companies are using pipes and lines that have been around for decades, most of THOSE having been built by...The government. Could any private company make a profit if it had to build its own Power or waterlines across a Whole Country?

There are actually private waste collection companies, but they come in two flavours: contractors for private industry, and contractors for government. Even when private industry gets into the garbage collection business, government taxes people to pay for the service, and then pays the private garbage collection business.

If everyone had to pay for their own garbage collection, the rate of littering would go up enormously, because it's cheaper to dump garbage bags in the park at midnight than it is to pay for the garbage collection. Sure, not everyone would do it, but enough people would do it to ruin the park.

Of course, this is where we run into the startling naivete of libertarians. Libertarians believe in a world where:

1) Your moral conduct always coincides with your material self-interest.
2) Everyone else's moral conduct always coincides with everyone's collective material self-interest.
3) Everyone can be assumed to agree with premises #1 and #2.

[Shroom Man 777]

Libertarians take society's generosities for granted because they're pampered and spoiled shits, no different from those anti-vaccination people who mostly come from countries that are well-off and not ravaged by disease. They're basically tools who overvalue their luxuries without even thinking about the true worth of things, of consequences, and of the exact nature of what it is they really want. They can't appreciate what their positions really mean because they're too well-off to even consider for a moment the things they'll lose off because they've never experienced or even thought about what it means to be deprived of those things they take for granted.

[Darth Wong]

Libertarians take society's generosities for granted because they're pampered and spoiled shits, no different from those anti-vaccination people who mostly come from countries that are well-off and not ravaged by disease. They're basically tools who overvalue their luxuries without even thinking about the true worth of things, of consequences, and of the exact nature of what it is they really want. They can't appreciate what their positions really mean because they're too well-off to even consider for a moment the things they'll lose off because they've never experienced or even thought about what it means to be deprived of those things they take for granted.

Well, that's one category. There's also the douchebags who think "I have rich parents so I'd be fine in a libertarian shithole country where rich people live in privately secured gated communities and everyone else lives in squalor", and the unwitting neo-Marxists who don't actually realize that they're neo-Marxists because they don't call themselves that. You know, the guys who envision "communities" getting together and spontaneously solving problems co-operatively using free-market principles, never noticing the Marxist parallels because "community" is a slightly different word than "commune".

[Shroom Man 777]

I think the former is a distinct minority, because that's just too honest for them.

[Darth Wong]

I think the former is a distinct minority, because that's just too honest for them.

You'd be surprised. I've run into the kind of asshole who shrugs about poverty and says "consequences of failure".

[Spyder]

Yep, that's the National party for you. We're talking about people that admire the American health care system and are working towards that level of privatization. They're actually in power at the moment and will probably remain there for some time so we're all waiting to see what new and innovative ways they come up with to fuck us over next.

[Shroom Man 777]

I think the former is a distinct minority, because that's just too honest for them.

You'd be surprised. I've run into the kind of asshole who shrugs about poverty and says "consequences of failure".

Oh, right, that's a major political platform and position in places like America.

[Surlethe]

I wonder how they explain the fact that "market forces" have not punished the big banks yet, despite the fact that public anger at the banks is no secret. The fact is that "market forces" don't do dick when it comes to enforcing The Will Of The People, and no amount of libertarian broken-record preaching will change that fact.

That's a pretty poor argument against libertarians: the entire fucking financial system was on the verge of collapse (i.e., in the process of being punished by market forces) until the government stepped in and bailed it out. What is The Will Of The People, anyway? Wouldn't you say that one way it's expressed is market forces, since market forces are just the collective result of The People making their decisions?

[Darth Wong]

Gee, thanks for reminding me of the bank bailout, as if I've never fucking heard of it before. The point is that the market has no way of punishing the banks now, nor will it ever. Do you honestly believe that "market forces" will ever punish the banks in any way? Do you believe that "market forces" will punish the executives? Wall Street has jumped back into financials both feet first.

[Surlethe]

Come on, if you're arguing with a libertarian, he's not going to let you get away with citing a result of government intervention as a consequence of the free market. If the government hadn't stepped in, the banks would have collapsed like the burned-out shells of businesses that they are; that would have been plenty of free-market punishment for their foolishness. It's just wrong to say that there was no mechanism in place for exacting discipline upon the financial institutions. (The executives are a different matter, but that's different from your original point.)

[J]

I'd argue that in the lack of government intervention, the banks will create some form of bailout mechanism for themselves so they can continue to loot the people, in fact that's what happened prior to the passage of the TARP/EESA bill last fall. The financial powers that be more or less held a gun to the government's head and said "if you don't bail us out, we'll kill the economy and ruin the country".

The end result of a libertarian system isn't a free market where corporations can succeed and fail based on their merits or lack thereof, rather, it results in the megacorps buying enough influence to further solidify their position in power and loot even more wealth by any means they can. I'd say that what you have in America now where the government is owned by various big industries (financials, healthcare, etc.) is the final product of a mature libertarian system, the megacorps have succeeded in consolidating their power & influence to help themselves at the expense of everyone else. J.P. Morgan would have giggle fits if he were still alive to see what his eponymous company is now doing to the US Treasury, government, and taxpayers.

[Surlethe]

I'd argue that in the lack of government intervention, the banks will create some form of bailout mechanism for themselves so they can continue to loot the people, in fact that's what happened prior to the passage of the TARP/EESA bill last fall. The financial powers that be more or less held a gun to the government's head and said "if you don't bail us out, we'll kill the economy and ruin the country".

That argument doesn't work: if you are going to assume lack of government intervention, you have to assume that the government is not going to step in if the banks threaten them. That's what happened, e.g., in the Great Depression and in the various financial crises during the Gilded Age. In other words, lack of government intervention also prevents the banks from getting handouts.

The end result of a libertarian system isn't a free market where corporations can succeed and fail based on their merits or lack thereof, rather, it results in the megacorps buying enough influence to further solidify their position in power and loot even more wealth by any means they can. I'd say that what you have in America now where the government is owned by various big industries (financials, healthcare, etc.) is the final product of a mature libertarian system, the megacorps have succeeded in consolidating their power & influence to help themselves at the expense of everyone else. J.P. Morgan would have giggle fits if he were still alive to see what his eponymous company is now doing to the US Treasury, government, and taxpayers.

Oh, I certainly agree to this. The problem with any sort of government is the balancing act between expressing the will of the people and expressing the will of the highest bidder. Note, though - this is an interesting counterargument - that in a libertarian fantasy world, the government will have very little power, so when it is inevitably bought out by corporate interests (as in the Gilded Age) it won't be able to do much damage. When it has a lot of power, as now, and is bought out, it can fuck things over pretty good.

[Lord of the Abyss]

Note, though - this is an interesting counterargument - that in a libertarian fantasy world, the government will have very little power, so when it is inevitably bought out by corporate interests (as in the Gilded Age) it won't be able to do much damage. When it has a lot of power, as now, and is bought out, it can fuck things over pretty good.

The problem with that libertarian argument is that in such a libertarian fantasy world, the corporations don't need to buy out the government to wield tyrannical power; they already have that kind of power in such a world.

[J]

Oh, I certainly agree to this. The problem with any sort of government is the balancing act between expressing the will of the people and expressing the will of the highest bidder. Note, though - this is an interesting counterargument - that in a libertarian fantasy world, the government will have very little power, so when it is inevitably bought out by corporate interests (as in the Gilded Age) it won't be able to do much damage. When it has a lot of power, as now, and is bought out, it can fuck things over pretty good.

On the other hand the end result is the same; the people are bent over and forcibly sodomized. Whether it's the corporations which are doing it or the government via the corporations, the people and the nation will take it up the poop chute with no lube.

[Winston Blake]

It should be theoretically possible to whip up a state that functions exactly like conventional moderate socialism does (i.e. most of the world) through the use of contracts and other Libertarian-friendly things. Just instead of the police charging you with "violation of Environmental Protection law", it will be "violation of contract to XYZ corporation". You might say that defeats the purpose of it completely, but my experience with Libertarians seems to be that they don't hate the consequences of socialism, they hate the idea of the government pulling it all off. For some reason.

I'm a complete noob at all this, but this has inspired a thought which I find interesting: the various branches of government may naturally arise in a contract-based society (if it's required to not implode).

This is how I imagine a Libertarian society would look: there would be consumers, corporations, and a lot of a third party surveyors, valuers, etc. The third parties are employed by the consumers to guard against the greed of the corporations. To avoid being bought by the corps, the third parties would need to be kept honest by an additional layer of contracts; contracts with bodies which can arbitrate impartially.

Now, how can these arbitration bodies be kept impartial? By them having contracts with all potential clients which outline their responsibilities. Individual identical contracts for all consumers would be much less practical than an 'open contract'. Criteria for defining 'potential clients' would mimic citizenship criteria. Further, the various bodies will naturally want to co-ordinate with each other to share best practices, such as established derivations for solutions to common arbitration problems (~ legal precedent). I.e. they become effectively centralised.

To summarise, the legislative and judicial branches of government are mimicked by the arbitration bodies, citizenship arises naturally, and this hypothetical state even has a pseudo-constitution! I suppose the executive branch is mimicked by the top-level negotiations between the biggest corporations, which may be contractually required to publish proceedings. These contracts would of course be enforced by the arbitration branch, which resembles how 'ordinary' states work. Libertarians would look on in trepidation as 'the government' reconstitutes itself after being blasted away, like a liquid-metal Terminator.

(The main difference is that the consumers have no input into legislative decisions. I think representative decision-making would not 'naturally arise'. It would have to be imposed; most societies throughout history have been run 'from the top'.)

[Simon_Jester]

I'm a complete noob at all this, but this has inspired a thought which I find interesting: the various branches of government may naturally arise in a contract-based society (if it's required to not implode).

(emphasis added)

Yeah. That emphasized bit is the catch, though. If all those branches of government don't arise on their own, the contract-based society will implode. Reasoning "OK, what kind of institutions do we need to keep our newly deregulated contract-based society from imploding?" and then expecting those institutions to evolve naturally gets evolution backwards, because evolution doesn't spontaneously generate pro-survival features simply because those features are pro-survival.

Instead, we need to attack the problem from the other end: if we start with a society where no one has the power to do social engineering, what happens when free agents start operating within the rules of the system? What happens when they start finding motives to break the explicit rules? Or the implicit assumptions that underly the rules? Imagine that people are not automatically constrained by divine intervention to act only in ways that promote the system. If so, then can the system survive the people who will inevitably try to break its rules, either because they want it to fail or because they are indifferent to its success?

The biggest problem with libertarianism is that by and large, libertarian thinkers don't do that. They see a proposed problem with their system and think "what kind of institution could exist within my system stop this from happening?" Then they assume that such an institution will appear out of nowhere to save the day: demand guaranteeing supply.

EDIT: this is why I think one of the artistically better presentations of extreme libertarianism I've seen is the game Bioshock, in which the whole thing falls apart as soon as anyone ambitious enough to try taking over starts making a real effort to do so. By the time you get there, the place has degenerated into full-blown civil war.

The deranged mutants wandering the halls are just a bonus...