The Financial Times announces the end of libertarianism as a political force. Evidence: the failure of soc-sec privatization, and individual health-care accounts. Problem: neither of these were really libertarian ideas.
Source link: http://blog.mises.org/5478/the-end-of-libertarianism-sort-of/
The End of Libertarianism (sort of)
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Precisely, Jeff. The FT article is completely off-base. A more trenchant analysis would have been on the end of the US Libertarian Party as a political force.
“The libertarians launched a massive intellectual and rhetorical assault on modern government from the 1970s onward. Their formidable forces included influential economists such as Milton Friedman, the Nobel Prize winner, and Martin Feldstein, who chaired Ronald Reagan’s Council of Economic Advisers; think-tanks such as the Cato Institute; and affluent pressure groups such as the Club for Growth and Americans for Tax Reform, whose leader, Grover Norquist, famously said that government should be shrunk until it can be drowned in a bathtub.”
What? No mention of Rothbard, Block or mises.org? No LRC? I would think that they must first be able to identify the more significant aspects of a movement before they can claim it is now dead.
“The demise of both socialism and libertarianism pretty much limits the field to moderate social democracy and big-government conservatism.”
Socialism is also dead along with libertarianism? This report of socialism’s demise I think, has also been greatly exaggerated. This is pretty funny since both social democracy and big-government conservatism, which the author indicates are alive and kicking, are themselves both certainly their own variations of socialism.
Not only has the author failed to identify key elements of the libertarian movement, he also fails to recognize the two currently most popular forms of socialism. This puts into perspective the quality of the scholarship behind this article.
“The libertarian moment has passed. It will not come again, and its defeat as a force in US politics will change the definitions of right, left and centre – not just in the US but also, the world.”
LOL! Where does the mainstream dig up these clowns and jackasses? This reminds me of Fukuyama’s BS “End of History” thesis. The quality of this kind of analysis is what would have given Soviet Russia’s socialism a clean bill of health right up to the point of its collapse. Too funny.
I can smell their fear.
What is so funny (and pathetic) about editorials such as this one is that they bemoan “free markets” without ever explicitly rejecting freedom and/or explicitly promoting socialism or fascism. These “commentaries” are weak and their authors should be called on it every time.
Paul Edwards> This is pretty funny since both social democracy and big-government conservatism, which the author indicates are alive and kicking, are themselves both certainly their own variations of socialism.
It took me awhile, but I eventually figured out that the press’s and the general populace’s understanding of libertarianism was about as keen as anything other political-social-economic matter. Which is to say nonexistant. They are morons. It turns out that they don’t know what the words “libertarianism,” “socialism,” “conservativism,” , and “liberalism” even mean. Once you know they don’t speak English, you quit attempting discourse with any frequency. I seldom read/watch pop-politics anymore.
Re the FT piece. Who the heck is Martin Feldstein? And what the heck is “libertarian” about vouchers? The author of this FT hack opinion piece knows nothing, absolutely nothing. I bet he failed math, physics and, in the event the skool he attended had such classes, he likely failed logic and history. In short, he has a bright future at almost any foundation or governmental advisory panel. Good job. Buy a benz and drink dom, fool.
You’re right. None of these ideas are necessarily libertarian ideas. They are are more accurately described as Chicagoite/Friedmanite ideas, i.e. right-corporatist policies. Most of the platforms he listed come right out of Friedman’s books nd writings.
I don’t necessarily believe that these policies are BAD for the cause of liberty and libertarianism. Rather, I see them as a point we need to cross over to get where we want to be.
I see the problem with social security privatization: If the gov’t has to approve what stocks can be bought w/ the accouts, the market will be heavily distorted. But what if we simply gave account holders ownership of pubic debt? Incoming SS reciepts would match the size of the defecit. If SS reciepts exceed the defecit size, the rest is refunded to the taxpayer. No, it’s not libertarianism, and no, it’s not where we want to be, but it’s a start.
Health care can be fixed if we repealed Corporate taxation, thereby removing the inventive for employee-provided healthcare (which is where many of the problems stem from).
Articles like this just confirm my own personal experience: For many people, their first exposure to self-declared libertarians are Republicans Who Like To Smoke Pot, like Insta-Pundit. First impressions matter in this game, and libertarianism as a whole loses a lot when loudmouth RWLTSP don the title “libertarian”.
Perhaps its time to surrender the term, as we have with liberal, and find a new one to distinguish ourselves from RWLTSP.
“If the gov’t has to approve what stocks can be bought w/ the accouts, the market will be heavily distorted”
Nick, I see it as even more basic than that. The fact that the money is invested no matter what (even if gov’t were totally hands off on which investments were made) distorts the market – people are no longer free to choose not to invest at all, and that is the fundamental difference between a free market and a monopoly (i.e., why monopolies can’t exist in a true free market).
quasibill,
You raise an excellent point that cannot be made too often. 401k’s, IRA’s, ESA’s, et al. are only about one step above an outright transfer payment.
That was strange. Not only does he clearly not know what libertarian is, but my opinion is that Libertarianisim is exploding – that the internet has killed the old media and with it their monopoly on beliefs. Back in the early 90′s – every Libertarian idea I talked about was met with hatred and harsh critizim. Libertarian thinkers and mentally retarted people were catagroized as the same. Now it almost seems like it’s a norm, like it’s not a problem. When I say communisim doesn’t work, no one blinks an eye. When I say, public schools are bad for kids – no one is shocked anymore. When I say welfare hruts the poor, no one looks at me like I’m crazy. When I say, social security won’t be there for you, they agree!!! End the war on drugs, guns don’t kill people do, taxation is theft, paper money is trash, … none of these illicit the “you’re a retard hick” response that they used to.
Now Mises and gold is mentioned in the NYT, Ron Paul is touted as a rogue hero. I would have lost a million dollars on those bets. From my perspective it seems like a Libertarian Renissance is starting up. Am I just seeing thins?
For a while now I’ve beengoing right to the core, and using “anarchist”.
But seriously, the Smithian (as in L. Neil, not Adam) “Propertarian” deserves some consideration.
Since private property is the basic premise, it seems good to me. Thoughts?
Libertarians have never had much influence with anyone except Libertarians. Couple hundred years ago someone noted that the USofA would last until the poor people discovered they could vote themselves money. The poor people have discovered that they can vote themselves money.
Here’s my comment from the Marginal Revolution blog:
I’m rather inclined to discount the small amount of the earth not covered by God’s Own Country (the US of A), but it would seem odd to call a political ideology dead based entirely on one country (a term that does not quite describe the U.S.S.R). Furthermore, the changes in the political fortunes of libertarianism do not seem that momentous. Perhaps it was never alive, and anarchism has always been even deader?
I think some of the posters here seem as out-of-it as the “libertarianism is dead” dopes. While the Chicago School & Cato is not the be-all end-all of libertarianism, the only people that don’t recognize them as libertarian are the nutballs over here. There are a lot more of them then the SUPERHARDCOREAUSTROANARCHISTS, so in forming such a larger portion of the libertarian movement they’ve got a better claim to the name. Just like how all my ranting about how the term “liberals” should really apply to classicals rather than modern progressives (and I sincerely hope they all switch to that term so “liberal” can be reclaimed), doesn’t change the fact that in the United States when anyone says “liberal”, they are referring to an ideology associated with the New Deal and a post-modern smorgasbord of nonsense.
I wonder if any Randians will proclaim that they told us “libertarianism” was a stupid idea and we should all convert to Objectivism.
The Financial Times announces the end of libertarianism as a political force. Evidence: the failure of soc-sec privatization, and individual health-care accounts. Problem: neither of these were really libertarian ideas.
They were the closest thing to libertarian ideas in the mainstream. If those market-oriented ideas are dead, then libertarianism proper was never alive in the first place, since no one is proposing our ideas.
Wild, that’s not correct. When I said these are not libertarian ideas, I did NOT mean that they are only half measures. I meant that they are not consistent with libertarianism. Soc-Sec Priv would have meant vast new government spending, debt, and probably new taxes. Private med accounts would have come with mandates and something of a national health-care minimum provision. These ideas used libertarian rhetoric but the reality was statist. So their failure was the failure of statist reform. (The same goes for vouchers–and what a catastrophe that has been!)
jeffrey, if socialist teachers’ unions derail a voucher proposal, would you consider that a “victory for libertarianism”? And to complement Wild’s point, what would you consider to be genuine recent libertarian victories?
Would I cheer the defeat of a voucher proposal that spent tax dollars to put private schools on the government payroll? You bet. Some estimates say a national voucher program would cost $300 billion plus! For goodness sake, person, that’s not a good thing.
What would I consider a victory? It’s not difficult: anything that brings more liberty and less statism.
TGGP, Wild Pegasus, and Person:
You all have very good points, in a rhetorical sense, about the current political establishment’s views. But what about the reality of the proposals that are called libertarian? Socialist teachers’ unions(?) do one thing, fascist conservative/”libertarian” think tanks(?) say another thing, etc., etc., but so what? The only thing that seems to ever be a consistent libertarian “winner” is when new bills/proposals are defeated.
If anything, the failure of classical liberals and “SUPERHARDCOREAUSTROANARCHISTS” is that they (we?) don’t speak clearly (and consistently) enough about what true liberty is all about. Instead, a lot of nonsensical fooling around is done by some who call themselves libertarians, including trying to warm up to the “respected” (by the big media?) establishment and coming up with half-brained (statist) reforms.
I question the validity — wait, I deny the validity — of mainstream big media commentary about what the average person really thinks. The establishment media seems (albeit apparently not by conscious design) like one big propoganda machine for statism. The only way to stop it (discredit it) is to dispute the “facts” written by the reporters and editorialists — a good opportunity to promote the ideas of true liberty or at least stop the advance of statist. On that note, thank goodness for blogs!
Person, Jeffery,
I used to support vouchers also, but that was until I realized that it would only lead to (further) gov’t regulation of private schools.
My proposal for the schools is far mare radical, and may even sound left-wing, but it is assuredly not.
I propose radical syndicalism for the schools. Hans-Hermann Hoppe proposed this idea for some of the socialized assets in E. Europe, and it sounds like an excellent plan. Basically, classical syndicalism states that the workers in a business are the true owners of the business. Most syndicalists therefore propose that workers sieze the factory from the owner, to give an example. However, Hoppe proposed that workers in state-run industries ARE the true owners if the original owners of exproriated property cannot be determined (as would be the case with public schools, since they were never privately owned). Since it is an unowned (public) good, those who have “mixed their labor” with it, in a Lockean sense, get first rights to ownership.
In this scenario, a consortium of teachers’ Union locals, principals, administratos, and the staffs would take ownership of the schools. School income would be in the form of the average amount spent per student in the district, multiplied by the number of students who attend their school. Students would be immediately free to leave the school, with their money, and go to any school they please, whether it would be one of the new union-owned schools or a private school. All of the new union schools would be instantly more efficient, as they are now driven by profit and the desire to preserve the capital value of their assets. Every school, then, would offer different criteria and settings. True School Choice!
In addition, I believe that many of the schools would be sold off by the unions to private companies.
The best thing about it is: who would oppose it? The teachers’ unions wouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth and reject a multi-billion dollar gift. Parents wouldn’t reject it, as they would now have 100% school choice.
I like the plan myself
What do you all think???
Nick,
“I propose radical syndicalism for the schools. Hans-Hermann Hoppe proposed this idea for some of the socialized assets in E. Europe, and it sounds like an excellent plan. Basically, classical syndicalism states that the workers in a business are the true owners of the business. Most syndicalists therefore propose that workers sieze the factory from the owner, to give an example. However, Hoppe proposed that workers in state-run industries ARE the true owners if the original owners of exproriated property cannot be determined (as would be the case with public schools, since they were never privately owned). Since it is an unowned (public) good, those who have “mixed their labor” with it, in a Lockean sense, get first rights to ownership.”
I dispute that the original owners of the expropriated property that funded the public schools can not be identified. The owners of the public schools, very far from it being the public school employees unions and administrators, are the net tax payers of the community that funded the school all along. The school employees are justified in getting absolutely no stake in the privatization of the school as they have from the start been net tax consumers. It is this principle which denies that those who run the state apparatus should benefit when aspects of that state are disbanded and its assets are distributed.
“In this scenario, a consortium of teachers’ Union locals, principals, administratos, and the staffs would take ownership of the schools.”
This would be the final outrageous highway robbery of the tax-payer.
“School income would be in the form of the average amount spent per student in the district, multiplied by the number of students who attend their school.”
School income would become whatever the new shareholders of the school (the tax-payers) could obtain by marketing to and attracting paying customers willing to pay the tuition.
“Students would be immediately free to leave the school, with their money, and go to any school they please, whether it would be one of the new union-owned schools or a private school. All of the new union schools would be instantly more efficient, as they are now driven by profit and the desire to preserve the capital value of their assets. Every school, then, would offer different criteria and settings. True School Choice!”
I’m all for it except for the one ghastly provision that the union would own the school. That would be a great travesty of justice.
“In addition, I believe that many of the schools would be sold off by the unions to private companies.”
Probably, but the unions have no just claim on the assets expropriated from the tax-payers. In fact, by virtue of them being such a pox on education and society, if justice were truly served, they would owe a debt back to the tax-payer.
“The best thing about it is: who would oppose it?”
I would.
“The teachers’ unions wouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth and reject a multi-billion dollar gift.”
LOL! I’m sure. But what an ironic twist of fate that a band of criminals that had been colluding with the state for so long should benefit so outrageously, and in the name of libertarian progress. It’s a sickening thought.
“Parents wouldn’t reject it, as they would now have 100% school choice.”
I am more concerned about how the tax-payers of the community would take it; Having been fleeced by property taxes all these years only to have to suffer one last insult of having the what’s left of their capital turned over to the unions and school administrators.
Are you sure like this plan?
Wild Pegasus;
“The Financial Times announces the end of libertarianism as a political force. Evidence: the failure of soc-sec privatization, and individual health-care accounts. Problem: neither of these were really libertarian ideas.
They were the closest thing to libertarian ideas in the mainstream. If those market-oriented ideas are dead, then libertarianism proper was never alive in the first place, since no one is proposing our ideas.”
I have an alternate theory – the general public recognizes these scemes as the frauds they are, and sensibly avoids them. When I talk to people about anarcho-capitalist ideas, many of them are surprisingly accepting. Apparently, there are more libertarians than you think…
Wild Pegasus;
“The Financial Times announces the end of libertarianism as a political force. Evidence: the failure of soc-sec privatization, and individual health-care accounts. Problem: neither of these were really libertarian ideas.
They were the closest thing to libertarian ideas in the mainstream. If those market-oriented ideas are dead, then libertarianism proper was never alive in the first place, since no one is proposing our ideas.”
I have an alternate theory – the general public recognizes these schemes as fraudulent, worse for them than even the current bad system, and sensibly avoids them. When I talk to people about anarcho-capitalist ideas, many of them are surprisingly accepting. Apparently, there are more libertarians than you think…
Vince – that’s exactly my point.
Many people see right through the self-contradictory BS that is RWLTSP and rightfully denounce it. Problem is, they don’t call it RWLTSP, they call it “libertarian”. It’s something an advocate of liberty must be aware of when dealing with the public at large: If you use the term “libertarian” there is often ALOT of baggage that immediately gets attached to you.
Paul Edwards,
If you read Democracy: The God that Failed, Hoppe touches on the reason why taxpayers couldn’t necessarily be the owners. How would you know how much of YOUR money was spent on the school? When tax dollars enter the state system, property rights are scrambled and spit out the other side. I guess, theoretically, that you could tally up the percent of a government’s budget was spent on education, then give the taxpayers a share in porportion to that number. For example, If a gov’t spend 25% of all expenditures on education over the past 50 years, taxpayers would be entitled to 25% of all the money they have paid in taxes to that government, in the form of shares in the school system. You would then subtract an amount equal to how much those taxpayers used the school. I just don’t think that the original owners, the taxpayers, could ever be determined.
I also believe that this is one possible was to “Break out of the box” to privatize and industry.
Despite our mutual disdain for the current politics of unions, you must admit that if the original owners cannot be determined, those who have “mixed their labor” with the school system have first right to it.
I would also find it highly ironic that the most socialist element of our society, union leadership and educators, would be turned overnight into capitalists! This would, in addition, eliminate a major source of push-back against libertarian goals. Finally, perhaps it is because the schools are so socialized is the cause of the left-wing views of educators.
Libertarianism isn’t dead, it’s just been put on the back burner by society. Once again, mainstream politics and economics have gone crazy, and libertarianism has been pushed out.
The same thing happened during the Vietnam War- the libertarians made alliances with the Left, and the conservatives showed themselves to be a bunch of jingoistic fanatics, and condemned the libertarians to be forevermore rejected by conservatism.
Of course, when the mania was over, libertarianism came back stronger than ever. I predict the same thing happening again- when this war mania is over, people will realize that libertarians were the only ones talking sense, and will flock to libertarians in large numbers.
Jeff and others:
The author of the piece cited was Michael Lind, now at The New America Foundation. His email address is lind@newamerica.net
Links tp his recent work are here: http://www.newamerica.net/people/michael_lind
Pieces like this are part of Lind’s schtick; as this commentary at NRO notes: “Michael Lind became a little famous in the mid 1990s for declaring, with entirely imagined authority, that the “conservative intellectual movement†had “died.—
http://www.nationalreview.com/goldberg/goldberg121001.shtml
Lind is absolutely correct on both points.
Libertarianism remains a potent ideology, but it is mostly the province of academics and their students. The point Lind is really making is that libertarianism as a political force it is dead, and I don’t think it will revive until and if social democracy collapses.
Lind is also correct that the conservative intellectual movement is dead, since its proponents have been banished as dangerous reactionaries and racists by a certain group currently very influential in the Republican Party and Bush administration. The fact that a stupid silver-spooned twerp who got his job solely because of his last name wrote this hatchet piece simply underscores Lind’s point.
To add a bit of perspective: this opinion piece came on the heels of PM Tony Blair propounding that any future depression will result from the effects of global warming. By implication, he denied that an unsound monetary system would be the cause of a future one.
Presumably, the FT thinks that this is enough of a “take-out” to kill libertarianism’s major outreach point: fiat money and a government-controlled fractional reserve banking system will result in another depression. Thanks to PM Blair, so is the Financial Times’ guess, any future economic trouble will be grist for the Greens, not for libertarians.
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