(You give multiple excellent reasons against forced-charity programs. When reasons are disjuncts, logically those opposed need to refute them all; but observe that, in politics, almost inevitably they try to refute only one.)
These folks say, "You need to stop gatekeeping the word 'libertarian.'" I would like to be corrected, but I think they implicitly define "libertarianism" as "do your own thing, whatever it is, and there will be no consequences, insofar as the state can arrange it."
I say this with perfect moral and intellectual neutrality: they are kidnapping the label "libertarian." Not for the same reasons, but precisely in the way that the label "liberal" (formerly and globally meaning "friend of liberty, suspicious of government") was kidnapped in 1920s and especially 1930s America by progressives, friends of government, suspicious of liberty. That was because the Edith Wilson administration had successfully disgraced the label "progressive." Old-fashioned liberals (including Herbert Hoover and Milton Friedman) complained then and since.
(Today's leftists, ignorant of or even proud of progressivism's disgrace, has reanimated it, and may even be moving leftward/Sharia-ward beyond it.)
(We few remaining friends of liberty, suspicious of government, evince no temptation to reacquire the obsolescent label "liberal," unless carefully guarded by the prefix "classical.")
It is not just that now even some self-called libertarians are willing to entertain programs that make no sense (taxing everyone to help everyone) or are "indefensible" (current social programs). It is that, even for some self-called libertarians, for a policy to make sense is no longer an absolute requirement, nor perhaps even a desideratum.
Again, I say all this with no ethical or intellectual reflection at all upon these people, to whom I offer the open hand of friendship and curiosity. (Assuming that friendship and curiosity are both offered by the same hand.)
Not following you, Mr. or Ms. 41. Do you think Prof. Friedman is confused by the just-world fallacy, or the self-called libertarians he calls into question, or some third parties? And what, more explicitly, is your argument?
Caplan (hypocrite), ensconced in his ivory tower funded by taxpayers and protected by tenure, waxes about the rationality of libertarianism. And he is right, as long as you ignore human nature and the empiric record of people using govt to take other peoples shit.
Libertarians are pedants dying on the hill of being technically correct and utterly impotent.
Very good post and more relevant than ever. It should be phrased more bluntly though. In the soft-core libertarian list are items implying that Social Security and Medicare were a bad idea. It isn't quite "Eliminate them!", because of transition costs, but I think anyone we call a libertarian has to wish Social Security and Medicare didn't exist. This is not for "membership", but to make the word mean something. A lot of people, I think, say they are libertarians but it just means they favor slightly lower taxes and marijuana (but not fentanyl) legalization. That is, they have no consistent principles.
A major issue, even if one wanted to roll back the welfare state, is that (a) government has already made explicit and implicit promises of provisions many years into the future (b) whole populations have structured their lives around these promises (c) 'pay as you go' mean that the 'entry' generation got benefits without contributions while the 'exit' generation will have to pay contributions without benefits and still self-provide for their own futures.
All of that means that winding down the welfare state is a multi-decadal project even if there is the political will for it.
"Through no fault of their own" I think is the key phrase that can be extended to cover most cases depending on how much agency you ascribe to people. It's no fault of their own if people have abusive parents, if they got poor sleep before the big exam, if they have a hyperactive dopamine system that makes addiction hard to avoid, if they got in a car accident, if they got sick, if they have low IQ, etc. You might say a reasonable person could take action to hedge each of these risks. And taken individually that works for some, but they tend to stack and for some people become intractable over time, especially as we get older.
As far as relying on charity we tried that, it's where we started.
I particularly appreciate your ninth point, on immigration, which seems to me to be very relevant at the moment. Alas, I don't think many people in the west really care about making global absolute poverty worse.
Well, they do seem to want to make it worse, in a desultory way, provided social desirability bias is appeased; perhaps by encouraging radical political movements in countries less potent than one's own; but not so much as actually to cost themselves something valuable to bring it about.
I agree throughout. But.
(You give multiple excellent reasons against forced-charity programs. When reasons are disjuncts, logically those opposed need to refute them all; but observe that, in politics, almost inevitably they try to refute only one.)
These folks say, "You need to stop gatekeeping the word 'libertarian.'" I would like to be corrected, but I think they implicitly define "libertarianism" as "do your own thing, whatever it is, and there will be no consequences, insofar as the state can arrange it."
I say this with perfect moral and intellectual neutrality: they are kidnapping the label "libertarian." Not for the same reasons, but precisely in the way that the label "liberal" (formerly and globally meaning "friend of liberty, suspicious of government") was kidnapped in 1920s and especially 1930s America by progressives, friends of government, suspicious of liberty. That was because the Edith Wilson administration had successfully disgraced the label "progressive." Old-fashioned liberals (including Herbert Hoover and Milton Friedman) complained then and since.
(Today's leftists, ignorant of or even proud of progressivism's disgrace, has reanimated it, and may even be moving leftward/Sharia-ward beyond it.)
(We few remaining friends of liberty, suspicious of government, evince no temptation to reacquire the obsolescent label "liberal," unless carefully guarded by the prefix "classical.")
It is not just that now even some self-called libertarians are willing to entertain programs that make no sense (taxing everyone to help everyone) or are "indefensible" (current social programs). It is that, even for some self-called libertarians, for a policy to make sense is no longer an absolute requirement, nor perhaps even a desideratum.
Again, I say all this with no ethical or intellectual reflection at all upon these people, to whom I offer the open hand of friendship and curiosity. (Assuming that friendship and curiosity are both offered by the same hand.)
Also know as https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_fallacy
We can say (I think with justification) that the world is just *on average*. Just not each individual case.
Not following you, Mr. or Ms. 41. Do you think Prof. Friedman is confused by the just-world fallacy, or the self-called libertarians he calls into question, or some third parties? And what, more explicitly, is your argument?
Another correct, irrelevant screed.
Caplan (hypocrite), ensconced in his ivory tower funded by taxpayers and protected by tenure, waxes about the rationality of libertarianism. And he is right, as long as you ignore human nature and the empiric record of people using govt to take other peoples shit.
Libertarians are pedants dying on the hill of being technically correct and utterly impotent.
Very good post and more relevant than ever. It should be phrased more bluntly though. In the soft-core libertarian list are items implying that Social Security and Medicare were a bad idea. It isn't quite "Eliminate them!", because of transition costs, but I think anyone we call a libertarian has to wish Social Security and Medicare didn't exist. This is not for "membership", but to make the word mean something. A lot of people, I think, say they are libertarians but it just means they favor slightly lower taxes and marijuana (but not fentanyl) legalization. That is, they have no consistent principles.
A major issue, even if one wanted to roll back the welfare state, is that (a) government has already made explicit and implicit promises of provisions many years into the future (b) whole populations have structured their lives around these promises (c) 'pay as you go' mean that the 'entry' generation got benefits without contributions while the 'exit' generation will have to pay contributions without benefits and still self-provide for their own futures.
All of that means that winding down the welfare state is a multi-decadal project even if there is the political will for it.
"terrible, but the rest of okay"
OK. Ten-year-old typos.
"Through no fault of their own" I think is the key phrase that can be extended to cover most cases depending on how much agency you ascribe to people. It's no fault of their own if people have abusive parents, if they got poor sleep before the big exam, if they have a hyperactive dopamine system that makes addiction hard to avoid, if they got in a car accident, if they got sick, if they have low IQ, etc. You might say a reasonable person could take action to hedge each of these risks. And taken individually that works for some, but they tend to stack and for some people become intractable over time, especially as we get older.
As far as relying on charity we tried that, it's where we started.
Would you care to give a quick list, including from your own books, what do you consider the very best books on libertarianism?
I particularly appreciate your ninth point, on immigration, which seems to me to be very relevant at the moment. Alas, I don't think many people in the west really care about making global absolute poverty worse.
Well, they do seem to want to make it worse, in a desultory way, provided social desirability bias is appeased; perhaps by encouraging radical political movements in countries less potent than one's own; but not so much as actually to cost themselves something valuable to bring it about.