Re: Why Libertarianism is not mistaken

Waldemar Ingdahl (wingdahl@hotmail.com)
Tue, 07 Sep 1999 12:13:04 CEST

>On Mon, 6 Sep 1999, Bryan Moss wrote:
>
> > Robert J. Bradbury wrote:
> >
> > > Libertarianism might work if you have 40 acres surrounded
> > > by a barbed wire electrified fence, a mine field between your hosue
> > > and the fence and you get grocer.com to deliver your food to the end
> > > of your driveway. Oh yes, and don't forget, it isn't the American
> > > Express card you should 'never leave home without', its a tank.
> >
> > OK, when was the last time you slaughtered your own cow before
> > eating steak?
>
>Never.
>I can probably count on two hands the number of times in the last 25
>years I've eaten meat (steak I could probably do on one hand),
>so I don't think this is much of a problem. And besides, I have
>it on reasonable authority that some of the cows are SI/alien agents
>so I'm quite content to stay on their good side.
>
> > Despite the fact that none of us tend to do this, the government does
>not
> > supply our meat, private industry does. Libertarianism is not
>suggesting
> > you literally protect yourself it's suggesting you have a choice in who
>does
> > protect you and what they protect you against.
> >
>Ok, well that's fine then. A little competition in providing "government"
>services (protection, law, meat inspection) would be a very interesting.
>But I think we may get back into the "too much information" problem.
>Are you qualified to judge whether U.S.D.A meat inspectors are
>better or worse than Elmer & Mo's Clean Meat Verification Services, Inc.?
>What about comparing in detail two legal systems such as the U.S.
>system and the French system?

The problem is: why the hell the USDA meat inspectors should be qualified to do that job in the first place? There is no guarantee that they will have your (or the other customers best interest in mind). This has already been discussed by the public choice school.

>While the idea is attractive, I think the problem is that the devil
>is in the details.
>
>Robert

And it is that devil that kills the government since it cannot analyze the extremely complex systems of modern society. Most economics show the diseconomies of scale of governments and that they have problems to deal with complex systems.

Waldemar Ingdahl



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