Willravel, yeah, many times the free market economy is called of anarchism economics. I think the fallacy comes from the association of anarchism with chaos, so Vienna must be very clear that just because there is no planning, it doesn’t mean there is no order. There is some pressure within the system to reward those whose prices and production structure are to the liking of the consumer. Labor economists show us, for instance, through the compensating differential that employers who better catter to the security of his, say, construction workers can outcompete those who don’t.
This specific example is about imperfect information. Good landlords want to provide that information, to steal customers from the bad ones, while the tenant would have liked to know there is no health risks to the house before moving in. The way he solved that was by hiring a team to provide him with that information – I don’t think he is complaining about his situation, as I assume he already made sure the lease allows himself to get away from the situation (maybe even making a few bucks from the situation), but that the next idiot might be trapped in the situation. Currently, landlords and tenants ask for government laws and inspectors to provide that information, and they at least it appeases our mind. What if government stayed out of this matters? Only society would know what the best method consumers prefer. Likely we would have a certification body (consumer’s protection society) that gives a token to the good landlord that tenants can then trust. (You could also argue that, like selling damaged food, there is fraud since it’s assumed the goods are in good condition, so government has a role to break these situations.)
Yeah, what a wonderful way to conduct debate! Anyone who disagrees with me is a nutty cultist!
Excuse me whilst I go bask in the sheer brilliance of “progressives”. [8-)]
Possible rebuttals: regulatory capture, the inability of the government to rationally impose regulations, the possibility of market/non-profit certification, the possibility of remedies at common law (for fraud, in this case), insertion of appropriate terms in contracts, market forces (yeah, what a dirty word, imagine the low quality of a good pushing consumers away from it!), pointing out that the government cannot really “guarantee” anything, even less so than the market can, and so on. Oh, but that must mean I am a zealot, to even think of this!
I like how you constructed a false strawman, and now expect people to defend it.
Why is it so hard to find a progressive who know what he is talking about and doesn’t have to construct capitalist boogeymen around every corner? Maybe because progressivism is really regressivism?
My bad. I got turned off by his last line. I’m not interested in broad debate. I’m interested in proving what can be proven, and drawing logical conclusions from that. These so called “broad debates” usually highlight an absence of knowledge, not an argument worth following to conclusion.
While I agree with you that libertarians should develop an understanding of the socialist position. I think so for three reasons: 1) socialists have some valid concerns but generally go wrong with their prescriptions for solving even the real problems that they see; 2) to better be able to argue against socialists; 3) to better understand libertarianism.
However, I do not find your example a particularly strong or reasonable objection to libertarianism - with emphasis on it not being strong. The following objections occurred to me off the top of my head. I could probably think of others but these should suffice for now.
I don’t see the market propping up anyone “unfairly” without government intervention.
For every example of a bad situation in a free market that socialists can dream up, we can probably point to 10 worse situations actually created by govt in history.
He also assumes the existence of the EPA and govt regulation. Plainly this is not a free market.
If the tenants are concerned about such things as lead, they should get clauses inserted into contracts before signing to deal with it. Maybe there is already something implicit in the contract that they could use in a private court (I’m no lawyer). They could get a private court to decide on the case. The judge might decide against the landlord and require him to fix the window, allow the tenants to switch apartments, or allow them out of the lease without penalty if the landlord refuses to maintain a safe living environment.
The poser of the problem lacks an understanding of market processes. He’s distrustful of how or if they function. This is an opportunity for Austro-libertarians to educate him politely, of course.
Neither govt nor free markets are a guarantee. It’s typical of socialists to want guarantees but to overlook the fact that govt can’t provide them either.
Emphasize the fact that free markets lead to better efficiency and better all-around well being. Tell him why state control over everything is bound to fail and leave the people in misery.
Defending, for the moment, the case made in the link I provided, if the government did stay out of the situation, there’s no reason to assume that the market would develop a national set of regulations pertaining to lead levels, and there’s no reason to assume that the market could regulate lead levels at all. It takes a very large amount of energy to hold companies responsible and to spread the word about bad buisness practices, and those victimized are usually poorer.
I wan’t making that argument for this thread, I was using that as an example of how a “socialist” might argue against libertarianism.
Jon and Liberty, I wasn’t arguing his points. I was presenting an example of an argument.
Geoffrey,
We see many governemnts having to step in and prevent monopolies. Microsoft did not gain it’s market share through government ntervention, but rather taking a product and improving it. After the anti-trust suit in the US other companies were able to crack the marketplace. Firefox now takes up nearly 20% of browser usage, and Mac OS and Linux are seeing their market share grow as well. This is just one example.
I’m going make this case as clearly as I can: the US healthcare system is more capitalist than most other health care systems. Yes, there are bought and paid for government officials who do interfere, but that doesn’t change the fact that the US does not have universal or socialized medicine. Other, more socialist systems are much more efficient and succesful. This is rather serious.If you’d like to debate this point, I’d be glad to go to a different thread or open a new one, but I’m using it as an example here.
Refer to #1.
There’s an old saying “beggers can’t be choosers”. It’s a fundamental flaw in any system that has greater security and safety for those who are more economically well off. Someone living in an apartment with lead in it may very well not have any other choice because they don’t make the money to live in a better place.
There are very few pure socialists. Most of those who call themselves socialists like to vacation in Marx, but not live there. The more succesful economic systems of the modern world have established balances between governmet power and market power. It’s not libertarian, it’s not socialism; it’s pragmatism.
Would you move in to a house with high lead levels or no lead levels? Yes, the market regulates itself.
That’s a rather bad example. Microsoft was simply providing cheaper products than there competitors. Unix and Mac were relatively expensive to their Microsoft counterparts, so people chose to go with MS. Basically, MS was providing a product people voluntarily bought, while ass-sore companies like Netscape decided to sue because they were being outcompeted.
Government intervention at its worse.
You’re wrong. Other more socialistic systems are giant fuck ups. Why do you think foreign leaders from countries with socialized health come to the US for surgery and treatment?
The WHO health report that is often quoted by socialists actually puts America as #1 in the responsiveness category that consists of health care quality and quickness of response. American cancer and AIDS patients have much higher survival rates than foreign cancer and AIDS patients, etc. Trust me, I come from a country with universal health care (Poland). My great grandmother died partly because we couldn’t get good care for her.
Even supposedly “successful” countries with universal health care (i.e. France, Switzerland, Netherlands) make the GREATEST use of market forces. For example, high copayments prevent abuse in the French system, while the more successful Swiss and Dutch systems make use of private insurance to a great degree. However, even these “successful” examples of socialized health are unsuccessful by American standards.
That’s why even a leftist like Obama is shying away from universal health care.
So governments should waste millions of dollars just to reduce the risk of lead poisoning for a few people? Besides, it’s not in the interest of apartment owners and whatnot to poison their own customers with lead.
Countries that are more libertarian than the others, such as Ireland, Hong Kong, Singapore, and Australia are far more successful than the “less” libertarian ones.
In short, libertarianism is pragmatism. Don’t fool yourself.
Another way to approach discussion with Socialists is to rely on the possibility that decentralized, localized, community-based solutions would be better suited for solving the problems with which they are concerned. Further, by its advocates’ own admission, socialism can only possibly work among a group of people who do not view it as oppressive and undesirable (even if the Socialist believes that holding such a view would be unreasonable, surely she will admit that people hold a lot of unreasonable views, and that a hostile populous would render socialism unworkable). Taking things a step further, socialism is a liberal philosophy, and is built upon the idea of protecting and expanding freedom. Accordingly, it seems reasonable that socialists would accept that members of a community who did not want to live under a socialist regime should not be forced against their will to accept what they viewed as an oppressive government. Rather, their exit from the community might be mutually beneficial, and in line with the Socialist goal of using collective action to bring about desirable social outcomes, there’s no reason why a community transitioning into socialism would not want to ensure that objectors were given the help they needed to find a new place to live without being cruelly kicked out of their homes or dealt with in a more oppressive manner. In support of all of this, I turn to Socialist philosopher G.A. Cohen’s discussion, in Self-Ownership, Freedom, and Equality, of the possibility that the people in a Socialist community will not most desire to live under a Socialist order:
In the first possibility, there remain a few capitalistically minded persons, meaning by ‘a few’ that their capitalist acts would not undermine the basic socialist structure. No sane socialist should commit himself to the suppression of capitalist activity on the stated scale. (It might even be desirable to allocate to capitalistophiles a territory in which they can bargain with and hire one another.)
Suppose, though, that the disposition to perform capitalist acts is strong and widespread, so that socialism is possible only with tyranny. What socialist favours socialism in such circumstances? Certainly Marx insisted that it would be folly to attempt an institution of socialism except under the propitious conditions he was confident capitalism would create. A socialist believes that propitious conditions are accessible. He need not proclaim the superiority of socialism regardless of circumstances (p. 29-30).
If a Socialist community wants to bring about its own existence without subordinating the interests of those who don’t want any part in their actions, then there’s no reason for libertarians to object. And if they didn’t want to bring about socialism that way, then I think the easy response would be, “I simply don’t agree that the desirability of a social order can justify subjugating entire classes of people under a coercive regime that they don’t support. So we simply have a fundamental difference in opinion. I just hope you don’t ever get the chance to act on your views.”
None of those arguments are either original, or even effective, so I doubt the OP will have much problem with such positions. They’re just talking points liberals use when debating conservatives. They’re not dealing with Catoites, not with Republicans, and not with neoclassical economists, but Austrolibertarians. But you do have a point in bringing such arguments up, as they are precisely what is the norm when debating a socialist, as they will often resort to one of those arguments, so having thought out responses will do one much good.
Guys, don’t run with Willravel off the forum. And Will, let Vienna say whether he doesn’t like where the discussion is going. We already gave him some hints; I think he will appreaciate to see what he will be faced with and some possible lines of defense.
By the way, the unintended consequences of government intervention and the government’s formalization of social standards could be two ways to go from here. But I think it’s pretty clear that government taking houses from the market doesn’t particularly help the poor; it’s obvious what people are worried here is that they’ll be rent or sold an house that is in bad conditions without them knowing. I would point out how free entrepeuners, such as in the hotel business, come up with the star ranking and booking agencies to work around the fact that tourists have no information on what the best hotel is. But again, the best tactic here is that failing to undisclose such damages on the house being sold/rented that make it pretty much unihabitable constitutes fraud as it is not what’s implicitely expected. It’s like you being sold a coffee that is cold – shouldn’t the coffee shop return your money in case it’s pre-payment? What if the coffee beans were damaged and made you sick afterwards – sure, I don’t need to go on how these would scare people of coffee shops and “the market” would correct itself, but c’mon, the guy may have medical bills, days off work, etc that he should be compensated for, as clearly he didn’t expect it. What if the coffee kills him? Clearly there is murder, even if by negligence. I would tackle the problem from the negative force perspective and would move on to more juicy stuff.
Anyway, I agree this leasing thing wasn’t the best socialist attack. I personally feel that externalities, and related stuff like social goods, are the best intellectual attacks. I don’t see myself how it would be desirable to live in a place without a local government (call it homeowners association) to provide that stuff. I may have to concede with my opponent here, though I would try to make it as liberal as possible Material equality ones can provide for very sad stories, and will likely be the most common arguments, but they are not exactly puzzles, though there is no silver bullet to point out here, since they vary a lot.
Danny makes a good point there that liberalism is compatible with voluntary socialism. I think most of them are actually corporationists (as Will pointed out, most of them don’t live in Marx commanded economy paradise), so I’m not sure if it will make that much of a big hole, unless we are talking of hard core guys here.
Thanks for all the suggestions. Our road to finding Austrian Economics and libertarianism are different. Some come from the liberal side (like myself), others come from the conservative side, or perhaps if you are lucky enough it may have been apparent to you on the onset. Our own personal subjective route here may provide deeper insight to convincing and sharing the Australibertarian approach. What will be effective from one standpoint, may not be effective from another individuals standpoint. What is effective in convincing one individual, may not be effective for another individual.
Hence, taking cues from my own road to Australibertarianism, I have decided (for better or for worse), to take the limited government non-interventionist approach while being strong on the Austrian Economic approach. It is interesting to note, as some already have on this board, that Mises thought that the state played a strong role, however, going on through Rothbard, Hoppe and other contemporary thinkers, the ideas and arguements were refined where the state played little role at all..
No, it doesn’t even play a strong role for Mises. It merely enforces the absolute minimum necessary for social cooperation, and besides, Mises believed where practical secession should be permitted down to the individual level. Now, things differ for Hayek or Lachmann, say, but they’re another matter.
