I got ya. [:)]
No, this certainly isn’t about Rothbard. Whether not that was his view, that is definetly a pervading trait of VMLI, after all, it is based in the U.S.
However I question whether or not U.S will be the birthplace of future freedom.
Shall we start this in a separate thread? Definitely something Im interested in.
I wonder about that as well. Awareness of libertarianism and the spread of various libertarian memes (RP, end the fed) is at an all time high. Tough times and big changes are coming as they do in any economic collapse. I do think it’s extremely unlikely that the US will not have at least a serious challenge to the current (and likely rapidly accelerating) encroachments of statism. Perhaps it will be a revolution of sorts or perhaps the political class will wise up and back off a bit before that point is reached. The question, I think, is whether we will have a traditional (violent mob) revolution or a revolution, in which ideas and memes, and subsequently power structures are rearranged without excessive destruction of infrastructure (whether in human life or property) needed to ensure the new power structures can be relatively stable.
Excellent point! States that tend to swirl around Statism, meaning, their attention is brought to to nationalistic and uniform thinking (which quantitative methods lay claim to being able to achieve), then yes, the quality in the culture dulls. The fervent life and fruitful creativity of the unique individual is suppressed for the masses. Public schools in the U.S. are terrible and thus good at killing creativity. More and more generic tests for the mass students take up the time of teachers and the individual gets suppressed in the state’s murmur.
Good points!
So Nock and Mencken write about this stuff? I’ve recently finished a book and wouldn’t mind reading one of their that tend to focus on this topic.
Mencken’s essay “Libido for the Ugly,” is good: http://www.bizbag.com/mencken/menklibid.htm
Nock’s memoirs are full of comparisons of his time in America with his time in Europe; for the most part he prefers Europe. He thinks “economism”-- the view that the purpose of life consists solely in the production, distribution and acquisition of material goods-- is much stronger in America and Britain than Continental Europe. He notes that good food, music, and general happiness seems to be much higher in Europe.
This piece “European Morals and Our Own,” by Nock points out another aspect he and Mencken thought the Anglophone world had in excess compared with Europe: namely, puritanism.
[/url]http://alumnus.caltech.edu/~ckank/FultonsLair/013/nock/european_morals.html[/url]
Thanks, starting to read Mencken’s “Libido…” First sentence really caught my attention already. I live near what he’s describing and I’ve heard stories from my parents and grandparents and other relatives about when they grew up in this region:
“On a Winter day some years ago, coming out of Pittsburgh on one of the expresses of the Pennsylvania Railroad, I rolled eastward for an hour through the coal and steel towns of Westmoreland county.”
Very familiar, thus, very interesting personally so far! Thanks!
Never spent a lot of time in that area myself, but my grandparents on my father’s side are from around the Pittsburgh/Northern West VA area so I’ve heard the same sort of stories.
I can only speak from my experience with foreign born people, there is a great divide, between the young and old as the appreciation of socialist nations (most experience with French and English). The young that are part of the college program where I work are very unhappy here in the US, the only thing they like about it is that our products are cheaper here than at home, but they would rather have all the services their home country provides. The older people that immigrated from the same countries claim it was horrible, and would only return to visit family, but would never immigrate back. The only understanding I can glean from this is that the college kids up until entering the program have had no employment and have not paid for the services they receive, and the adults have…
I hope this helps people understand what socialist ideals always start with the younger generations…
Norway, the least successful Scandinavian nation
What do you base this on? Norway has actually passed Sweden in absolute GDP during the first quarter of 2009, even though Sweden has a population two times larger than the Norwegian. I.e. the GDP per capita in Norway is twice the one in Sweden, and the larger than any of the Nordic countries (or any country in the world, except luxembourg etc).
Whether this is because of the fact that Norway has large oil resources is a valid question, but I think it is completely wrong to characterize it as the least successful nordic nation. I’d rather say it is the most successful economically.
How are the Norwegian and the Swedish GDPs calculated?
Knowing that Austrians reject the use of GDP, I assume this is a critical question rather than searching question (if not, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gdp)
Even if there are better ways in measuring the wealth of a country, it still means something that a country has a GDP per capita that is twice the size of another. Unemployment and and foreign debt in Norway has also been a lot lower than that of Sweden.
Can anyone show that Sweden (or any other nordic country) is doing better than Norway economically at the moment?
If you look at a list of countries by GDP per capita, you’ll notice that Norway comes after countries like Luxembourg and Liechtenstein. Whilst Norway is able to piggy back on the fact that it is the best piece of real estate in the world, with oil, natural gas, minerals, abundant wildlife, etc., Luxembourg and Liechtenstein have no abundant natural resources. If Norway were to run out of its natural resources tomorrow, the country would be permanently in ruin unless the government greatly scaled back its operations.
Some other interesting facts about Norway are:
Kaju that only illustrates the point that reasonable progressive (small p: govt exists to protect and nourish the society) systems of governance will lead to a deregulated free economy. Investing in your base (the “people”) is how so-called Golden Ages are born. I can think not of one culture that’s Golden Age wasnt accompanied by strong public investment in the working majority; against the better interests of the wealthy elites. I know thats the last thing the shruggians want to hear but, i see no reason to believe it is false.
“You think these people exist to provide you with things. I think you exist to provide them with freedom (Life, Liberty, pursuit of happiness)…” From Braveheart about feudal overlords; but it means just the same to our current corporate overlords.
Well that is an absurd statement because it preassumes that freedom is an alienable state. That a class of individuals are necessary to provide that which is already instilled within an individual. I think it can be equated to: We need dogs to breathe.
Or, maybe it demonstrates that if they were not to allow freedom in certain areas they’d be crippled, stifled and collapse… so that the only reason they’re still doing well is because they allow a certain amount of economic freedom.
Funny, the feudal overlords were like government, well they were government [:O], odd, do you think corporations are like government???
What about the rest of the quote, your snippet says, you think the government provides you with things, but you exist to keep the government free…
No, reread the post. It illustrates that there are multiple factors that effect economic growth. It also shows that Norway is in someways freer than other countries.
One word: Renaissance.
You are wrong.
You do realize that most people here are not Randroids, right?
Besides the fact that no socialist country ever had a golden age.
This.
Who are the socialist again?
STOCKHOLM (AFP) — The Swedish government has ruled out a takeover of the country’s beleaguered automaker Volvo Cars if its owner, US group Ford, decides to sell it, daily Dagens Nyheter reported on Tuesday.
“It’s not in our industrial policy to own carmakers and we will not jeopardise taxpayers’ money,” Enterprise and Energy Minister Maud Olofsson told Sweden’s newspaper of reference on the sidelines of a meeting in Brussels.
The centre-right government has on the contrary pursued a policy of selling state assets since it came to power in 2006.
“We need to look at what the government can do without jeopardising taxpayers’ money,” she added.
Among possible buyers seen for Volvo are Germany’s BMW and France’s Renault.
“But selling car companies in the midst of this financial crisis is hard,” Olofsson acknowledged.
Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt recalled that Volvo and Sweden’s other carmaker Saab, owned by General Motors, have appealed to the government for various forms of state aid.
“We are not an emergency bank where companies can get money when things take a turn for the worse. That would just be a misappropriation of taxpayers’ money,” he told Dagens Nyhete
There is an interesting mix of social welfare with free-market policies as I see. It’s pretty much like Hayek’s version of social democracy.
Exactly. That is what Im saying. Any person who thinks of planning for the future in governance should know that the freedom to express oneself (AS LONG AS IT DOESN"T HARM MY EXPRESSION) is crucial the a flourishing culture. And a flourishing memorable culture is the cornerstone of an “advanced” civilization; what we call superpowers like Rome, Greece, post Rome Arabic lands, Renessaince Europe, The Han period of China, Mayans, Incans, those things. (And yes, they had their own barbaric practices, but you cant deny that the era out of which your libertarian theories developed doesn’t owe much to these cultures).
How can you say the Renessaince wasn’t accompanied by a fourishing middle class. Remember all the merchants that developed; intermediate between Nobles and peasants… middle class. Im not talking of socialism. Im talking of not rewarding rich people for being rich; they have their reward; aka Shrugganism. My stance is that the drivers and creators of our culture exist for the betterment fo the general people; you don’t create products just to make money, you create them to fix a problem and ease the struggles of the populace. And they, in turn, pay you accordingly.