I’m new here (just found this excellent place) but I’ve been libertarian and Austrian since I’ve started studying economics and political science. I’m going off to University in the UK in half a year, hopefully to do economics all the way to a PhD.
Anyway enough with the chit chat. My question is this: Which countries rank at the top for both personal, and financial freedoms? When I was a naive child I wanted to go to America. Then I realised America had been undergoing a confiscation of financial since 1913 and personal liberty since Roosevelt. The UK has the NHS, and huge taxes. It also has a huge amount of surveillance, all in the name of fighting terrorism, which from careful analysis can be shown to be a result of England’s foreign policy, which effectively duplicates that of America.
After University I want to be able to move to a country where I can get some sort of economics related job (possibly at a University), and live in as much of a Libertarian and Austrian system as possible. Does this even exist in this world?
I’ve always looked at the economic freedom index at heritage, it gives a somewhat decent indicator. The US typically ranks around 5th which, I think says more about the state of the world than it does about the US. If the US is so high with it’s plethora of regulations, central bank and relatively high tax rates there’s certainly a massive lack of freedom even if these countries which are ostensibly freer. Usually Hong Kong, Singapore, and Switzerland constitue the other top countries. Have you begun your formal studies yet or are you just starting now? I’m now in a masters program and plan to move on for my Phd in a year (i’m interested in George Mason).
Austrian economics is values free. It doesn’t say what governments should do, it only tries to determine whether policies will have the desired effects. This is what makes it such a good match for anarcho-capitalism.
Of course, if you have a government because you desire inequality, poverty, and violence then Austrian economics has no dispute with you.
Hong Kong is by far more socialist than the perception. Hong Kong has government regulated education K-12, a majority of homes are government owned, heavy land tax, national parks, public roads, post office clone, socialized medicine, FDA clone, ecoconservative policies, etc. Hong Kong may be considered a minarchist state by the Chicago school.
We are all socialists now… But maybe technology brings us the possibility to draw a virtual country with more freedom. Like a club.
I can picture people associated in a way that guarantees some laws, justice, defense and other services (health, education, transport, communications, ..), not enforced but applied to people that belong to that sort of virtual net or club. Totally voluntary, much more efficient, flexible, adapted on-line. Maybe one day the governments as we know them now are regarded as so useless and expensive that everybody will be associated to one of these agencies in order to solve their disputes, etc.
… and then the regular governments just dissapear.
I have personal experience living in New Zealand, the United States, Switzerland and France. I’m about to move to Austria. I’m not sure I’d recommend any of those - perhaps Switzerland depending on which Canton you were living in and how much money you have (some Cantons can be quite advantagous if you’re a high net worth individual but those advantages aren’t necessarily apparent if you’re not already worth ten or twenty million).
My brother, on the other hand, has lived in New Zealand, Japan, Australia and Hong Kong. He’s presently in Hong Kong and has only good things to say about it (as do I, having visited him regularly). Of the four, he’s happiest right where he is.
My personal choice would be Hong Kong then… I realize liberterian had a few negative comments about this further up and Hong Kong isn’t necessarily the perfect libertarian state but it’s sure as heck a lot more free than any of the alternatives I know of. Low taxes (the government actually gave all it’s tax payers a refund of US$1000 last year because it didn’t have anything to do with the extra cash), extremely low crime rates, low cost of living (for everything except rent), extremely good public services and relatively little government intervention. However, and probably it’s biggest asset, it’s people genuinely prize all of those things - when they tried to introduce a modest sales tax a couple of years back they all got out on the streets to protest and the sales tax got binned…
In Switzerland, even if there is relative freedom in many Cantons presently, many citizens seriously contemplate joining the EU and everything that implies (not least of which their “unfair tax competition” stance and minimum 15% sales tax - even countries that do implement the minimum, as Luxembourg has, get flak for not setting their sales taxes higher at 19% or 20% like everyone else)! In short, the EU wouldn’t be great for Switzerland and I worry a bit that personal freedoms in Switzerland are at risk of being seriously eroded by continuing pressure from the European community and by a cultural shift among the Swiss people themselves (who see themselves as Europeans) in the future. Hopefully those concerns are misplaced.
For the time being then, Hong Kong would be my choice (and indeed my wife and both have a plan to move there in the next few of years, circumstances permitting).
The black market there is more than 50% of the economy (I heard). You have people manufacturing clothes, cigars, electronics and other stuff and the government knows nothing about them. Their problem is that Brazil, Argentina and Bolivia are much more efficient in taxing and controlling. So they just smuggle things around.
It is a very 3rd world country, but I think they just need the right focus to become an economic superpower. They already have the main ingredients.
I was born and raised in Austria. Went through the government pre-school program, government education system all the way through college. It is far from “Austrian”. Taxes are very high and government is pretty much involved in everything as well.
Somalia is one of those examples that anarchists seem to love but I have never met a person who has actualy been there who thinks it is an anarcho-capitalist paradise.
Here is a write up by a friend of mine who went there in 2006 and 2002.
(He is also writing a travel guide to both Congo’s if anyone is interested)
But if it is lack of government control you desire and have kidnap & rescue insurance then Haiti maybe the place for you. Its actually kind of a fun place in many ways. Really polite people, great nightlife, lax gun control, no one around to arrest you for drugs or drinking and driving, one traffic light in all of Port Au Prince (right near the airport so everyone can see it) and a police force that never leaves their little cinderblock stations. But there is a very massive downside that is way too long to go into here.
One place I really liked was northern Italy in the Aosta region (bordering Switzerland and France) not because of the laws or lack of them but because the people had such a healthy disrespect for government and made wonderful efforts to avoid them on a daily basis. And the police made wonderful efforts not to enforce them. Plus the whole Italian alps region is loaded with people who think the US government destroyed the WTC, and I know some people would find that appealing (I didn’t but I still really like the place).
One of the worst places is Ecuador. I loved the country and the people but the Government there often finds ways to sieze bank accounts of both citizens and non-citizens.
I have no idea which place is the most Austrian. Perhaps Liechtenstien but I have never been there. But one criteria I would look for would be the nature of the people towards Government and not the official laws. Prosperity and freedom can happen just as much from breaking laws and not enforcing them.
Surely one of the requirements for an “Austrian” free market is respect for property rights… The government is one entity that habitually infringes on people’s property rights through the threat or use of violence, but it’s not the only one.
If you’re constantly being obliged to fork over all your valuables then do you really care if it’s an official government theif taking your valuables by force or an independent contractor working for a local gang?
I can’t see the advantage to living in any society where the occurence of mutually beneficial trade relationships is serously impaired by the use of violence to force people to enter into unilateral agreements - whether those agreements be with governments or “criminals” (as governments are so fond of calling them, rather ironically).
I guess if I was a big tough guy with lots of guns then maybe I’d really really like to live in a place like Somalia, but as it stands at the moment I think the benefits of the centralized/socialist government run internal and external security in countries like Switzerland and Hong Kong outway the costs (the various taxes) in those places (for me personally). Assuming I’m not alone in this regard, that would explain why so few people are emmigrating to Somalia and why so many people are emmigrating to western Europe - this is, to an extent, a reflection of the fact that people tend to value personal security quite highly.
This is not new. During the middle ages people regularly paid taxes to “land lords” who ran private armies to protect these people (and their source of revenue) from other private armies. Violence has always been part of our economies. I still haven’t found a good reason why these protection agencies so often end up being monopolies… I think that is at the very heart of the reason why we don’t live in an “Austrian” economy today - it’s because of a natural tendency for the “violence/protection markets” towards monopolies.
Yeah I spent about 3 months there myself. It’s a very interesting place - all of the taxes that are paid in Aosta get spent in Aosta. They’re effectively an autonomous administrative unit with their own laws and local government - so the only way they’re even really part of Italy is in as much as they share military expenses. There are two other autonomous regions like this in the north of Italy as well - sort of like Monaco but not as well known.
I’m definitely with you there. If the people themselves don’t value personal freedom then they won’t be able to hold onto it for long even if they do happen to accidentally end up with it temporarily.
If you have been to Aosta then you must have seen the magnificant local sport of Cow Fighting? I would have loved to have drank alot of wine and watch a pregnant cow intimidate another pregnant cow off of a desired patch of grass while drinking wine and paying 5 euros for various charity ribbons (I have no idea to this day what causes I donated to) but I had to drive my Fiat to Torino to fly home after getting lost a few times and I decided it was best to be sober when I got lost in an unfamiliar city.
lol - no I don’t recall any cow fights… you’re sure it was just wine in the glasses they were handing out? I was there late summer / early autumn though so maybe at the wrong time of year!
I was there this past September and I have cow fighting on film in a village called Chardonney. Its not exactly a “blood sport”. Cows paw at the dirt to frighten other cows in a way that only cows seem to be able to understand.
But back to “Austrian” Aosta…One thing that works against it is the building regulations they have there. Those massive slate shingles on the roofs are often mandetory. I talked to a hotel owner there who told me that the law requires that when you hire someone, they must work for six months or be paid for six months work. The season he wanted to hire for was closer to 3 months, so it was bad for him and the ski bums who want to only work for the season as well.