I’d certainly welcome them, if I could be assured that they’d not be a worse situation than the governement roads we have now. I’m apparently being argued with because not taking “All Government, in all cases, is worse than the Free Market” as an article of faith seems to infuriate some.
Danno, who hardly ever toes anyone’s party line.
I’m sorry - I used that word poorly. I don’t demand actual proof - I’d be happy with a realistic “this is how it would work” that answers objections convincingly - as is easily available in the case of free market security services versus state-run police forces, for example.
I’ve followed pointers, read papers, essays, and previous conversations. Mostly, they’re unsatisfying - vague “we’ll figure that out when we get there”, or “you only disbelieve because of your preconceptions, which are false” arguments. I’d hoped for a convincing scenario. It’s apparently unavailable, and nobody is less happy about that than I am.
Danno, apologizing for any confusion my poor choice of words may have caused.
You’re right, it’s simple - I don’t. I’m a strong proponent of roads being funded by user fees, not general taxes. I’m actually okay with each property owner in urban environments being required to provide right of way (sidewalks) for general use, and I’m not oft okay with anyone being required to provide anything to anybody - but personal and commercial transportation is an essential, and I would not be okay with access to that being put into the hands of someone against whom there is no effective recourse.
Is that a bit clearer, or are you going to read that as something I have clearly not said again?
Danno, striving for clarity, but apparently failing.
Either you favour violence or you don’t. You quite clearly do, you said people should be required to provide “right of way”? How exactly would that be enforced? Violence.
You either believe in a government monopoly funded by taxes with other providers excluded through violence or you don’t, and you quite simply do.
Fine. Well, you also said something about ‘minimal government’ I think. That usually means a monopoly whose only purpose is to protect individual rights. (I don’t know what other functions you think it’s legitimate for a government to perform, if any.)
Ha. =/
Well in the case you cite above the state is using the roads for its own political agenda. I imagine that such a thing would be impossible in a free-market road. In such a private road you’d just pay a fee and use it regardless of whether you get along with your ex-family or not…
No, it’s not. So I personally think that a private road owner in a free-market is not entitled to ‘regulate’ such a commons, if ‘regulation’ means using the road for political purposes…like the state does.
The provision of services that cannot be provided by the free market but are worthwhile enough to empower them to provide - like roads. It’s eminently debatable, of course. I can think of no other valid purpose for supporting a government.
That’s where I get nervous about the free market urban roads - there would be very little way to prevent the owners of such from using them for their own purposes - no way to ensure that they’d ‘play nice’. If an airlines refuses to sell me transportation services unless I submit to extensive and intrusive searches, refrain from smoking (or even carrying firemaking tools), I can always try for a better deal with a railroad, bus, or drive myself. With the road that goes past my house, I don’t have those other options available, and don’t believe that it would be practicable for anyone else to offer an alternative.
There were local restaurants that forbade their customers from smoking on the premises - a negative thing for smokers, and a positive thing for the people who wanted to avoid secondhand smoke. The ones with exceptional food survived that choice, but none of the nightclubs that banned smoking could stay in business. (Now, of course, the local government has outlawed smoking in restaurants, and all business suffer a downturn in traffic - but, for a time, it was a business’s choice, and some made it.)
There is an American Indian casino complex not far from here, who has prohibited the possession or use of alcohol upon their property. I would not have believed it if I had not seen it myself. There are, of course, other places to gamble and rent sleeping accommodations that serve alcohol, and gambling is not a necessity. But this business decided that alcohol was something they disapproved of, and their customers are not allowed to use or possess it. It’s apparently worth the loss of revenue to them to take this moral stance.
Just as in these examples, there is no way to reliably predict what conditions a road owner may choose to insist upon from its customers.
I was thinking of ‘regulate’ to mean such things as traffic rules - which side of the road to drive upon, what range of speeds would be acceptable, etc.
On the other hand, in a free market, if I owned this piece of road that was essential to the local residents, and decided that everyone must go shirtless to use it - who could stop me, and by what right would they try? This would, likely, have the effect of lowering the property values of the people who must use that road, and eventually reducing my profit - but businesses have made foolish decisions before, and will again. The presence of competition protects the consumer from such bad decisions - in the absence of competition, a superior force (i.e., government) is the only effective way I can envision to prevent such misuse of power.
Note that under the current system, that power does get misused - but only to a point. Governments are run by individuals. An individual in a government must usually find a large enough group that agrees with them to enact a policy. An owner does not have that restriction on their power. A very restricted government could be prevented from such a misuse of power. I dearly wish one such were available - that being available would indeed be cause for me to endure moving.
I’d perhaps have more faith in the idea that my neighbors would not be that unreasonable if I hadn’t seen so many instances of them being unreasonable. A lack of government does not necessarily imply a lack of people who enjoy exercising power over others, and control of a limited resource is, indeed, power.
Danno, untrusting as ever.
This is an economics forum. If you deny the existence of economic self-interest, you should leave.
There’s no way to prevent governments from doing whatever they please, and worse, governments claim the ‘right’ to dictate what is morally correct, what is wrong, and what the ‘law’ is.
If people have some sort of natural tendency to abuse power, then I’d rather deal with a stupid road owner who wants to play king than with a police state.
Sounds like a bad joke =/
That’s theoretically possible but I don’t think it’s likely. Libertarianism can only work if people have libertarian leanings. A community in which a road owner can come up with such stupid idea and get away with it is not a libertarian community.
That’s where your reasoning stops making sense. In order to curb some people who may abuse power you want to set up an entity with absolute power ?
The thing is, unreasonable policies can only be enforced by the state. Only a state can come up with something like the Eighteenth Amendment. Unreasonable neighbors can do whatever they please…in their own properties. In a society where security is handled by private contractors it’s highly doubtful that puritans(or whatever) would try to/could force their ‘moral’ code on others.
You are in fact a socialist on this matter, so yes.
-Jon
Whilst outlawing its development in the process.
-Jon
Over the past few pages he’s contradicted himself numerous times, on one hand he wants to stop using coercion as a means to provide roads and on the other he doesn’t trust the free market to provide roads. Perhaps he believes they should provide themselves?
Actually, the provision of roads is a non-issue - the problem is not roads but land ownership.
Smith and Wesson (S&W) WENT INTO BANKRUPTCY as a result of gunowner boycott. The S&W of today was purchased from the bankrupt British owners and they are still suffering from the bad name.
Need confirmation, Goggle using smith wesson bankrupt.
Spooner vs. U.S. Postal System by Lucille J. Goodyear
American Legion Magazine, January 1981
There didn’t seem to be any way to lick the high cost of postage until Lysander Spooner came to the rescue
Since 1971, the cost of sending a letter has gone up 150 percent. Out mail service seems slower each day. And, there appears to be no feasible solution or alternative in sight. Like the weather, everyone talks and complains about the high postal rates and apparently slower service, but no one knows what to do about them.
Perhaps we need another Lysander Spooner. Lysander who? The Lysander Spooner, a fiercely independent New Englander who went to battle and brought about a change in the postal system. He could also be called the “Father of the three-cent stamp.”
Read the rest of the story here:
Here is some more detail regarding the boycott and bankruptcy of Smith & Wesson:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smith_%26_Wesson_Holding_Corporation
In 1964, the company passed from Wesson family control, and subsequently several conglomerates took control of it.
From 1987 to 2001 Tomkins PLC, a British company, owned Smith & Wesson.
In March 2000, Smith & Wesson signed an agreement with the Clinton Administration in order to avoid lawsuits.[2] The company agreed to numerous safety and design standards, as well as limits on the sale and distribution of their products. Gun clubs and gun rights groups responded to this agreement almost instantly by initiating large-scale boycotts of Smith & Wesson by refusing to buy their new products and flooding the firearms market with used S&W guns, cutting into their market share. [3][4]
On May 11, 2001, Saf-T-Hammer Corporation acquired Smith & Wesson Corp. from Tomkins PLC for US$15 million, a fraction of the US$112 million originally paid by Tomkins. Saf-T-Hammer also assumed US$30 million in debt, bringing the total purchase price to US$45 million.[5][6] Saf-T-Hammer, a manufacturer of gun locks and other firearms safety products, purchased the company with the intention of incorporating its line of security products into all Smith & Wesson firearms in compliance with the 2000 agreement.
The acquisition of Smith & Wesson was chiefly brokered by Saf-T-Hammer President Bob Scott, who had left Smith & Wesson in 1999 because of a disagreement with Tomkins’ policies. After the purchase, Scott became the president of Smith & Wesson to guide the 157-year-old company back to its former standing in the market.
On February 15, 2002, the name of the newly formed entity was changed to Smith & Wesson Holding Corporation.
If I start denying the existence (or benefit) of ANY self-interest, my departure from this forum will simply not be drastic enough - my brain will have melted.
Does this have something to do with the practicibility (or not) of alternatives to roads for transit in urban areas? I’m not sure of what that comment is in response to.
Danno, confused, yet again. Fortunately, it’s not totally unfamiliar territory.
Well, could be you’re right about that, but that just proves the point, doesn’t it? Under anarchy, they wouldn’t have had a government to bail them out…(which, after reading the posts immediately above, they didn’t anyway)
I understand that it often seems that way, but it’s really not quite that bad. When we say ‘government’, we’re not actually talking about a multi-person super-entity - we’re talking about the cumulative efforts of a large number of individuals, each with their own agenda. Happily, those agendas often contradict or counteract each other; there’s more infighting in ‘government’ than there is in the Libertarian Party of the USA. History is full of examples of individuals in government who were stymied in their goals - FDR and his catfight with the Supreme Court, for example. Too often, such individuals are able to achieve their goals, but there are some checks and obstacles to overcome, and they are required, by the necessity of being reelected, to not annoy the general populace too much.
On average, I would guesstimate that individuals not working in government have fewer control issues - but that’s on average, and only a guesstimate. However, individuals, operating in a free society, have (by definition of “free”), fewer checks on what they may do with their property.
Overall, I prefer more freedom to less - but that does not necessitate me ignoring the potentially worse dangers that such freedom can bring with it.
There are advantages and disadvantages either way. The power-mad government can call upon more firepower and resources, but it’s easier to fly under their radar. The neighbor has fewer resources, but may have a clearer look at you - and it’s more likely to become very personal on that level.
I beg to differ - a society in which a property owner can be prevented from doing such a stupid thing with their own property is not a libertarian community.
I’d have agreed that it was unlikely, until I saw that casino with the prohibition on alcohol. Very little human silliness strikes me as unlikely now.
I disagree on another point, as well. I’ve lived my life on libertarian principles for almost … well, over 30 years now. I have always been surrounded by people who either have no knowledge of libertarian principles, or who violently disagree with them. Freedom-lovers are, regrettably, scarce. I can happily report, however, that these principles have stood me in good stead - one need not be in a community that universally agrees with libertarian principles for those principles to work, just fine. It may not always work - but it works better than anything else would have.
I understand your confusion, and apologize for being unclear. I have no intent or desire to set up an entity with absolute power, other than individuals with absolute power over themselves and their property. I certainly do not wish to participate in the creation of a government.
However, I’m surrounded by government - it was put here by others, and is a part of my world. I cannot change what has been put into my world for me to deal with, but I can try to deal with it intelligently. Removing or restricting large portions of it makes sense, if I can achieve it.
The ideal goal, I suppose, would be to change the world to a pattern that would work better for everyone. This is not realistic - the folks working in government will have the challenge of finding new jobs if I can do away with their portion of government. A second-tier, more realistic goal, is to change the world into a pattern that will work better for most people, and increase the probability of justice. That’s a goal I can live with, and greatly reducing the role and effect of government seems to be one way of achieving that goal.
However, it remains a possibility that removing government from the role of supplying roads in urban areas would result in a system that would work worse, increasing the probability of injustice and hardship for people. I’d just as soon avoid working towards such a goal. If government supply of roads is, indeed, the most likely method of the most good being done to the most people, with the minimum of injustice, then that’s the goal I should strive for.
Not being omniscient, I cannot be certain that I’m not mistaken. The best I can do is to look carefully at all of the available options, and choose the one that looks to best fit my goals. Looking at how privately-owned roads would work (or could be made to work) in an anarchist society seems to be a responsible, reasonable path to me.
This is, apparently, remarkably annoying to some folks for whom “anarchy is best in all things” is a religious tenet, which cannot be questioned with impunity. Oh, well. I intend to look it over and judge for myself anyway.
I am sorry to disagree with you here, my friend - I most sincerely wish that it were not so. But, given the freedom to do so, a frightening percentage of the population will spend amazing amounts of effort to force their standards of behavior on their neighbors. There are several methods of preventing this - some more effective than others, all imperfect. If you do not wish to take my word as gospel, fine - read histories yourself, decide for yourself. Those people will try to force thier standards of behavior on others - and we must needs prevent that where we can, because stopping it after it’s started is far more difficult.
Only a state can be unreasonable? Oh, I wish. Consider the situation of the major industry in town being run by a person who refuses to hire redheads, or libertarians, or homosexuals - regardless of their qualifications to do the job. It’s his industry, his call - as stupid as it may be. I would never dispute his right to make that decision for his establishment - but I would also never consider it reasonable.
Is this such a difficult situation to imagine?
Danno, verbose as ever.
Thank you for that clarification - I sincerely appreciate it.
That a remarkably prolific poster here, obviously respected, would endorse the obvious forgery of a quote, amuses me. That this poster has been made a moderator perhaps explains some things I’d been wondering about.
That it happens in a venue that supposedly reveres free-market capitalism, which generally (elsewhere) decries any attempt at deception or fraud, just amuses me greatly.
I’m ever so glad that you’re so willing to show what principles you prefer to live by.
Really, thank you.
Danno, wondering if this will be moderated out.
Thank you ever so much for clarifying that for me - all these years, I’d been so mistaken about what I’d believed. I’ll have to go back and apologize to all of those people I’d argued these issues with.
Keep the faith, brother.
Keep firmly in mind that anyone who does not totally agree with you, or wants clarification, must be Evil Incarnate. Rest assured that, in less than a thousand lines of text, you can cut to the heart of the matter and know other people better than they know themselves. Keep firmly in mind that you have the authority - nay, the divine right to judge such people, and feel joy in the certain knowledge that your judgements cannot possibly ever be wrong.
You are, indeed, a True Believer.
Welcome to my killfile, Idjiit.
Danno, frankly disgusted - but looking elsewhere for reasoned discourse.