Maybe this is just a new studiers observation that isn’t in the right direction, but I am having trouble seeing why the original way the constitution of the United States was setup to handle currency can’t work today?
I believe that if we had a government backed with a gold standard, no federal reserve, and the governments monetary budget coming to start from private banks and then turning into a surplus based on resources (see dubai), we could have a chance at remvoing this debt based economy and give our currency back some real value. It seems to me when the founding fathers setup up our government with no central bank, and the successors fought all the way to 1913 to keep a central bank from taking over the economy, they knew what they were doing! There are government programs, such as public construction projects that I think we should keep, but there is 0 reason for our taxes to be going to debt interest payments on our currency to a central bank, with our government able to use money at anytime just by saying “type in some more digits.” If the government wants the money, they should earn it by either discovering or buying resources that trade in a free market or raise money through taxes and spend what they earn.
Thats why i kinda see it as a combination. It wouldn’t be a libertarian viewpoint for construction projects, but if the government had it within their budget to employ people to work on the projects and fund them while still bringing in a surplus each year, it seems like it would be a healthy way to run an economy.
While stealing at all is not good, a surplus means the government is stealing too much.
You’re new so I’m trying to play along with the minarchist perspective, but when the government can tax, and perform activities the market can perform, only because it can tax and write law by fiat, then you’re eventually going to get leviathan. Government does not willfully shrink itself, and certainly not when you give it the tools to grow.
I guess my view of an economy working is skewed and different than the traditional austrian view by quite a bit then, but I am enjoying reading and learning this views.
If a 100% free market is the answer, then where do things like defense come in? If the U.S. government was limited to it’s original constitutional provisions plus some of the amendments (removing things like the 16th amendment for income tax), that would still leave it with public responsibilities such as law enforcement, court systems, and national defense that require money to operate. How would the government get the funds to run the core things without taxation of some kind?
Defense? Do it how Switzerland does it. How Lichtenstein does it. How Luxembourg does it. How Singapore does it.
There is more than one model than the monolith American military empire to look at. The Founders IIRC, believed in a well regulated militia and were not for standing armies. I don’t see why this would be unreasonable.
Law enforcement? What laws? The Constitution very narrowly defines a handful of federal offenses. Do you mean treason?
As Stranger implied, one has to step back and assess how far out of whack the system is, and then question if it is possible to go back, and if so, what is to prevent it from happening again? Better to devise a new system, instead of trying to recapture what never was.
The best answer would be: there would be no government. The market and civil society (that is, people voluntarily associating, competing, and cooperating) would provide all of the services currently monopolized by the state.
There has been, however, some thought on how to fund a non-taxing state. Some suggestions have been voluntary donations, charging for civil court services, and state-sponsered lotteries. Ayn Rand’s essay “Government Financing in a Free Society” in The Virtue of Selfishness is the only place that I can think of that discusses the topic.
I agree with this in seeing that the founders called for a well regulated militia, which was then used as a national standing “continental army” and then disbanded following conflict to return to being a state militia.
When I look at the system as it is today, I see one that was in the process of succeeding but then corrupted by the creation of a central bank by a few. A free market based economy based on a currency with real backing rather than debt to me is the best way to run an economy. The problem I see with a pure market based economy and no government is that people function differently. There are leaders, followers, loners, and those who need assistance. If you give the people the choice to live in a free market with no core rules to live by, you would end up with crime. Who is to say that one security force attempting to dispence justice on one plot of land can go to another without a common platform. If you own your land, and your land becomes popular with others who want to move into your land also to grow their wealth, you become a city. Some are just wired difference, a free market is not going to stop a person who wants to commit crimes from doing so if security cannot work together. It’s human nature thats says they will not all work together. A total free market has no control over human free will and emotion, and this is the fundamental flaw of a perfect system in my view.
So what if everyone is different! As long as they are going about their own business and are not using force, fraud and coercion angainst anyone else then you, I, and anyone else shouldn’t give two SS and a F!
By saying rules, did you mean moral rules, laws or both?
we have tons of laws now, yet we have tons of crime! Just because you have laws, doesn’t mean people will obey them.
I’m sorry to point out to you but you are arrogant fool! You don’t get it…There isn’t one True Libertarian or Anarchist in the world that believes that there should be no laws or rules. We are in favor of laws of defense/protection against force, fraud and coercion and We oppose pointless/useless laws and victimless crime laws.
I agree in that I too oppose useless laws and victimless crime laws, but my point is how do you get a society that does not live by the same enforcement standards to abide by this? It leaves open just as much chance or more for corruption to have a private security force you pay with free market money protect you than it does for a public force. A standard false flag/you need more protection/you MUST pay more to get it would be very very easy for a private company to do in order to get more money, same as a government can do. A free market isn’t going to prvent that because it is greed in human nature that will cause it. It just seems without some kind system of checks and balances, a total free market would fail due to greed, both individually and corporately.
There is no perfect system and can never be because of the human element, so how is complete removal of government any different than full government. Those who can get power in either situation will, and it would take wars to stop them just as it does now. The only solution is the best balance of all of these things, and I believe the guide to this balance was written in the U.S. constiution if it was just actually followed. It is not arrogant to want to live free, It is in my personal opinion arrogant to think that a complete free society can ever exist in a world with choice.
wavemaker, the difference is, the people who recognize it as a false flag will not have to pay for the increased security.
In a free market, costs are decentralized, and not socialized.
The current system is failing to greed, in a free market, wealth must be earned, it can’t be stolen with taxes or inflation. It can’t be stolen by handouts, subsidies or government contracts.
As soon as government is in charge of taxing to build infrastructure, the game of socializing costs and institutionalizing corruption begins.
Not that long ago, I believed minarchy could work. I wish I could remember what got me started on anarchy, but at one point you realize that if you’re truly for freedom, then you can’t be for taxes or democracy. And thus, the state must not be a moral or ethical solution.
calling someone an arrogant fool isn’t as bad as you make it
Arrogant means uneducated and fool can mean either being a jester, joker, jokester, wit-cracker, prankster, or buffoon! I was going for the wit-cracker one!
Ok. But it’s not good to be hard on the minarchists. Many anarchists start out as minarchists. When people get too aggressive, it’s a turnoff. People instinctively stop listening even if the message is worthwhile.
The idea of taxation for infrastructure as corruption I can see. But are you personally opposed to government all together or just the taxation from government. Say if the government had alternative sources of income, but still provided general security and such, would this also be opposed? It sounds like the oposition is to the nation, but what happends for people that have a sense of pride in their nation, just as they would for a sports team or club or what not.
Depends on how you define ‘government’. A purely consensual government would indeed be a company/club/organization, but one with the specific purpose of decision-making for its members.
For this reason it’s often helpful to distinguish between ‘government’ and ‘state’, at least when the notion of voluntary government is in consideration.