We all know this system is immoral and unsustainable. So why not accelerate its collapse by exploiting every grant and social program the government offers when you are eligible for it. If we avoid it on principle we will just end up maintaining the system. If we act responsible and earn a living independent of government we’ll just end up funding the system when we are taxed and more so the more successful you are. If we instead keep our income to the lowest tax bracket and exploit every grant available we will not only help to take down the system but we willl no longer contributes to it.
When you start making greater good arguments like this, that it is better to collapse the state before people are ideologically positioned for freedom, and thus could end up with statism of a worse variety (Hitler, Napoleon), while causing pain and suffering to others, seems to me not well thought out.
Also, there is a high risk of corruption of radical libertarians if they begin to live off the state, ostensibly to collapse the state. This is what happens to most political libertarians. They succumb to gradualism.
When I said collapse I didn’t mean the collapse of government itself but of the social programs and other costly government policies. I should have been more clear. If everyone used all the social programs available to them and the ratio between contributors and takers became lopsided the government would be forced to cut back. If I decide to work harder then all that does is lengthen the time for that system to collapse.
I don’t see it as something violent. I see it as a peaceful transition like the Soviet Union into modern day Russia and not a violent transition like Imperial Russia to the Soviet Union. The thing is that I don’t want to wait 50+ years until these programs collapse naturally. I want to accelerate that transition.
I also don’t see it as harmful. Nobody can force me to work and taking part in social programs is not illegal. I see it as supply and demand. There is no incentive to start your own business because you will be assaulted with regulations and taxes. There is no incentive to work since work is hard to find to begin with and even if you do get a job you will get taxed to support wars and social programs I never agreed to fund. The government has made the price to work too high while making the price not to work free.
If you do decide to work and pay your taxes you will end up doing harm by encouraging this system. What I advocate isn’t something that isn’t already happening naturally. Even if I continue to work welfare, social security, medicare and military expenditures will eventually collapse under its own weight just like the policies of the Soviet Union. Except that in the US it will take longer because it is a mixed economy.
I don’t see an alternative. Most people will continue to support social programs because they see it as morally good since most people see altruism as something that morally right. If people see these policies collapse they won’t pursue them anymore. Telling them that they will collapse isn’t enough when you have the mainstream media and politicians saying they will go on forever. Seeing is believing.
Any debate with a statist always ends up on the argument of sustainability of a given system. The Statist is willing to sacrifice their own freedoms in exchange for security whether it is economic or from aggressors, Arguments on liberty are useless against them. If you can show the statist that this security is unsustainable they will have no choice but to be convinced. The best way to show the unsustainability of a statist system is by showing its natural outcome in the real world. Show that if you burden people with government they will be less willing to work. Show them that if you offer free services at the expense of others they will lead to economic decline.
It is like building a website. In order to make sure it is solid you need to attack it and try to exploit it yourself. Otherwise if you set it off into the real world hackers will do that for you at your expense.
The more we take advantage of the services, the more we’ll pay for things we dont’ want. I don’t like using uneeded/unwanted state services because of my own personal pride. I don’t think it’s ethical to use and abuse them for ones advantage for the sake of collapsing the system.
However I do think things like paying your taxes in person and in dimes is fun. Or if you do your taxes on the computer with a program such as turbo tax, don’t do the electronic file, rather print it out, and black out all the barcodes so the irs can’t scan anything.
If everyone leeches who will pay for those services. That is what I am getting at. The current system is perverse. The harder you work and the more you earn the more you get taxed and the more government expands. There is no such thing as a surplus in the US government. If there is extra money they will find another program to put it into. During booms the government expands. During busts the government expands.
The only real end is a collapse.
Most of us probably won’t qualify for benefits but what you can do without crossing any ethical lines is to be as self sufficient as possible in order to support a low income lifestyle. If you grow your own food and have renewable energy you can stay below the tax bracket and keep your tax contributions to a minimum. Also use tax deductions on everything you legally can.
What other end is there? I’d really like to be wrong.
Also how can you prevent a collapse if it is bound to happen. As far as I know government action will lead to hyper inflation. Suffering is inevitable or am I wrong?
But it’s not just that - as Rothbard said we should use every ethical or a-ethical method to get rid of the state. Causing the state to coerce even more in order to fund itself, and living off the coercion of others is unethical.
Aren’t you encouraging the state to coerce more the harder you work and the more you pay taxes. In the US the trend towards government expansion is in a constant incline. The government has never given back surpluses they just use it to expand government even more. So if everyone started working it will only lead to more government. Working people are the fuel of the government. I say we should become dead weight until the car can move no more.
Ultimately the goal is to try and starve the state of funds by exploiting government resources and contributing as little as legally possible to the state. You are already living off the coercion of others when you drive on public roads and use other public infrastructure. By contributing more taxes you are only encouraging government to interfere even more because they take credit for your gains.
Here is the way I see it. If you continue to work harder to overcome government interference then you are only prolonging and encouraging government interference. Your tax money gives a signal to government that their policies are working.
If you become a non contributor and starve the government of funds there is no way the government can expand even if they wanted to unless they make slaves of everyone and force people to work and even that won’t work.
There is no logical way the government can continue expanding if a vast majority of people went on government benefits or contributed minimal taxes.
Its like a giant well of water where the workers take water in and the leeches take water out. If there are 3 people taking water from the river into the well and 20 people taking water out of the well there is no way that can be maintained without instantly drying up the well. But if you have 20 workers puting water into the well and only 3 takers the government will make the well bigger to accomodate all the extra water.
Withdrawing consent in masse would work but I don’t see that happening any time soon. It would be easier for the producers to withdraw their work. The producers and biggest tax contributors in this country are in small minority(5-10% of the population). If they all left the country or stopped their businesses they would stop the government intervention.
It’s my opinion, that any plan that requires mass libertarian cohesiveness will never get off the ground.
You’re also missing the internal contradiction of using the state to collapse the state, which is in essence the same as political libertarianism. By winning, you lose. Every time you pay taxes and take it back, you lose the moral high ground, and indirectly endorse the state as a redistributor.
I really believe the only ethical path for a hardcore libertarian is to deny all direct requests for state aid.
There are no quick fixes. The state will end when we have done all of the hard work. Not before. There are no shortcuts or “get state free” schemes.
Even if the state collapsed tomorrow, there would be a new one within a week. People are not educated about liberty. And it’s very hard to preach morals and ethics when you’re taking government welfare, regardless of your motive.
they don’t take more or less from you based on whether or not you take money out. by that logic we should be happy to pay taxes because if we didn’t someone else would have to pay more…?
If you pay in, and you take out, who do you think will be hit with higher taxes to fund the tax parasites? The person paying in and taking out. The person with savings will be the one hit with inflation.
I cannot see how taking back from the state through the state’s programs in any way further libertarianism. We might as well all go vote.
The problem then is how to get people educated when you have politicians and MSM fighting against you by spreading misinformation and ignorance. It is an uphill battle.
Even in a tyrannical state nobody was put into gulags for feeding off the state and being lazy. This practice is encouraged even if unintended.
In fact if we were in a state like this the only recourse would be to fight or sneak out of the country. Spreading literature or media about liberty in this type of tyrannical state would definitely get you into a gulag. Just saying.