There are some issues faced by Libertaria that I cannot figure out a hypothetical resolution for. Liberal, would you please reply when you have the time?
A neighboring country implements tariffs on goods from Libertaria. What is the appropriate response from the Libertarian government?
What, if anything, should the government do in a situation where a family is incompetent to provide for its children? If the children are abused? This assumes that the availability of charity/adoption is insufficient to support these children.
In the event of damage to or theft of property, monetary restitution works fine. What should be the penalty for inflicting bodily harm on another or engaging in fraud leading to such? Why?
Nothing. Libertaria doesn’t force people to buy the products produced within its borders. If the neighboring country’s people really want to pay MORE for goods, that’s their funeral.
I can’t speak for Liberal, but it’s my understanding that all but the most radical libertarians still allow for police and jails for violent criminals. This would take care of question 3, and perhaps the part of question 2 dealing with abuse.
As far as the bulk of question 2 and Longhair75’s question, most honest libertarians admit that the urban poor are really screwed under their system. Some may justify it with a cost benefit analysis of sorts, trying to show that the poor are screwed under our system anyway, and that the advantages of libertarianism offset the additional screwing.
Again, I am not a libertarian, these are just some of the arguments I’ve heard.
First, thank you **Apos ** for replying to this thread. It seems like many of these libertopia threads end up as a dogpile on Lib.
As for my own concerns, I’ve long since realized that my vision of a civilized society does not meet with that of your average libertarian. So lately, I’ve begun focusing on the actual possibility of this system occurring, and how long it could survive.
How would this libertarian state interact with other, more conventional nation-states? In terms of diplomacy, trade, war, etc. Do you foresee a state like this able to maintain sovereignty over everything within its borders? If not (and I can see how the idea of sovereignty might be antithetical to libertarian thought), then what stops an outside power from encroaching, conquering, etc?
My own thoughts- libertaria could be secured, I suppose, but I can’t see it surviving on a scale larger than commune size, and probably not for more than one generation.
Note also that any system which enforces property rights is rather more “American Libertarianism” than “Original Libertarianism”. The latter would argue that the former just makes the rich the new government and that such plutocracy looks as oppressive and restrictive as any totalitarian state when viewed from the bottom up.
When one owns so much that another has such vastly disproportionately small bargaining power that he is in thrall to you for his very existence and well-being, like the medieval serf and his feudal lord, is this near-slavery not coercion?
**Apos **got it right. The appropriate response is “nothing”.
Parents would not be free to abuse their children in libertopia, although I’m sure there is much to be debated about what actually constitutes “abuse”. I don’t see why a system of foster care leading to eventual adoption (not unlike what we currently have in the US) would be incompatible with libertopia.
The exact penalty for any specific crime isn’t really an issue. You couild have two different libertopias with different punishments for the same crime. It’s the nature of what constitutes a crime that defines libertiopia, not the details of the punishment.
Entities would be free to come up with their own set of building codes, and then would have either employees or licensed inspectors who would certify a building as complying with their codes. Property buyers would be able to ask which organization certified their building, and go from there. As for the effect this system would have on the poor, see Larry Borgia’s answer.
This kind of regulatory market isn’t as far-fetched a concept as it initially seems. See Underwriters Laboratories for an example of a private company that acts as a de facto regulatory agency in many respects.
Of course, since UL doesn’t make their standards publicly available (you gotta buy 'em, and they ain’t cheap), you could argue that they hinder innovation and the market far more then a government agency that supplied similiar standards for free would.
so, i am free come up with my own electrical standards, hire a couple of employees to certify that my building is safe and open the doors.
could i interest you in a 44th floor apartment? i am sure my elevators will never fail or the shaft fill with smoke during a fire, so i see no need for a fireproof stairwell for you to exit. or an interlock with the fire alarm system to allow the fire department to use them. after all, they have all those ladders…
i can provide more efficient waste water draining by eliminating those pesky p-traps under the drains, and flexible plastic is a much more efficient delivery system, and at a lower cost. my furnace is pretty good, so those pipes should never freeze
and just why does that furnace need to be vented to the outside? it just wastes heat.
light gauge aluminum wiring works just fine! go ahaed and plug your coffee pot in. no real need for 12 gauge copper, 18 gauge aluminum conducts the current as well, or better in my opinion. and what’s all this nonsense about metallic conduit? no need for this at all.
Of course, I’m free to keep out of buildings certified by “Longhair75’s Cheap-and-Quick Building Standards Association” and instead only enter ones certified by the reputable and trusted agencies. Hopefully they put a plaque on the buildings so I can quickly verify that the shop I’m about to enter isn’t a death trap before I walk in…
That has no bearing on the reality of what current orginizations do. I have experience with Underwrites Laboratory and American National Standards Institute requirements for ovens. They are more stringent than what the government requires. Now it is legal to sell an oven in America that hasn’t been certified by either of these orginizations but I would bet dollars to donuts that every oven sold in America is certified by these companies.
Presumably apartment codes in Libertaria would be set by the apartment code company at the necessary level for safety. This allows the cheapest apartments with sufficient safety. Now there would be apartments that don’t meet these codes for the poor. From what I can glean the Libertarian answer to this is ‘sucks to be poor’ or ‘the person should have put themself in a better economic position’.
On preview:
Shrug presumably you would have to research every companies standard. Most likely there eventually would be large companies spanning from ovens to cars to baby products that you could trust on reputation.
Maybe it’s just me but I don’t think you quite “got” that question, though your answer of “Do nothing” might still be correct.
If a neighboring country imposes tariffs on a Libertaria product to force it’s price to match or exceed local products it’s not quite “their funeral”. People buy the local goods, whatever they “lose” stays in the country and Libertarian producers lose sales. I know this is contrary to the philosophies of Libertaria but it still works.
I could still see the Libertarian answer as being “tough luck” as far as government action goes. The obvious solution I guess would be private lobby groups hired to influence legislation in foreign countries.
The same way I trust electronics certified by UL as being safe to plug in to my wall–because the reputable and trusted agencies would be recognized by industry. For example, when you take out a loan to have a building built, the lender is going to want insurance, and the insurer isn’t going to insure something that hasn’t been built to standards, because it will increase the chance they’ll have to pay out a claim. So the insurer would probably do some research and come up with a short list of trusted certification companies and say that the building has to meet those standards if it’s gonna be insured.
I doubt the “building certification” section of the phone book would have many listings. There’d probably be a brief period of competition, and then a couple (or more likely one) leader would emerge as the authority…
After all, if you can’t afford any of the safe and reliable housing options (and I gather people sometimes fall through the social safety nets and end up in this situation, even in the US), living in a dangerous, filthy shed is still better than being forced to live on the street. As long as the “shabby but safe” and “sleep under a bridge” options are both still available, adding a third option in-between (“it’s a death trap, but at least it has a roof”) cannot objectively be said to make the situation worse, can it?
