Let’s outline some fundamental principles of modern conservatives/libertarians:
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[li]TAANSTAAFL - There Ain’t No Such Thing as a Free Lunch. Much liberal thinking goes beyond mere helping those who need help, and moves into the realm of trying to legislate prosperity. Job creation programs, tariffs, socialized medicine for all (and not just the poor). Conservatives are more likely focused on the costs of these programs, and the understanding that, for instance, ‘job creation’ from the government really means job destruction in the private sector due to the taxes required to fund the jobs programs.[/li][li]The Law of Unintended Consequences - Governments suck. Central planning sucks. They are sometimes necessary, but are almost always less efficient than dynamic, bottom-up processes. Liberals are more likely to see the direct benefit of a government regulation, while conservatives are more likely to look at the side-effects the regulation will cause. For an example, consider rent controls. A liberal is more likely to say, “damned right the government should put a cap on rents! Poor people should not be kicked out of their apartments because of greedy landlords.” Conservatives are more likely to say, "Uh, if you cap rents, there will be no incentive to build more apartments or maintain the current ones. This is a prescription for a slum.’ Pass too many job regulations, and jobs move overseas. Set up minimum wage laws, and people who are not worth minimum wage become unemployable and wards of the state. Offer too much in welfare, and you will reduce the incentive to become productive. Etc.[/li][li]Respect for property rights - Liberals are often absolutists when it comes to civil liberties. Free speech, abortion, equality, etc. But they often treat property rights with contempt. Conservatives are much more likely to consider the right to work where you want and keep what you earn to be as important as the right to say what you want to say. And the conservatives are correct. If our society tried to institute ‘travel permits’, and only allow people to travel if the state approves, civil libertarians would scream. But they will turn around and try to stop people from driving or flying by putting punative taxes on their mode of transportation. For those on the margin, the outcome is identical. [/li][li]The overgeneralization of ‘rights’ - Liberals often fail to understand that you cannot have a ‘right’ to something that requires someone else to provide it. If there is one doctor in town, but two people who need full-time treatment, who has a ‘right’ to health care? And what of the doctor’s rights? Is he a slave? The conservative position is that NO ONE has a ‘right’ to health care, or a ‘right’ to a job, or a ‘right’ to three meals a day or a roof over their head. We may CHOOSE as a society to provide these things because we are rich and magnanimous. But when we codify them as ‘rights’ we make a tragic error, one that leads to an angry population, waiting lines, shortages, and eventual systemic collapse. Especially when the ‘rights’ are for things we cannot afford. Health care, for example. We simply cannot afford all the health care that we want. Some liberals refuse to believe this (see, “Legislating wealth” above), and think that all that’s required is a clever government plan. But since we can’t afford all we want, it WILL be rationed. It can either be rationed through prices and the market, which is the most efficient, or it can be rationed through government fiat, like it is in countries with socialized medicine. [/li][li]Government is DANGEROUS - Liberals are very concerned with the concentration of power in businesses. They demand heavy regulation of industry on the assumption that absent such regulation, businesses will naturally act as predators against the workers. But they are curiously unconcerned with the concentration of government power (other than when they effect civil liberties). The same people who will fight the merger of two large corporations will turn around and approve of a giant government bureaucracy that is much more inflexible and controlling. Conservatives are more likely to see government as the source of danger, rather than as the provider of solutions.[/li][/ul]
Not all conservatives buy into all of this. For example, you can find plenty of conservatives who are in favor of farm subsidies, tariffs, and the like. Most conservatives put different amounts of emphasis on different items. For myself, I’m more focused on the notion of the harm that government does that goes unnoticed. The reduction in innovation, the distortions of the market it creates, the unintended consequences that stifle growth and hurt everyone, including the rich and poor. I’m compassionate, and have no problem with social safety nets. I just don’t want the major focal point of society to be the government. I believe the government should be an enabler of freedom. The main organizing structure of society should be the myriad of interactions and transactions of free people living their lives according to their personal choices, without coercion.
I also happen to believe that that is the most efficient structure for a society. Government can help around the margins, and limited social programs can help reduce class friction and social upheaval. But government is not our big brother, our nanny, or our conscience.
This does not mean conservatives are hard-hearted, mean, or cheap. They give plenty to charity. My wife is a staunch conservative, and serves at a downtown soup kitchen regularly. We both give to charity. Last year, private individuals in the U.S. gave almost 300 billion dollars to charities - An amount greater than the entire budget for welfare, medicaid, and most other social programs combined. This isn’t about charity - it’s about whether government should coerce people into handing over their own money at gunpoint so that the government can dole it out to others.
