Which is absolutely his prerogative, to not consent to be governed.
Not only less, but nonexistent.
How is it coercing him to tell him he can live there and have whatever relations he wants with the other residents as long as he is peaceful and honest? If he feels he doesn’t need the government to protect his rights, he is free to not be governed by them. Really, Daniel, if all you’re going to use is straw men, your army is going to burn up quickly.
Wrong. The natives can sign the contract and the government will protect their rights, or they can not sign the contract and protect their rights on their own, or they can leave. If their particularly enterprising, and feel they are better at protecting rights . . . get this . . . they can even offer competing governance!
There are no taxes. Those who have consented to be governed voluntarily pay as outlined in their contract.
If he signed the contract, he is now in breach, as he knew at the outset he would be required to pay. If he did not, the government cannot expect him to pay.
If the next island over threatens the property and persons of those who did pay, the government will react accordingly.
Then, if they signed, they are all in breach. Furthermore, they will have rendered the government incapable of acting on their behalf to protect their rights, a self-defeating strategy if ever I saw one.
Do you not understand the difference between initiated force and retaliatory force? Do you need a guided reading, perhaps?
Maybe this will help:
**in·i·ti·ate (-nsh-t) **
v. tr. in·i·ti·at·ed, in·i·ti·at·ing, in·i·ti·ates.
To set going by taking the first step; begin.
**re·tal·i·ate (r-tl-t) **
v. re·tal·i·at·ed, re·tal·i·at·ing, re·tal·i·ates.
v. intr.
To return like for like, especially evil for evil.
v. tr.
To pay back (an injury) in kind.
What about this is so difficult that someone with obvious intelligence doesn’t understand it?
If you’re going to misrepresent, misunderstand, and lie about everything, how do you expect to have a discussion? If a signatory to the contract refuses to pay, he is in breach, and the government is acting appropriately, with retaliatory force, to make him honor the contract.
Why would you sign a contract if you did not agree to the outlined consequences for breaking it?
Incidentally, Daniel, how does the US currently avoid allowing Candians in border cities and provinces to benefit from the presence of US military forces and nuclear forces which they did not pay for?
That is such an egregiously broad mischaracterization of what I posted that I’m going to label it a lie. The fact that the State sometimes (or, as I admitted, “not infrequently”) gets things wrong does not by any stretch mean that it always does, or that it mostly does, or that the passage of time and will of the electorate can’t correct some or most of the wrong standards. Do you seriously think that in Libertaria there will be no wrong standards in any of your voluntary States? Or that people won’t “volunteer” for things odious to them because the State offering the offensive feature has the best available whole package?
Think of it a preemptive non-coercion. Unlike you, I believe that our corporeal, here and now existence has value. In fact, I think that that is all we have. Given that, are you really so surprised that I’m willing forcibly to take from you a little of the precious property you so worship to try to preserve the life of your neighbors? Having some sort of arbitration proceeding after my neighbor’s shortsightedness has inadvertently created a coercion that has taken my life is just not good enough.
Just call me Mr. Lucky. Or see below. A State making a small number of decisions for other men, and for me, is crucial to the “solution” of my own life.
More. Much more, actually, and that is my point. If it makes you comfortable, feel free to live in a fantasy world where voluntary government somehow creates a peaceful and honest paradise with happy agrarians not creating any pollution. I live in New York City. And in New York City, someone is going to coerce my neighbor into building his building out of suitable materials, because I’d just as soon there be a reasonable shot that a fire in his building not spread to mine. And someone is going to coerce him to limit the activities in his building to minimize the danger to me and mine. And, you have to believe me here, the City of New York is much more peaceful about coercion than I would be if I didn’t have them to do the job for me. Heck, they have courts and fines and restraining orders and trained police and all sorts of things. All I have is an extremely strong self-preservation instinct and massive amounts of firearms. Well, at least I’m honest.
In exchange for the protection that the City of New York provides me through its coercion of others, I expect the City of New York to coerce me in other ways. I also depend on them to be the only coercer, and to protect me from others who would do to me what I’d do to them if the State didn’t forcibly mediate. And finally, I expect that my neighbors and I collectively get to select our coercers, and that they will coerce under threat of being removed electorally or otherwise if they get out of line.
Is the real world so incomprehensible to you that you are incapable of imagining a system that takes into account the fact that it exists?
How does the libertarian view the place of socialised medicine, limited social welfare (e.g. re-training to help people escape from poverty), state education and the like?
My limited understanding is that the social contract is an agreement to surrender some freedom in order to guarantee the better part (supporting mechanisms to guarantee property rights, defence and the like). Does this extend to “social” benefits such as education, medicine and the like?
If not, and if (as I suspect) many of these are down to individual charitable causes, what guarantee is there that these will actually happen, or will happen to the extent that it’s not really a problem?
I don’t expect libertarianism to have all the answers, but I believe one of the reasons it hasn’t gained a wider respect is that people worry about “falling out” of society without a safety net. Is this a justifiable concern from your points of view?
The whole concept of Libertarianism seems to rest on the concept that everyone will be excellent to one another…almost a vision of a utopian society. While this is certainly a noble concept and goal humanity just isn’t up for it yet (the part from the movie The Matrix where the bad guy tells the good guy that the computer originally created a perfect world for humans to live in but our minds wouldn’t accept it causing the loss of whole crops of humans just popped into my head). There are too many divergent needs and opinions for what I’m seeing described here to work.
I disagree. I believe there are circumstances where force and/or coercion may be initiated. The problem usually lies in where people agree that the line is drawn for such measures but circumstances can be dreampt up where all but the clinically insane would agree that force is appropriate. Before you say that sure, anyone can dream up some obscure hypothetical that’s never happen, I’ll use a real world example already mentioned in this thread (although anyone willing to come up with any other gotchas feel welcome).
In response to:
Then in response to:
So, no coercion, no force allowed in a Libertarian government. Air Traffic controllers are free to strike at will. The controllers are good people but have a legitimate beef with their wages. You have now handed an INCREDIBLE (I can’t stress that enough) amount of power into the hands of a few people. The controllers can shutdown air travel over the entire United States. The economic impact would be staggering. The entire US economy could be brought to its knees in a few short days and, given the size of the US economy, could quite possibly smack the global economy upside the head as well causing a global depression. Even if business concerns don’t sway you how about flights carrying organ transplants or people needing to travel to medical centers for critical care that will now die? Delivery of medicines, food, you name it.
These controllers aren’t affecting a few people…they are holding an ENTIRE country, even the WORLD, hostage! And you say, “Sorry…that’s how it goes because under no circumstances will we tell someone they must go back to work.”
I’m not saying the controllers should be held at gunpoint and forced to work for slave wages but neither should such a group weild so much power. Some industries are just too critical to society as a whole.
(FYI: For what it’s worth a Federal judge felt the same way and ordered them back to work when this did happen.)
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Education and Worker’s Rights
I don’t know if PLDennison was just being contrary about my comment on education in Africa and Central America or if my point was to obscure. Basically I was trying to point out that the notion of people’s innate goodness to support education (or any program) for the disadvantaged is optimistic in the extreme.
Africa and Central America were merely two places where you see stunningly low education rates and not many people lending aid to drag them out of that situation. Still, I don’t need to go overseas for this but can point to our own backyard. Inner city and rural schools are chronically understaffed and ill-equipped to provide what (by American standards) would be considered a good education. There are a few corporations that have stepped in to lend money but that aid is rare. Where are the millionaires and billionaires that should be falling over themselves to help out? Donald Trump alone could easily refit every school in New York and setup an endowment to increase teacher’s wages so class size is reduced and teachers are happier. Ted Turner could take Atlanta, Bill Gates could take Seattle, Oprah and Michael Jordan could take Chicago, a coalition of movie stars could take LA and so on. The wealthiest people in America could probably bangout the top 20 largest school districts in the US leaving the money the government saves supporting those to go to the rest of the school system.
Pie in the sky notions are fine and dandy but experience doesn’t bear the Libertarian view of everyone chipping in a helping hand so everything is hunky-dory.
So, under a Libertarian government, we will have a class of people who cannot receive an education. No matter how you slice it some of the population will be unwilling or unable to pay for an education and there almost certainly won’t be enough ‘free’ schools to meet the demand. You are left with a PERPETUAL underclass. Right now the poor and disadvantaged have a shot, albeit a difficult one, at a better life. With no guaranteed eduacation some will simply never rise above poverty.
What do these people do? They take whatever crap jobs are left that no one else wants. Since a Libertarian government will not enforce minimum wages* you can get these people to work for damn near anything including below subsistence wages. They get pissed and strike? No problem, they’re all fired* and new workers hired…plenty where they came from. This is no, “Gee, it sounds good,” notion. This is based in history. Look to the late 19th and early 20th century for how workers got treated when they had no protection at all. Even unionized they frequently got squashed till the government COERCED/FORCED business into playing fairly.
From there we can go on to child labor laws. Libertarian government will not coerce anyone to do or NOT do anything. If a parent decides to pop their kids into work instead of school that’s their prerogative.
Of course, we haven’t even touched on discrimination. Hey, I can hire whoever I want and it’s not going to be women or negros. I’m not being unfair or coercive, I pay my employees well and provide a safe work environment. I just choose to only have white people work for me. Libertarians will let this happen*.
Point to a place and time where the Libertarian ideal (or something close if you want to say there has never been a Libertarian government) worked on a macro-economic scale.
*-Libertarian wrote
I could go on and on for awhile but this post is getting lengthy enough so I’ll leave it at this for awhile. I’m sure a few of you will have something to say to prompt more ramblings from me ;).
I just wanted to pick out a couple of points and respond to the rest later:
I disagree. It rests on the concept that the people who do act that way (i.e., peaceful, honest people) should be left along and be free from initiated force or fraud. It’s the people who don’t act that way from whom you need to be protected, and you can engage a government to protect you from them, or not.
Here’s a corollary argument: How many of these same disadvantaged, inner-city school district governments have handed out property tax abatements like they were M&Ms to corporations located on land whose assessed property tax value is worth millions? The governments who are supposed to be running these schools are working at cross-purposes by giving tax breaks to the bodies most able to pay them on the most valuable land.
I don’t think it is . . . I think when you have children, you have an implied contract to treat them a certain way until they reach the age of majority. But that’s my personal opinion.
Would you patronize a business that you knew hired only straight white males? Do you know many people who would?
This is a play on words. By the same token, I can argue that the USA government does not engage in coercion. The adherents of Libertarianism are free to find a place on earth where they can practicice their chosen form of goverment. Try to join Sealand! Live on Antarctica! To quote poster Libertarian from another thread, your choices are limited only by your wit and imagination. A libertarian should recognize that any person’s life is what they make of it.
I just had to respond to this. If the business had lower prices, I know many people that would. And I know many people that would not be bothered by these hiring practices.
And libertarian proponents seem to centre around the idea that the oppressive governmental employees who are corrupt and keen to abuse your rights will magically transform into fair-minded, honest and peaceful when they own the large corporation with whom you will be signing one of the multitude of contracts that will be a constant fact of life in a Libertarian government. Of course, the more successful citizens will be constantly accompanied by an attorney specializing in contract law, and a large corporation will have a team of a hundred attorneys phrasing contracts in the way most advantageous for them. But hey, if you’re smart enough, you should be able to figure out how to get a fair deal, right?
This is a non-starter for the Libertarian view. In the Libertarian scheme the corporation will not pay taxes either (or very little). Certainly nothing to support schools since those are privately funded.
In fact, this is even worse in the Libertarian scheme than the way mentioned in the reply. While the corporation is not paying taxes the workers who move to the area to work are forced (to greater or lesser degrees) to pay taxes to support the local school system. In the Libertarian scheme it is entirely up to the good will of the corporation and the people to pony up the required funds to support the schools. If they decide not to pay, as is their option, then no schools for the kids.
Also, let’s say you do pay for your kids to go to school. Where does the goodness of your heart kick in to support a school your kids don’t go to to make sure everyone has a fair chance and ensure a decent society? Doesn’t a part of you say, “Hey, I pay for my kids to go to school but THOSE parents choose not to pay…why should I be obliged to pay someone elses expenses?” Certainly you are under no obligation to make up for the shortcomings of others. Heck, the money you send to another school is money you could spend at your OWN kids school to improve their chances. Which are you going to choose first? Do you really believe that there wouldn’t be places that refuse or can’t pay money to support a local school system? If they refuse you may say tough luck to them but how about those that can’t? Do they get schools equivalent in every way to the wealthier schools or do you create a stratified society where there are crap schools, so-so schools and excellent schools?
In response to:
I think Libertarianism (as it is being described in this thread) most certainly implies child labor as a real possibility if not an outright foregone conclusion.
It works like this–
Schools are a private endeavor. Not everyone will be able to afford schools for their children. Government CANNOT tell businesses who they can (or must) OR who they can’t (or mustn’t) hire. Parents are poor, they have kids running around doing nothing, no restrictions on child labor beyond a parent’s good will to keep them at home. Historically children HAVE been sent out to work at VERY early ages. Still do in many parts of the world.
With no restrictions against it why do you suppose human history would stop repeating itself and be any different in the US? Implied contract with children be damned…you can find PLENTY of examples of parents in the US who abide by no such contract with their children today. It’s sickening and sad but unfortunately true. Just because you are (or would be) a good and noble parent is no guarantee on other’s behavior.
In response to:
That answer is simplistic in the extreme. This makes an assumption (among many) that all businesses are service businesses. Take coal miners for example. For the sake of argument let’s say they become discriminatory in the extreme. Exactly how do you avoid keeping them in business? Are you (and everyone else) going to forgo electricity till they behave? What about the steel in your car and appliances?
There are dozens of ways that you could end up supporting businesses, knowingly or unknowingly, that are discriminatory by virtue of the ENTIRE product cycle from digging materials out of the ground through manufacturing through distribution to retail not too mention advertising and marketing.
As for services YOU may avoid the grocer that discriminates but there are places in this country TODAY that would specifically shop at a grocer that DOES discriminate. In the end you may have a few places that cater to the enlightened souls who care enough to walk a few extra blocks for their services but in the end you’d find your patronage (or lack of it) would matter little.
My question was more to the point of asking why, under our system, you are so upset with Donald Trump and Michael Jordan for not bailing the government out of a situation that they themselves causd. Shouldn’t you instead ask why the government keeps removing so many sources of funding from the schools?
Not if they don’t live where they work, and I’d wager that in most inner cities, this is the case. Many of them probably don’t even live and work in the same county, let alone municipality. And even if they work in a city that collects local income taxes on nonresident employees, the schools aren’t funded from those sources. They’re funded from the property taxes. Too many people, in urban areas, commute from well outside their workplace for this to even be an argument.
In Cleveland, a few years ago, the citizens took steps to solve these problems. They initiated a ballot issue that said, basically, “Grant all the property tax abatements you want, but the portion that would have gone to the schools must be made up from other sources in the general fund.” Know what happened? The mayor, Mike White:
used his position as mayor to wage a political campaign against the citizens of Cleveland, claiming that they wanted to eliminate tax abatements which provide valuable jobs, and blaming the school’s problems on BMW-driving teachers.
Defeated the ballot issue, using tax money for mailings and speeches–to fight his own citizens!
Got permission from the State of Ohio to dissolve the school board and appoint a “schools CEO” and a hand-picked board.
So explain again how the current system is better, and why this is all billionaires’ faults for not bailing out the schools.
A group of people that collectively decides not to educate their own children isn’t going to last very long. Don’t you think?
Given the premise of a Libertarian system, would you choose to live by people who think this way? Not “If the US suddenly turned Libertarian tomorrow,” but in a hypothetical Libertarian system.
Yes, we call those people “child abusers” and we put them in “jails.” Do you think children in a Libertarian system are not subject to the law prohibiting coercion and fraud?
Wait, wait . . . are we in the United States or a Libertarian system for this question? Because you seem to keep switching back and forth. Is there only one, government-monopoly-granted power company, and it only uses coal? Or is there more than one? (Hell, there are two in Cleveland–CEI and Cleveland Public Power.)
You might be doing that now. Some of us buy gas from . . . what, Shell Oil? Who were caught making astoundingly racist remarks on tape, and who hire mercenaries to protect their pipelines in Africa by decimating local populations? So explain again how the current system is superior to a Libertarian system, or why you would expect another system to prevent what America’s mix of capitalism and socialism cannot.
Nobody said a Libertarian system would be perfect, only better and more free. If you want a system that would actually magically prevent bad people from doing bad things, good luck. The system we have now, which many people feel is the best ever, doesn’t prevent that; why would you expect another system to?
pldennison: *[Libertarianism] rests on the concept that the people who do act that way (i.e., peaceful, honest people) should be left alon[e] and be free from initiated force or fraud. It’s the people who don’t act that way from whom you need to be protected *
To my mind, this attitude is one of the most fundamental flaws of Libertarianism. Libertarians, as RTFirefly remarked about gun-control opponents on another thread, tend to assume very clear distinctions between Good Guys and Bad Guys. There are the peaceful and honest, who need no control or guidance, and the non-peaceful non-honest, who deserve no consideration or trust.
In real life, of course, people’s ethical behavior is a lot more volatile, and often heavily dependent on others’ expectations. I think real-life societies are more effective, and more peaceful and honest as well, when the social structure assumes everybody to be linked in some form of mutual responsibility and support.
Shareholders will pay fees for protection of their property (or not) as they wish. After this much time, you still miss that point?
As to shareholders supporting education, would you want to select from a workforce of well educated people who can read, write, cipher, and spell? Or would you want to keep it like it is today?
Are you saying that parents are grinding out children like rabbits, giving less thought to how they will care for children than how they will care for a new car? Is this the mindset brought upon us by the system you champion?
Ahoy! Another one who thinks that government ended discrimination!
I tell you it was demanded by the people who marched in the streets and descended upon the politicians. And even after all that, there are those naive enough to believe that there is less discrimination than before. It is worse now than ever, I tell you, because it is insidiously hidden.
Now I’m thinking you are being either deliberately obtuse or Trolling me for the hell of it.
Why am I upset Doanld Trump doesn’t bail out education? Simple…I’m not upset. Not in the least.
The Libertarian view in this thread argues that everyone will want good education so everyone will pay into the system voluntarily. My point is they don’t do this now. What makes you think they will do so under a Libertarian regime?
You might argue they already pay taxes and don’t feel the need to support education further. Well, if that’s so, then if they pay for their own kids schools why would you think they’d pay more for someone elses? Because everyone wants an educated workforce because that’s good for business? See below…
Who says everyone wants an educated workforce? For some industries it’s in their interest to not have them educated. Uneducated workers have a harder time organizing. Uneducated workers work for less money. Uneducated workers may not be aware their company is taking advantage of them and won’t take them to court for any of a variety of issues.
Since when is an education required for apple pickers or the guy who slides sheet metal in and out of a machine?
What you will get by your system is a stratified society of the intelligensia and the workers. It will most certainly be in the intelligensia’s interest to maintain that system. Cheap labor that doesn’t complain too much.
Re-read my earlier posts and I talk about this. I think I got it. What’s your point?
Are you living in a cave somewhere? Yes, there are areas where children are being pumped out like rabbits and the parents apparently care less for them than their own needs. Children (6 I think) were found in a room in Chicago living in their own crap…literally. Parents were on the street doing their own thing. Another couple left their 8(?) year old and 4(?) year old home alone while they went on vacation. Children are having children in Chicago as early as age 12. I tutored a kid from the projects who tried to set me up with his grandma! The boy was 8, his mom was 22 and his grandma was 37 (I was 31 at the time).
Do I like the current system that this developed under? Hell no. But I certainly don’t see the Libertarian system as an improvement. Far from it, I believe it would exacerbate the situation by removing what little support these people do enjoy today.
Libertarian, if you can find one place where I said the current government ended discrimination or even implied such was the case I will concede the debate to you forthwith and leave this thread alone.
I think I’ve shown that Libertarianism would promote discrimination beyond what is experienced today. A point you conveniently sidestepped with a wisecrack. Since government wouldn’t be around to keep the screws on business to practice fair hiring practices the “insidiously hidden” discrimination will be free to come out of the closet in plain sight for all. That’s worse than the current system because at least now some pretense has to be made at fairness which allows at least a few minorities to sneak in under the wire. Under Libertarianism companies wouldn’t have to bother…they simply wouldn’t hire minorities.
In response to:
I might not choose to live next to people who won’t pay for schools but then again I can afford to make that decision. Somewhere there will be people who can’t afford school and somebody will be living next to them.
Of course I’d expect child abusers to be put in jail in ANY society/government. That doesn’t mean packing your kid off to the factory counts as child abuse. Your implied parental contract and breaking that implied contract does not equate to child ABUSE (although it can). It’s possible to equate to, “I feel our child working will be more help to this family than sending him/her to school.” Unfortunately people who are desperately poor will think their kids working is more valuable than school more often than not.
Nothing you or anyone else has written has even approached a solution or guarantee this wouldn’t happen. Flawed as the current system is parents must by law send their kids to school at least up to a minimum point (8th grade?).
I wrote:
I think I’ve been pretty clear about which system I’m talking about when I write. It’s unclear in the quote above because it doesn’t matter. Pick your government system and the meaning of the above quote remains the same.
As to choosing a power company it doesn’t matter either. My example said coal miners. I did not specify one coal miner but ALL of them. If you operate a coal burning power plant then you buy from them or you buy oversea and increase your operational cost. Most people will buy the cheap power…not the politically correct power.
If all the air traffic controllers got together and decided to strike for higher wages, crippling the country? Well, two options. One: the airline owners decide that they have to pay higher wages because the controllers have the skills they need. Two: the airline owners decide that there are plenty of people who can do the job and hire new controllers. Of course, in a libertarian system, I doubt the entire work force would strike, because they are all being paid by different companies, different airports, etc, just like airline pilots are. Some will have great contracts and great pay, and won’t strike. Others will have lousy pay, and they might strike. But the country won’t be shut down because there will be other airlines–those that pay controllers what they are worth–still running.
If we look back to the actual controller strike, they had signed a contract guarenteeing that they wouldn’t strike. That’s why the judge ordered them back to work. When they didn’t go back to work, they were fired. The controllers were replaced because they violated their agreement. No judge has the power to arrest people and drag them to a workplace.
Look, strikes succeed when the employers can’t find replacements. Successful recent strikes were of people like the airline pilots, the Boeing engineers, or the Baseball players. So why don’t other highly skilled people strike? Why don’t CEOs and executives go on strike? Well, they don’t have to. They negotiate for their salaries with their employers directly. They want a salary, the employer offers another salary. They can take it or not, or demand more money or not. But it’s not going on strike.
If there is sufficient flexibility and competition there is no need to go on strike. All you need to do is look for a different position. Not making enough as a computer programmer? Organizing your fellow developers to strike is silly…you simply find another company that will pay more. Or maybe you find that no one will pay you more…maybe you’re not as talented as you think you are.
Minimum Wage: Why does everyone think that if the minumum wage were repealed that wages would drop like a rock? And why do people say the minumum wage is below the poverty line? Oh, because you can’t support a family of four on a minumum wage job! But why should you? Most people making minumum wage don’t support families. And if you do support a family, maybe you could get more skills and get a better job?
Let’s say you make $6.00/hr. 40 hours a week makes $960 a month. 7% in social security gives you about $900 left. $75 a week in food (generous) leaves $600. Now, how much rent do you pay? Maybe you live at home. But obviously you can’t afford an apartment on your own. You need, shockingly, shared housing. You can find an apartment where your share is under $400, easy. It’ll be crappy, but you can do it unless you want to live in Manhattan. If you want to live in Manhattan, I suggest you get a better job. You don’t have a right to live in Manhattan. Now, you can’t afford a car, so $50 a month in bus tickets…that leaves $150. Well, you do have to buy all your clothes in thrift shops. Remember when you were a kid and you hated it when Mom gave you clothes for Christmas? Well, now you love it. Anyway, if you think the budget is crazy, I’ve lived this way for years…not at minumum wage, but working part time. It is possible to live on minumum wage. But you can’t support a family. Why should you be able to?
Public Education:
Well, I’m not a strict libertarian. I do believe in public funding of schools. But we should finance them differently. Instead of parents being expected to pay for the kid’s school, make the kid pay for school…in the form of student loans. Everyone is entitled to one, and you pay it off over thirty years starting when you turn 21. You’ll also have to pay a small loan for insurance, since some kids will die or end up in jail or be unemployable. Also, there is no such thing as a public school, only publicly funded schools. Any teacher or group of teachers can open a school. The elected loan fund trustees will certify schools…if they think the school stinks, you can’t get a loan to attend. If parents don’t send their kid to school, they are engaging in coercive child abuse.
Discrimination:
Employers should be free to discriminate if they want to. Customers already have this power…you don’t have to patronize a black or gay or white or male or asian owned business if you don’t want to. Same with employment. Now, what prevents rampant discrimination? Well, greed. Why do so many companies today offer domestic partner benefits? They don’t have to. It’s not against the law in most places to discriminate against gays. But most companies realize that if they want to hire the best people they have to pay the price. Not hiring a qualified homosexual simply means that your competitors hire him and you make less money. Capitalism is a great destroyer of predjudice…the only color a businessman cares about is green.
OK, some of this isn’t strict libertarianism, but this might give people something to criticize.
You are correct in your assessment of the Air Traffic Controllers but it doesn’t quite match what I described as a scary possibility.
A) The Controllers form a union. Thus their salary is negotiated by the union. There can still be differences from airport to airport in salaries (I imagine a Controller at O’Hare in Chicago should get paid more than a controller in Sioux Falls) but in the end the negotiations happen in one place.
B) When a union strikes they can have only a particular plant walk off or threaten that ALL workers they represent walk off. In some cases entirely separate unions hold sympathy strikes to show worker solidarity. In my horror scenario they ALL walk off…it makes for one helluva bargaining chip.
C) Your options: “One: the airline owners decide that they have to pay higher wages because the controllers have the skills they need.” This is, of course, exactly what the union is hoping for. Plus, with the damage they are doing with the strike they can certainly demand more money than might be reasonably expected.
“Two: the airline owners decide that there are plenty of people who can do the job and hire new controllers.” This isn’t so easy. Do you suppose there are 10,000 trained air traffic controllers hanging about? It’s a rather specific skill and one you don’t necessarily find easily. This pushes the airlines back to option 1 you mentioned and that’s my point…they REALLY have their employers over a barrel. It takes years to become a properly trained flight controller.
You are quite correct that a judge can’t force people to work. In this case I don’t think you’d want to anyway even if you could. At least, I wouldn’t want a pissed off controller in charge of MY plane when it was landing. That’s a little flip…I seriously doubt controllers would crash planes but they would almost certainly drag their heels and cause tie-ups and delays.
However, the judge most certainly CAN throw you in jail in this case (the real controller strike). Not for not working (exactly) but for REFUSING a court order to return to work. You go to jail for contempt of court. I’m not suggesting 10,000 (or whatever) controllers should have been jailed (kinda silly)…just saying they could have been. I don’t recall what did happen but instead of jailing 10,000 controllers the judge may jail the union leaders who refuse to tell their constituency to return to work.
In the end they were able to fire the controllers because they were able to use military controllers to stand in. Still, there weren’t enough controllers in the military to handle the full load of the original controllers causing flight cancellations and other problems (albeit problems that could be overcome without too much hassle). IIRC they estimated something like six years to fully replace the fired controllers and back to 100%.
I think the idea I was trying to convey still stands since in a Libertarian society a Judge will have nothing to say about that issue. If there aren’t enough military controllers to be had that could be a genuinely destructive situation.
Just out of curiousity, in a Libertarian context, is the position of air traffic controller a closed shop? One has to belong to the union? I don’t see how, in a Libertarian context, that that situation could arise. So, while there could conceivably be a shortage of controllers, there couldn’t be an absence. Those controllers who decided not to join the union would not walk out.
Sure it could happen in a libertarian context, I think. A large majority of the existing controllers voluntarily band together as a union and negotiate contracts with the ATC companies providing that the companies hire exclusively from the union ranks. The ATC companies would not want to do this of course, but I can see how it could possibly come about as the result of good-faith bargaining by both sides.
Not to say it’s likely, of course, but that it seems possible even if both sides are volunteers to the negotiation.
Or is there a coercion here that I’m not seeing? Not being libertarian myself, I could easily be missing something.
>2>“No force under ANY circumstance”, except when you have signed a contract. So the whole big deal is if you agree, they can do anything they want. And you do not think witholding stuff like police protection is “duress”?
>3> Yes he is, he is getting defended by the military “for free”. How about the Police-Do you check before responding to a cry for help if you have a contract? What happens if he lies? Or get fake “citizenship” papers? You can’t touch him, as he did not sign a “contract”- right? Or if your Police decide he is the man who did some burglaries, what do you do? Does he get a trial? For “free”? What right do your Police have to arrest him, on suspicion?(I agree your “contract” police would be able to stop him from doing damage to those under contract, but he is not commiting these crimes in plain sight). He did not sign a contract, remember. So what “right” do you have to question him, or search his house for evidence? Or, if he did not sign “the contract”, he has NO rights at all, ie the Police can torture him until he confesses, and then sell him into slavery, or shoot him. if that is the case, how is “the contract” NOT being signed under coercion? “If you don’t sign this, gestapo oficer Heinrich here will begin the torture—I really don’t like it when he does that, of course, but until you sign, I am powerless to stop him”. Riiight. :rolleyes:
>4> Ah, now I see how you libertarians get around things- you use the Humpty Dumpty approach- ie “A word means whatever I say it means”. Thus- “taxation” = theft, and “coerced under a contract” does not = “coercion”. Well, unless you are a giant humaniod Egg, I’m not buying it.
>1. Another “Humpty dumpty” definition. Since the “payments” are “voluntary”, they are not “taxes”. And this is one reason why I asked for a “hypothetical” Libertarian country- 2 other “libertarians” have said there would be taxes for the Military and Police.
>2 So he gets “free” military protection. Nice.
>3.& >5 So when YOU break the Law by not paying taxes, and get arrested, that’s “initiated force”; BUT if you break the “contract” by not paying “payments”, and get arrested, thats “retalitory force”. Sure, “Humpty”. :rolleyes:
>4 LIE? Where?// Misunderstand? What is there to misunderstand? I asked to have shown to me a hypothetical Librtarian Gov’t, and you guys refused. If I have “misunderstood”, whose fauly is that? Misrepresent? “Payments are not taxes” :rolleyes:
So, if a Libertarian Government IS really practical, I suppose you will point out on this world map all the Libertarian counties?
Daniel, if I asked you in 1950 to name all the human beings who had walked on the moon, could you do so? How about if I asked you in June 1969? How about on July 18, 1969?
Do you think anyone would ever invade, say, Toronto? Why or why not? Hey, what’s with Switzerland, by the way?
No, when the government says, “Give us 30% percent of your paycheck or we’ll throw you in jail, and no you can’t bloody well opt out,” THAT’S initiated force.
Tell me, are you in the habit of regularly signing contracts that you have not read and/or to the terms of which you do not consent? If you are, they have a word for people like you: “stupid.”
Do you regularly sign contracts and then refuse to meet your legal obligations under them? If so, they have a word for you: “criminal.”
Nonsense. Such a thing has been shown several dozen times on this MB in the last six months. Furthermore, you still refuse to acknowledge a difference between initiated and retaliatory force. Here’s a clue: You walk up to me on the street and punch me in the face. I punch you back. We have both used force. Here’s the tricky part: which of us has initiated force?
Frankly, yours, since you are quite busy not reading anything anyone says, instead being occupied shouting inanities while preparing to retreat and declare victory.
Do you consider what you spend at Wal-Mart to be a tax? Why or why not?
