# What do Libertarians think should happen when disasters strike? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 12, 2012, 5:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758 "2012-11-12T05:22:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Beware\_of\_Doug](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/278dde/32.png) [@Beware\_of\_Doug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beware_of_Doug)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 6:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758/101 "2012-11-13T18:41:49Z")
> [@Absolute](#): > > No, the linchpin is that he took a quote from one guy and cherry-picked some quotes from a bunch of wingnuts on a libertarian forum and found an authoritarian streak. I don’t find this at all surprising. > > I could use the same technique to write a similar article claiming to find a streak of jealousy and victimhood in “liberal thought”. It would be equally meaningless in a serious discussion. Still, I see a real potential for authoritarianism to cloak itself in libertarian garb. Do you? Does it concern you? ---
**Author:** ![CannyDan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cannydan/32/548_2.png) [@CannyDan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CannyDan)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758/102 "2012-11-13T18:44:41Z")
The whole “government distortion” meme is an article of faith, not a true characterization of the situation. Resources have been allocated, not by government, but by the choices of private entities seeking to make a profit. If this was ‘economically inefficient’, the fault resides in the businesses making those investments. As I alluded earlier, NOLA isn’t built where it is because of any government decision, let alone one conferring ‘distortion’. It is there because businesses found it profitable to create a port between the ocean and the Mississippi River. People live there because they work for the businesses making a profit there. Government played a role, ‘distorting’ the market by facilitating this development because that was seen as being beneficial to the country as a whole. But government surely didn’t direct this development separately or for some unrelated purpose. ---
**Author:** ![Absolute](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b2d939/32.png) [@Absolute](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Absolute)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 7:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758/103 "2012-11-13T19:00:43Z")
> [@Beware\_of\_Doug](#): > > Still, I see a real potential for authoritarianism to cloak itself in libertarian garb. Do you? Does it concern you? I agree the potential is there. It doesn’t concern me. Any political philosophy will have people who are attracted to some of the talking points but aren’t sharp enough to realize the philosophy is actually completely incompatible with some of their viewpoints. Hell, that probably includes me. 😃 Now, I was mostly kidding in my previous post, but in fact, upon reflection, I see a real potential for jealousy, victimhood, and vindictiveness to cloak itself in liberal garb. People who are jealous or resentful of the rich and successful, voting or advocating for higher taxes (e.g. the 75% tax rate recently passed in France) out of spite. Does that concern you? ---
**Author:** ![rogerbox](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/76d3ee/32.png) [@rogerbox](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rogerbox)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758/104 "2012-11-13T19:25:47Z")
> [@Absolute](#): > > How many billions of taxpayer dollars would you let the government spend subsidizing people who chose to live in disaster-prone areas before you say the market with no political motives handles risk-benefit analysis better? I’d like a number, afterwhich you would hey admit “Hey, we were wrong”, that is my problem with big-government types, they never say when they would be proven wrong, jut hide behind “the market will not solve all!” like a religious credo. I think we’re doing just fine and FEMA is working spectacularly when not under George Bush. Unlike Libertarians, I think there is a place for Government and Free Markets with the ultimate goal of helping people, whereas Libertarians think there is almost laughably no legitimate role for government except to enforce the 8 million private contracts we will all make with each other for banal tasks in the name of “efficiency” (insert libertarian apologists here claiming they believe in gov’t doing X when they constantly preach about the gov’t doing ANYTHING being bad in all cases), and people should subjugate themselves to the free market because “distporting it” is the gravest sin, and people’s welfare is tertiary to the almight god-given market. You can see it here in this thread, where if disaster relief is privatized and more people on the whole DIE, it is still better because gov’t is bad by definition and market distortions are HORRIBLE, way worse than thousands more people dying would be. It’s sick, cruel, and I have no shame in saying it, evil. To answer your question with a dollar figure, the entire point of gov’t isn’t just to build, but to MAINTAIN, and we allocate dollars every year for FEMA to clean up the inevitable natural disasters, and in exchange NOLA gives us a huge port and rich culture and we won’t be heartless monsters. So eleventy billion dollars. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758/105 "2012-11-13T19:32:26Z")
I’d like to clarify my own views here. As a general principle, I certainly agree that insurance premiums should reflect risks. If you insist on building a home on a mudslide or near a fire hazard, insurance companies should charge you an appropriate premium. Government should not subsidize this unless it is in the public interest to do so. I have no easy answer to such questions of public interest. But to take New Orleans as a specific example, that city needs low and middle-income people to thrive, and those people may face danger. One can argue that our country has “painted itself into a corner” regarding the course of the Mississippi and the location of this important port, but to pretend that residents of New Orleans should be punished for their decision to live there is silly. I’ve no idea what the best approach is. An escalating tax on New Orleans shipping? And a similar tax on New Orleans entertainment? Careful study of the River and Delta’s future? Continued subsidies from the public treasury to mitigate any future flood? _I don’t know._ But to pretend that the free market is automatically the answer is just silly. (Is each homeowner supposed to negotiate with various levee-maintenance entrepreneurs?) > [@John\_Stamos\_Left\_Ear](#): > > … how would one privatize emergency rescue and assistance? Emergency services for profit? I thought OP’s question was very clear. He isn’t asking about compensation for lost housing. He wants victims **rescued _now_**. He wants them supplied with **water and blankets _soon_**. This is why I was rather astonished when the thread took a detour with post #2: > [@WillFarnaby](#): > > Insurance. I still don’t understand the answer. I guess we’re talking about entrepreneurs operating rescue boats and selling water and blankets with some customers (via “insurance” or perhaps as part of their Frequent Flier Program) getting this for free. If the libertarians think that lots of small rescue entrepreneurs will deliver emergency service more effectively than government, that might be an interesting debate. But the one-word answer “Insurance” makes me think the libertarian(s) didn’t even understand the question. ---
**Author:** ![rogerbox](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/76d3ee/32.png) [@rogerbox](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rogerbox)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758/106 "2012-11-13T19:37:21Z")
FEMA is insurance. ---
**Author:** ![Blaster\_Master](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/cab0a1/32.png) [@Blaster\_Master](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blaster_Master)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758/107 "2012-11-13T19:43:55Z")
> [@John\_Stamos\_Left\_Ear](#): > > So Hurricane Sandy came along and messed up some pretty populous areas of the country, some of which are still trying to come to terms with things. When this happened, FEMA on the federal level and a ton of assistance from the states and local municipalities came to the aid of the many people affected. > > What do Libertarians think about this? > > I saw a few [cartoons](http://blog.chron.com/nickanderson/files/2012/10/and103112blog1.jpg) and Facebook images shared about how everyone is a Libertarian until they’re on their rooftops and the helicopter is there to rescue you. It’s funny because it’s kinda true: Wouldn’t a true Libertarian be against the government assisting even in times of natural disasters? Wouldn’t a bootstrappy individualist who hates and mistrusts the government not want to be saved by the government? > > Assuming that is the case, how would one privatize emergency rescue and assistance? Emergency services for profit? > > Or do they suggest that victims are to rely on charities (as I often hear about other forms of welfare)? If so, how would they do so when local charities and shelters are often themselves swept away by hurricanes, tornadoes, floods or earthquakes and the ones who can assist are almost always lacking in manpower, supplies and resources - and that is WITH governmental assistance in the mix? > > Or in spite of what [Mitt Romney suggested](http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/DC-Decoder/2012/1030/Did-Mitt-Romney-suggest-eliminating-FEMA-video) when he was securing the nomination or what [Ron Paul said](http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2011/08/27/ron-paul-we-dont-need-fema/) when he was… Ron Paul… Do most (or a large minority at least) of Libertarians feel that emergency services is one of the few things that the government should be doing? > > To those who don’t agree on even that… What do they suggest? The biggest problem with discussing libertarian perspective is that it is often simplified into a single, and often wrong, perspective about what libertarians think, why they think it, and how it applies to specific scenarios. For instance, there’s the idea that all libertarians are in favor of no regulation at all on the market, and there certainly are a number of libertarians that think that, but it’s definitely not all libertarians, and there’s another concept that does cover that, free-market capitalists. The basic libertarian perspective is simply that government should do only that which it must and that it generally should be done at the most local level possible. What that entails depends on opinion. Most libertarians, for instance, would agree that national defense is something that the government ought to run and ought to be run at the national level. Once you get into things like health care, emergency situations, education, etc. You’ll see opinions all over the place. In the case of emergency situations, I can’t speak for all libertarians, but chances are you’ll probably not have many who think it should be handled on the national level. The reason being that the types of emergencies that are likely to occur will change depending on the region. The needs of emergency management in Florida will include hurricanes and flooding, the needs in California will include Earthquakes. So some libertarians may say that emergency management should be management by the government, but at a more local level, maybe by the state or region. I think even the majority of the hardcore free-market capitalist types will concede that, in the same way that there’s an obligation on doctors and hospitals to help people in need regardless of insurance coverage, people who need to be rescued should be saved in an emergency situation and then they, or their insurance, can be billed later. Obviously, these types would say that a person or group of people who fail to buy insurance wouldn’t get their possessions replaced or their uncovered infrastructure repaired, but that would be the nature of insurance. You might still find a few who think that there would be helicopters going around and verifying coverage information and if they aren’t working with that carrier or they don’t have any, they’d leave them behind. First, I don’t think there’s very many people who actually have that opinion. Second, it’s not practical or reasonable to do that sort of thing in an emergency situation where it would likely cost the lives of covered people by wasting time checking and rejecting uncovered people. Third, this perspective isn’t really even libertarian anymore as it is anarcho-capitalist, since there’s no government oversight AT ALL. And, really, that’s probably the biggest issue with understanding libertarian thought that I’ve seen. A lot of people confusing libertarian ideology with anarcho-capitalism. ---
**Author:** ![suranyi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@suranyi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/suranyi)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758/108 "2012-11-13T19:51:49Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > I spent a few of my childhood years living in rural areas disconnected from the government. Every single farmer I knew purchased crop insurance against hail, because it was a known threat. For other catastrophes, people pitched together. If your barn burned down or you got sick and couldn’t pull in your crops, your neighbors would pitch in and help. There was definitely a sense that everyone had better work together. The local fire department was all-volunteer, and they were very effective. Here’s the thing. You give an example where insurance, or neighbor-helping-neighbor, would work well. But what if the whole town burned down? And all the towns nearby also burned down? Remember, we’re talking a major natural disaster here. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Stamos\_Left\_Ear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_stamos_left_ear/32/3198_2.png) [@John\_Stamos\_Left\_Ear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Stamos_Left_Ear)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758/109 "2012-11-13T19:56:30Z")
> [@newcomer](#): > > I may be way off here but I’m not sure you understood Ron Paul’s comment… I don’t see where you get the idea that if there is no FEMA that people will be left to die. Do you see anything about people being “left to die” in my OP? Possibly you’re the one who misunderstands. > [@](#): > > You seem to be presenting Ron Paul’s stand against FEMA as being against helping people in need. That is a quite an incendiary conflation, IMHO. And judging from a discussion, many people accepted it as a fact. Ron Paul is against \*the government \*helping people. He is against the government organization that does this and as far as I know, has not proposed some other governmental agency handle things. You don’t think that’s a fact? Or are you trotting out strawmen to make your boy Ron Paul seem less silly? ---
**Author:** ![newcomer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/e5b9ba/32.png) [@newcomer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/newcomer)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758/110 "2012-11-13T20:26:17Z")
> [@John\_Stamos\_Left\_Ear](#): > > Do you see anything about people being “left to die” in my OP? Possibly you’re the one who misunderstands. Most likely. > [@John\_Stamos\_Left\_Ear](#): > > Ron Paul is against \*the government \*helping people. He is against the government organization that does this and as far as I know, has not proposed some other governmental agency handle things. I honestly think that his criticism of FEMA is based on the facts: (1) that it’s a federal bureaucracy that only enlarges spending and cements the hold that government has on various aspects of society and, (2) history of inefficiency. I don’t like W. Bush as the next guy but ascribing all the blame on him for Katrina and saying that the main reason FEMA was inefficient is b/c of him is somewhat disingenuous. Sometimes things have structural obstacles that are not visible on a whites sheet of good intentions. From Katrina Wiki: > [@](#): > > A report by the Appleseed Foundation, a public policy network, found that local entities (nonprofit and local government agencies) were far more flexible and responsive than the federal government or national organizations. The federal response was often constrained by lack of legal authority or by ill-suited eligibility and application requirements. In many instances, federal staff and national organizations did not seem to have the flexibility, training, and resources to meet demands on the ground. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758/111 "2012-11-13T20:28:11Z")
> [@Kearsen](#): > > No, but they were residing under sea level… Hey you in the Netherlands! Move! ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 8:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758/112 "2012-11-13T20:35:26Z")
> [@newcomer](#): > > I honestly think that his criticism of FEMA is based on the facts: (1) that it’s a federal bureaucracy that only enlarges spending and cements the hold that government has on various aspects of society and, (2) history of inefficiency. I don’t like W. Bush as the next guy but ascribing all the blame on him for Katrina and saying that the main reason FEMA was inefficient is b/c of him is somewhat disingenuous. > > Sometimes things have structural obstacles that are not visible on a whites sheet of good intentions. Under Bush 1 FEMA had a bad rep. Clinton appointed professionals to run it, and it ran quite well. Bush II as we all know appointed political lackeys to run FEMA, and we see how that turned out. Obama appointed professionals again, and things are going relatively smoothly again. As for inflexibility, Christie noted that Obama was able to cut through the red tape, so he could fill out the proper form over the phone and not in writing. With leadership many things are possible. But Obama did not need aides to create a DVD to inform him of the problem. Yes government agencies can do things poorly, especially when they are led by people who think government has no role. That just means right wingers shouldn’t be allowed anywhere near the reins of government. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Stamos\_Left\_Ear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_stamos_left_ear/32/3198_2.png) [@John\_Stamos\_Left\_Ear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Stamos_Left_Ear)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758/113 "2012-11-13T20:40:36Z")
> [@newcomer](#): > > I honestly think that his criticism of FEMA is based on the facts: (1) that it’s a federal bureaucracy that only enlarges spending and cements the hold that government has on various aspects of society and, (2) history of inefficiency. I don’t like W. Bush as the next guy but ascribing all the blame on him for Katrina and saying that the main reason FEMA was inefficient is b/c of him is somewhat disingenuous. (1) Ron Paul is against almost all Federal government. That was why I used him as a citation of someone who wants FEMA to be done away with but I didn’t see where he had alternatives set up for search & rescue and immediate life-preserving things, let alone the long view. That was the main question of this thread: You want FEMA and other government emergency assistance done away? Okay, what are the alternatives. Do you know what Paul’s alternative is? I never said it was “everybody dies.” Has anyone in this thread? (2) FEMA generally tends to run lousy under Presidents who don’t put much into it and generally is uncontroversial when under presidents who actually pay attention to it. To the surprise of nobody, that means [it’s been at its best under Democrats](http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2012/10/fema-case-study-difference-between-democrats-and-republicans): > [@](#): > > At a deep ideological level, Republicans believe that federal bureaucracies are inherently inept, so when Republicans occupy the White House they have no interest in making the federal bureaucracy work. And it doesn’t. Democrats, by contrast, take government services seriously and appoint people whose job is to make sure the federal bureaucracy does work. And it does. Ron Paul (and those who fellate him) should either come up with a viable alternative to FEMA (has he done that and I missed it?) or put the blame for FEMA failures where it belongs: residents of the oval office who don’t give FEMA more than the smallest concern. ---
**Author:** ![Beware\_of\_Doug](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/278dde/32.png) [@Beware\_of\_Doug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beware_of_Doug)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758/114 "2012-11-13T20:40:39Z")
> [@Absolute](#): > > I agree the potential is there. It doesn’t concern me. Any political philosophy will have people who are attracted to some of the talking points but aren’t sharp enough to realize the philosophy is actually completely incompatible with some of their viewpoints. Hell, that probably includes me. 😃 > > Now, I was mostly kidding in my previous post, but in fact, upon reflection, I see a real potential for jealousy, victimhood, and vindictiveness to cloak itself in liberal garb. People who are jealous or resentful of the rich and successful, voting or advocating for higher taxes (e.g. the 75% tax rate recently passed in France) out of spite. Does that concern you? Spitefulness is a terrible reason to vote for anything. But butthurt can make itself felt on both sides. All the same, it’s a lot easier to remedy, and at lower cost to society, than the cry for petty tyranny. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758/115 "2012-11-13T21:19:24Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > This thread illustrates two problems in talking about libertarianism. > > The first is that opponents always want to talk about how libertarianism would work if we just waved a magic wand and converted the world to ‘libertopia’ overnight. The answer is that it wouldn’t, because government has broken markets and encouraged risk-taking and all sorts of other things that wouldn’t have happened at all had the government not been there. For example, you can make a good argument that the decline in the savings rate is the result of government income security. Likewise, many libertarians (and social conservatives) say that one of the unintended consequences of big government is the destruction of social networks and extended families which used to make up the ‘social safety net’. For every example of government inspired risk taking, I can give you one of risk taking now prevented by the government. Buying on margin, for example. I’m listening to Simon Winchester’s book on the San Francisco earthquake. There were massive numbers of cheap wooden houses that slid off their foundations and burned, and larger structures, uninspected, which were shoddily constructed due to the lack of government regulation. There are plenty of examples of cities with strong government building codes surviving much better than cities without such codes. IOW, more libertarian cities. After all, there is strong incentive for free market builders to skimp on materials to maximize short term profits, especially since it is likely they will be long gone before there are any consequences. And of course there have been numerous panics and bubbles long before strong government intervention. > [@](#): > > But more to the point, because people knew the government wasn’t going to protect them, they stocked up on food and supplies. Because a crop could fail for a number of reasons and no one would -bail them out, there was a strong culture of savings. We had an entire larder full of canned goods, a large water tank for emergency water, etc. If a big snowstorm hit and blocked the roads for a week, we were fine. We had redundant heat in the form of oil heaters and a giant wood stove that could supplement as a heater in the case where there was no heating oil and no government help. Guess what - I have canned goods and water stored in case of an earthquake. I don’t know how many people do, but it is strongly recommended by the government. And I live in walking distance of several supermarkets. Government will help us - but who knows when they will be able to? And if a massive earthquake takes out local government, I’ll be damn glad of nonlocal government, state and federal, being able to stage resources away from the danger zone. > [@](#): > > So part of the equation is that in an _evolved_ libertarian world, people wouldn’t have been so helpless in the first place, and there would be private organizations in place for things like disaster assistance. Think ‘AMA Road Services’ on a grander scale. Please give the business case for such a company. And don’t say it will work as a charity. Our local food bank is one of my top causes, but they are still trying to keep up, and my area is pretty prosperous. Without food stamps, it would be a disaster. And don’t claim that people don’t donate because government helps. First, we all hear plenty of need. Second, the US has historically low tax rates, but I’m unaware of charities flush with money. > [@](#): > > The other problem in talking about ‘libertopia’ is that libertarians believe in emergent order and market innovation, which makes it impossible to predict the exact social structures and markets that would spring up to replace the vacuum of large government. Sure we can - we can just look at the paradise of Dickensian London. > [@](#): > > But you can’t see the path not taken. The French had Minitel, the rest of the world had a free market. And it turned out that the market wasn’t stalled. The internet took off and very rapidly became much, much more than the inventors of Minitel could possibly have imagined. Within a handful of years, France went from a great example of government intervention to a digital 3rd world, and internet adoption in France lagged the other developed nation by years and ultimately hurt the French people. Minitel was early, Minitel was a pioneer, and you can tell the pioneers by the arrows in their backs. Compuserve had the same problem. And, might I remind you, the Internet and the Web were both developed inside of government agencies. Private on-line services clearly had incentive to corral their customers, and for good reason - look how AOL became irrelevant when the Web happened. Lots of copies profit from the government created infrastructure, but which of them would have built it? Which shows the proper role of government, pioneering basic infrastructure and research so that private industry can take advantage of it. The interstate highway system, the web, and, soon, I hope, space travel. > [@](#): > > So we can’t see how the market would have evolved to handle disaster services, because we never let it try. And because the government has guaranteed the financial safety of people regardless of how risky their choice of real-estate is, people have over-built on flood plains and in coastal areas and other places that have a high risk potential. And because people have come to expect that the government will protect them, they don’t protect themselves. They don’t save money, they don’t stock up on food, they don’t build the social networks needed to come to each other’s aid. What a load of crap! First, as I noted, people in risky areas do save food. People on the plains have storm cellars government or no. Flood and earthquake insurance hardly eliminate financial damage from disasters. At best people get low cost loans - which still have to be paid off. And, as I mentioned, earthquake insurance has an immense deductible and is expensive. Finally, saying that people don’t talk to their neighbors because of the government is stupid, stupid, stupid. You seem to be saying that the only reason people have social interactions is to have a safety net in case of disaster. Really? That is a pretty nasty thing to say about humanity in general. > [@](#): > > If you were forced to get flood insurance as a condition of getting a mortgage, then the risk of flooding would increase the ownership cost of the home. If the government didn’t provide subsidized flood insurance, fewer people would be able to get mortgages in areas of high flooding and these areas wouldn’t be over-developed. This means that if we had been living in libertopia from the start, we wouldn’t have so many people in areas constantly hit by disasters in the first place. One possible result is that we’d have more people living in rural and suburban areas where they can look after each other, rather than being packed into cities on coasts where they are reliant on massive relief efforts in the case of an emergency. We might have evolved into a world of less overall systemic risk. Gee, Sam, there are these things called cities and they have some benefits. But the parts of NJ hit by the storm would be considered suburban by most people, which does not involve homes half a mile apart. And they don’t get hit every year or even every decade. Though it might start happening thanks to climate change - something most libertarians are not very excited about. Tell you what. There is a definite danger that us socialist Americans will stream over the northern border to get away from our big government. If we do, you guys will be in trouble. Just to be safe, why don’t you move all Canadians say 100 miles away. No problem, right? No disruption? I thought conservatives wanted to take us back to the 19th century, I didn’t know this was a libertarian plank also. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758/116 "2012-11-13T21:21:17Z")
> [@suranyi](#): > > Here’s the thing. You give an example where insurance, or neighbor-helping-neighbor, would work well. But what if the whole town burned down? And all the towns nearby also burned down? Remember, we’re talking a major natural disaster here. Of course neighbors still do help neighbors, all over. But it is damn useful to have people unaffected by the disaster to come and help also. It is not an either-or thing. ---
**Author:** ![emacknight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/3ec8ea/32.png) [@emacknight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/emacknight)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758/117 "2012-11-13T21:32:14Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > Of course neighbors still do help neighbors, all over. But it is damn useful to have people unaffected by the disaster to come and help also. It is not an either-or thing. > [@suranyi](#): > > Here’s the thing. You give an example where insurance, or neighbor-helping-neighbor, would work well. But what if the whole town burned down? And all the towns nearby also burned down? Remember, we’re talking a major natural disaster here. You are both taking the term “neighbour” too literally. Following Katrina Mexico was quick to send help, IIRC in the form of water treatment equipment. Following the destruction caused by Sandy Canadians were quick to send power crews to help with downed lines. Following 9/11 rescue crews from all over the US volunteered to help. ---
**Author:** ![Beware\_of\_Doug](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/278dde/32.png) [@Beware\_of\_Doug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beware_of_Doug)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 11:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758/118 "2012-11-13T23:27:39Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > I thought conservatives wanted to take us back to the 19th century, I didn’t know this was a libertarian plank also. Sure it is, for some. Giving rein to petty authoritarianism - rule by Colt, Bible and belt - makes for a polite but ruthless society, where one can turn one’s back with a clear conscience on certain kinds of people in certain kinds of trouble. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2012, 11:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758/119 "2012-11-13T23:40:22Z")
> [@suranyi](#): > > Here’s the thing. You give an example where insurance, or neighbor-helping-neighbor, would work well. But what if the whole town burned down? And all the towns nearby also burned down? Remember, we’re talking a major natural disaster here. Yes, bad stuff can happen, and it will suck for the people it happens to. But one of the unspoken assumptions in this thread seems to be that if government doesn’t organize relief, no one else will. There will be no volunteerism, no ad-hoc communications networks, no possible large-scale response. But in fact, the history of disasters shows that responses do come from many places, only one of which is the federal government. During Katrina, one of the few entities that managed to get supplies in to people early was [Wal-Mart](http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/05/AR2005090501598.html): > [@](#): > > At 8 a.m. on Wednesday, as New Orleans filled with water, Wal-Mart chief executive H. Lee Scott Jr. called an emergency meeting of his top lieutenants and warned them he did not want a “measured response” to the hurricane. > > “I want us to respond in a way appropriate to our size and the impact we can have,” he said, according to an executive who attended the meeting. At the time, Wal-Mart had pledged $2 million to the relief efforts. “Should it be $10 million?” Scott asked. > > Over the next few days, Wal-Mart’s response to Katrina – an unrivaled $20 million in cash donations, 1,500 truckloads of free merchandise, food for 100,000 meals and the promise of a job for every one of its displaced workers – has turned the chain into an unexpected lifeline for much of the Southeast and earned it near-universal praise at a time when the company is struggling to burnish its image. > > While state and federal officials have come under harsh criticism for their handling of the storm’s aftermath, Wal-Mart is being held up as a model for logistical efficiency and nimble disaster planning, which have allowed it to quickly deliver staples such as water, fuel and toilet paper to thousands of evacuees. Plenty of studies have shown that when government charity recedes, private charity picks up the slack. The liberals in this forum seem to believe that, left to their own devices people will be selfish and cruel and not look after each other. So they advocate public charity instead of private, displace the private charities, then use the lack of private charity as further justification for public charity. Here’s another example of private disaster preparedness often doing a better job than government: The private HAM radio network. It has often made a huge difference in getting communications to people where government communication systems have failed. Have you seen how much effort and money ham radio operators expend to maintain this capability? It’s pretty impressive. We can only speculate on how much more of this kind of stuff would exist in a world with no federal disaster relief. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2012, 12:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758/120 "2012-11-14T00:37:41Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > For every example of government inspired risk taking, I can give you one of risk taking now prevented by the government. Buying on margin, for example. I’m listening to Simon Winchester’s book on the San Francisco earthquake. There were massive numbers of cheap wooden houses that slid off their foundations and burned, and larger structures, uninspected, which were shoddily constructed due to the lack of government regulation. There are plenty of examples of cities with strong government building codes surviving much better than cities without such codes. IOW, more libertarian cities. After all, there is strong incentive for free market builders to skimp on materials to maximize short term profits, especially since it is likely they will be long gone before there are any consequences. And of course there have been numerous panics and bubbles long before strong government intervention. First of all, very few libertarians are opposed to building codes - especially in areas where damage to one building can affect another. Second, the San Fransisco earthquake was a hundred years ago. Do you know what else was worse 100 years ago? EVERYTHING. And that’s not because of a lack of large government, it’s because people were ooorer. These types of arguments from the past are very annoying to libertarians. Whenever a discussion of libertarianism comes up, someone is sure to make this argument: “Dickensian London sucked. There was smaller government then. Therefore, smaller government makes things suck.” I’m sure you can see the myriad logical flaws in that kind of argumentation. Even when it comes to regulation, the amount of regulation we can tolerate today is largely a function of our wealth. Regulation costs money, and if you’re poor enough, you just can’t afford it. > [@](#): > > Guess what - I have canned goods and water stored in case of an earthquake. I don’t know how many people do, but it is strongly recommended by the government. The government can recommend until it’s blue in the face, but people respond to real incentives, not to pleas and suggestions from authorities. This is one of the first rules of economics. You can ask people to save more, or to eat less red meat, or to stay in school longer. But they won’t until there is a real incentive for them to do so. And so long as government promises to protect them from bad things, they will cease to protect themselves. However, remember that like all things economic, we’re talking about the marginal case here. Changes happen on the margins. Push more responsibility back on the people, and those on the margin will take that responsibility and push the margin in that direction. But even in pure libertopia there will still be people who refuse to prepare and will need to be cared for. There will just be fewer of them. > [@](#): > > And I live in walking distance of several supermarkets. Government will help us - but who knows when they will be able to? And if a massive earthquake takes out local government, I’ll be damn glad of nonlocal government, state and federal, being able to stage resources away from the danger zone. Yeah? And how do you feel about standing in gas lines because the government imposes price controls and prevents the market from efficiently allocating resources? I wonder how the people in Katrina felt when their government told them all to head to the sports stadium, then ignored them once they were congregated there? No discussion of libertarian answers can be complete unless we also look at the failure of government, and the misguided policies that make it harder to recover from disasters. The primary one is the absolute refusal by government officials to allow prices to seek their own level. One of the primary market mechanisms for disaster management is the price system. It ensures that supplies are available to people with the highest need, that additional supplies are rushed into an area that needs them, etc. Governemnts almost _always_ short-circuit this with ‘anti-gouging’ laws that are destructive and counter-productive. After Katrina, there was a huge spike in demand for things like generators and water pumps. The market responded to this by driving up the price of these goods, and that in turn caused people in nearby unaffected areas to buy those goods and transport them into the area - until the government stopped them because it wasn’t ‘fair’. Anti-gouging laws are the best example of how governments can make a problem worse through ‘feel good’ legislation and the ignorance of elected officials. > [@](#): > > Please give the business case for such a company. And don’t say it will work as a charity. Our local food bank is one of my top causes, but they are still trying to keep up, and my area is pretty prosperous. I just gave an example: Wal-Mart. And if anti-gouging laws were struck down, many businesses would stock more goods needed in disasters, because they could be sold for higher prices if disaster struck. So you’d have more supplies in the area in the first place. I think you under-estimate just how much charity businesses engage in. They do it for many reasons: to improve their brand, to improve the morale of their work force (everyone wants to work for a company that is seen as being a good corporate citizen), to protect their own assets and markets, etc. My company is constantly pushing us to engage in more charity. It has matching programs for employee contributions. It gives us several days off per year to volunteer for charitable work like Habitat for Humanity. It is even involved in disaster relief efforts. And it’s not hard to imagine at all that a community might band together and set up volunteer emergency services and all the rest. For larger communities and regions, municipal and state governments can set up disaster relief efforts. Libertarians are much less opposed to government at the local and state level, because people ultimately have the option of changing locations if they don’t like local government. > [@](#): > > Without food stamps, it would be a disaster. And don’t claim that people don’t donate because government helps. First, we all hear plenty of need. Second, the US has historically low tax rates, but I’m unaware of charities flush with money. What a surprise - the U.S. government has low taxes, and the U.S. people are [among the most charitable in the world](http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2010/sep/08/charitable-giving-country#_). So yes, I AM claiming that public charity displaces private charity, and that higher taxes result in lower amounts of private charity. > [@](#): > > Sure we can - we can just look at the paradise of Dickensian London. I already mentioned this - Dickensian London sucked because it was POOR. Can you point to another major city in the same era that had better standards of living because of stronger government? Because comparing the living standards of hundreds of years ago to modern living standards makes for a lousy comparison. > [@](#): > > Minitel was early, Minitel was a pioneer, and you can tell the pioneers by the arrows in their backs. Compuserve had the same problem. Here’s the difference: Because CompuServe was private, as soon as it was uncompetitive with the changing market it vanished. But Minitel, being a government program, continued to displace innovation for years after it was obviously an inferior product. > [@](#): > > And, might I remind you, the Internet and the Web were both developed inside of government agencies. And I might remind YOU that this is a load of nonsense. The only thing developed inside of government were the basic protocols, of which there were plenty of competitors. And there was a LOT of resistance within the government and academia (mostly by liberals) to keep the internet from going commercial. A lot of people back then felt that ‘crass commercialization’ of the internet would destroy it. At the time it was commercialized, _no one_ knew what it would become. The structure of the modern internet has been driven almost entirely by market forces. It is the most unregulated market in the world, by far. Anyone is free to set up a web site or offer services online. Taxes are low or nonexistent. There are no public employee unions of programmers controlling access to the infrastructure. No internet planning boards determining what the ‘correct’ content should be. No zoning laws preventing web sites from looking or behaving how their owners choose. No government inspectors of code quality, no enforcement of the ADA or Davis-Bacon act requirements that only union programmers be used for web sites that serve government. The internet is a nearly-perfect example of ‘libertopia’ - a creation of spontaneous order driven by market demands rather than by central planners. And yet, it handles its own disaster preparations, it has standards that are enforced by the market, and it has created trillions of dollars in wealth. It also has some problems like spam and viruses, but even there market forces are working to control it. By the way, Squarespace was based in New York, and they never suffered any downtime. Do you know why? Because they had TWO backup generators. One in the basement, and one on the roof. The basement one flooded, so the Squarespace owners enlisted help from volunteers and employees and set up a ‘conga line’ to move gasoline to the rooftop generator to keep the data center running. And now, after the experience of losing one of their generators, they are setting up a redundant server farm in a different geographic location to isolate them from any local disaster. They are doing this to win market share, not because the government told them to. > [@](#): > > Private on-line services clearly had incentive to corral their customers, and for good reason - look how AOL became irrelevant when the Web happened. Lots of copies profit from the government created infrastructure, but which of them would have built it? Are you kidding? You already mentioned CompuServe, which _already_ had a packet-switched network up and running nationally. BBS’s were evolving rapidly into a constellation of networked hubs. There were MANY competing network topologies and technologies, any one of which could have emerged as the standard for the internet. The government simply got there first because it was the largest. Had the government never had a thing to do with anything digital, we’d still have an internet today, and it would look much the same as it does now. The names of the protocols would be different, and they might have functioned slighly differently, but the basic needs for such a protocol were obvious. Hell, there were even alternatives to HTML at the time. I was writing full graphic online pages in a language called “RIP-Script”, which was just as rich as HTML at the time, or even more so. My own company had a google-like text search product I wrote that we were selling to companies like Microsoft, which had set up huge BBS systems to provide tech support. > [@](#): > > Which shows the proper role of government, pioneering basic infrastructure and research so that private industry can take advantage of it. The interstate highway system, the web, and, soon, I hope, space travel. Despite what I just said about the internet, I don’t really disagree with this. As far as government interventions go, spending money on infrastructure and basic research is the least objectionable. The biggest argument against it is that ‘infant industries’ are hard to tell from ‘commercially viable’ industries, causing government to overstay its welcome. So for example I can admit that NASA helped bootstrap the space program, while also recognizing that today it’s totally incapable of competing for LEO launch and heavy lift with the private market, yet the government is still planning to build new LEO rockets and heavy launch systems to displace the private market that has already proven its capability to deliver those services better and far less expensively. > [@](#): > > What a load of crap! First, as I noted, people in risky areas do save food. No, you made an assertion, and backed it up with personal anecdote. Actual disaster planners say that’s not true, and that the average city is only a day or two away from major food and water shortages because people DON’T save. Just how much extra food do you think the apartment dwellers in Manhattan have on hand? > [@](#): > > People on the plains have storm cellars government or no. People on the plains tend to be those red-state rednecks that cling bitterly to their guns and their spare food and water. You tend to sneer at them until they’re useful in pointing out how some people manage to look after themselves in the existence of big government. > [@](#): > > Flood and earthquake insurance hardly eliminate financial damage from disasters. Yes they do, by preventing the over-building and over-population of those areas in the first place. As a related example, the high cost of motorcycle insurance for young men absolutely has an effect of limiting the number of foolish motorcycle deaths in a given year, by preventing the most foolish people from buying a motorbike in the first place. Also, insurance companies DO act as a regulatory force. I get a break on my motorcycle insurance because I took a safety class. I get a break on my home insurance because I installed an alarm system. My insurance company demanded that I have an inspector (certified by THEM, not the government) inspect my basement development for proper electrical work as a condition of my house insurance. It’s not a big stretch to assume that, absent government earthquake codes, private insurance companies would set up the equivalent of Underwriter’s laboratories to demand and inspect for compliance with their own building guidelines for earthquake resistance. > [@](#): > > I thought conservatives wanted to take us back to the 19th century, I didn’t know this was a libertarian plank also. It’s you who keeps bringing up the 19th century examples. My examples would be more along the lines of the internet, Hong Kong, and Singapore. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-libertarians-think-should-happen-when-disasters-strike/640758.md?page=7)