Greetings folks:
Recently I had a lot of dialogue with our great friend Ernie, regarding
political and economics views. We had a lively dialogue, and I am now going
to sum it up, as to what my thought processes are, in these subjects.
To summarize the below: I am one of a few things: Libertarian **leaning**.
A pro-market centrist. A constitutionalist (remember, the
Constitution wanted limited government. My, how we have deviated from
this!). Or "Center-Libertarian". Or Classical-Liberal-Leaning. Take your
pick. Labels are just a bunch of words, anyway; it's the substance behind
the labels that matter. But those labels would most accurately describe my
way of thinking.
Here is now the breakdown of that thinking. I used bullet points for easier
navigation, and red highlights to bring home the most important points:
*1).* When it comes to the government, my way of thinking is: government
has the same flawed human beings as society and markets as a whole. So,
less government (without too little) is better. I.e. the smaller the
government, the less chance of things like the following happening:
a). Corruption
b). Dictatorship/Tyranny
c). Government favoritism and backing, which unfairly favors some
corporations over others.
d). Terrible amounts of debt and fiscal mismanagement in general
e). Fraud Waste and Abuse, the kind we waste millions - sorry billions-
of dollars each year on.
So yes, I believe a smaller government, (not pea-sized small like most
libertarians want - that's too extreme) has less chance of the above things
happening. Not zero chance, but less chance.
Mind you, unlike anarchists and near-anarchist Libertarians: I respect some
government. We absolutely DO need some government, but significantly
smaller/more limited. What is in that smaller government, I leave to
debate. For me, what should be in that smaller government is
infrastructure/public works/sanitation, military, law and order, fire
department, ambulance. Welfare in the form of a check, not some extensive
Welfare Office. And a few other things. And that's it. Privatize all the
rest.
All the above, adds up to a much smaller government than the one we have.
What's more, is that a smaller government means it's less costly to
maintain - less taxes to have to pay.
On top of that, I propose a sales-only tax, or a tariff-only tax, or maybe
the geo-libertarian take, a land-only tax. Make one of those the singular
tax revenue for the country, instead of income tax. That way we keep the
money we earn, we are rewarded for saving money instead of being taxed for
it. And it may force people to assess their spending habits. Oh, the joy of
eliminating or greatly reducing the IRS!!
*2)*. This brings me to my attitude about the free market. I believe in
customer-ism, or market-ism. This is where corporations and companies
compete with each other, without any government backing or favoritism
whatsoever. No tax breaks, no subsidies, no other favoritism of any kind
from the government. In this system, success or failure is EARNED. i.e, We
don't have government picking the winners and losers; it is the PEOPLE who
decide which companies make it, and which don't.
Now you may ask yourself: what about the greed, the corruption, the bad
angels of human nature, in the marketist/customerist model? Here is my
answer:
The customerist/marketist model is far better at addressing the good and
bad angels of human nature, than government. Here's why:
In the marketist/customerist model, if a company behaves in a corrupt way,
or has bad ethics: customers, **ideally**, will see this, and leave the
business. And then, this business will eventually go out of business.
On the flip side, if a company is doing great, because they treat their
customers with care, because they have very good, non-corrupt practices,
etc. - this company will succeed, and far outshine other companies. And it
would be well deserved.
On the other hand, a "bad" company that has extensive government subsidies,
tax breaks and other backing - these backings would keep this "bad" company
existing longer than it should, thereby absolutely wrecking true market
competition.
*3).* So we talked about what happens to a "bad" company in the
marketist-customerist model. Ideally it would eventually go out of
business. But a corrupt government on the other hand??? Any change for the
better could take lifetimes. You see, government is much more of a
monolithic Leviathan, it does not have the kind of competition that the
market has. Government employees will earn a paycheck no matter what
happens to society. So in reality, the government does not have nearly as
much incentive as the free market to improve or lower it's corruption. So
again, trying to make government, especially a *corrupt or tyrannical*
one, better, could potentially take lifetimes.
*4). *Another advantage of the pro-marketism, small-government model I
proposed: too much blame and praise goes to politicians for making society
and economy better or worse. With a smaller government, we can now look at what
SOCIETY is doing wrong. What are SOCIETY's attitudes that need to change
for the better? The focus can be on that, rather than only on such a small
subset of society; i.e., what government and politicians are doing wrong.
*5).* Now, our discussion further ensued, and another argument was very
well brought up: well if we want to reduce corruption, reduce society as a
whole. My answer would be: Society as a whole is too big, too
boundary-less, for us to really grasp it as a whole. All we can do is make
the best observations we can, and provide the best input we can, with the
observational apparatus we have, which is undoubtedly limited compared to
the vastness of society as a whole.
Now, government is a subset of society; it has the same flawed human beings
as the free market does. But at least, government DOES have boundaries. So at
the very least, we can reduce an entity like government, with boundaries we
CAN see, unlike the vastness of society at large.
So all of my above points are why I much prefer a limited-government,
pro-market society. Now, I am fully aware that I am speaking from a very
idealist perspective; I know that no system is perfect. There will be
unintended consequences to any political and economic model. I am perfectly
aware of this. So I am sure you will find holes to shoot, in my arguments.
I hope you enjoyed this read - take it for what you think it is worth, that
is up to you.
I wish all of you a happy holiday season,
Vik
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