Welcome to Keith's night. Don't tread on anyone.
This is a summary and Analysis of busting myths about the state
and the libertarian alternative by Zach Roper.
He begins with myth. Number one.
The state is good and does good. Before we start criticizing
anything. You want to make sure you're
talking about the same thing. So you should really Define your
terms of people think that the state is a vehicle, sort of like
a tool like a wrench or a hammer.
Just a mechanism to achieve something.
Well, you're probably not going to end up at the same place as
far as though your understanding of what the state should do or
whether or not it should exist. If you're not even talking about
the same thing. So the state maybe is a group of
people that provide rules and Roads and schools for society.
Well certainly country clubs and supermarkets, provide goods and
services and rules. As and ways for us to cooperate
and are mechanisms for us to achieve our ends in life.
Does that make roads and schools and supermarkets, and country
clubs and religious organizations government.
Well, no not necessarily Roper gets to the heart of what the
state is, right? At the beginning and says, the
state is violence, not a vehicle.
So what makes government or the state, a unique organization and
Society? Is it claims a, right?
No, other organization has Right, to initiate aggression or
violence against peaceful, people.
By decree, by making laws or legislation.
So the state has the right to do that against the citizenry.
If the citizenry tries to do it against the state.
They're called literal terrorists.
They are initiating violence for political ends against
politicians. So, here, we finally have a
principled difference between the state Society.
And a general organization role for defines taxation as the
confiscation of property of peacefully acting individuals.
If taxation were just a morally, just way of acquiring money or
property. Well, then certainly, any
organization would just have the right to issue taxes against a
peaceful people. So also instead of me having to
vote for a congressman to tax on my behalf, if they represent me,
I Lily would have the right to issue taxes against peaceful
people. So if I don't have the right to
issue taxes against citizens, how can I delegate that right to
a congressman vitally important step that many people think
past, he says, regulatory legislation is passed to force
peacefully, acting individuals to take or refrain from taking
actions with their bodies or private property.
Contrary to how they would otherwise, I act imagine me
saying to a fellow podcaster. I am a very nice man here to
represent you and I am going to regulate your podcast and by
that. I mean before you are allowed to
issue a podcast to people and spread your ideas to the world.
You just have to run everything by me.
So make the podcast, send it to me.
I will see if it's okay and up to my standards because we have
to have standards. It's and I'll tell you whether
or not you are allowed to publish it.
Well, this first of all is me being a tyrant.
Second of all, it would drastically decrease, the amount
of choices and opportunities. The average person had to access
podcast that they want. Also, I'm totally biased as is
every other human being and all government officials because
they too are human beings. So the regulatory idea is both
immoral and Economically unjustified role for says, if
government isn't coercive, how do you explain the violent
penalties for non-compliance? Imagine me saying, you owe it to
the Christian church. To pay 5% annually of your
income to the church. It's because of the church we
have ideas, like Thou shalt, not murder, Thou shalt not steal.
Thou shalt not commit adultery you benefit from Christian
ideology. And Jewish ideology from the Old
Testament. So since you benefit there for
the church, and the temples have the right to take five percent
of your income annually. The and if you don't chip in
then, will they have the right to put you in a cage?
And if you resist the cage while they shoot you if you resist,
that's what government does. You can see it's unjust because
of any other organization tried to do it.
You would blatantly see it as unjust just hold the state to
the same standards. You would hold any other
Ization, the root of the idea, the of libertarianism that real
fur is getting at is essentially an actual, my body, my choice
philosophy. I came across this meme.
A license for registration is just the permission slip by the
state. You have to pay money for
voluntary. Transactions between consenting
individuals, don't need third-party.
Validation free people don't ask for permission and don't need
legal validation. Imagine before you do anything,
you say. I really wonder if a group of
people in Washington d.c. Called the Congress group
approve of this. Why would you ever seek their
advice on anything Rover? Then discusses entrepreneurial
activity. I thought this was an excellent
passage. I, I'm gonna read the short
couple Pages here as noted above.
The purpose. Of an economy is to allocate
productive, resources, natural resources, labor and capital
goods to maximize the In of human wants, no one can produce
all of his own needs and thus humans must trade, a person,
produces what he can And Trades this product with others who are
producing what he wants, but cannot produce for himself.
However, productive resources are scarce relative to human
wants. Thus choices have to be made in
organizing. These scarce resources to try to
satisfy. Those wants that are ranked most
highly I each person the key question is how can we know
which ones are ranked most highly so that we could then try
to organize resources, accordingly.
Those who organize these scarce resources are society's
entrepreneurs. Their function is to try to
anticipate, human wants bid for and organize the necessary
scarce resources to create Goods to satisfy those wants and then
price these Goods appropriately and deliver them to Consumers
those entrepreneurs who are able to successfully bid for and
organize resources at a lower cost than what customers are
voluntarily willingly. To pay for the end product would
make a profit, the entrepreneurs who are unsuccessful at the
tack. This task would incur a loss.
The key point. However, is that entrepreneurs
cannot force their products on consumers in the free market.
The customers King and he votes with his dollars every minute of
every day, those entrepreneurs who make profits would be able
to purchase further resources. And those who incur losses would
have to yield resources both of which are beneficial.
For society, as it means, resources are flowing to those
entrepreneurs who are best at satisfying actual wants since
Society is more prosperous. The more human wants are
satisfied, profits are not something we should distain, but
rather something we should embrace.
The lure of making profits is what draws entrepreneurs to take
risk with their capital and time to try to find a way to satisfy
customers and losses are a way to disappear.
Plan entrepreneurs who make mistakes in the process final
point on entrepreneurs and entrepreneurs task is very
difficult, the knowledge of which his customers want in
terms of price quality location. Etc, is not available in injured
in any Central database and are there are millions of customers
and the economy each with his own specific wants
entrepreneurs. Therefore take their cues from
signals given by their customers.
Murmurs if a customer is voluntarily willing to pay for a
good at the price proposed by the entrepreneur, then the
entrepreneur knows he is satisfying a want if a customer
is not willing to transact, then the entrepreneur knows he is not
satisfying a want the entrepreneur tries to anticipate
customer demand, but keeps experimenting every day amid
continuous changes in demand competition and the availability
quality and price. And of resources, I thought that
was just a terrific explanation of the entrepreneurial role in
the free market role for goes on to myth.
Number 10. We need the state to provide
public goods. People will say first because of
the so-called free rider problem.
Namely private firms wouldn't be able to prevent people from
benefiting from these Goods without paying for them.
First of all, how is that a problem people benefit from
something and don't don't compensate others.
So what I don't see that as terrible, I don't send people
invoices for my podcasts or YouTube videos and things are.
Okay. I don't see that as inherently a
problem people benefiting, but let's continue commonly cited
examples of these goods include lighthouses National Defense and
police second because these goods are just too difficult for
the private sector to handle. They require complex.
Arrangements were huge amounts of financial capital and profits
would be too hard to generate or would be too distant in the
future. The fact that profit is hard to
generate does not justify coercing people to fund your
operation examples of these goods include roads, schools,
money courts, railroads power and scientific research and
develop. And now all you have to do is
take the lesson we learned from myth, number one in 04,
Excellent book here and apply these principles consistently.
So imagine. Well, I have the right to coerce
people to give me their property because a portion of it goes
towards lighthouses and it's okay for me to take people's
money by force because I run a security agency and we protect
people. The fact that you go around
performing actions that may or may not yield societal.
Quote benefits doesn't If I, you caging people who don't want to
chip in, to whatever you're doing National Defense, for
example, is a excellent example because it makes us less safe by
creating enemies all over the world by through sanctions and
bombings and collusion with other governments courts.
Also, I don't benefit from all the courts, caging people for
victimless crimes schools teach people to be Mindless Prussian
robots who obey the state and don't think critically so I
don't benefit from those money. Well, I'd benefit from a
commodity-based money supply whereas the current money supply
is constantly diminished. I mean that would give whoever
invented Bitcoin or discovered Bitcoin the right to tax us
because well it's hard for me to generate profits.
Absolutely ridiculous nonsense for more on this.
Check out the lighthouse and By Ronald H coasts from the
University of Chicago Law School, the privatization of
roads and highways by dr. Walter block and private
education is good for the poor. A study of private schools
serving the poor and low-income countries by James Tooley and
Pauline Dixon as far as police and military go and private law.
Arbitration check out private governance creating order in
economic and social life. By Edward Peter Stringham and a
collection of essays that Ed string and put together called a
no Turkey and the law of the political economy of choice.
He continues on the idea of public goods saying why insist
on a monopoly with regard to public goods.
So for example government courts have a monopoly on enforcing law
and government police have a monopoly on enforcing said law
even status except that monopolies are bad because they
lead to higher prices and less Innovation compared.
With when there is competition. If so, why would the state is
argue that the state must monopolize the production of a
public good. What would be the harm in
allowing genuine competition? If the statist is correct,
namely that the private sector would not produce such a good,
then the status should not be concerned.
If the state does not Outlaw Competition note.
However, that what I'm advocating for is a real
competition where consumers could opt out of paying for the
state's public good and in, Stead purchase only the
competitive, private good. He goes on this.
Puts these suppliers at a tremendous disadvantage since it
raises the effective price to Consumers of the private good,
because the consumers have to pay for the state's public, good
via taxes, and then also for the suppliers provide public, good
for the suppliers. Good.
So, if you take an Arizona, we have a private school st.
Thomas. - Catholic church and school and a public school
Corona del Sol. What you would want to ask the
advocate of State education. Is why is it that one of these
organizations gets to collect funds, coercively.
And the other doesn't have the right to collect funds,
coercively. Because I mean things, they
might say about the public school is, well, you benefit
from what people learn you benefit from what people learn
from st. Thomas Aquinas. - well, you live
in a society. And in order to live in a
society, you want kids who are educated so you can have a
future of people who are intellectually able to operate
in the world. And you also want people who are
productive. Well st.
Thomas Aquinas Catholic church and school also does that the
status has to justify this double standard for why?
His Going to take action gets to collect funds coercively and
everyone else has to collect funds, voluntarily Zach role for
continues with the Free Rider concept.
The most fundamental Point relating to public goods.
However, is that status cannot convincingly answer the question
which goods are public goods and which are not.
Oftentimes, the stateís simplistic response is to cite
those goods currently produced by the state.
However, that is circular reasoning.
The question is asking for The principles from which one could
deduce which Goods should be produced by the state and which
should not just because the state is currently producing.
A good doesn't provide any principled argument for the
necessity or morality of its production by the state role for
continues. Saying Free Riders, do not
justify forced Riders. This is a widely recognized meme
called relax its for the roads and someone coercively.
Funds to fund roads because if you benefit from roads and that
justifies forcing people to fund them.
Well, then anyone can force you to fund them.
So long as a portion of the funds, go to roads or the paint
for roads or flattening tar, or construction companies role for
says, in terms of the moral issue with the state is saying,
is this, I want this good but you benefit from it even If you
don't pay for it, so I'm going to force you to pay for it.
The moral counter-argument is this, I don't want to, and then
he actually goes on, but to me that, that's enough, my body, my
choice, my money, my choice, my time, my choice, he says, in
terms of economics. One of the key insights of
Austrian economics is that all benefits are subjective.
Thus, it is not correct for a to tell.
B. That b is benefiting from a
so-called public good and thus must pay for it as in he should
get caged. Not chipping in only be can make
that call. It's the equivalent of me
saying, I have a YouTube channel with almost 600 videos and an
odyssey Channel, and library, and B.
You and minds and archive.org. You can benefit from all that
stuff. And that's why I'm going to cage
you. If you don't give me twenty
dollars a year. I've no right to do that.
Even if it's true that they do benefit which were over
correctly, does not even give them the tation for because all
benefits are subjective in Practical terms.
The Free Rider principle is capable of expanding the range
of public goods to absurd levels of a company provides a
significant number of jobs in a local community.
Then this could provide certain benefits to the that Community
which flow from lower unemployment, such as lower
crime, greater vibrancy Etc. Get the community is not
reimbursing that company for these.
That you also benefit from the existence of competition.
Even if you only shop at store X, they know that you might go
to store y. So you benefit from the
existence of businesses that you never even shop at same with
your employer. They, there's a reason not all
employers, pay minimum wage is because at any time you could go
somewhere else and you have certain productive capacity.
So you benefit from people you don't even know.
About and probably never will associate with.
That doesn't give them the right to issue taxes against you, or
regulate your behavior Rover continues.
Myth number 21, Libertarians don't care about the poor.
He says on page, 183 poverty has been the default the natural
state of man for all of history. So two people like Nelson
Mandela or Ayana Presley congresswoman in America when
they say, well, poverty is created.
What is the cause of poverty? The answer is more or less?
Nothing. Well, any research I do says
something to the extent of home homo sapiens throughout the
history of Life. Beginning, some 4.2 billion
years ago down to recent Evolution with Homo sapiens
during. And since the last glacial, .
I also have the evolutionary process led to modern humans
humans and their ancestors have been walking.
The planet for about 6 million years, Homo sapiens, who are the
modern form of humans evolved 300,000 years ago, from Homo
erectus human civilization. Started forming around 6,000
years ago. So, even if you believe the
Earth was created, six Thousand Years Ago by God in 7 days.
When was this time? Where there?
It was no poverty and then a bunch of businessmen created
poverty. Like if we're in 2021 now like
20 or 1971 or 1921 1821 1721 1621.
Where was this non poverty? That the entrepreneur came in
and ushered in it. Of course, is a lie.
That is just used to justify State coercion.
So the idea that Libertarians don't care about the poor role
for says is inaccurate because they advocate in ideology
referred to as free markets. This is an idea of free trade
basically free trade. Free exchange with the
recognition of self-ownership. So this by definition rules out
slavery, coercion theft Etc. The recognition of
self-ownership. Thus leads us to voluntary.
Strange along with original appropriation referred to as
homesteading. So he says that wealth is more
or less a result of specialization also known as the
division of labor free association people having the
ability to move and go elsewhere if they're not happy with their
current place of where they're purchasing things or place where
they're working and free trade, the ability to trade goods, they
value with regard to the idea of businesses role for says,
importantly. Almost every consumer oriented
business that has been successful.
Has achieved the Success Through constant Innovation to bring
down the price of goods to make them accessible to the masses.
It is much harder to achieve success on a grand scale by
selling to only the rich. So we could take that principle
that row. Forgives us on page 184 and
apply it to the biggest examples in.
Let's just take American history.
And America currently people like Cornelius.
Vanderbilt only got successful because they made both steamship
travel and railroad travel available to the average.
Joe Andrew Carnegie got rich by drastically.
Lowering the price of steel Henry.
Ford didn't invent the car. He increased the, or he
decreased the production costs of the automobile.
Creating Ford giving a significant increase in a Access
to people at lower levels of income.
Walmart, didn't invent food or clothes or anything else.
They just increased access to people at lower income levels.
Same thing with Amazon. One of the earliest videos of
Jeff Bezos, you could find him saying we what we started Amazon
by trying to sell things like books, cuz there's the highest
quality of different types of this product.
I probably should have had that. Quote, before going into it,
either way, Amazon has done an excellent job at increasing
people's access to Goods. They otherwise wouldn't have at
lower income level. So yeah, kings and queens have
always had access to, you know, the best things that are around.
But the fact that the average Joe can just order something
online and get it to their door. In a short amount of time.
It increases the number of options.
They have, if all I have is my local bookstore.
I'm much less. Likely to understand the nature
of the universe. Truth, morality philosophy,
history, economics, mathematics, quantum mechanics, then if I
have access to tons of other things, which places like Amazon
have made accessible. And then Apple is a another
example where I mean, high-tech computers cameras Skype, Zoom.
They got wealthy because they made these things access
accessible to a wide number of individuals.
It wasn't just pleasing the right.
So the idea that what we can't have a free market because then
only the rich will have computers.
So, we need the government to nationalize computers is just as
ridiculous as well. We can't have a free market in
courts or police or military or defense because then only the
rich will have military and police and defense.
It's all a deception. This is very in line with a
thesis put forward by Deirdre. McCloskey saying the two things
that make Societies, wealthy is one economic Liberty.
The ability to exchange both your time labor and property
with who you'd like to voluntarily and social honor,
the idea that you are not shamed by the average person into, oh,
you're seeking profit. Oh, that's evil.
That's terrible. That's exploitative.
This is what makes society, which I think Rover doesn't.
Excellent job explaining. This certainly Graphics like
this from Human progress.org show us things like bicycles.
Blenders coffee makers. Heaters stoves grills
refrigerators televisions vacuums.
Microwaves skis treadmills. Etc stereos, not only go down in
price over time, but they increase in quality.
This is a causal result of innovation free trade and
competition. Not because Well, Congress made
a law that blenders have to get cheaper and vacuums have to get
cheaper and TVs, have to get cheaper and computers have to
increase in quality according to a congressional law.
This is the result of voluntary exchange Innovation, free
exchange of in formation. If you take a look at the
average iPhone that someone has access to it more or less, has
the capacity of a phone, a camera, a CD player, a watch.
A Top a video recorder and a notepad.
Or as Steven Pinker says in a explanation in an explanation of
Enlightenment. Now, he lists all the things on
the right hand side. If you're listening on the
podcast, please check the description for the link to the
video. You have things like Netflix
music. Radio your contact list.
A flashlight, access to the New York.
X, a telephone Hulu. And tons of books and PDFs along
with many other things in a much smaller quantity.
This is also another argument for the environmentalist
position of the free market. You're able to do much more with
much less, which is much more friendly to the environment a
book written called. Who's the fairest of them?
All the truth about opportunity taxes and wealth in America.
By Stephen Moore says, here are a Of households and their
capacity to access products in the year 1970.
And in the Year 2005. However, he doesn't interesting
things. He in the year, 1970 goes
through all households and 2005 just looks through, poor
households using data from the Dallas Federal Reserve based on
Census Bureau data. He determines that things like
washing machine clothing, dryer dishwasher refrigerator stove
microwave. Microwave color TV video,
cassette DVD, personal computer, telephone cell, phone and air
conditioner. More poor people in the Year
2005 had access to these life. Improving products.
Then all households did in the year 1970.
So not only have they gone down in price and more people can
access them than previously but they've increased in quality
vitally. Important other things.
Roll 4 goes into is the idea of chair.
From Mutual Aid to welfare state, fraternal societies, and
Social Services, 1892, 1967 by David.
T be do is an excellent book. In a free Society.
People would be able to look up America's top Charities on
Forbes, and they'd be able to screenshot who they donated to.
So they could brag about who they are contributing to, this
allows people to both increase their social status.
Otis while supporting Charities that help the needy.
The idea that well Charities could be corrupt and what if
they don't actually give the money to the poor, that is a
legitimate concern and that's why you need a free market in
charity because that could also happen under the existence of a
state. And with a state, you can't, you
can't legally opt out of funding these organizations.
So that's why the free market position is morally and Anomaly
Superior it both allows you to opt out do with your time.
Money and property. Would you choose to do and
economically in the sense of it provides an incentive for
producers to produce things that consumers demand?
It gives you the cleansing mechanism of disassociation
Rover. Finishes the book with a title
called governing by principle. Not arbitrarily.
Roper asks by what standard should legislation be judged as
good law in the sense of being just He refers to the arbitrary
nature of statism. This is the concept that many
Advocates of government are very comfortable with saying, well, X
is Justified because X is the law.
Well, that doesn't justify the law.
It's literally like me saying, it's all right, for me to
enslave people and kidnap them because my boss says so very
clearly in his manual. Well, who justifies the Manual.
That's not an independent justification role for says, not
so Libertarians to them. The only just law is one that
prescribes the initiation or threat of force against peaceful
individuals. I would also add fraud both of
those violate the consent and mutual understanding of the
parties involved role for says, to make this point differently.
Partial statism is internally inconsistent.
Most status believe in the state for some tasks and not for
others yet. They can point to no consistent
koujun logical principle, which allows one to distinguish
between the two sets of Tasks. So this is the idea that yeah,
the state should coercively fund and monopolize police but not
health care or they should do. So for healthcare, but not books
or we have regulation in the electronic industry, but there
shouldn't be a regulation in the podcast and destroyed.
If these things were morally Justified, you'd be able to
apply them consistently to all people and all sectors.
He mentions. What Tom was refers to as a
low-intensity civil war, can come arise in a society, when
there is not only a state, but especially a big state.
So, when you have in America, the government stealing and
printing about five trillion dollars, almost a 1/4 of the
economy every year, then what you have is people who otherwise
would be indifferent to. The actions of the state, just
another organization, say well, hey, I I'm forced to fund this.
So I'm going to enact my interests at the cost of yours.
And if you get your way, well, then I have to succumb to your
ideology and your rule. So now I want to infiltrate the
state and use it to enforce my ideology on you.
Probably the best examples is Is a good government education?
So if the state already monopolizes education and forces
you to fund and forces your kids to attend through compulsory
education laws and truancy legislation.
Well, then you're going to want to infiltrate the state and make
sure they're teaching creationism.
Unless you are not a creationist.
Then you want them to only teach Evolution.
Even if you don't believe in creationism, you might say well
I still want them to teach the heh.
X of the Bible and not allegiance to the state will
unfortunately under statism. You only get a one-size-fits-all
row for continues every interest group, competes aggressively to
exercise or rent. The state's coercive Powers.
Since on any issue there, can only be one winner to use the
example given previously. We either have to drink Coke or
Pepsi role for n saying to attain a more More peaceful
Society. You need to start with a
peaceful governing principle. He says that principle is the
libertarian principle of self-ownership voluntary
exchange, and original appropriation.
The book is busting myths about the state and the libertarian
alternative by Zach Roper. Thank you for watching Keith
Knight. Don't try it on anyone.