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Maybe it’s that I have very weird friends, but pretty much no libertarian I’ve met has defended zero redistribution. They all hate the way it’s done now, and f

Maybe it’s that I have very weird friends, but pretty much no libertarian I’ve met has defended zero redistribution. They all hate the way it’s done now, and favor other arrangements like a negative income tax or UBI (as a substitute for government-run services). I haven’t seen all the questionnaire, but the questions shown in the article could be read both ways.

AdrianB1 6y ago
Libertarian and redistribution have an obvious logic conflict, so you may be right about very weird friends. Libertarian base idea is freedom, as much as possible; redistribution is the opposite of freedom because you work, earn money and someone comes and takes it from you. Makes sense?
- zozbot234 6y ago
  Redistribution is about giving everyone a stake in upholding a free society for everyone else. That's what actually makes for "freedom, as much as possible". The point is that we're doing it in almost the worst possible way; putting a lot of undue and costly burden on those who work, while not doing all that much for those whom we might want to benefit. UBI or NIT would be a vast improvement on what most developed countries (including the U.S.) are doing now.
  - luckylion 6y ago
    > putting a lot of undue and costly burden on those who work, while not doing all that much for those whom we might want to benefit I suppose "all that much" is the key term. Is European style redistribution (aka a nice flat, utilities, TV and smartphone, clothing, health insurance, food and cash money to spend on whatever you please) not all that much? It's not like we're wasting 90% of taxes on administrative overhead, so I'm not sure what could be improved there, without adding more "undue and costly burden" on those who work, unless you're suggesting taxing e.g. capital gains rather than income.
    - zozbot234 6y ago
      European-style redistribution is extremely costly for what it achieves. It means that the government has to take or transfer a sizeable fraction of GDP via taxation, while also burdening the economy as a whole with excess regulation (e.g. the firm size regulations that were mentioned elsewhere in the comments, and many others). It would be very surprising if there was no way of achieving comparable results with less burden on others.
      - imafish 6y ago
        It will be very surprising if there is a way to achieve comparable results with significantly less burden on others. European countries have looked for it for 40 years now.
        zozbot234 6y ago
        > European countries have looked for it for 40 years now. They really haven't. Classical liberalism, while perhaps more popular than in the U.S., is still a niche political stance in Europe. The 1980s saw a wave in liberalization and deregulation, and that's when stuff like NIT or UBI reached its peak in popularity.
        nickik 6y ago
        European countries are democracies. Change is incredibly slow and often incredibly resisted. You act as if European countries were lead by some philosopher kinds in search of the perfect system. Look at how hard it was for German to reform its social system in 90/00s for example. And German was one of the countries that actually achieved significant reforms while many others didn't.
    - oriolid 6y ago
      > Is European style redistribution (aka a nice flat, utilities, TV and smartphone, clothing, health insurance, food and cash money to spend on whatever you please) As an European, I have to ask what exactly does this refer to?
  - unishark 6y ago
    > Redistribution is about giving everyone a stake in upholding a free society for everyone else. That's what actually makes for "freedom, as much as possible". I think it's arguments like these (going back to conflict with socialists over such definitions) which lead to libertarians claiming they do not base their philosophy on "freedom" but rather "liberty". Which they more narrowly define as something like the freedom specifically from external force. Not the freedom to do whatever the hell you want no matter who it hurts etc.
    - Kbelicius 6y ago
      Then what do libertarians think that freedom means in this context? Because in this context it certainly doesn't mean "do whatever the hell you want no matter who it hurts" as you put it.
      - unishark 6y ago
        That sentence was put there to make the point which you missed anyway. The principle is pretty much the same in any context. Freedom is the absence of restriction, for example the restrictions against violating others rights by taking their property. To restate the point in a less triggering way.
- sandoooo 6y ago
  When the alternative is aggrieved mobs come and burn down your house / loot your shop while forcibly redistributing your wealth pennies on the dollar, a libertarian learns to make sacrifices.
  - AdrianB1 6y ago
    They do make sacrifices, but it does not mean they are in favor of having to do it; that is the point my comment was responding to.
- nickik 6y ago
  Funny then that libertarians love F.A. Hayek and Milton Friedman who both argued some redistribution was whole compatible with liberalism. But I'm sure you know better what they believe.
  - zozbot234 6y ago
    They have argued this but they have also cautioned that redistribution is quite economically costly, so it is important that it be limited and not incur too much undue burden. That's why both of them have endorsed something quite NIT- or UBI-like. Often, many of a more socialist or leftist bent don't quite understand these points, even though they clearly think of redistribution as core to their political stance.
  - _0ffh 6y ago
    >libertarians love F.A. Hayek and Milton Friedman Well that's where you went wrong already. Surely most libertarians respect these guys, but that's about as far as you can take it. Some do love them, I suppose. To others they're thoroughly misguided in some of their conclusions, which are seen as much to statist-socialist in nature. See e.g. [1] for a libertarian critique of Hayek. [1] https://vimeo.com/53850513 https://vimeo.com/53850513
    - nickik 6y ago
      Its actually Hans Herman Hesse and the people from the Mises Institute are on the outside. Hesse in particular philosophically speaking is pretty far is no longer even classically liberal in many way. They are decently not representative. They just have the best online media presence.
      - _0ffh 6y ago
        Uh, if we accept the premise that modern American right-libertarianism was practically single-handedly created by Murray Rothbard, and that Hans-Hermann Hoppe is actually still quite faithful to his old mentor, I guess we'll have to accept that his positions lie well inside the boundaries of right-libertarian thought. I'm not claiming that all of Hoppe's positions are typical for, or representative of all libertarianism. I just used him as a handy example that the assertion that "libertarians love F.A. Hayek and Milton Friedman" is not a given, which is exactly the topic of the lecture I referred to. As an aside, I'm sure the guys at the Mises Institute will be ecstatic to hear that you think their media presence is the best, even though all that sweet Koch money is going to Cato. I think I kind of agree. :)
- zajio1am 6y ago
  For a liberal/libertarian, personal freedom is the most important value. The threats to freedoms are not only government power, but also societal and market pressures. Therefore, there may be some level of redistribution and some restrictions of societal and market pressures that generally increase personal freedom. As such interventions have diminishing returns, they should be limited to low-hanging fruits. Alternatively, one can see it as a way to distribute power to independent power structures (government, society, markets, ...) to prevent one structure dominating others. Each such structure is a threat to personal freedom, but with different manifestations and effects. And it is more manageable to have more smaller threats than less bigger ones.
- mjburgess 6y ago
  To have something taken which you owe is not an infringement on freedom. "What we owe to others" is not settled by the question of freedom, and therefore it is perfectly logically consistent to be a libertarian proponent of redistribution.
  - AdrianB1 6y ago
    You don't "owe to others". This kind of entitlement is a fallacy.
    - mjburgess 6y ago
      Which "entitlement"? The one expressed in the idea that you owe nothing to others, or the one where others should expect something of you? Why is one "entitlement" and not the other? In either case, there is no logical fallacy present. And the question is independent to the question of freedom which is secondary to the question of moral constraint. Ie., establishing what is moral in our interactions with others (murder, theft, etc.) is prior to the question of freedom -- freedom is whatever remains to be maximised when moral constraints are in place. The cause of "freedom" is therefore often rather a meaningless one. Everyone is pro-freedom except the "freedom to do what is immoral". And so the question is only ever really, "what is moral?" Ie., what we owe to others, and what they owe us supersedes any particular political programme.
      - _0ffh 6y ago
        That comes down to a question of negative vs positive rights. To quote Bastiat: >> M. de Lamartine wrote me one day: "Your doctrine is only the half of my program; you have stopped at liberty; I go on to fraternity." I answered him: "The second half of your program will destroy the first half." And, in fact, it is quite impossible for me to separate the word "fraternity" from the word "voluntary." It is quite impossible for me to conceive of fraternity as legally enforced, without liberty being legally destroyed, and justice being legally trampled underfoot. <<
        6y ago
- xondono 6y ago
  That conflict is only there if you assume redistribution is forced rather than opt-in.
  - AdrianB1 6y ago
    Have you seen any opt-in with no forced anywhere? I haven't.

AdrianB1 6y ago

Libertarian and redistribution have an obvious logic conflict, so you may be right about very weird friends. Libertarian base idea is freedom, as much as possible; redistribution is the opposite of freedom because you work, earn money and someone comes and takes it from you. Makes sense?

zozbot234 6y ago
Redistribution is about giving everyone a stake in upholding a free society for everyone else. That's what actually makes for "freedom, as much as possible". The point is that we're doing it in almost the worst possible way; putting a lot of undue and costly burden on those who work, while not doing all that much for those whom we might want to benefit. UBI or NIT would be a vast improvement on what most developed countries (including the U.S.) are doing now.
- luckylion 6y ago
  > putting a lot of undue and costly burden on those who work, while not doing all that much for those whom we might want to benefit I suppose "all that much" is the key term. Is European style redistribution (aka a nice flat, utilities, TV and smartphone, clothing, health insurance, food and cash money to spend on whatever you please) not all that much? It's not like we're wasting 90% of taxes on administrative overhead, so I'm not sure what could be improved there, without adding more "undue and costly burden" on those who work, unless you're suggesting taxing e.g. capital gains rather than income.
  - zozbot234 6y ago
    European-style redistribution is extremely costly for what it achieves. It means that the government has to take or transfer a sizeable fraction of GDP via taxation, while also burdening the economy as a whole with excess regulation (e.g. the firm size regulations that were mentioned elsewhere in the comments, and many others). It would be very surprising if there was no way of achieving comparable results with less burden on others.
    - imafish 6y ago
      It will be very surprising if there is a way to achieve comparable results with significantly less burden on others. European countries have looked for it for 40 years now.
      - zozbot234 6y ago
        > European countries have looked for it for 40 years now. They really haven't. Classical liberalism, while perhaps more popular than in the U.S., is still a niche political stance in Europe. The 1980s saw a wave in liberalization and deregulation, and that's when stuff like NIT or UBI reached its peak in popularity.
      - nickik 6y ago
        European countries are democracies. Change is incredibly slow and often incredibly resisted. You act as if European countries were lead by some philosopher kinds in search of the perfect system. Look at how hard it was for German to reform its social system in 90/00s for example. And German was one of the countries that actually achieved significant reforms while many others didn't.
  - oriolid 6y ago
    > Is European style redistribution (aka a nice flat, utilities, TV and smartphone, clothing, health insurance, food and cash money to spend on whatever you please) As an European, I have to ask what exactly does this refer to?
- unishark 6y ago
  > Redistribution is about giving everyone a stake in upholding a free society for everyone else. That's what actually makes for "freedom, as much as possible". I think it's arguments like these (going back to conflict with socialists over such definitions) which lead to libertarians claiming they do not base their philosophy on "freedom" but rather "liberty". Which they more narrowly define as something like the freedom specifically from external force. Not the freedom to do whatever the hell you want no matter who it hurts etc.
  - Kbelicius 6y ago
    Then what do libertarians think that freedom means in this context? Because in this context it certainly doesn't mean "do whatever the hell you want no matter who it hurts" as you put it.
    - unishark 6y ago
      That sentence was put there to make the point which you missed anyway. The principle is pretty much the same in any context. Freedom is the absence of restriction, for example the restrictions against violating others rights by taking their property. To restate the point in a less triggering way.
sandoooo 6y ago
When the alternative is aggrieved mobs come and burn down your house / loot your shop while forcibly redistributing your wealth pennies on the dollar, a libertarian learns to make sacrifices.
- AdrianB1 6y ago
  They do make sacrifices, but it does not mean they are in favor of having to do it; that is the point my comment was responding to.
nickik 6y ago
Funny then that libertarians love F.A. Hayek and Milton Friedman who both argued some redistribution was whole compatible with liberalism. But I'm sure you know better what they believe.
- zozbot234 6y ago
  They have argued this but they have also cautioned that redistribution is quite economically costly, so it is important that it be limited and not incur too much undue burden. That's why both of them have endorsed something quite NIT- or UBI-like. Often, many of a more socialist or leftist bent don't quite understand these points, even though they clearly think of redistribution as core to their political stance.
- _0ffh 6y ago
  >libertarians love F.A. Hayek and Milton Friedman Well that's where you went wrong already. Surely most libertarians respect these guys, but that's about as far as you can take it. Some do love them, I suppose. To others they're thoroughly misguided in some of their conclusions, which are seen as much to statist-socialist in nature. See e.g. [1] for a libertarian critique of Hayek. [1] https://vimeo.com/53850513 https://vimeo.com/53850513
  - nickik 6y ago
    Its actually Hans Herman Hesse and the people from the Mises Institute are on the outside. Hesse in particular philosophically speaking is pretty far is no longer even classically liberal in many way. They are decently not representative. They just have the best online media presence.
    - _0ffh 6y ago
      Uh, if we accept the premise that modern American right-libertarianism was practically single-handedly created by Murray Rothbard, and that Hans-Hermann Hoppe is actually still quite faithful to his old mentor, I guess we'll have to accept that his positions lie well inside the boundaries of right-libertarian thought. I'm not claiming that all of Hoppe's positions are typical for, or representative of all libertarianism. I just used him as a handy example that the assertion that "libertarians love F.A. Hayek and Milton Friedman" is not a given, which is exactly the topic of the lecture I referred to. As an aside, I'm sure the guys at the Mises Institute will be ecstatic to hear that you think their media presence is the best, even though all that sweet Koch money is going to Cato. I think I kind of agree. :)
zajio1am 6y ago
For a liberal/libertarian, personal freedom is the most important value. The threats to freedoms are not only government power, but also societal and market pressures. Therefore, there may be some level of redistribution and some restrictions of societal and market pressures that generally increase personal freedom. As such interventions have diminishing returns, they should be limited to low-hanging fruits. Alternatively, one can see it as a way to distribute power to independent power structures (government, society, markets, ...) to prevent one structure dominating others. Each such structure is a threat to personal freedom, but with different manifestations and effects. And it is more manageable to have more smaller threats than less bigger ones.
mjburgess 6y ago
To have something taken which you owe is not an infringement on freedom. "What we owe to others" is not settled by the question of freedom, and therefore it is perfectly logically consistent to be a libertarian proponent of redistribution.
- AdrianB1 6y ago
  You don't "owe to others". This kind of entitlement is a fallacy.
  - mjburgess 6y ago
    Which "entitlement"? The one expressed in the idea that you owe nothing to others, or the one where others should expect something of you? Why is one "entitlement" and not the other? In either case, there is no logical fallacy present. And the question is independent to the question of freedom which is secondary to the question of moral constraint. Ie., establishing what is moral in our interactions with others (murder, theft, etc.) is prior to the question of freedom -- freedom is whatever remains to be maximised when moral constraints are in place. The cause of "freedom" is therefore often rather a meaningless one. Everyone is pro-freedom except the "freedom to do what is immoral". And so the question is only ever really, "what is moral?" Ie., what we owe to others, and what they owe us supersedes any particular political programme.
    - _0ffh 6y ago
      That comes down to a question of negative vs positive rights. To quote Bastiat: >> M. de Lamartine wrote me one day: "Your doctrine is only the half of my program; you have stopped at liberty; I go on to fraternity." I answered him: "The second half of your program will destroy the first half." And, in fact, it is quite impossible for me to separate the word "fraternity" from the word "voluntary." It is quite impossible for me to conceive of fraternity as legally enforced, without liberty being legally destroyed, and justice being legally trampled underfoot. <<
      - 6y ago
xondono 6y ago
That conflict is only there if you assume redistribution is forced rather than opt-in.
- AdrianB1 6y ago
  Have you seen any opt-in with no forced anywhere? I haven't.