| Notes | Book |
I think most people would agree that the current society in the US has a fairness deficit. How do we get from here to a fair society?
The assertion that All Men are Created Equal may be part of the problem. The most obvious flaw of this statement is that it is not literally true. Male infants show a great deal of variation in all characteristics that I know of. I guess saying all men should have equal rights just doesn't have the same ring. The second glaring problem with this statement is that all people are not men, and a fundamental statement for a political philosophy is surely deficient if it doesn't cover all the members of that society. All men might be equal before the law, but that doesn't seem to have ever been close to true in practice. The third problem with equality is that it doesn't provide a simple measure of progress. The almost mystical mindset of the Declaration describes a lofty ideal, but doesn't provide a clear road map of how to get to that ideal state. This has resulted in Rube Goldberg contraptions like the Constitution and Laws and Courts and Cops. These don't work very well because there is no known method of rational analysis to guide their operations.
The libertarian proscription against initiating force and fraud is simple and good. In a world where no one initiated force or fraud, all transactions would be fair in the sense that anyone would have the right to refuse a transaction that they do not think was fair. All transactions would be fair because all the participants would think they were fair, or they wouldn't participate. The right to just say no is the most fundamental right, and the easiest to recognize. It can even be applied to transactions between people and animals or intelligent machines. It provides a simple road map that almost anyone over the age of six can understand.
We need a consistent and rational basis for our morality and our society. A theory of social operation that divides people up into different classes with different privileges and responsibilities can't be consistent and rational. I'm not arguing that we don't need leaders. I am saying we need leaders who are not chosen by forcible and fraudulent processes, and who don't initiate force or fraud as part of their leadership role.
People who want a fairer society should not only obey the proscription against initiating force and fraud, they should do their best to avoid situations where they are victims of force and fraud. You can do this by planting a garden, buying gold and silver, doing everything you can yourself, working for yourself, or a small business. These are a few of the things you can do to bring about a fairer society, limit the amount of your energy that goes to the state, and position yourself to better survive the collapse of fiat currencies.
Unfortunately we have coercive organizations call governments. People believe governments rule the world. But if the president proposes a new law, people fight about it. If Bill Gates writes a check for a new building, nobody fights. People just start bringing out the heavy equipment and get on the job. By the measure of getting people to do what you tell them to, Bill Gates is immensely more powerful than the president.
A person who has money has the power to tell people what to do and have them actually do it, and perhaps even enjoy doing it. Even the government motivates its minions through money. Soldiers and cops with no payday don't remain soldiers or cops very long.
Money is more powerful than coercion. Money preceded the state, and money will be with us after the state has been dethroned.
Money derives from cooperation, not coercion, and money promotes cooperation. Money is not the root of all evil. Money is the collection of the common good. Money provides freedom and the state provides coercion.
The state may not be the root of all evil, but the state initiates more coercive transactions than private citizens by a very large margin.
Recently States have been trying to control money with Central Banking. Like any criminal enterprise, This has always failed eventually, and it usually causes a lot of suffering when it does. After the fiat paper currency has crashed and burned, money reappears in a sounder form.
When a State distorts money, it also distorts the moral fabric of the society. Applications of force and fraud cause misaligned incentives. For example, a firefighter who works as an employee of the state has an incentive to start fires so he can have more work. A group of private property owners working together to fight a fire that threatens their property have a strong incentive to put out the fire. The payoff matrix of a central banker provides him incentive and means to steal enormous sums of money from the population at large. Drug enforcement agents have a vastly distorted incentive structure. There are countless examples in our society today. The incentives of government agents and contractors are almost always misaligned with the interests of the general public.
Eventually, we'll all have to just learn to get along. The sooner that happens, the better.