Katrina versus Libertarians



Like much of the blogosphere, Centroids has been discussing the fallout from Katrina and what it tells us about both government and Libertarian philosophy -- specifically, the limits of both. The discussion has certainly been spirited, if somewhat uneven. One of the most creative was Rich Hockett's proposal for privatizing and tying together flood prevention and insurance, which led me to assert three fundamental fallacies of Libertarianism :

a) There is always a solution that does not require a strong central authority with coercive powers

b) Big business is inherently wiser than big government

c) Rational, self-interested financial calculations *always* yield the optimal social result

and the following axiom of small government:

In order to deal with a real, large problem, the only way to make government a) smaller is to simultaneously make it b) stronger, and c) smarter

My problem with Libertarians is that they demand (a) while claiming (b) is undesirable and (c) is impossible! I also replied to Rich's fundamental principles:

> 1) there are many problems that can (and should) be handled by the private sector rather than the public, and that's OK :)
> 2) local institutions (private and public) are more effective and efficient than big government
> 3) rational, self-interested financial calculations often yield better results than political aspirations

with my own premises:

a) Market solutions allow greater individual creativity at the price of lower social accountability
b) Local solutions enable greater responsiveness at the risk of global mis-optimization
c) Rational, self-interested financial calculations are only optimal if they take into account long-term consequences
d) Rational, self-interested political calculations are only optimal if they take into account long-term consequences

though I did concede:

e) Our current financial systems tend to provide greater discipline than our current political systems

Though as a fixable aspect of the systems involved, not an immutable law of nature.

Posted: Sun - October 2, 2005 at 09:45 PM        

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