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From: nrh@inmet.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: libertarianism VS economic reality
Message-ID: <1841@inmet.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 29-Nov-84 01:15:51 EST
Article-I.D.: inmet.1841
Posted: Thu Nov 29 01:15:51 1984
Date-Received: Sat, 1-Dec-84 19:32:35 EST
Lines: 194
Nf-ID: #R:wucs:-49500:inmet:7800196:000:9645
Nf-From: inmet!nrh    Nov 27 14:49:00 1984

>***** inmet:net.politics / wucs!esk /  7:24 am  Nov 26, 1984
>
>Let me remind the net exactly what consequence the libertarians are
>willing to accept:  that there could be a situation in which a coercive
>action could make everyone better off, and they would still oppose it.
>For all we know this may be the situation for some coercive actions
>that are occurring right now.  There is a word for accepting bad
>consequences when nobody gets any net benefit in return:  IRRATIONAL.

DING! Hold it, please.  When you say: "make everybody better off"
do you mean:

A) Economically better off
B) Better off in the sense that everyone would
   prefer the new situation to the old.

If you mean (A), then it is quite obvious that libertarians have a rational
reason to "accept bad consequences" -- they'd rather be poor and free than
rich and fettered.

If you mean (B), I fail to see the point -- LIBERTARIANS would not
prefer that coercive actions take place, so the coercive actions you are
proposing would NOT be Pareto superior.  Let me just note here that it
*DOESN'T MATTER* if you think libertarians are crazy for preferring an
entirely no-initiated-coercion society -- if even one "irrational" type
somewhere prefers it (even given greater personal benefits), the
proposed situation is not Pareto superior to the old one.


>Laura mentions that some people may be totally opposed to some of the
>things govt. produces (e.g. nukes).  In this case, government non-
>production is Pareto-optimal.  Nevertheless, at this point one may want
>to depart from the restrictions of economic analysis and ask whether
>people's preferences are rational (in the case of nuclear weapons, it's
>a tough question; however in other cases it might be easier).

And if they are NOT rational?  Who gets to judge?  Congress?  The
Madison Ad agencies?  A "council"?  To claim that you've got a metric
for showing one situation superior to another, and then to abandon it
when it turns out not to result in what you preferred is a little
chicken, don't you think?

>
>> Any figure that you come up with will have to be some person's opinion 
>> of the value of the public good. 
>
>If people can be made to reveal their preferences for a public good
>honestly (and Clarke explains how this can be done), the government (or
>anyone) can determine what level of provision of the public good will be
>Pareto-optimal.  Unfortunately for libertarians, the mechanism by which
>this is achieved involves a tax, so the free market can't do it.  The
>free market is LESS EFFICIENT than one with certain kinds of govt. inter-
>ference.

It has long been known that the MOST efficient sort of government
is an incorruptible, benevolent, absolute dictatorship.  That it is
impractical and offensive to free men is enough to keep me from
espousing it.  

That the "free market" can't do it, doesn't mean a libertarian society
can't do it.  Free people may give to charity, or they may fulfill what
some may see as their obligations to society, or they may participate
in boycotts against those who do not.  While the free market would
almost certainly be the primary arena of economic interaction in
a libertarian society, it would not be likely that those choices 
that drive the market were made in a social vacuum, and it would be
even less likely that all economic decisions were market-driven (giving
to charity doesn't make market sense, but some folks do it anyhow).

>From: nrh@inmet.UUCP
>> I should, of course, read Clarke to find out what he says about this, but
>> if you know offhand, tell me:  is he talking about the efficient moves
>> a government could make were it benignly-motivated?  
>
>A red herring par excellence.  Motivation has nothing to do with it; Clarke
>is talking about efficient moves that government could make, period.  Pre-
>sumably we have to *force* the government to make these moves, by threaten-
>ing to "vote the rascals out" of the legislature who don't work for
>economic efficiency.

Hmmm.... Are you saying that an imperfect means for threatening legislators
would result in their behaving so as to overrule their personal interests
(getting rich off "incorrect" decisions?)  Why do I doubt this is a
practical scheme for instituting a particular set of rules for decision
making? If the legislators make significant choices, their motivation
has EVERYTHING to do with it -- they determine what choices will be made.
If Clarke's mechanism can reveal unambiguously what SHOULD be done, and
legislators merely carry this out (as accountants "carry out" the balance
sheet), I'm impressed.  Of course, the possibility of a sudden 
"embezzlement" followed by leaving the legislature (and perhaps the country)
remains.

>
>This is worth elaborating on, for here we have a CLASSICAL libertarian
>FALLACY.  Libertarians see political philosophy as a ONE-DIMENSIONAL
>spectrum:  someone is either for "less" government or "more".  

Wrong, Pareto-breath :-)!  That many of us regard it as the MOST 
important axis is true, but let's not set up any straw men here.

>To state
>the obvious (obvious to everyone but libertarians that is), this totally
>ignores the fact that there are DIFFERENT KINDS of government activity.

Sure!  Obvious to me, also (concede the point?).

>On morality:
>Your "breaking up with your girlfriend" example is a bad one because it
>is totally beyond me how anyone could *force* me to do that unless they
>did something drastic, in which case I would not be better off.  

If the example did nothing else, it has prompted you to raise the issue
of HOW Pareto-superior choices are enforced.  I'll make a deal with you:
I'll tell you how I make you break up with your girlfriend, and how it
doesn't hurt either of you, if you tell me how a government imposes an
otherwise Pareto-superior choice (against market dictates) WITHOUT
giving cause for someone to feel worse off.  That's fair, right?
We're both talking about imposing solutions for someone else's own
good....

If you can't come up with such a solution, then Clarke's whole discussion
is pretty, but remains academic.

>Let's
>take a better example: suicide.  Now, if by forcing me not to kill myself
>you would make me grateful afterwards, do you have a right to do it?  I
>say you do.  

That's nice.  Remember, I had to grab the gun, or hit you, or something.
In that moment, there was a Pareto-inferior situation imposed by me on you.
To what extent did I have the right to do THAT?  How long can a Pareto-
inferior situation be imposed?  Do the "ends justify the means"?

>> In other words, if the government could find out true social costs and
>> such, libertarians would be opposing the imposition of those costs.
>> This might or might not be true, depending on what was thought to 
>> belong to government.    On the other hand, it hardly matters: 
>> the government posesses no way of generating Pareto-optimal outcomes ...
>
>On the contrary, it does.  

We're all eager to hear it.  Remember -- the government has to 
UNDERSTAND everyone's preferences in order to generate situations
more in-line with those preferences.  I think you'll find this
particularly sticky given the hill-climbing nature of social
situations -- to generate a Pareto-superior position might
involve a transfer through a Pareto-inferior one.  For example,
we might all be happier if we were all richer, but we might all
have to work harder for that.  Even though we'd be happier afterwards,
we'd probably be LESS happy while we did the 60 hour weeks working
up to that point.

>And even if it falls somewhat short of Pareto-
>optimality (efficiency) it may still come closer than a laissez-faire
>market.  What I have conceded it cannot generate (except by luck) are
>outcomes that make everyone better off than they were under the status
>quo.  Nevertheless, over a wide range of issues, as far as anyone has
>the relevant knowledge, it might make all of our *expected* prospects
>better.  

This is a rather mealy-mouthed set of assertions.  The point remains
that to ENFORCE Pareto-optimality, you must use force.  This invariably
results in pain (those forced to do things are hurt or threatened).
On the other hand, a free market requires (from government)  only
restraint.

>It could easily fulfill my "modified golden rule" criterion
>that says that society is best which one would choose if one didn't know
>which member of that society one was to be.
>

Again, a pretty notion, but I'm still curious what happens if you
became a member of society adjudged (to coin a phrase) "Pareto-insane",
that is, unwilling to go along with the mechanism chosen to choose
and enforce Pareto-superior outcomes.  Or if it is frequent that the
government meddles in people's decisions.

>> By the way, in a libertarian society, nothing would prevent people from
>> forming and joining compacts designed to result in enforced
>> Pareto-optimal outcomes among themselves.  
>
>That's a valid point which Clarke discusses at some length.  However, it
>would not work for large-scale externality problems like air pollution,
>national defense, research, and many others.

Nor does it solve the N-body problem, nor tell us whether Fermat had the
goods or was just spouting off, nor how to help the poor.  Libertarian
solutions to pollution, defense, research, and the rest (not Fermat's
theorem nor the N-body problem) exist, but that THIS libertarian solution
is not the solution to THOSE problems does not mean that it is not a
good solution to the problem of satisfying those who wish not to worry
that their lot in life could not be improved without harming anybody
else.