This article originally appeared in Liberty, Volume 3 Number 4 (March 1990), pp. 11–12.
The Lomasky review is an interesting example of what is getting to be a fairly common phenomenon: Hoppephobia. Although he is an amiable man personally, Hoppe’s written work seems to have the remarkable capacity to send some readers up the wall, blood pressure soaring, muttering and chewing the carpet. It is not impolite attacks on critics that does it. Perhaps the answer is Hoppe’s logical and deductive mode of thought and writing, demonstrating the truth of his propositions and showing that those who differ are often trapped in self-contradiction and self-refutation.
Hoppe is my hero in this regard. It’s great to win a debate on the merit of your ideas, on the clarity of your argument, and the sincerity of your values. But it is also fun to watch your counterpart disqualify himself as he resorts to ad hominem and lies while you avoid getting dirty, and don’t break a sweat.
h/t Stephan Kinsella
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I saw this Mises quote on the LvMI community forum.
Here is Mises on this matter from “Planned Chaos” (http://mises.org/web/2714#Ch.3)
“The market is a democracy in which every penny gives a right to vote. It is true that the various individuals have not the same power to vote. The richer man casts more ballots than the poorer fellow. But to be rich and to earn a higher income is, in the market economy, already the outcome of a previous election. The only means to acquire wealth and to preserve it, in a market economy not adulterated by government-made privileges and restrictions, is to serve the consumers in the best and cheapest way. Capitalists and landowners who fail in this regard suffer losses. If they do not change their procedure, they lose their wealth and become poor. It is consumers who make poor people rich and rich people poor. It is the consumers who fix the wages of a movie star and an opera singer at a higher level than those of a welder or an accountant.”
–Mises
In the past, I have promoted this idea as market as democracy, but now I believe it is quite false. The market is not a democracy as popularly understood.
Continue reading Markets are not democratic
Sometimes anarchists talk about forming liberty colonies or seasteading. The goal being to find somewhere, anywhere outside of state jurisdiction, or prime for micro-secession from the monopoly institution of state.
The one place that provides an escape from the state and the scarcity of “property” (in the loosest sense, elbow room) is space.
Sure, it might not be feasible to live generationally on space ships or stations. Sure, there may not be many or any easily habitable planets. But it seems to me that we’re getting closer and closer to commercial space travel. And when that day happens, someone is going to wander off the accepted and beaten path, and attempt to blaze their own trail. It’s quite likely many will.
My goal is to never stop looking upwards with hope no matter how much the state wants me to focus my gaze down.
I’m bringing this up because (1) I am in a sci-fi mood lately, (2) libertarians/austrians/anarchists seem to do a lot more staring backwards than forwards, and (3) a young fella on the Mises Forums inspired it.
Juan @ the Mises Forums posted up a link from a site I have visited through some other sources before.
It’s a list of obscure tax havens. When I first looked through it, Nevis caught my eye (it’s near the beginning of the article). A new habit of mine, when considering any country as a destination, is to head over to NoState.com’s Renunciant Resource page, to check the viability of surrendering citizenship and/or gaining stateless status in that country.
Unfortunately, Nevis doesn’t pass the renunciant test, however I did also visit it’s Wikipedia page, to find out that like most small countries so-called “financial services” are a growth area, and a leading sector of the economy. Financial services is a creative way of saying that these countries attract capital by offering financial freedom, either with tax sheltering, low taxes, no taxes, creative incorporation schemes etc.
A small joint like Nevis doesn’t need an imperial army, or massive redistributive schemes. There aren’t thousands of miles of highway to maintain. The obscure tax haven article makes mention that one might be able to purchase citizenship quickly.
Sounds like my kinda place.
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