I’ve always considered myself a unique individual. Ever since I was a child, I was eccentric, and much of that can be attributed to my attitude that I had to be different than everyone else. Looking back, I remember many times where I lied about liking a TV Show or a band when one of my classmates asked me, in fear that they might mock me. It took me a long time to understand the concept that having something in common with someone else was actually a positive thing and that those classmates were trying to start a conversation with me. When I look back at events like that, I start to wonder if this is where I get my individualist streak from. A few commentators have pointed out that libertarians are often Autistic or at the very least fall somewhere on the Autism spectrum. A recent study shows that all other political ideologues tend to think with their hearts, while libertarians think with their brain (logically). And antisocial behavior is often attributed to those who are very logical thinkers.
Many criticize Ayn Rand’s philosophy as antisocial and narcissistic. After all, we are taught from a young age that we must always share our toys. But fundamentally, what is so wrong in having self worth? Why do I have to share my toys? Few people outside of libertarian circles understand why we think they way we think. Some call us heartless because of our nature to put ourselves first above others. They think we are somehow against the poor or do not respect the culture that allows us to be successful. On the contrary, it is because of our somewhat free and open society that we have so much confidence in the ideas of individualism. These ideas were the foundation of America and allowed us to prosper beyond any nation before us.
Michael Moore says that it is a myth that the poor cannot become rich; that statistically it is nearly impossible because of the hold the rich have over us. He is partially correct in his analysis, but for all of the wrong reasons. I will address the “all rich are holding us back” part first. If anyone studies the history of capital accumulation and the rise of capitalism, they should come to the realization that this system was never what many libertarians advocate for when they talk about lazze fare capitalism. The industrial revolution was sparked largeley because of the British state seizing land from those who had worked it for thousands of years, forcing those poor serfs into the cities and into the factories. Here in America, things were not much better. Our history began with a large population of slaves and indegered servants. Their free labor brought prosperity to the nation because they were able to create resources that were needed all across the world. By the time the industrial revolution came here in America, there was such a large class of poor whites and blacks, not to mention Polish, Irish and German immigrants, that needed work, the industrialists had no issue finding the labor they needed to run their factories or mine their coal. Many leftists stop their analysis at this point; they address that the West’s wealth was originally created by explotation, but they neither point out the influence that the State had on this situation nor do they consider later examples of production that were not explotative. Some will say that all production is explotative (wage slavery). To that I say: What man can survive without working for his bread?
Admitedly, there are many wealthy people today that acquired their wealth through that original explotative period early in the industrial age. But most did not. The majority of wealthy people in this country today can trace their money back to the period between the 1880′s and the 1960′s. During that time period, industry flourished (with a few exceptions) and wealth was being created at a rapid pace. Innovative entepernures came up with ideas and implemented those ideas, building up their businesses and employing millions of people. This was not a perfect system, however, since some of the workers could not afford to live from the wages they were receiving. The union was born. Using the idea of democracy, they applied this concept to the workplace and were able to collectivly bargen for a larger cut from what they were producing. This likely cut into the overall advancement of industry, but it did give those who were the actual producers their fair wage. Prosperity continued. We became the first nation in the world to have a stable middle class.
Then something unfortunate happened. Some blame it on greed, but I blame it on men of low moral character. We started slipping. Wages started dropping. Industrialists started lobbying the goverment to enact regulations that soley benefited them; basically using the arm of the state to cartalize whole industries. No longer could a man come up with a great idea, find funding for his idea, and hire people to produce. There were regulations in place that were conviently forgotten about when it came to a few choice corporations. Then these same corporations lobbied the government to pass legislation that went after the powers of the unions (much of the legislation passed to benefit the unions originally is morally questionable at best, but was passed in a good will effort to help the working class). The most egregious piece of legislation that is being proposed today is the so called “Right to Work” legislation, somehow touted by libertarian minded folks as a positive step forward. What many libertarians seem to be forgetting is this type of legislation actually breaks long standing contracts between the unions and the employers that allowed for the prosperity we saw in the 20th century.
So Michael Moore is partially right. The wealthy in this country have declared class warfare against the poorer classes, but they did so by denying the poor class to the very rights their puppet politicians espouse on a daily basis. The cartilization of business, via the very regulations designed to protect the public, have created a huge artificial barrier of entry into almost every industry. If you want to see a modern example of a market that is still very open, look at the Internet. The wealthy did not expect to see the average person use this new platform to become enterpurners. But we did. And it was a good run, except now the same politicans that have closed up every other industry in the country are starting to legislate the freest market in the world. Recently California decided to start charging sales tax on all Affiliate sales for sites like Amazon. Affiliate sales are where a person signs up on a website, is given a link to post on their website, and people click on those links to purchase products on the former website, thereby giving the affiliate a percentage of the sale. In response, Amazon decided to cancel all affilate accounts in the State of California. Now the federal goverment is talking about having a federal license that will be required by anyone developing applications on the web. These tactics, targeted at protecting the public but often lobbied for by large corporations, will again stiffen competition in the marketplace and give privelege to a choice class of wealthy leaches who can afford to purchase these licenses. The little guy, like myself who does this for a living, will eventually be squeezed out of the market.
Freed markets may not produce the results that many of us libertarians wish they would produce. Just like any theory, there are always anomolies that nobody can predict ahead of time. But we are at a time in history where we need to try something different; something radically different. If our detractors are correct, we will end up in basically the same situation we are in today: serfdom to a select few wealthy individuals who have no respect for our basic human rights. But if they are wrong, and history seems to indicate they are, we will see the greatest prosperity man has ever been a part of.
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Corey Moore is a student liberty activist from Kent, Ohio. Check out his radio show over at http://vordshow.com or check out the Kent Student Liberty Alliance, the organization where he is President over at http://kentsla.org