On Free Immigration and Forced Integration

[menciusmoldbug]

On Free Immigration and Forced Integration (http://www.lewrockwell.com/2014/07/hans-hermann-hoppe/free-immigration-is-forced-integration/)

By Hans-Hermann Hoppe (http://www.lewrockwell.com/author/hans-hermann-hoppe/?post_type=article)
July 11, 2014

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The classical argument in favor of free immigration runs as follows: Other things being equal, businesses go to low-wage areas, and labor moves to high-wage areas, thus affecting a tendency toward the equalization of wage rates (for the same kind of labor) as well as the optimal localization of capital. An influx of migrants into a given-sized high-wage area will lower nominal wage rates. However, it will not lower real wage rates if the population is below its optimum size. To the contrary, if this is the case, the produced output will increase over-proportionally, and real incomes will actually rise. Thus, restrictions on immigration will harm the protected domestic workers qua consumers more than they gain qua producers. Moreover, immigration restrictions will increase the “flight” of capital abroad (the export of capital which otherwise might have stayed), still causing an equalization of wage rates (although somewhat more slowly), but leading to a less than optimal allocation of capital, thereby harming world living standards all-around.

In addition, traditionally labor unions, and nowadays environmentalists, are opposed to free immigration, and this should prima facie count as another argument in favor of a policy of free immigration.

II

As it is stated, the above argument in favor of free immigration is irrefutable and correct. It would be foolish to attack it, just as it would be foolish to deny that free trade leads to higher living standards than does protectionism.

It would also be wrongheaded to attack the above case for free immigration by pointing out that because of the existence of a welfare state, immigration has become to a significant extent the immigration of welfare-bums, who, even if the United States, for instance, is below her optimal population point, do not increase but rather decrease average living standards. For this is not an argument against immigration but against the welfare state. To be sure, the welfare state should be destroyed, root and branch. However, in any case the problems of immigration and welfare are analytically distinct problems, and they must be treated accordingly.

The problem with the above argument is that it suffers from two interrelated shortcomings which invalidate its unconditional pro-immigration conclusion and/or which render the argument applicable only to a highly unrealistic – long bygone – situation in human history.

The first shortcoming will only be touched upon. To libertarians of the Austrian school, it should be clear that what constitutes “wealth” and “well-being” is subjective. Material wealth is not the only thing that counts. Thus, even if real incomes rise due to immigration, it does not follow that immigration must be considered “good,” for one might prefer lower living standards and a greater distance to other people over higher living standards and a smaller distance to others.

Instead, a second, related shortcoming will be the focus here. With regard to a given territory into which people immigrate, it is left unanalyzed who, if anyone, owns (controls) this territory. In fact, in order to render the above argument applicable, it is – implicitly – assumed that the territory in question is unowned, and that the immigrants enter virgin territory (open frontier). Obviously, this can no longer be assumed. If this assumption is dropped, however, the problem of immigration takes on an entirely new meaning and requires fundamental rethinking.

III

For the purpose of illustration, let us first assume an anarcho-capitalist society. Though convinced that such a society is the only social order that can be defended as just, I do not want to explain here why this is the case. Instead, I will employ it as a conceptual benchmark, because this will help clear up the fundamental misconception of most contemporary free immigration advocates.

All land is privately owned, including all streets, rivers, airports, harbors, etc. With respect to some pieces of land, the property title may be unrestricted; that is, the owner is permitted to do with his property whatever he pleases as long as he does not physically damage the property owned by others. With respect to other territories, the property title may be more or less severely restricted. As is currently the case in some housing developments, the owner may be bound by contractual limitations on what he can do with his property (voluntary zoning), which might include residential vs. commercial use, no buildings more than four stories high, no sale or rent to Jews, Germans, Catholics, homosexuals, Haitians, families with or without children, or smokers, for example.

Clearly, under this scenario there exists no such thing as freedom of immigration. Rather, there exists the freedom of many independent private property owners to admit or exclude others from their own property in accordance with their own unrestricted or restricted property titles. Admission to some territories might be easy, while to others it might be nearly impossible. In any case, however, admission to the property of the admitting person does not imply a “freedom to move around,” unless other property owners consent to such movements. There will be as much immigration or non-immigration, inclusivity or exclusivity, desegregation or segregation, non-discrimination or discrimination based on racial, ethnic, linguistic, religious, cultural or whatever other grounds as individual owners or associations of individual owners allow.

Note that none of this, not even the most exclusive form of segregationism, has anything to do with a rejection of free trade and the adoption of protectionism. From the fact that one does not want to associate with or live in the neighborhood of Blacks, Turks, Catholics or Hindus, etc., it does not follow that one does not want to trade with them from a distance. To the contrary, it is precisely the absolute voluntariness of human association and separation – the absence of any form of forced integration – that makes peaceful relationships – free trade – between culturally, racially, ethnically, or religiously distinct people possible.

IV
In an anarcho-capitalist society there is no government and, accordingly, no clear-cut distinction between inlanders (domestic citizens) and foreigners. This distinction comes into existence only with the establishment of a government, i.e., an institution which possesses a territorial monopoly of aggression (taxation). The territory over which a government’s taxing power extends becomes “inland,” and everyone residing outside of this territory becomes a foreigner. State borders (and passports), are an “unnatural” (coercive) institution. Indeed, their existence (and that of a domestic government) implies a two-fold distortion with respect to peoples’ natural inclination to associate with others. First, inlanders cannot exclude the government (the taxman) from their own property, but are subject to what one might call “forced integration” by government agents. Second, in order to be able to intrude on its subjects’ private property so as to tax them, a government must invariably take control of existing roads, and it will employ its tax revenue to produce even more roads to gain even better access to all private property, as a potential tax source. Thus, this over-production of roads does not involve merely an innocent facilitation of interregional trade – a lowering of transaction costs – as starry-eyed economists would have us believe, but it involves forced domestic integration (artificial desegregation of separate localities).


Moreover, with the establishment of a government and state borders, immigration takes on an entirely new meaning. Immigration becomes immigration by foreigners across state borders, and the decision as to whether or not a person should be admitted no longer rests with private property owners or associations of such owners but with the government as the ultimate sovereign of all domestic residents and the ultimate super-owner of all their properties. Now, if the government excludes a person while even one domestic resident wants to admit this very person onto his property, the result is forced exclusion (a phenomenon that does not exist under private property anarchism). Furthermore, if the government admits a person while there is not even one domestic resident who wants to have this person on his property, the result is forced integration (also non-existent under private property anarchism).

V

It is now time to enrich the analysis through the introduction of a few “realistic” empirical assumptions. Let us assume that the government is privately owned. The ruler literally owns the entire country within state borders. He owns part of the territory outright (his property title is unrestricted), and he is partial owner of the rest (as landlord or residual claimant of all of his citizen-tenants real estate holdings, albeit restricted by some kind of pre-existing rental contract). He can sell and bequeath his property, and he can calculate and “realize” the monetary value of his capital (his country).

Traditional monarchies – and kings – are the closest historical examples of this form of government.

What will a king’s typical immigration and emigration policy be? Because he owns the entire country’s capital value, he will, assuming no more than his self-interest, tend to choose migration policies that preserve or enhance rather than diminish the value of his kingdom.

As far as emigration is concerned, a king will want to prevent the emigration of productive subjects, in particular of his best and most productive subjects, because losing them would lower the value of the kingdom. Thus, for example, from 1782 until 1824 a law prohibited the emigration of skilled workmen from Britain. On the other hand, a king will want to expel his non-productive and destructive subjects (criminals, bums, beggars, gypsies, vagabonds, etc.), for their removal from his territory would increase the value of his realm. For this reason Britain expelled tens of thousands of common criminals to North America and Australia.

On the other hand, as far as immigration policy is concerned, a king would want to keep the mob, as well as all people of inferior productive capabilities, out. People of the latter category would only be admitted temporarily, if at all, as seasonal workers without citizenship, and they would be barred from permanent property ownership. Thus, for example, after 1880 large numbers of Poles were hired as seasonal workers in Germany. A king would only permit the permanent immigration of superior or at least above-average people; i.e., those, whose residence in his kingdom would increase his own property value. Thus, for example, after 1685 (with the revocation of the Edict of Nantes) tens of thousands of Huguenots were permitted to settle in Prussia; and similarly Peter the Great, Frederick the Great, and Maria Theresia later promoted the immigration and settlement of large numbers of Germans in Russia, Prussia, and the eastern provinces of Austria-Hungary.

In brief, while through his immigration policies a king might not entirely avoid all cases of forced exclusion or forced integration, such policies would by and large do the same as what private property owners would do, if they could decide who to admit and who to exclude. That is, the king would be highly selective and very much concerned about improving the quality of the resident human capital so as to drive property values up, not down.

VI
Migration policies become predictably different, once the government is publicly owned. The ruler no longer owns the country’s capital value, but only has current use of it. He cannot sell or bequeath his position as ruler; he is merely a temporary caretaker. Moreover, “free entry” into the position of a caretaker government exists. Anyone can, in principle, become the ruler of the country.


Democracies as they came into existence on a world-wide scale after World War I offer historical examples of public government.Migration policies become predictably different, once the government is publicly owned. The ruler no longer owns the country’s capital value, but only has current use of it. He cannot sell or bequeath his position as ruler; he is merely a temporary caretaker. Moreover, “free entry” into the position of a caretaker government exists. Anyone can, in principle, become the ruler of the country.

What are a democracy’s migration policies? Once again assuming no more than self-interest (maximizing monetary and psychic income: money and power), democratic rulers tend to maximize current income, which they can appropriate privately, at the expense of capital values, which they cannot appropriate privately. Hence, in accordance with democracy’s inherent egalitarianism of one-man-one-vote, they tend to pursue a distinctly egalitarian – non-discriminatory – emigration and immigration policy.

As far as emigration policy is concerned, this implies that for a democratic ruler it makes little, if any, difference whether productive or unproductive people, geniuses or bums leave the country. They have all one equal vote. In fact, democratic rulers might well be more concerned about the loss of a bum than that of a productive genius. While the loss of the latter would obviously lower the capital value of the country and loss of the former might actually increase it, a democratic ruler does not own the country. In the short run, which most interests a democratic ruler, the bum, voting most likely in favor of egalitarian measures, might be more valuable than the productive genius who, as egalitarianism’s prime victim, will more likely vote against the democratic ruler. For the same reason, a democratic ruler, quite unlike a king, undertakes little to actively expel those people whose presence within the country constitutes a negative externality (human trash, which drives individual property values down). In fact, such negative externalities – unproductive parasites, bums, and criminals – are likely to be his most reliable supporters.

As far as immigration policies are concerned, the incentives and disincentives are likewise distorted, and the results are equally perverse. For a democratic ruler, it also matters little whether bums or geniuses, below or above-average civilized and productive people immigrate into the country. Nor is he much concerned about the distinction between temporary workers (owners of work permits) and permanent, property owning immigrants (naturalized citizens). In fact, bums and unproductive people may well be preferable as residents and citizens, because they cause more so-called “social” problem,” and democratic rulers thrive on the existence of such problems. Moreover, bums and inferior people will likely support his egalitarian policies, whereas geniuses and superior people will not. The result of this policy of non-discrimination is forced integration: the forcing of masses of inferior immigrants onto domestic property owners who, if they could have decided for themselves, would have sharply discriminated and chosen very different neighbors for themselves. Thus, the United States immigration laws of 1965, as the best available example of democracy at work, eliminated all formerly existing “quality” concerns and the explicit preference for European immigrants and replaced it with a policy of almost complete non-discrimination (multi-culturalism).

Indeed, though rarely noticed, the immigration policy of a democracy is the mirror image of its policy toward internal population movements: toward the voluntary association and dissociation, segregation and desegregation, and the physical distancing and approximating of various private property owners. Like a king, a democratic ruler will promote spatial over-integration by over-producing the “public good” of roads. However, for a democratic ruler, unlike a king, it will not be sufficient that everyone can move next door to anyone else on government roads. Concerned about his current income and power rather than capital values and constrained by egalitarian sentiments, a democratic ruler will tend to go even further. Through non-discrimination laws – one cannot discriminate against Germans, Jews, Blacks, Catholics, Hindus, homosexuals, etc. – the government will want to open even the physical access and entrance to everyone’s property to everyone else. Thus, it is hardly surprising that the so-called “Civil Rights” legislation in the United States, which outlawed domestic discrimination on the basis of color, race, national origin, religion, gender, age, sexual orientation, disability, etc., and which thereby actually mandated forced integration, coincided with the adoption of a non-discriminatory immigration policy; i.e., mandated inter-national desegregagtion (forced integration).

VII
The current situation in the United States and in Western Europe has nothing whatsoever to do with “free” immigration. It is forced integration, plain and simple, and forced integration is the predictable outcome of democratic – one-man-one-vote – rule. Abolishing forced integration requires a de-democratization of society, and ultimately the abolition of democracy. More specifically, the authority to admit or exclude should be stripped from the hands of the central government and re-assigned to the states, provinces, cities, towns, villages, residential districts, and ultimately to private property owners and their voluntary associations. The means to achieve this goal are decentralization and secession (both inherently un-democratic, and un-majoritarian). One would be well on the way toward a restoration of the freedom of association and exclusion as it is implied in the idea and institution of private property, and much of the social strife currently caused by forced integration would disappear, if only towns and villages could and would do what they did as a matter of course until well into the nineteenth century in Europe and the United States: to post signs regarding entrance requirements to the town, and once in town for entering specific pieces of property (no beggars or bums or homeless, but also no Moslems, Hindus, Jews, Catholics, etc.); to kick out those who do not fulfill these requirements as trespassers; and to solve the “naturalization” question somewhat along the Swiss model, where local assemblies, not the central government, determine who can and who cannot become a Swiss citizen.


What should one hope for and advocate as the relatively correct immigration policy, however, as long as the democratic central state is still in place and successfully arrogates the power to determine a uniform national immigration policy? The best one may hope for, even if it goes against the “nature” of a democracy and thus is not very likely to happen, is that the democratic rulers act as if they were the personal owners of the country and as if they had to decide who to include and who to exclude from their own personal property (into their very own houses). This means following a policy of utmost discrimination: of strict discrimination in favor of the human qualities of skill, character, and cultural compatibility.The current situation in the United States and in Western Europe has nothing whatsoever to do with “free” immigration. It is forced integration, plain and simple, and forced integration is the predictable outcome of democratic – one-man-one-vote – rule. Abolishing forced integration requires a de-democratization of society, and ultimately the abolition of democracy. More specifically, the authority to admit or exclude should be stripped from the hands of the central government and re-assigned to the states, provinces, cities, towns, villages, residential districts, and ultimately to private property owners and their voluntary associations. The means to achieve this goal are decentralization and secession (both inherently un-democratic, and un-majoritarian).

More specifically, it means distinguishing strictly between “citizens” (naturalized immigrants) and “resident aliens” and excluding the latter from all welfare entitlements. It means requiring as necessary, for resident alien status as well as for citizenship, the personal sponsorship by a resident citizen and his assumption of liability for all property damage caused by the immigrant. It implies requiring an existing employment contract with a resident citizen; moreover, for both categories but especially that of citizenship, it implies that all immigrants must demonstrate through tests not only (English) language proficiency, but all-around superior (above-average) intellectual performance and character structure as well as a compatible system of values – with the predictable result of a systematic pro-European immigration bias.

[seyferjm]

Read this yesterday, very good read imo.

[menciusmoldbug]

Sorry if I'm not supposed to just post articles from other sites without comment, but I thought this was good enough to be worth sharing/discussing.

Any open-borders libertarians care to comment on Hoppe's piece here?

[Carlybee]

Bump

[kcchiefs6465]

Bump
Good read. I've yet to really sit down and read any Hoppe.

In short, individuals have the right (and ought have the ability) to protect their property. There is no authority to stop one from acquiring land or limiting their ability to move freely, even if said movement is depreciating of property value (or offensive to a given class). Contracts are contracts, absent the taking advantage of the unsound, fraud, and the violation of one's rights. It would sound, and certainly reading some in the OP's other threads, that this article was posted with xenophobia and flawed ethics at heart. At the least, much of his dogma is possibly the result of chewing bridges.

I am also not an anarcho-capitalist. Others would be more suited to provide a response. I can think of a few but would leave them to respond in their free time.

The fundamental, underlying principle would be: Do you, by way of collecting a 'majority' (which is never the true majority, simply the majority of voters) have legitimate right to amend law and take things that do not belong to you [or the group]? Does the Constitution, which has never been read by the overwhelming majority, and never signed or agreed to by any living person, absent the few who comprise the government, which hardly the few of which would comprise the government, grant you the authority to violate rights? Is being birthed here or there, under which or whatever system, enough to constitute the infringement of liberty?

[kcchiefs6465]

..

[P3ter_Griffin]

I'm gonna cut the irrelevant (what I see as irrelevant).


The classical argument in favor of free immigration runs as follows: Other things being equal, businesses go to low-wage areas, and labor moves to high-wage areas, thus affecting a tendency toward the equalization of wage rates (for the same kind of labor) as well as the optimal localization of capital. An influx of migrants into a given-sized high-wage area will lower nominal wage rates. However, it will not lower real wage rates if the population is below its optimum size. To the contrary, if this is the case, the produced output will increase over-proportionally, and real incomes will actually rise. Thus, restrictions on immigration will harm the protected domestic workers qua consumers more than they gain qua producers. Moreover, immigration restrictions will increase the “flight” of capital abroad (the export of capital which otherwise might have stayed), still causing an equalization of wage rates (although somewhat more slowly), but leading to a less than optimal allocation of capital, thereby harming world living standards all-around.

This is an economic benefit of free immigration, not an argument for it. He makes the argument latter in the piece, that being the freedom of association.


It would also be wrongheaded to attack the above case for free immigration by pointing out that because of the existence of a welfare state, immigration has become to a significant extent the immigration of welfare-bums, who, even if the United States, for instance, is below her optimal population point, do not increase but rather decrease average living standards. For this is not an argument against immigration but against the welfare state. To be sure, the welfare state should be destroyed, root and branch. However, in any case the problems of immigration and welfare are analytically distinct problems, and they must be treated accordingly.

Agreed, although I can't wrap my head around 'analytically distinct', but as long as distinct means distinct, then yes, I agree.


The first shortcoming will only be touched upon. To libertarians of the Austrian school, it should be clear that what constitutes “wealth” and “well-being” is subjective. Material wealth is not the only thing that counts. Thus, even if real incomes rise due to immigration, it does not follow that immigration must be considered “good,” for one might prefer lower living standards and a greater distance to other people over higher living standards and a smaller distance to others.

Agreed again, and thus why the economic benefits of free immigration are benefits, not reasoning.



Instead, a second, related shortcoming will be the focus here. With regard to a given territory into which people immigrate, it is left unanalyzed who, if anyone, owns (controls) this territory. In fact, in order to render the above argument applicable, it is – implicitly – assumed that the territory in question is unowned, and that the immigrants enter virgin territory (open frontier). Obviously, this can no longer be assumed. If this assumption is dropped, however, the problem of immigration takes on an entirely new meaning and requires fundamental rethinking.

Here again, he trips over his mistaking economic benefits as reasoning rather than benefits. But even if we were to frame this as purely economic this would, or could, still be false. For instance, if I owned a factory which I don't utilize 'efficiently', and sold it to an immigrant who did utilize it 'efficiently' his stated benefit of immigration would still apply.


All land is privately owned, including all streets, rivers, airports, harbors, etc. With respect to some pieces of land, the property title may be unrestricted; that is, the owner is permitted to do with his property whatever he pleases as long as he does not physically damage the property owned by others. With respect to other territories, the property title may be more or less severely restricted. As is currently the case in some housing developments, the owner may be bound by contractual limitations on what he can do with his property (voluntary zoning), which might include residential vs. commercial use, no buildings more than four stories high, no sale or rent to Jews, Germans, Catholics, homosexuals, Haitians, families with or without children, or smokers, for example.

[petergriffin] I could see this being the case if you are not the sole owner of the property (i.e. provision of a loan against the property), I don't understand though how this could be true if you are the sole owner.

Clearly, under this scenario there exists no such thing as freedom of immigration. Rather, there exists the freedom of many independent private property owners to admit or exclude others from their own property in accordance with their own unrestricted or restricted property titles. Admission to some territories might be easy, while to others it might be nearly impossible. In any case, however, admission to the property of the admitting person does not imply a “freedom to move around,” unless other property owners consent to such movements. There will be as much immigration or non-immigration, inclusivity or exclusivity, desegregation or segregation, non-discrimination or discrimination based on racial, ethnic, linguistic, religious, cultural or whatever other grounds as individual owners or associations of individual owners allow.

Agreed, other than the note.


In an anarcho-capitalist society there is no government and, accordingly, no clear-cut distinction between inlanders (domestic citizens) and foreigners. This distinction comes into existence only with the establishment of a government, i.e., an institution which possesses a territorial monopoly of aggression (taxation). The territory over which a government’s taxing power extends becomes “inland,” and everyone residing outside of this territory becomes a foreigner. State borders (and passports), are an “unnatural” (coercive) institution. Indeed, their existence (and that of a domestic government) implies a two-fold distortion with respect to peoples’ natural inclination to associate with others.

:)


In brief, while through his immigration policies a king might not entirely avoid all cases of forced exclusion or forced integration, such policies would by and large do the same as what private property owners would do, if they could decide who to admit and who to exclude. That is, the king would be highly selective and very much concerned about improving the quality of the resident human capital so as to drive property values up, not down.

:( Quality is subjective much like 'wealth' 'well-being' or 'good'. But, in this hypothetical where the king owns all property, his (subjective) decisions to admit or exclude would be exactly like that of private property owners, because he'd be the sole property owner.


The current situation in the United States and in Western Europe has nothing whatsoever to do with “free” immigration. It is forced integration, plain and simple, and forced integration is the predictable outcome of democratic – one-man-one-vote – rule. Abolishing forced integration requires a de-democratization of society, and ultimately the abolition of democracy. More specifically, the authority to admit or exclude should be stripped from the hands of the central government and re-assigned to the states, provinces, cities, towns, villages, residential districts, and ultimately to private property owners and their voluntary associations. The means to achieve this goal are decentralization and secession (both inherently un-democratic, and un-majoritarian). One would be well on the way toward a restoration of the freedom of association and exclusion as it is implied in the idea and institution of private property, and much of the social strife currently caused by forced integration would disappear, if only towns and villages could and would do what they did as a matter of course until well into the nineteenth century in Europe and the United States: to post signs regarding entrance requirements to the town, and once in town for entering specific pieces of property (no beggars or bums or homeless, but also no Moslems, Hindus, Jews, Catholics, etc.); to kick out those who do not fulfill these requirements as trespassers; and to solve the “naturalization” question somewhat along the Swiss model, where local assemblies, not the central government, determine who can and who cannot become a Swiss citizen.

Towns and villages are much less centralized than our federal government, but it no way (unless a sole individual owned the town or village) would rules by a town or village restricting the freedom of association be a way to restore the freedom of association.


What should one hope for and advocate as the relatively correct immigration policy, however, as long as the democratic central state is still in place and successfully arrogates the power to determine a uniform national immigration policy? The best one may hope for, even if it goes against the “nature” of a democracy and thus is not very likely to happen, is that the democratic rulers act as if they were the personal owners of the country and as if they had to decide who to include and who to exclude from their own personal property (into their very own houses). This means following a policy of utmost discrimination: of strict discrimination in favor of the human qualities of skill, character, and cultural compatibility.The current situation in the United States and in Western Europe has nothing whatsoever to do with “free” immigration. It is forced integration, plain and simple, and forced integration is the predictable outcome of democratic – one-man-one-vote – rule. Abolishing forced integration requires a de-democratization of society, and ultimately the abolition of democracy. More specifically, the authority to admit or exclude should be stripped from the hands of the central government and re-assigned to the states, provinces, cities, towns, villages, residential districts, and ultimately to private property owners and their voluntary associations. The means to achieve this goal are decentralization and secession (both inherently un-democratic, and un-majoritarian).

Why would we not hope and advocate for the freedom of association? If the ruler was prejudice against some class (religion, ethnicity, habits) and you happened to fit into that class, would you really want the ruler to act as if it was their own property? And how does giving the power to states, provinces, cities, towns, villages, and residential districts prevent forced integration or exclusion? The only way to do that is 'ultimately private property owners'.


More specifically, it means distinguishing strictly between “citizens” (naturalized immigrants) and “resident aliens” and excluding the latter from all welfare entitlements. It means requiring as necessary, for resident alien status as well as for citizenship, the personal sponsorship by a resident citizen and his assumption of liability for all property damage caused by the immigrant. It implies requiring an existing employment contract with a resident citizen; moreover, for both categories but especially that of citizenship, it implies that all immigrants must demonstrate through tests not only (English) language proficiency, but all-around superior (above-average) intellectual performance and character structure as well as a compatible system of values – with the predictable result of a systematic pro-European immigration bias.

Again, the author’s subjective values are better than advocating for the freedom of association?

If I cut anything you think is important out please tell me (not that my thoughts on the subject really matter). I agree with the author on plenty, but he started out with a poor premise (economic benefit vs reason), and then added more as he went (advocating for poor immigration policies vs freedom of association).

[The Free Hornet]

Any open-borders libertarians care to comment on Hoppe's piece here?

What's an "open-borders libertarian" and why would one care to comment on some dude's piece? Is a "closed-borders libertarian" closer to his perspective? I can't see how.

The piece makes an argument for "a uniform national immigration policy" (closed border) that is an open border in practice. "... requiring ... sponsorship". I.e., close the borders unless someone already on the other side can wave you over???

He seems to think we can turn people around because an HOA down the road has a "No Mexicans" (or whatever) policy. But, in reality, they don't, they won't add one, and if they did, there are plenty of other places to live.

If I favored closed borders, I'd suspect this guy of wanting to let too many people in. Or he is delusional in thinking his kind would control the process.

[menciusmoldbug]

It would sound, and certainly reading some in the OP's other threads, that this article was posted with xenophobia and flawed ethics at heart. At the least, much of his dogma is possibly the result of chewing bridges.
https://c.mql5.com/3/25/picard-facepalm31e.jpg

[kcchiefs6465]

Meh.

[menciusmoldbug]

I could see this being the case if you are not the sole owner of the property (i.e. provision of a loan against the property), I don't understand though how this could be true if you are the sole owner.
Consider the following situation: Suppose I built a house and sold it to another party with a provision in the contract stating that the purchaser agrees not to sell or rent the property to "Jews, Germans, Catholics, homosexuals, Haitians, families with or without children, or smokers," and furthermore that any sale of the property they may make in the future must contain this clause as well, thereby ensuring (if the contract is enforced as written) for all eternity that the property will not be owned or rented by "Jews, Germans, Catholics, homosexuals, Haitians, families with or without children, or smokers." Is this a valid contract? Should it be enforced? If not, why not? If so, are there any similar contracts that could be made which should not be enforced, in your opinion?

Towns and villages are much less centralized than our federal government, but it no way (unless a sole individual owned the town or village) would rules by a town or village restricting the freedom of association be a way to restore the freedom of association.
Why must the owner of the town or village be a sole individual in order to be able to exercise their right to freedom of association? If two people were to purchase the town or village, is it your assertion that in doing so they thereby ought to lose their right to freedom of association? If so, why? If not, then do you see what this implies about the validity of restrictions on the entrance of "beggars or bums or homeless . . . Moslems, Hindus, Jews, Catholics, etc." into the town or village?

Why would we not hope and advocate for the freedom of association?
You've answered your own question in the very next sentence:

If the ruler was prejudice against some class (religion, ethnicity, habits) and you happened to fit into that class, would you really want the ruler to act as if it was their own property?
In the same vein, consider the question of why one might not hope and advocate for freedom from rape: Suppose you really want to have sex with someone, and they don't want to have sex with you! Well, in that case, would you really want there to be universal laws against rape? Wouldn't it be better if the law said that rape was always prohibited unless YOU were doing the raping?

Likewise, if you are a member of a group that is (rightly and justifiably) discriminated against on the basis of statistically valid information about members of that group, then you will be opposed to "freedom of association," because other people exercising that freedom will be bad for you.

And how does giving the power to states, provinces, cities, towns, villages, and residential districts prevent forced integration or exclusion? The only way to do that is 'ultimately private property owners'.
Suppose states, provinces, cities, towns, villages, and residential districts were considered private property. In that case, forced integration/exclusion would be prevented by definition. Do you see why?

Now recognize that this is in fact a valid and legitimate way to view the world. Indeed, I'd argue that it is by far the most accurate and correct way to do so.

Again, the author’s subjective values are better than advocating for the freedom of association?
You are deeply confused and should re-examine what "freedom of association" means.

I agree with the author on plenty, but he started out with a poor premise (economic benefit vs reason)
He did not; you are mistaken.

and then added more as he went (advocating for poor immigration policies vs freedom of association).
The immigration policies he supports are excellent and should be implemented. What you call "freedom of association" is incoherent amounts to nothing more than pure communism.

[P3ter_Griffin]

Consider the following situation: Suppose I built a house and sold it to another party with a provision in the contract stating that the purchaser agrees not to sell or rent the property to "Jews, Germans, Catholics, homosexuals, Haitians, families with or without children, or smokers," and furthermore that any sale of the property they may make in the future must contain this clause as well, thereby ensuring (if the contract is enforced as written) for all eternity that the property will not be owned or rented by "Jews, Germans, Catholics, homosexuals, Haitians, families with or without children, or smokers." Is this a valid contract? Should it be enforced? If not, why not? If so, are there any similar contracts that could be made which should not be enforced, in your opinion?

Sure, I wouldn't purchase a property with such restrictions, but I can dig it. I think as far as this could go though is restricting whoever bought the property from you. So they can't sell to "whomever", but the person who buys that property from the person you sold it to wouldn't be under any obligation of the contract.


Why must the owner of the town or village be a sole individual in order to be able to exercise their right to freedom of association? If two people were to purchase the town or village, is it your assertion that in doing so they thereby ought to lose their right to freedom of association? If so, why? If not, then do you see what this implies about the validity of restrictions on the entrance of "beggars or bums or homeless . . . Moslems, Hindus, Jews, Catholics, etc." into the town or village?

Don't be so dense.


In the same vein, consider the question of why one might not hope and advocate for freedom from rape: Suppose you really want to have sex with someone, and they don't want to have sex with you! Well, in that case, would you really want there to be universal laws against rape? Wouldn't it be better if the law said that rape was always prohibited unless YOU were doing the raping?

Likewise, if you are a member of a group that is (rightly and justifiably) discriminated against on the basis of statistically valid information about members of that group, then you will be opposed to "freedom of association," because other people exercising that freedom will be bad for you.

It doesn't have to be 'rightly and justifiably' discrimination, it is their property, I have no right to it.


Suppose states, provinces, cities, towns, villages, and residential districts were considered private property. In that case, forced integration/exclusion would be prevented by definition. Do you see why?

Now recognize that this is in fact a valid and legitimate way to view the world. Indeed, I'd argue that it is by far the most accurate and correct way to do so.

I do not recognize that as a fact, you didn't make any argument, you made a statement.



You are deeply confused and should re-examine what "freedom of association" means.

cool


He did not; you are mistaken.

story


The immigration policies he supports are excellent and should be implemented. What you call "freedom of association" is incoherent amounts to nothing more than pure communism.

bro

[menciusmoldbug]

What's an "open-borders libertarian" and why would one care to comment on some dude's piece?
An "open-borders libertarian," to my mind, would be someone who does not believe that it is legitimate or desirable for USG to prevent people from crossing its borders or taking up residence within them. I thought that one might be interested in commenting on Hoppe's piece here because he seems to take a different view of things, and it might be productive to figure out why individuals starting from a similar place and seeking similar goals might reach diametrically opposed conclusions.

Is a "closed-borders libertarian" closer to his perspective? I can't see how.
Well, as I alluded to above, an "open-borders libertarians" would argue that it is neither legitimate nor desirable for USG to prevent people from crossing its borders or taking up residence within them. What you call a "closed-borders libertarian" would argue the opposite, as Hoppe has here - that it is both legitimate and desirable for USG to prevent people from crossing its borders and taking up residence within them.

The piece makes an argument for "a uniform national immigration policy" (closed border) that is an open border in practice. "... requiring ... sponsorship". I.e., close the borders unless someone already on the other side can wave you over???
I'm having to bite my tongue to avoid making a sarcastic and insulting remark here, but I will point out that you have not read the piece very carefully at all and have as a consequence summarized it as making literally the exact opposite of the argument that it in fact makes. Allow me to quote it in full:

"It means requiring as necessary, for resident alien status as well as for citizenship, the personal sponsorship by a resident citizen and his assumption of liability for all property damage caused by the immigrant. It implies requiring an existing employment contract with a resident citizen; moreover, for both categories but especially that of citizenship, it implies that all immigrants must demonstrate through tests not only (English) language proficiency, but all-around superior (above-average) intellectual performance and character structure as well as a compatible system of valuesas well as a compatible system of values..."

To call this "an open border in practice" is jaw-droppingly retarded. If we assume that the native and potential immigrant populations have equal intelligence and character structure (a false assumption, but one that we'll make for argument's sake), then requiring that immigrants demonstrate "above-average" intellectual performance eliminates 50% of potential immigrants by definition. Tack on all the rest of the requirements and it quickly becomes obvious that putting such stringent standards in place would result in radically reduced levels of immigration, with most of it coming from a select few countries.


He seems to think we can turn people around because an HOA down the road has a "No Mexicans" (or whatever) policy. But, in reality, they don't, they won't add one
But suppose they put in a policy that was not designed to discriminate against Mexicans (or whoever) but had a disparate impact upon them? As a point of fact, there are an enormous number of businesses, homeowners, HOAs, etc. who would love to put such policies in place but are prevented from doing so by the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Because policies that have a "disparate impact" are racist.

For quite some time in America it's been illegal to employ racists, sexists, and fascists, and mandatory to employ a precisely calibrated percentage of women, People of Color, etc. Because America is a free country and that's what freedom means.

and if they did, there are plenty of other places to live.
Right. Like Mexico! I am 100% in favor of allowing Mexicans to live in Mexico.

If I favored closed borders, I'd suspect this guy of wanting to let too many people in.
I think you may be using the term "closed borders" in a way that very few people who support immigration restrictions do. The quantity of immigrants is far less of a concern than the quality. If there happen to be a million+ potential immigrants with 115+ IQs and a strong work ethic who have jobs lined up can be expected to pay more in taxes than they consume in benefits, I say let them all in. If, on the other hand, there is a much smaller number of such people available, then I think we should let a much smaller number of people in.

Or he is delusional in thinking his kind would control the process.
Locking a border down really isn't that difficult if you actually want to do it. See: Israel, Soviet Union, etc. The problem is that our elites and political class do not want to secure the border - (R)s because they like cheap labor, (D)s because they like cheap votes. The losers in this game are the native poor and middle class.

[menciusmoldbug]

Sure, I wouldn't purchase a property with such restrictions, but I can dig it. I think as far as this could go though is restricting whoever bought the property from you. So they can't sell to "whomever", but the person who buys that property from the person you sold it to wouldn't be under any obligation of the contract.
I'm afraid you've ignored the second part of my question, which was: "If not, why not?"

It's all well and good to say that contracts you don't like ought not be enforced, but I'd like to know more about the reasoning that led you there.

"Because... if contracts I don't like get enforced, then I wouldn't like that!" is not an acceptable answer.

Don't be so dense.
I am so much smarter than you that we can barely be said to belong to the same species. If you want to accuse me of being "dense," then explain yourself, elsewise we must conclude that you are ignoring the question because you have no good answer.

Of course, we will eventually reach this conclusion anyway, because there is no good answer to the question posed, but you seem to be giving up much earlier than you must.

It doesn't have to be 'rightly and justifiably' discrimination, it is their property, I have no right to it.
But how are we to determine who gets what? That is, how are property rights apportioned?

I do not recognize that as a fact, you didn't make any argument, you made a statement.
With this much, at least, I can agree.

[Reece]

What should one hope for and advocate as the relatively correct immigration policy, however, as long as the democratic central state is still in place and successfully arrogates the power to determine a uniform national immigration policy? The best one may hope for, even if it goes against the “nature” of a democracy and thus is not very likely to happen, is that the democratic rulers act as if they were the personal owners of the country and as if they had to decide who to include and who to exclude from their own personal property (into their very own houses). This means following a policy of utmost discrimination: of strict discrimination in favor of the human qualities of skill, character, and cultural compatibility.

Why only for immigration? Should we also hope that the democratic rulers act as if they were the personal owners of the country in every respect? Should they spy on us, take as much money in taxes as they like, detain us without trial, and so on if they feel like it would improve the country (their property)? They aren't the owners of the country, so they don't have the right to do any of these things. Hoppe can't just get around this by saying that the government doesn't own these things. They also don't own the roads or anything else in the country. If they did have the right to restrict the roads (and other things generally looked at as government property), then they would at least have the right to highly regulate the road - search your car when you are driving down it, force you to pay taxes if you use it, detain you if you are acting suspiciously on the road, etc. Hoppe's argument would logically lead to the government being able to do all of these things.

Even just on immigration, Hoppe doesn't seem to differentiate between people outside the country that don't meet his "human qualities of skill, character, and cultural compatibility," and people already inside the country. If the central government acts as if it is the owner of the country, then why wouldn't it kick people out living here right now that don't meet these standards? Hoppe seems to realize that this would lead to some un-libertarian deportations, although not to the extent that he should. If I invite someone (who isn't one of his favored English speaking Europeans) from outside the country onto my property, this is perfectly allowed under his libertarian framework of private property rights, but his central government would not allow this. Allowing people to come if they get a sponsor (which doesn't even seem enough under Hoppe's framework to be allowed in) doesn't fix this problem. Do people currently here need to find a sponsor too?

Open immigration isn't forced integration. You can exclude people from your property under open immigration - to the extent that you can't (for example, businesses being restricted from saying "No Mexicans allowed" or some similarly racist policy), you also can't for people already here. The open immigration policy doesn't make this worse. You don't gain the right to use violence against an innocent person just because the government is using violence against you. The roads aren't owned by the government, and I don't want them to be. The immigrants didn't pay for the road, but nor did anyone born today. If I have the right to use the roads, then I can surely share that right with other people, just like I can let other people use my car. I'll gladly share this right with every single immigrant wanting to come into this country. This gives them just as much right to be here as anyone else, including Hoppe.

I've said this before, but I think it's worth repeating. Hoppe can be considered an anarcho-capitalist in the same way Marx can be considered an anarcho-communist. Both support the end of the state. Both support an extremely powerful state over a limited one before we reach this goal. I consider Milton Friedman and other minarchists far more libertarian than Hoppe - since anarchy is unlikely anytime soon, the current policies one supports (given that there will be a state) seem far more important than the end goal one supports. Hoppe supports the government essentially owning the country. Friedman fought against that.

[P3ter_Griffin]

I'm afraid you've ignored the second part of my question, which was: "If not, why not?"

It's all well and good to say that contracts you don't like ought not be enforced, but I'd like to know more about the reasoning that led you there.

"Because... if contracts I don't like get enforced, then I wouldn't like that!" is not an acceptable answer.

I missed this the first time through:


and furthermore that any sale of the property they may make in the future must contain this clause as well

I have no problem with that. I think even the most racist of individuals would not buy a property where potential buyers are so limited, but that isn't what your asking.


I am so much smarter than you that we can barely be said to belong to the same species. If you want to accuse me of being "dense," then explain yourself, elsewise we must conclude that you are ignoring the question because you have no good answer.

How could I be more clear on my belief in property rights? If one, two, ten, 100, people own ALL the property in a given town, and they ALL have the policy that restricts the entrance of "beggars or bums or homeless . . . Moslems, Hindus, Jews, Catholics, etc.", then where could the "beggars or bums or homeless . . . Moslems, Hindus, Jews, Catholics, etc." go that wouldn't be violating someones property rights? But it is not a town decree that makes this so, it is the individual property owners. It would not restrict these individual owners from their freedom of association, to sell or allow on their property which resides in this given town "beggars or bums or homeless . . . Moslems, Hindus, Jews, Catholics, etc." if they so decide.


Of course, we will eventually reach this conclusion anyway, because there is no good answer to the question posed, but you seem to be giving up much earlier than you must.

:confused:


But how are we to determine who gets what? That is, how are property rights apportioned?

WE are not to determine who gets what, unless the property is ours. Generally you gain ownership of a property by buying it from the previous owner, sometimes inheritance, sometimes by way of gifts.

[AuH20]

Forced integration runs in direct contrast to free association. Hoppe nails it.

[Feeding the Abscess]

Forced integration runs in direct contrast to free association. Hoppe nails it.

Know what runs in direct contrast with free association? Having a government so powerful that it can dictate what people you can and can't hire, who is allowed on your property, and who you can contract with.

And Hoppe argues that that is the proper policy for a government to have. Good job Hans, you should know better than to assume the government that you've given so much power will only do the things you advocate for (which is bad enough).

He nailed nothing in this piece.

[NorthCarolinaLiberty]

I am so much smarter than you...


LOL.

[menciusmoldbug]

Why only for immigration? Should we also hope that the democratic rulers act as if they were the personal owners of the country in every respect?
Yes.

Should they spy on us, take as much money in taxes as they like, detain us without trial, and so on if they feel like it would improve the country (their property)?
Yes.

They aren't the owners of the country, so they don't have the right to do any of these things.
They are the owners of the country, and they do have this right.

Hoppe can't just get around this by saying that the government doesn't own these things. They also don't own the roads or anything else in the country.
They do own the roads and everything else in the country, including you and me.

If they did have the right to restrict the roads (and other things generally looked at as government property), then they would at least have the right to highly regulate the road - search your car when you are driving down it, force you to pay taxes if you use it, detain you if you are acting suspiciously on the road, etc. Hoppe's argument would logically lead to the government being able to do all of these things.
And as we see, the government is in fact able to do all of these things. It follows logically that they must indeed possess these rights.

Even just on immigration, Hoppe doesn't seem to differentiate between people outside the country that don't meet his "human qualities of skill, character, and cultural compatibility," and people already inside the country. If the central government acts as if it is the owner of the country, then why wouldn't it kick people out living here right now that don't meet these standards?
It very well might!

Hoppe seems to realize that this would lead to some un-libertarian deportations, although not to the extent that he should. If I invite someone (who isn't one of his favored English speaking Europeans) from outside the country onto my property, this is perfectly allowed under his libertarian framework of private property rights, but his central government would not allow this.
There is no such thing as "your" property. You are a serf/slave; everything in your possession is stuff that you are renting from your owner: USG. When we speak of serfs/slaves possessing property, we are using shorthand for ease of communication. But the underlying reality is that all property rights are ultimately vested in the state.

Allowing people to come if they get a sponsor (which doesn't even seem enough under Hoppe's framework to be allowed in) doesn't fix this problem. Do people currently here need to find a sponsor too?
Not if they're able to provide for themselves. The purpose of requiring sponsors for immigrants is to ensure that liability for any damage they do can be placed on a person with something significant to lose. It's a form of insurance, similar to the requirement that default-prone renters co-sign with a more asset-laden individual.

Open immigration isn't forced integration. You can exclude people from your property under open immigration - to the extent that you can't (for example, businesses being restricted from saying "No Mexicans allowed" or some similarly racist policy), you also can't for people already here. The open immigration policy doesn't make this worse.
This is incorrect. As poor immigrants flow into a democratic state or country, they vote for politicians who promise to expropriate the property of citizens already living there and redistribute it to themselves. The more immigrants there are, the more rapidly this expropriation will occur. Thus an open immigration policy most certainly does make this worse.

You don't gain the right to use violence against an innocent person just because the government is using violence against you.
I see. So a group or individual that makes use of human shields renders themselves invulnerable to retaliation, in your view? If it is illegitimate to attack a tank/plane/ship with innocent civilians on board, then any army can make itself invincible and slaughter countless civilians itself simply by taking advantage of this fact. Thus, your moral system requires you to commit suicide. This should cause you to rethink it.

The roads aren't owned by the government, and I don't want them to be.
Whether they ought to be seems at least potentially worth debating, but how you can claim with a straight face that the roads are not in fact owned by the government (aside from private toll roads, of course) is beyond me.

The immigrants didn't pay for the road, but nor did anyone born today. If I have the right to use the roads, then I can surely share that right with other people, just like I can let other people use my car. I'll gladly share this right with every single immigrant wanting to come into this country. This gives them just as much right to be here as anyone else, including Hoppe.
You don't have any rights aside from those that you can forcibly defend, and nor does anyone else. Hope this helps.

[menciusmoldbug]

I think even the most racist of individuals would not buy a property where potential buyers are so limited, but that isn't what your asking.
That's because you don't know your history (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covenant_(law)#Exclusionary_covenants).

In 1963, a long time ago but in the lives of many now living, the citizens of California, by a majority of nearly two-thirds, voted to pass a law called Proposition 14 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Proposition_14). This amended the state constitution to add the following:

"Neither the State nor any subdivision or agency thereof shall deny, limit or abridge, directly or indirectly, the right of any person, who is willing or desires to sell, lease or rent any part or all of his real property, to decline to sell, lease or rent such property to such person or persons as he, in his absolute discretion, chooses."

In other words: if you don't want to live with persons of color, you don't have to. The amendment, obviously, turned out to be unconstitutional (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reitman_v._Mulkey), just like this one (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Proposition_187_%281994%29); and we have persons of color to this day in California. In fact, we have so many of them that California in 2008 elected Barack Obama, noted person of color, by almost the same margin that its 1963 predecessor passed Prop. 14.

How could I be more clear on my belief in property rights? If one, two, ten, 100, people own ALL the property in a given town, and they ALL have the policy that restricts the entrance of "beggars or bums or homeless . . . Moslems, Hindus, Jews, Catholics, etc.", then where could the "beggars or bums or homeless . . . Moslems, Hindus, Jews, Catholics, etc." go that wouldn't be violating someones property rights? But it is not a town decree that makes this so, it is the individual property owners. It would not restrict these individual owners from their freedom of association, to sell or allow on their property which resides in this given town "beggars or bums or homeless . . . Moslems, Hindus, Jews, Catholics, etc." if they so decide.
As in the last thread we interacted, you seem to be completely ignorant of the existence of joint ownership arrangements. Sadly, as you learned nothing then, I don't very well see how you can be expected to learn anything now. But I'll go ahead and talk you through it in the hopes that someone else reading this might not be quite so mentally impaired.

It is possible for two or more people to join their assets in order to purchase a piece of property that none of the individuals in question could afford on their own, thereby granting them joint ownership over the property. Individuals who make this sort of arrangement are generally referred to as "corporations." If a corporation were to purchase a town or village (or a mall!), it would likely want to rent out the various buildings and stores within that territory in order to turn a profit on the land. Corporations, by their very nature, occasionally take actions not supported by all of their shareholders. Thus if 51% of the voting shares in a corporation wish to instate a policy that bans "beggars or bums or homeless . . . Moslems, Hindus, Jews, Catholics, etc." from corporate property, such a policy will be put in place over the objections of the 49%. Would you object to this? If so, on what grounds?

btw, normal people call corporations of this nature a "government."

WE are not to determine who gets what, unless the property is ours. Generally you gain ownership of a property by buying it from the previous owner, sometimes inheritance, sometimes by way of gifts.
https://c.mql5.com/3/25/picard-facepalm31e.jpg

[NorthCarolinaLiberty]

And as we see, the government is in fact able to do all of these things. It follows logically that they must indeed possess these rights.

You don't have any rights aside from those that you can forcibly defend, and nor does anyone else. Hope this helps.


No, it does not help because it is not correct. Do something and having the right to do something are not the same thing. Inability to defend a right does not negate the right.

[menciusmoldbug]

Know what runs in direct contrast with free association? Having a government so powerful that it can dictate what people you can and can't hire, who is allowed on your property, and who you can contract with.
Not really. Your mistake is in forgetting that "freedom of association," by its very nature, can only exist for free persons. Serfs aren't free. If the government wants its property not to be granted certain rights, it won't have those rights.

And Hoppe argues that that is the proper policy for a government to have. Good job Hans, you should know better than to assume the government that you've given so much power will only do the things you advocate for (which is bad enough).
Who ever said anything about assuming that the government will only do things we advocate for? Governments will act in their own interests, as they always have. That's what things tend to do. The most we (the serfs) can hope for is to find some way to align the interests of the government with ourselves. Democracy was thought to be a good way of doing so, but I think most people here can agree that it has failed.

He nailed nothing in this piece.
You might say so, but your ass does seem to be bleeding profusely. Might wanna get that looked at.

[menciusmoldbug]

No, it does not help because it is not correct. Do something and having the right to do something are not the same thing. Inability to defend a right does not negate the right.
Might makes right, hope this helps. Read your Nietzsche and get back to me.

[NorthCarolinaLiberty]

Might makes right, hope this helps. Read your Nietzsche and get back to me.

You stealing my watch does not make it right. Put it in your own words and get back to me.

[NorthCarolinaLiberty]

The most we (the serfs) can hope for is to find some way to align the interests of the government with ourselves.

You might say so, but your ass does seem to be bleeding profusely. Might wanna get that looked at.


Your "alignment" with government looks like you're the one taking it in the ass.

[menciusmoldbug]

You stealing my watch does not make it right. Put it in your own words and get back to me.
I agree that my stealing your watch would not make it "right" in the sense that you mean it and apologize for the dismissive tone of my original reply. I'll try to better explain what I meant by the comment with which you initially disagreed.

What we commonly call "rights" are not real things - they do not refer to anything that exists in the world. They are fictions. Moral realism is false, while nihilism is true; thus, it is not correct to say that anyone has a right to anything (in the sense that the term is usually used). Instead, all we may properly say is that people/groups are capable or not capable of doing certain things. If we wish to make use of the usual language surrounding such claims, we might say that those rights exist which can in fact be exercised - thus, if you are capable of retrieving your watch after I have stolen it (either via direct force or by alerting a police officer who takes it from me and gives it back to you), then we may say that you have a right to your watch. If you are not capable of retrieving your watch after I have stolen it, then we may say that you do not have a right to your watch.

Make sense?

[menciusmoldbug]

Your "alignment" with government looks like you're the one taking it in the ass.
That's because you have the blood of the Anglo-Saxons running through your veins, I'd wager. A notoriously individualistic people, they hated being ruled/submitting to more powerful entities than themselves. Believe me, I know the feeling - I have an anti-authoritarian streak in me a mile wide. It took a lot of reading and thinking to overcome.

Here is a very long article that I'd appreciate it if you read: Civil liberties and the single reactionary (http://unqualified-reservations.blogspot.com/2013/06/civil-liberties-and-single-reactionary.html)

I don't really expect you to take the time, nor can I really blame you for doing otherwise. But I think you might learn something you otherwise wouldn't know by doing so, and I also suspect that you'd consider it worthwhile afterwards. Your call!

[NorthCarolinaLiberty]

If you are not capable of retrieving your watch after I have stolen, then we may say that you do not have a right to your watch.




You possessing the watch after stealing it does not make it right. You possess the watch, but you have no right to possess it. Possession and right are two different things.

[NorthCarolinaLiberty]

I have an anti-authoritarian streak in me a mile wide.


Who admits to being pro-authoritarian?

[P3ter_Griffin]

That's because you don't know your history (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covenant_(law)#Exclusionary_covenants).

In 1963, a long time ago but in the lives of many now living, the citizens of California, by a majority of nearly two-thirds, voted to pass a law called Proposition 14 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Proposition_14). This amended the state constitution to add the following:

"Neither the State nor any subdivision or agency thereof shall deny, limit or abridge, directly or indirectly, the right of any person, who is willing or desires to sell, lease or rent any part or all of his real property, to decline to sell, lease or rent such property to such person or persons as he, in his absolute discretion, chooses."

In other words: if you don't want to live with persons of color, you don't have to. The amendment, obviously, turned out to be unconstitutional (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reitman_v._Mulkey), just like this one (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Proposition_187_%281994%29); and we have persons of color to this day in California. In fact, we have so many of them that California in 2008 elected Barack Obama, noted person of color, by almost the same margin that its 1963 predecessor passed Prop. 14.

That in no way relates whether an individual would buy a property that could never be sold to certain counter-parties. What this says is, as the owner of the property, you cannot be forced to rent or sell your property to any individual, for any reason. And I 100% agree, Prop 14 shouldn't have needed to be passed in the first place, it is inherit in an individual's property rights. The reason to not buy a property with such conditions is that, even if it is in your best interest as you determine them, even if it is your desire, you would not be allowed to expand your customer base to include those excluded by the contract.


As in the last thread we interacted, you seem to be completely ignorant of the existence of joint ownership arrangements. Sadly, as you learned nothing then, I don't very well see how you can be expected to learn anything now. But I'll go ahead and talk you through it in the hopes that someone else reading this might not be quite so mentally impaired.

lol, you sure are quite the prick. I know very well of joint ownership, my girlfriend and I own our house jointly.


It is possible for two or more people to join their assets in order to purchase a piece of property that none of the individuals in question could afford on their own, thereby granting them joint ownership over the property. Individuals who make this sort of arrangement are generally referred to as "corporations." If a corporation were to purchase a town or village (or a mall!), it would likely want to rent out the various buildings and stores within that territory in order to turn a profit on the land. Corporations, by their very nature, occasionally take actions not supported by all of their shareholders. Thus if 51% of the voting shares in a corporation wish to instate a policy that bans "beggars or bums or homeless . . . Moslems, Hindus, Jews, Catholics, etc." from corporate property, such a policy will be put in place over the objections of the 49%. Would you object to this? If so, on what grounds?

I agree with that. Although, to be nit picky, how can you achieve 51% of the voting shares when there is a disagreement and only two owners, as you stated here:


If two people were to purchase the town or village, is it your assertion that in doing so they thereby ought to lose their right to freedom of association?


btw, normal people call corporations of this nature a "government."

No, no they don't. I have heard Walmart, etc, referenced exactly zero times as a government.

[P3ter_Griffin]

Is it fair to say, mucus, that you have derailed so far from the original intent of this thread because Hoppe's writing is indefensible garbage? Also, is it fair to say you too disagree with Hoppe's piece, other than the historical aspects and the advocation for European only immigration?

[NorthCarolinaLiberty]

That's because you have the blood of the Anglo-Saxons running through your veins, I'd wager.

Negative.



Here is a very long article that I'd appreciate it if you read

Why would I read that? Put something in your own words already.

[Reece]

And as we see, the government is in fact able to do all of these things. It follows logically that they must indeed possess these rights.

This is just an argument over semantics then. As you've said before:


The answer to your question hinges on how we choose to define "right." There are two reasonable definitions that lead to very different answers.

1) If we think of the word "right" as referring to some objectively extant property in nature, then the answer is no, because "rights" in this sense do not exist - nobody has any "rights" whatsoever. "Rights" are simply fictional entities, somewhat akin to unicorns or dragons. People talk about them, but when they do they are simply confused about what is real and what is not.

2) If we think of the word "right" as referring to a legal or political right, then the answer is yes. The word "right" in this sense is synonymous with the word "power." Does the state have the "right" (power) to transfer property between citizens on a whim? Obviously - states do this sort of thing all the time. You are correct that the victims of these forced transactions are very often outraged - and yet the transfers take place nonetheless. This is because states tend to be radically more powerful than the citizens they own. These citizens/slaves sometimes construct moral systems according to which such transfers are illegitimate in order to justify their feelings of outrage - that is the origin of the definition of "right" referred to in the paragraph above.

You assumed the second, while it's pretty clear I was talking closer to the first. I'm not going to argue over a definition, so I won't use the word anymore, but my previous post was using rights as ethics based rules on who should control what. And, as I said before (but you didn't reply to), the ethical look at "rights" isn't just some unicorn. Both of us look at things as "good" and "bad." You think economic freedom is "good" and redistribution of wealth "generally bad." These are both value judgments that don't have any firm basis in reality, and yet you still hold them. Whatever the reasoning (that people are generally happier under economic freedom, that economic freedom sounds cool, etc.), the reasoning still has to be assumed to be a good thing too, and the reasoning for the reasoning being a good thing has to be assumed to be good (and so on). Ethics can't be proved, but it can be built up from a place that almost everyone agrees upon.


Not if they're able to provide for themselves. The purpose of requiring sponsors for immigrants is to ensure that liability for any damage they do can be placed on a person with something significant to lose. It's a form of insurance, similar to the requirement that default-prone renters co-sign with a more asset-laden individual.

My point was that people here right now currently aren't required to be insured or have a sponsor, regardless of their assets. So, if this is Hoppe's position, I fail to see why he wouldn't want the government to require everyone else with few assets to be sponsored. I thought you were a libertarian (I forgot you were the same person I argued with months ago), and so assumed you would see that this would not be a good policy.


This is incorrect. As poor immigrants flow into a democratic state or country, they vote for politicians who promise to expropriate the property of citizens already living there and redistribute it to themselves. The more immigrants there are, the more rapidly this expropriation will occur. Thus an open immigration policy most certainly does make this worse.

Not all of them. Immigrants actually seem to have a pretty small impact, partially because many of them don't vote. You're also ignoring other effects:

1) As immigration increases, current locals tend to become more against welfare. These people also tend to vote.

2) More open borders also brings about competition between countries. If Mexico is losing a bunch of people, they are going to want to incentivize them to return. This generally means more free market policies, especially in the long term, which you have called a "good thing," and certainly means less property restrictions.

3) Why only focus on political changes here? Currently there are massive restrictions on the labor market. Imagine if there was regulation only allowing a certain number of cars to enter the US from other countries per year. Suppose also that local car owners often donated to pro-free market candidates. If we only look at the political change of ending this regulation, yes, it is quite possible that ending this regulation would cause more anti-free market candidates to be elected. But we're also ending an anti-free market policy by allowing cars to enter (meaning people are able to use their property more freely by being allowed to buy foreign cars). Being able to hire foreign labor and to invite people I like onto my property is of far bigger importance than being able to buy a foreign car.

I think it's pretty clear net restrictions on my property would decrease significantly with a more open immigration policy.


I see. So a group or individual that makes use of human shields renders themselves invulnerable to retaliation, in your view? If it is illegitimate to attack a tank/plane/ship with innocent civilians on board, then any army can make itself invincible and slaughter countless civilians itself simply by taking advantage of this fact. Thus, your moral system requires you to commit suicide. This should cause you to rethink it.

One could come up with hundreds of examples like this. For example, if I say theft is wrong, one could bring up an example of one needing to steal a relatively insignificant item to save a large number of people. This doesn't destroy my ethics system, it just shows that there is sometimes something far more important than a minor aggression. The murdering of the people is still wrong and the theft is still wrong, but the additional benefit from the action makes it "worth it." It isn't difficult to see that killing an innocent person is in of itself wrong while still supporting it in extreme circumstances.

[menciusmoldbug]

You possessing the watch after stealing it does not make it right. You possess the watch, but you have no right to possess it. Possession and right are two different things.
It's like you didn't read a word a said. I don't know what else to do at this point other than repeat myself.

Moral realism is false. Nihilism is true. There are no such things as "rights" in the sense that you are using the term.

Now, you are of course welcome do believe in whatever fantasies or fairy tales you like, but doing so will not change the way the world actually is. If someone steals your watch and you can't get it back, then whether you say they have a "right" to possess it or not is 100% irrelevant.

[menciusmoldbug]

Who admits to being pro-authoritarian?
I am pro-authoritarian.

[Reece]

And as we see, the government is in fact able to do all of these things. It follows logically that they must indeed possess these rights.

Just to be clear, the main argument you're having with people is because of how you define rights. Imagine if you started a thread that said "People have the right to burn and eat kids." Since they are able to do this, it would follow that they have the right to under your definition. This would naturally bring a bunch of people calling you crazy (because burning kids is clearly wrong). You would argue (correctly under your definition) that people have the right to do this because they are able to do it, while other people would argue (correctly under their definition) that they don't have the right to do this because it is wrong to kill kids. I don't see the point in defining rights in the way you are, because the general population defines it differently, and it would be easier just to say, "The government is able to drop nuclear bombs on its citizens" (or whatever the discussion is about). At the very least, defining your terms when you use them in an unconventional way could prevent much of this back-and-forth.

[mczerone]

Sorry if I'm not supposed to just post articles from other sites without comment, but I thought this was good enough to be worth sharing/discussing.

Any open-borders libertarians care to comment on Hoppe's piece here?

It's too "central plannery": My job isn't to figure out the "best policy" for the existing welfare state, it's to insulate myself from it's pernicious effects.

It's also curious that he lays out the "private property" solution in the introduction, but abandons it's efficacy when a central state is present. He does this not by showing why private property solutions wouldn't work in spite of state policy, but by shifting his attention from acting individuals to the institution known as the state.

We still have, largely, the right to keep our property free from immigrants. If we have a problem with welfare/social programs subsidizing people, we should, First, do what we can to avoid paying into them. Then, we exercise what little control we have over the state administrating them. The third measure, restricting other people's freedom of movement, shouldn't even be on the table, as it is the least likely to work, the most costly, and the least moral option.

In all, Hoppe is a decent philosopher, but here he either confuses the object of his analysis or deliberately shifts his focus to come up with a pre-determined socially conservative solution.

[menciusmoldbug]

That in no way relates whether an individual would buy a property that could never be sold to certain counter-parties. What this says is, as the owner of the property, you cannot be forced to rent or sell your property to any individual, for any reason. And I 100% agree, Prop 14 shouldn't have needed to be passed in the first place, it is inherit in an individual's property rights.
sigh

You know, I actually seriously considered the possibility that you might be so mind-bogglingly stupid as to think that only the words I put in the post were worth reading rather than the link contained therein as well. I thought about leaving the words out entirely and posting only the link in the hopes that this would encourage you to click it.

In any case, your complete ignorance of property law has caused you to say yet another cringe-inducingly dumb thing. Rather than belabor the point, I'll simply post this (http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/covenant):

"A covenant is said to run with the land in the event that the covenant is annexed to the estate and cannot be separated from the land or the land transferred without it. Such a covenant exists if the original owner as well as each successive owner of the property is either subject to its burden or entitled to its benefit. A covenant running with the land is said to touch and concern the property. For example, an individual might own property subject to the restriction that it is only to be used for church purposes. When selling the land, the person can only do so upon an agreement by the buyer that he or she, too, will only use the land for church purposes. The land is thereby burdened or encumbered by a Restrictive Covenant, since the covenant specifically limits the use to which the land can be put. In addition, the covenant runs with the land because it remains attached to it despite subsequent changes in its ownership. This type of covenant is also called a covenant appurtenant.


Certain easements also run with the land. An easement, for example, that permits one landowner to walk across a particular portion of the property of an adjoining landowner in order to gain access to the street would run with the land. Subsequent owners of both plots would take the land subject to such easement.


A covenant in gross is unlike a covenant running with the land in that it is personal, binding only the particular owner and not the land itself. A subsequent owner is not required to keep the promise as one would with a covenant appurtenant."

do you see now that this renders everything you have said on the subject both wrong and retarded

Covenants that run with the land are a thing. They have been a thing for a long time, and they continue to be a thing to this day. A subset of them have been deemed unenforceable because OMG RACISM, but prior to that they were quite popular. Go click the wiki link (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covenant_(law)#Exclusionary_covenants) (I'll quote it for you too):
Exclusionary covenantsBefore 1948, these covenants were legally used for segregationist purposes.[17]


In the 1920s and 1930s, covenants that restricted the sale or occupation of real property on the basis of race, ethnicity, religion or social class were common in the United States, where the primary intent was to keep "white" neighbourhoods "white". Such covenants were employed by many real estate developers to "protect" entire subdivisions. The purpose of an exclusionary covenant was to prohibit a buyer of property from reselling, leasing or transferring the property to members of a given race, ethnic origin and/ or religion as specified in the title deed. Some covenants, such as those tied to properties in Forest Hills Gardens, New York, also sought to exclude working class people however this type of social segregation was more commonly achieved through the use of high property prices, minimum cost requirements and application reference checks.[18]:131–7 In practice, exclusionary covenants were most typically concerned with keeping out African-Americans, however restrictions against Asian-Americans, Jews and Catholics were not uncommon. For example, the Lake Shore Club District in Pennsylvania, sought to exclude various minorities including Negro, Mongolian, Hungarian, Mexican, Greek and various European immigrants.[18] Cities known for their widespread use of racial covenants include Chicago, Baltimore, Detroit, Los Angeles, and St. Louis.
HistoryRacial covenants emerged during the mid-nineteenth century and started to gain prominence from the 1890s onwards. However, it was not until the 1920s that they adopted widespread national significance, a situation that continued until the 1940s. Racial covenants were an alternative to racially restrictive zoning ordinances (residential segregation based on race) that the 1917 US Supreme Court ruling of Buchanan v. Warley invalidated on constitutional grounds.[19][20]:26 Such covenants were upheld by the Court in the 1926 ruling of Corrigan v. Buckley,[21] only later to be declared legal but “unenforceable” in the 1948 decision of Shelley v. Kraemer.[22]


Some commentators have attributed the popularity of exclusionary covenants at this time as a response to the urbanization of black Americans following World War I, and the fear of "black invasion" into white neighborhoods, which they felt would result in depressed property prices, increased nuisance (crime), and social instability.

[gee, I wonder what could have possibly given them THAT idea?]


The reason to not buy a property with such conditions is that, even if it is in your best interest as you determine them, even if it is your desire, you would not be allowed to expand your customer base to include those excluded by the contract.
"This is an economic [cost] of [a restrictive covenant], not an argument [against] it."

oh my peter, it appears that you have been hoisted on your own petard. how very shameful.

how can you achieve 51% of the voting shares when there is a disagreement and only two owners
it's very complicated, so i'm not sure you'll be able to understand, but here goes:

suppose the two parties in question put up different amounts of money for the initial purchase - say 75% came from party A and 25% from party B, and they agreed to divide the voting shares in that ratio (as is common). then party A would have 75% of the voting shares and party B would have 25%.

No, no they don't. I have heard Walmart, etc, referenced exactly zero times as a government.
https://c.mql5.com/3/25/picard-facepalm31e.jpg
that is because wal-mart is not a corporation of the nature that i described. thus it is not called a government. very good peter.

USG, on the other hand, IS such a corporation. and it is indeed called a government. it's right there in the title: United States Government.

[menciusmoldbug]

Is it fair to say, mucus, that you have derailed so far from the original intent of this thread because Hoppe's writing is indefensible garbage? Also, is it fair to say you too disagree with Hoppe's piece, other than the historical aspects and the advocation for European only immigration?
no peter, those are not fair things to say

[menciusmoldbug]

Negative.
If you don't mind my asking, then: What is your ancestry?

Why would I read that?
People generally read things because they hope to learn something. I can see that this isn't a strong motivator for you, however.

Put something in your own words already.
No, I don't think I'll be doing that. You don't strike me as enough of a high-quality person for it to be worth my time. I would certainly support your deportation. =P

[menciusmoldbug]

This is just an argument over semantics then. As you've said before:

You assumed the second, while it's pretty clear I was talking closer to the first. I'm not going to argue over a definition, so I won't use the word anymore, but my previous post was using rights as ethics based rules on who should control what. And, as I said before (but you didn't reply to), the ethical look at "rights" isn't just some unicorn. Both of us look at things as "good" and "bad." You think economic freedom is "good" and redistribution of wealth "generally bad." These are both value judgments that don't have any firm basis in reality, and yet you still hold them. Whatever the reasoning (that people are generally happier under economic freedom, that economic freedom sounds cool, etc.), the reasoning still has to be assumed to be a good thing too, and the reasoning for the reasoning being a good thing has to be assumed to be good (and so on). Ethics can't be proved, but it can be built up from a place that almost everyone agrees upon.
I agree with almost all of this. The only part with which I'd quibble is where you claim that my "value judgments... don't have any firm basis in reality." On the contrary, value judgments are almost all ultimately rooted in reality, because embedded in our value judgments about how the world ought to be are empirical beliefs about how the world actually is. It does not follow that a value judgment can be "wrong," but it is true that the empirical beliefs upon which a value judgment is based may be wrong, and if a person comes to recognize this, they will often alter their value judgment as well.

You seem to recognize this towards the end of the paragraph, so I'm not even sure that we actually disagree on this point. I suspect that if we do, it's "just an argument over semantics."

My point was that people here right now currently aren't required to be insured or have a sponsor, regardless of their assets. So, if this is Hoppe's position, I fail to see why he wouldn't want the government to require everyone else with few assets to be sponsored.
I can't speak for Hoppe, but I do want the government to require everyone else with few assets to be either sponsored or deported. That would make this a MUCH nicer place to live, in my opinion. (Note that my belief about the desirability of this policy hinges on empirical beliefs about what it will cause the world to look like.)

I thought you were a libertarian (I forgot you were the same person I argued with months ago), and so assumed you would see that this would not be a good policy.
"My favorite analogy for official authority is the stellar cycle. If the authority of government is the temperature of the star, and the size of government is the size of the star, Washington is easily identifiable as a red giant, like Betelgeuse - enormous and cool.

For former libertarians, such as myself, this inverse relationship is critical. The paradox is that weakening government makes it larger. At least, to a libertarian, this seems like a paradox. Once it seems quite natural, you may no longer be a libertarian."

Not all of them.
You are correct that not all immigrants have a net negative effect on the present polity. My claim was not intended to be a blanket statement applying to every single individual belonging to the group in question (though I can see how it could fairly be read that way). Instead, it was intended to be read in much the same way as the sentence, "Men are taller than women."

Immigrants actually seem to have a pretty small impact, partially because many of them don't vote.
United States presidential election in California, 1988 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election_in_California, _1988)

Immigrants have a smaller impact on elections per capita than native-born citizens because they vote at a lower rate. However, it is simply not correct to conclude from this fact that immigrants "seem to have a pretty small impact," because their effect has been the largest in those places where they are most heavily concentrated, and their numbers continue to grow. As this happens, we can expect the California effect to spread.

You're also ignoring other effects:

1) As immigration increases, current locals tend to become more against welfare. These people also tend to vote.

2) More open borders also brings about competition between countries. If Mexico is losing a bunch of people, they are going to want to incentivize them to return. This generally means more free market policies, especially in the long term, which you have called a "good thing," and certainly means less property restrictions.
I hope you'll believe me when I say that I am by no means ignoring these other effects. As a point of fact, I have literally used these precise points to argue in favor of open borders less than a year ago. I have since been persuaded that I was wrong to. Here (http://www.xenosystems.net/suicidal-libertarianism-part-doh/) is a blog post addressing the other effects in question. Key quote:

"This argument is so freaking Mad Max that I actually quite like it. Burn down the world and you take the welfare state with it. Yeeaaaahhhhh! (I’ll leave it to more responsible voices to point out any possible flaws.)"

Because I see myself as a somewhat responsible person, I'll take this opportunity to say that I do not think destroying social capital and trust are good things, even if they result in less overall support for welfare. I would much rather live in a place with high social capital/trust + welfare than a place with low social capital/trust - welfare. Moreover, the welfare is likely to continue anyway, especially as the number of welfare-supporting immigrants begins to overwhelm the number of welfare-opposing natives.

3) Why only focus on political changes here? Currently there are massive restrictions on the labor market. Imagine if there was regulation only allowing a certain number of cars to enter the US from other countries per year. Suppose also that local car owners often donated to pro-free market candidates. If we only look at the political change of ending this regulation, yes, it is quite possible that ending this regulation would cause more anti-free market candidates to be elected. But we're also ending an anti-free market policy by allowing cars to enter (meaning people are able to use their property more freely by being allowed to buy foreign cars). Being able to hire foreign labor and to invite people I like onto my property is of far bigger importance than being able to buy a foreign car.
Have you read much Friedrich List? No? I can't recommend him highly enough. Google Books is your friend here - go!

I think it's pretty clear net restrictions on my property would decrease significantly with a more open immigration policy.
You are plainly a pretty smart guy, and I respect your opinion. However, I am also a pretty smart guy, and I happen to think the precise opposite. Perhaps if we were to exchange explanations for our beliefs, one of us might be persuaded to change his mind. Does that strike you as possible?

One could come up with hundreds of examples like this. For example, if I say theft is wrong, one could bring up an example of one needing to steal a relatively insignificant item to save a large number of people. This doesn't destroy my ethics system, it just shows that there is sometimes something far more important than a minor aggression. The murdering of the people is still wrong and the theft is still wrong, but the additional benefit from the action makes it "worth it." It isn't difficult to see that killing an innocent person is in of itself wrong while still supporting it in extreme circumstances.
Forget about destroying your ethics system - I'd like to return to your initial claim, which I disputed:

"You don't gain the right to use violence against an innocent person just because the government is using violence against you."

It seems to me that in the quoted paragraph above, you are conceding that this is not in fact correct. On the contrary, you may very well gain the right to use violence against an innocent person if the government (or some other person/entity) is using violence against you. No?

[menciusmoldbug]

Just to be clear, the main argument you're having with people is because of how you define rights. Imagine if you started a thread that said "People have the right to burn and eat kids." Since they are able to do this, it would follow that they have the right to under your definition. This would naturally bring a bunch of people calling you crazy (because burning kids is clearly wrong). You would argue (correctly under your definition) that people have the right to do this because they are able to do it, while other people would argue (correctly under their definition) that they don't have the right to do this because it is wrong to kill kids. I don't see the point in defining rights in the way you are, because the general population defines it differently, and it would be easier just to say, "The government is able to drop nuclear bombs on its citizens" (or whatever the discussion is about). At the very least, defining your terms when you use them in an unconventional way could prevent much of this back-and-forth.
But burning kids is not "clearly wrong." That's the whole point! The mere fact that >99% of people agree with the statement "burning kids is clearly wrong" (including me!) does not make it true. In fact it is false. There are no such things as objective rights or wrongs, and pretending otherwise makes it difficult (if not impossible) to move peoples' moral needles. If you want to do so, you have to start by analyzing the world as it actually is and convincing people that their view of things is wrong in some important empirical sense. Appeals to morality are toothless.

[Carlybee]

I am pro-authoritarian.

Why?

[menciusmoldbug]

Why?
Briefly: Because I favor order over chaos and believe that order can only ever be the product of authority. This is not to deny the importance of what's commonly called "spontaneous order;" I merely deny that such order is quite so spontaneous as is sometimes imagined. Absent a backdrop of some violent enforcement mechanism, I do not believe that the magic of markets can do its job.

[Carlybee]

Briefly: Because I favor order over chaos and believe that order can only ever be the product of authority. This is not to deny the importance of what's commonly called "spontaneous order;" I merely deny that such order is quite so spontaneous as is sometimes imagined. Absent a backdrop of some violent enforcement mechanism, I do not believe that the magic of markets can do its job.


Why do you think authoritarianism is necessarily antithetical to chaos? Sometimes it relies on chaos to justify it's existence. Sometimes it creates chaos.

[NorthCarolinaLiberty]

People generally read things because they hope to learn something.

I know why people read. You did not answer my question.


I can see that this isn't a strong motivator for you, however.

I can see that putting things in your own words is not very strong for you.



No, I don't think I'll be doing that. You don't strike me as enough of a high-quality person for it to be worth my time.

You won't being doing it because you really don't know how.


If someone steals your watch and you can't get it back, then whether you say they have a "right" to possess it or not is 100% irrelevant.

Your opinion about relevance is irrelevant to what exists, namely that possession of something and right to possess something are two different things.



I am pro-authoritarian.


Okay, well, heil Hitler.

[menciusmoldbug]

Why do you think authoritarianism is necessarily antithetical to chaos?
I don't. Certain authorities can have the effect of creating rather than quelling chaos.

Sometimes it relies on chaos to justify it's existence.
I believe this is a valid justification.

Sometimes it creates chaos.
Agreed. I do not view a broadly pro-authoritarian disposition as requiring that one support all possible authority figures.

[helmuth_hubener]

Consider the following situation: Suppose I built a house and sold it to another party with a provision in the contract stating that the purchaser agrees not to sell or rent the property to "Jews, Germans, Catholics, homosexuals, Haitians, families with or without children, or smokers," and furthermore that any sale of the property they may make in the future must contain this clause as well, thereby ensuring (if the contract is enforced as written) for all eternity that the property will not be owned or rented by "Jews, Germans, Catholics, homosexuals, Haitians, families with or without children, or smokers." Is this a valid contract? Should it be enforced? If not, why not? If so, are there any similar contracts that could be made which should not be enforced, in your opinion? It's a little more complicated than that. A contract needs a counter-party.

[menciusmoldbug]

It's a little more complicated than that. A contract needs a counter-party.
Consider the following situation: Suppose I built a house and sold it to another party with a provision in the contract stating that the purchaser agrees not to sell or rent the property to "Jews, Germans, Catholics, homosexuals, Haitians, families with or without children, or smokers," and furthermore that any sale of the property they may make in the future must contain this clause as well, thereby ensuring (if the contract is enforced as written) for all eternity that the property will not be owned or rented by "Jews, Germans, Catholics, homosexuals, Haitians, families with or without children, or smokers." Is this a valid contract? Should it be enforced? If not, why not? If so, are there any similar contracts that could be made which should not be enforced, in your opinion?

[Reece]

I agree with almost all of this. The only part with which I'd quibble is where you claim that my "value judgments... don't have any firm basis in reality." On the contrary, value judgments are almost all ultimately rooted in reality, because embedded in our value judgments about how the world ought to be are empirical beliefs about how the world actually is. It does not follow that a value judgment can be "wrong," but it is true that the empirical beliefs upon which a value judgment is based may be wrong, and if a person comes to recognize this, they will often alter their value judgment as well.

You seem to recognize this towards the end of the paragraph, so I'm not even sure that we actually disagree on this point. I suspect that if we do, it's "just an argument over semantics."

Yeah, I agree.


I can't speak for Hoppe, but I do want the government to require everyone else with few assets to be either sponsored or deported. That would make this a MUCH nicer place to live, in my opinion. (Note that my belief about the desirability of this policy hinges on empirical beliefs about what it will cause the world to look like.)

Okay, so suppose 250 years ago, someone came across some completely unused land in the US. They then "homesteaded" it by turning it into a small farm. Suppose they then passed it on to their children, who passed it onto their children (and so on). They don't have much money, but there's no evidence that they will resort to crime. Don't you think they have an ethical claim to the land? If they don't have the required assets and can't find a sponsor, wouldn't it be unethical to deport them?

Also, would the amount of assets be fixed? Some people can do far more damage with their crimes (someone with a drug company for example could potentially kill tens of thousands of people) than others.


"My favorite analogy for official authority is the stellar cycle. If the authority of government is the temperature of the star, and the size of government is the size of the star, Washington is easily identifiable as a red giant, like Betelgeuse - enormous and cool.

For former libertarians, such as myself, this inverse relationship is critical. The paradox is that weakening government makes it larger. At least, to a libertarian, this seems like a paradox. Once it seems quite natural, you may no longer be a libertarian."

I don't think this holds up to the empirical evidence. Countries with no military, for example, tend to have relatively small governments. I think size of the country might be a better identifier for smaller governments, although there are exceptions there too.


Immigrants have a smaller impact on elections per capita than native-born citizens because they vote at a lower rate. However, it is simply not correct to conclude from this fact that immigrants "seem to have a pretty small impact," because their effect has been the largest in those places where they are most heavily concentrated, and their numbers continue to grow. As this happens, we can expect the California effect to spread.

California helps your case, but states like Texas flipped the other way despite a massive number of immigrants coming in (last voting for a Democrat in 1976). States like New York are extremely authoritarian without the immigration problem. I would have to see a study in order to be convinced that it's a large impact, perhaps comparing cities with high immigration and low immigration, correcting for other policies the states pushed through before the immigrants came.


I hope you'll believe me when I say that I am by no means ignoring these other effects. As a point of fact, I have literally used these precise points to argue in favor of open borders less than a year ago. I have since been persuaded that I was wrong to. Here (http://www.xenosystems.net/suicidal-libertarianism-part-doh/) is a blog post addressing the other effects in question. Key quote:

"This argument is so freaking Mad Max that I actually quite like it. Burn down the world and you take the welfare state with it. Yeeaaaahhhhh! (I’ll leave it to more responsible voices to point out any possible flaws.)"

I think the blog post does not answer my criticisms sufficiently. On competition:


Consider two companies: Effective Inc. and Loserbum Corp. Both have very different corporate cultures, adequately reflected in their names. Under market conditions, Loserbum Corp. either learns some lessons from Effective Inc., or it goes under. Net benefit or no great loss to the world in either case.
But along comes Caplan, to bawl out the stockholders, management, and other employees of Effective Inc. “You monsters! Don’t you care at all about the guys at Loserbum Corp.? They have the same moral status as you, don’t you know? Here’s the true, radical free-market plan: All managers and workers of Loserbum get to enter your company, work there, introduce their business strategies and working practices,until we reach equilibrium. Equilibrium is what markets are all about, see? Sure, Effective Inc. will degenerate significantly, but imagine all the utility gains of the poor Loserbums! It all comes out in the wash.” But … but … countries aren’t companies. Well, maybe not exactly, but they’re competitive institutions, or at least, the more they are, the better they work. The most important thing is true equally of both — to the extent they are able to externalize and pool their failure, the less they will learn.

Caplan was not talking about competition between pieces of land, but competition between governments. Let's use the blogger's framework and consider the US government a company, just for the sake of the argument. As the blogger pointed out, the US company does not wish to allow anyone to work for the US government who wants to. That's the case now, and would be the case under open immigration. But the US company does want as many customers (taxpayers) as possible. A smart restaurant doesn't have signs saying "Whites only" and a smart government doesn't have a sign saying "US born people only (or approved non-US born)." No, they should want more people paying for their services. Whether they are "loserbums" or not, a company generally prefers more customers. Now, it's true there are some exceptions to this example; some places only accept people that dress nicely, some clubs are very restrictive, etc. But in general, this example points more to an open immigration policy working than a closed immigration policy.

Furthermore, this is an incredibly weak example, and doesn't even hit the whole competition argument. Not only are more people free by moving to live under the freer government, the less free government also wants to attract the person back. And the government is not the only service provider in the country. By allowing someone to move here, they also get to pay for thousands of other services and work for thousands of different companies, voluntarily. So, open immigration would be like forcing one company (the US government) to allow a certain group of customers, while closed immigration would be like freeing the one company (the US government), but forcing every other company not to hire or accept a certain group of people.


"Although poor immigrants are likely to support a bigger welfare state than natives do, the presence of poor immigrants makes natives turn against the welfare state. Why would this be? As a rule, people are happy to vote to “take care of their own”; that’s what the welfare state is all about. So when the poor are culturally very similar to the rich, as they are in places like Denmark and Sweden, support for the welfare state tends to be uniformly strong.

As the poor become more culturally distant from the rich, however, support for the welfare state becomes weaker and less uniform."

This argument is so freaking Mad Max that I actually quite like it. Burn down the world and you take the welfare state with it. Yeeaaaahhhhh! (I’ll leave it to more responsible voices to point out any possible flaws.)

The blog post doesn't address "any possible flaws" in this argument. It seems to throw it out without considering it. Your response is much more interesting:


Because I see myself as a somewhat responsible person, I'll take this opportunity to say that I do not think destroying social capital and trust are good things, even if they result in less overall support for welfare. I would much rather live in a place with high social capital/trust + welfare than a place with low social capital/trust - welfare. Moreover, the welfare is likely to continue anyway, especially as the number of welfare-supporting immigrants begins to overwhelm the number of welfare-opposing natives.

I don't think immigration destroys social capital or trust, except maybe on a per capita basis. But someone's trust for someone already here wouldn't change, or perhaps might even increase. Only the trust for the immigrant would be low. But, if we're worried about the immigrant, then I think it's clear that despite the low trust for him, he is better off here than in his previous country. And, as they are here longer, they become part of the population, and I'm guessing their political views move more toward the norm (as the children and their children are integrated into the society). Remember, almost everyone here today is descended from an immigrant who came in recent centuries. While I do think this alone may cause a slight increase in welfare in the long term, I think the other pressure (competition between governments) pushes it in the opposite direction.


Have you read much Friedrich List? No? I can't recommend him highly enough. Google Books is your friend here - go!

I'll look into him. Do you have a specific book in mind?


You are plainly a pretty smart guy, and I respect your opinion. However, I am also a pretty smart guy, and I happen to think the precise opposite. Perhaps if we were to exchange explanations for our beliefs, one of us might be persuaded to change his mind. Does that strike you as possible?

Yes. My above points (especially #3, quoted again below) were my reasoning behind this assertion. The blog post didn't address #3, and you just responded by referring to Friedrich List (which will take some time to get through, and I'm not sure which of his works would have the answer to my point, if it even exists in his works). It would be helpful if you quoted or pointed me to the relevant passages


Why only focus on political changes here? Currently there are massive restrictions on the labor market. Imagine if there was regulation only allowing a certain number of cars to enter the US from other countries per year. Suppose also that local car owners often donated to pro-free market candidates. If we only look at the political change of ending this regulation, yes, it is quite possible that ending this regulation would cause more anti-free market candidates to be elected. But we're also ending an anti-free market policy by allowing cars to enter (meaning people are able to use their property more freely by being allowed to buy foreign cars). Being able to hire foreign labor and to invite people I like onto my property is of far bigger importance than being able to buy a foreign car.


Forget about destroying your ethics system - I'd like to return to your initial claim, which I disputed:

"You don't gain the right to use violence against an innocent person just because the government is using violence against you."

It seems to me that in the quoted paragraph above, you are conceding that this is not in fact correct. On the contrary, you may very well gain the right to use violence against an innocent person if the government (or some other person/entity) is using violence against you. No?

No, I don't think you gain the right. If, for example, I saved the world and didn't need to kill any innocent people to do it, the vast majority of people would see it as wrong for me to kill someone after this. But if I killed the same person in order to save the world, most people wouldn't see it as wrong. The killing in of itself is still an ethical negative, but it being necessary to the stopping of a much larger aggression may make the total act (not just the killing) an ethical positive. So, while you didn't gain the right to kill someone, it is possible that you avoided giving other people the right to retaliate after committing the act.

[Reece]

But burning kids is not "clearly wrong." That's the whole point! The mere fact that >99% of people agree with the statement "burning kids is clearly wrong" (including me!) does not make it true. In fact it is false. There are no such things as objective rights or wrongs, and pretending otherwise makes it difficult (if not impossible) to move peoples' moral needles. If you want to do so, you have to start by analyzing the world as it actually is and convincing people that their view of things is wrong in some important empirical sense. Appeals to morality are toothless.

Okay, but to the vast majority of people (probably everyone on this forum), it is wrong. My point was just that a lot of the confusion in this thread is over a definition - I think the same thing happened last time as well. There isn't anything inherently wrong with your definition, but most people connect rights with ethics (not even just libertarians - most liberals now think gay people have a "right" to marry, even in states where gay people clearly cannot marry, for example), so it can be a bit confusing.

[helmuth_hubener]

If I just "sell it," and then am out of the picture, then whose rights are being violated 100 (1000?) years later when the property is sold to a Jewish Haitian? Who is going to have grounds to sue?

No, as I said, it's a little more complicated than that. Dead people can't bind live people in perpetuity simply by making a proviso, as in your example. A proviso with no built-in consequences. There must be an "or else." There must be a counter-party to enforce the "or else."

This can be fairly easily accomplished by, for instance, owning an entire neighborhood, and setting up such restrictions as you want along with, probably, a neighborhood governing system. You then sell off each individual lot, with these restrictions and agreement to this system written into the deed. If there is a violation, the neighborhood association may repossess the lot because you are in contractual violation with them.

[NorthCarolinaLiberty]

I am so much smarter than you that we can barely be said to belong to the same species.



That's because you don't know your history (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covenant_(law)#Exclusionary_covenants).


Sadly, as you learned nothing then, I don't very well see how you can be expected to learn anything now. But I'll go ahead and talk you through it in the hopes that someone else reading this might not be quite so mentally impaired.






You might say so, but your ass does seem to be bleeding profusely. Might wanna get that looked at.




You know, I actually seriously considered the possibility that you might be so mind-bogglingly stupid...

...caused you to say yet another cringe-inducingly dumb thing.


...do you see now that this renders everything you have said on the subject both wrong and retarded

...it's very complicated, so i'm not sure you'll be able to understand,




You don't strike me as enough of a high-quality person for it to be worth my time.



However, I am also a pretty smart guy,







You keep asking about people learning things. I'll tell you one thing I've learned. I've learned that you're fairly insecure in your intellectual abilities.