StephanKinsella.com

Latest notable terms from this and last week’s Slate Culture Gabfest (feel free to email me suggestions or leave them in the comments to the main page). [continue reading…]

[From my Webnote series]

Gene Callahan, in Private Domains and Immigration, in 2003, concluded, in a critique of Hans-Hermann Hoppe’s views on immigration:

giving more power to the state, based on an arbitrary set of ideals as to who should be allowed to come to the US (or any other country), ideals that are divorced from any actual entrepreneurial judgment, is not the answer to these problems. True freedom is the only answer.

Callahan, in 2010, in The Nature of Ideology, drawing inspiration from cow-psychologist Temple Grandin and his “second stay in Switzerland,” now writes:

Spending more time there on trip two, I thought I was in the most naturally orderly and civic-minded place I had ever been – and, I realized, if the Swiss ever adopted the open border policy I had advocated until then, that place would be gone in a decade. Now, when I recently expressed some reservations about unrestricted immigration on a libertarian blog, I was immediately accused of being a ‘xenophobe.’

Interestingly, these latter observations are similar to those of Ralph Raico and Hoppe. Raico argued:

Free immigration would appear to be in a different category from other policy decisions, in that its consequences permanently and radically alter the very composition of the democratic political body that makes those decisions. In fact, the liberal order, where and to the degree that it exists, is the product of a highly complex cultural development. One wonders, for instance, what would become of the liberal society of Switzerland under a regime of “open borders.”

In other words, the argument is that relatively liberal societies would certainly soon become less libertarian if they opened their borders.

And Hoppe argues here ¹ (emphasis added):

It is not difficult to predict the consequences of an open border policy in the present world. If Switzerland, Austria, Germany or Italy, for instance, freely admitted everyone who made it to their borders and demanded entry, these countries would quickly be overrun by millions of third-world immigrants from Albania, Bangladesh, India, and Nigeria, for example. As the more perceptive open-border advocates realize, the domestic state-welfare programs and provisions would collapse as a consequence. This would not be a reason for concern, for surely, in order to regain effective protection of person and property the welfare state must be abolished. But then there is the great leap—or the gaping hole—in the open border argument: out of the ruins of the democratic welfare states, we are led to believe, a new natural order will somehow emerge.

The first error in this line of reasoning can be readily identified. Once the welfare states have collapsed under their own weight, the masses of immigrants who have brought this about are still there. They have not been miraculously transformed into Swiss, Austrians, Bavarians or Lombards, but remain what they are: Zulus, Hindus, Ibos, Albanians, or Bangladeshis. Assimilation can work when the number of immigrants is small. It is entirely impossible, however, if immigration occurs on a mass scale. In that case, immigrants will simply transport their own ethno-culture onto the new territory. Accordingly, when the welfare state has imploded there will be a multitude of “little” (or not so little) Calcuttas, Daccas, Lagoses, and Tiranas strewn all over Switzerland, Austria, and Italy. It betrays a breathtaking sociological naiveté to believe that a natural order will emerge out of this admixture. Based on all historical experience with such forms of multiculturalism, it can safely be predicted that in fact the result will be civil war. There will be widespread plundering and squatterism leading to massive capital consumption, and civilization as we know it will disappear from Switzerland, Austria and Italy. Furthermore, the host population will quickly be outbred and, ultimately, physically displaced by their “guests.” There will still be Alps in Switzerland and Austria, but no Swiss or Austrians.

As for Callahan getting smeared as a “xenophobe” for having reservations about unrestricted immigration, this is common–from criticisms such as he himself leveled at Hoppe, and so on (followup). Make of this what you will.

(To be clear, I’m pro-immigration and opposed to state restrictions on immigration.)

Update: See some recent tweets:

Tweet:

It’s hard for an ancap to support the INS, or any other federal goonds. OTOH it’s hard to support mass subsidized immigration either. Hoppe himself sees the heart of the problem is one caused by state democracy, welfare, and intervention: if the state prevents a citizen from inviting some outsiders, that violates his rights; it is what Hoppe calls forced exclusion. He specifically criticizes state immigration policy when it violates the rights of its citizens to invite whoever they want to their property. OTOH if the state subsidizes mass immigration and forces people to support and associate with and employ and give voting rights to these outsiders by means of antidiscrimination laws, welfare, and public roads and transportation and other state owned public property and facilities, this violates the rights of citizens by way of forced integration. Both forced exclusion and forced integration violate property rights of the citizens, according to Hoppe. Hoppe’s solution–the “first best”–is to abolish the state so that neither forced exclusion nor forced integration occur. Barring that, his “second best” solution as to a reasonable way to minimize both, to reduce the rights violations from either forced exclusion or forced integration, is to deny outsiders the use of public resources owned by citizens (because given welfare and other legal rights, they will have access to this as soon as they are permitted access) unless they are invited by a citizen who takes responsibility for them. By prohibiting them from accessing public resources (without an invitation) you reduce forced integration and related costs and rights violations; by permitting someone who is invited by a citizen, you reduce the forced exclusion problem (and by making the invitee-citizen responsible, you further reduce the forced integration problem since presumably there is a lower chance the immigrant will be a criminal or on the dole, since a citizen has to vouch for and to some degree even be responsible him). Until we abolish the welfare state, voting, and the state itself, you can see why his solution has an appeal to some libertarians: it’s an attempt to reduce both types of rights violations perpetrated by the state: forced exclusion, and forced integration/mass-subsidized immigration. See relevant quotes here https://stephankinsella.com/2007/09/boudreaux-on-hoppe-on-immigration/… n.b.

1. Natural Order, the State, and the Immigration Problem (Vol. 16 Num. 1, Winter 2002): 75-97, in The Great Fiction). [↩]

China is widely viewed as a “threat” to the US because of its perceived rapid and unstoppable economic growth. This is, in my view, doubly confused. First: if the premise were true, this would be good, not bad. Second: I don’t think China is in such great shape. Unfortunately.

Some free market economists think otherwise. Peter Schiff “predicts that China will overtake the U.S in terms of Gross Domestic Product before 2020.” Jim Rogers thinks “China will likely constitute tomorrow’s most powerful nation-state.”

I’ve been working for years now for a company with factories and extensive dealings in Taiwan and China. It’s been my opinion for some time that China is a primitive basket case. Land is leased, not owned. The communist party corruption is everywhere. The Asian mentality is far different than the western one; they are less innovative, more subservient and servile, more order-following, more collectivist and less individualistic. Poverty and peasantry are rampant. Asians are far more racist and superstitious than Americans (everyone is more racist than Americans in my experience). You have to get permission for everything. There are currency controls. Contracts are not respected–they are signed because they are viewed as red tape and then they start being renegotiated the next day. And on and on.

In my view, America is, for all our faults, still, by far, the strongest and best large economy in the world. Who can match the US? Canada is too small. Japan is not quite our size and has its own problems. Europe is like an older, more kleptocratic version of the US–and is probably second best in the world. South America is a basket case of banana republics. Africa is even worse. Russia and Central Europe?–mired in pessimism and corruption and the tendrils of the wreckage of communism. Of the rest, I think India has a better chance than China, for two reasons: they speak English, and they inherited the English property rights system–unlike in China where you still have to lease land from the state for 50 years instead of buying it. And I think India is a basket case too, unlikely to improve much for many decades. So the US is and will remain preeminent, in my view–despite all our problems. (See also Jonathan Bean’s America’s Hidden Strength: Babies, Immigration.) Unfortunately, this will allow our parasitical state to maintain its warfare-welfare state (see my post Hoppe on Liberal Economies and War).

An American friend of mine living in China sent me some of his thoughts, which I provide, with editing, and anonymously, below:

China is [screwed], I tell you. This place is one big pile of poo. Jim Rogers and Peter Schiff are wrong, at least about China. Jim Chanos is right! [See also Jim Rogers: China not in a bubble, Chanos couldn’t spell China; China May ‘Crash’ in Next 9 to 12 Months, Faber Says. Also note: Mark DeWeaver, who has written for the Mises Institute before, recently gave a speech about Chinese monetary policy. There’s some interesting meat in both the audio and corresponding slides.] [continue reading…]

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (17.0MB)

Subscribe: RSS

I was on The Peter Mac Show on May 12, 2010, with my fellow Libertarian Standard co-blogger Rob Wicks. We discussed a variety of matters, including whether libertarians should use the word “capitalism,” also anarchy, IP and other topics. The MP3 file is here.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (6.8MB)

Subscribe: RSS

My reply to one “Chris George’s” post No, The Non-Aggression Principle is Not Enough (see Reply to Left-Libertarians on “Capitalism” for other discussions with Chris):

Chris, you are getting better. Glad you accept the NAP as a basic rule of thumb. But confusions remain.

“If we got down to the really nitty gritty, I’m sure you could find plenty of people who would deny my libertarianism at all since I’m a rationalist, anarchist, localist, pluralist, and moral subjectivist before I’m a libertarian”

As long as you are opposed to aggression we don’t “deny your libertarianism.” We welcome your opposition to aggression. THe word “before” is confusing; you don’t mean chronologically, and you won’t give an example of where you value something more than non-aggression such that you would condone aggression. (BTW this is exactly what conservatives say: “Hey, we are as against aggression as the next guy, but unlike you libertarians it’s just one of MANY “values” we hold. So we have to balance them.” So they leave the door open for moral majority laws etc. This is what you are doing too, in principle–you need to work to root that out. we must oppose aggression *on principle*. Your *reasons* can be your own. But it has to be a principled opposition, not a mere tentative rule of thumb).

You also write: “While I don’t accept the NAP absolutely do to issues of property and efficacy, it’s something that I think should be looked to first in the majority of cases.”

you mean “due” to. But still, you seem to want to leave the door open to condone aggression against private property due to some kind of leftist sentimental abhorrence of property rights. But all human rights are property rights, of course. You cannot be against agression and a libertarian without objecting to trespass against private property rights, of course.

” If we can define a decent standard of property/possession/whatever-you-want-to-call it,”

we have already done this. Next!

““no, the NAP is not enough.” Let me explain and it doesn’t lead to specifically “left” answers.

For the most part, the reason is strategic. Simply put, most people don’t want to hear some philosophical gibberish about “aggression” or “how ethics ‘derived’ from the nature of man are the ‘correct’ ethics.””

As for your first “reason,” I stopped reading there. You are conflating truth with strategy and persuasiveness, a common mistake of the activist mindset (see my The Trouble with Libertarian Activism, http://www.lewrockwell.com/kinsella/kinsella19.ht… .) You cannot say the NAP is wrong because it doesn’t persuade many people. this makes no sense at all.

Then you get to your “second” reason which is equally confused:

“The second reason the NAP is not enough is just simply due to its relative worthlessness in real life. Would you really want to live in a world where the only constant is non-aggression? A world where everyone was a shallow, selfish dickhead who avoided aggression would suck.”

This again makes no sense. Libertarianism is a narrow philosophy concerned with interpersonal violence. But we are not just libertarians. As humans we can and should oppose meanness and shallowness, etc. Living in a good society means (a) being free from aggression; and (b) a lot of other things, like culture, art, benevolence, civilization, civility, charity, and so on.

Recognizing this in no way argues against the non-aggression principle! Just because living a crime-free life is “not enough” does not mean we should not oppose crime on principle!

Think straight, man. You have potential, but you have got to get out of this muzzy, confused, left-emotional way of thinking. Think clearly and all this is easy to sort out.

It is clear that the left-libertarians have lost in their campaign to demonize the word “capitalism.” Nice try, fellas, but you lost. Libertarians are not buying your strained arguments and pointless attempt to fight semantic battles. Capitalism as a word just means private ownership of the means of production. I point you to a dictionary. This is obviously compatible with libertarianism, and arguably an essential part of the economy of an advanced libertarian society. Crony capitalism and corporatism are unlibertarian, but laissez-faire capitalism is not. The origin of the term may be interesting but does not change what meaning it has now. There is nothing wrong with using capitalism to describe a key aspect of a libertarian social order, as long as one is clear to distinguish it from crony-capitalism. See: Capitalism, Socialism, and Libertarianism; Rothbard: “True anarchism will be capitalism, and true capitalism will be anarchism”; Reply to Left-Libertarians on “Capitalism”; Left-Libertarians Admit Opposition to “Capitalism” is Substantive.

And it is not we libertarians who have things to learn from the left: rather the opposite is true. We non-prefix libertarians are not left, but we are also not right, and it’s wrong of left-libertarians to accuse us of being “right” merely because we reject the equally confused and false doctrines of the left. We already know that crony capitalism is wrong. Furthermore, we are aware of the fact that state intervention has distorted the market. We also do not just rubber stamp and endorse current land holdings out of some fetish for the status quo; non-prefix libertarians believe that if someone can show a better claim to a given piece of property than the current legal owner, he should prevail. But unless and until this occurs, the current legal owner, so long as he is private, has a better claim to the property than anyone else and should be its owner (property held by the state should be taken from it, of course).

Go capitalism, go! Here is some recommended recent pro-capitalist libertarian reading:

• Peter Klein’s new book The Capitalist and the Entrepreneur: Essays on Organizations and Markets
• Thank Goodness for Capitalism, by Jonathan M. Finegold Catalan, Mises Daily (Tuesday, May 11, 2010)
• Crony Capitalism Is NOT Capitalism, Dominick T. Armentano, Independent.org (May 10, 2010)

I was a guest on the May 9, 2010 episode of BlogTalkRadio’s show Anarchy Time, hosted by James Cox. Other guests included C4SS Development Specialist Mariana Evica, Wilt Alston, and Stefan Molyneux. (Local MP3.)

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (27.7MB)

Subscribe: RSS

TokyoTom, enviro-global-warming anti-corporation libertarian, in Risk-shifting, BP and those nasty enviros, has some criticisms of Lew Rockwell’s Feel Sorry for BP?

1. “It should be obvious that BP is by far the leading victim, but I’ve yet to see a single expression of sadness for the company and its losses.”

BP is the leading “victim”? Victim of what/who? Sure, they’re a target (1) for all manner of evil people whose livelihoods or enjoyment of their property or common property are directly or indirectly affected by the spill, (2) for evil enviro groups (relatively well-off citizens who profess to care about how well/poorly government manages the use of “common resources” by resource extraction industries), and (3) for evil governments and politicians looking to enhance their own authority/careers. But these are all a consequence of the accident, and not a cause of it. Has BP been defrauded, tricked or strong-armed into drilling anywhere? Is BP the “victim” of its own choices?

Even if one concedes that some criticisms of BP will be unfair, how can BP possibly be cast as the LEADING victim – as opposed to all of the others whose livelihoods or property are drastically affected by this incident, which they had no control over whatsoever?

BP is a victim in the sense that a terrible tragedy just happened to it, and it’s gonna cost it dearly. It’s the leading victim assuming the others damaged are going to be compensated from BP. The point is it’s a bad thing that’s happened to it.Why not feel sorry for them?

2. “The incident is a tragedy for BP and all the subcontractors involved. It will probably wreck the company”

The incident will certainly be costly for the firms involved, but the firms will survive the death of employees, and there is certainly very little risk indeed that BP will be “wrecked” by the spill. Far from it; it is unlikely that BP will even bear the principal costs of cleanup efforts, much less the economic damages to third parties that federal law apparently caps at $75 million.

Have you not heard of “INSURANCE”? A little thinking (and Googling) would tell you that BP (and its subcontractors) has plenty of it. To the extent BP is NOT insured, it has ample capability to self-insure, unlike all of the fishermen, oystermen and those in the tourist industry who are feeling significant impacts. Insurers will bear the primary burdemn, not BP.

Obama has threatened BP and they have caved in, agreeing to pay above the $75M cap. And the cap was in exchange for a tax on oil companies to be put into the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund for such emergencies–do you think that BP will be able to get that tax refunded? Naah.

3. “we might ask who is happy about the disaster: 1. the environmentalists, with their fear mongering and hatred of modern life”

Sorry, but this is perverse: enviros might feel that they have been proven right – and you might be annoyed that they can make such a claim – but they certainly aren’t “happy” with any of the loss of life, damage to property or livelihoods of the little guy (or of bigger property owners), or to a more pristine marine environment that they value.

Aren’t happy? Have you seen, say, Spill Baby Spill, Boycott BP! ? And another tolerant, caring liberal on Slate’s Political Gabfest Facebook page said, “I don’t get the calls for pity. Boohoo another oil giant might have bankrupted itself.” These misanthropic sickos oppose nuclear power, which makes fossil fuels necessary. They act like they hate BP. Why? For making a mistake? Mistakes are inevitable. For drilling for oil? Why? We need oil.

Your projection of happiness at damages to common resources/private property and hatred of modern life is especially perverse, given your own explicit recognition that government ownership/mismanagement of commons, and setting of limits on liability both skew the incentives BP faces to avoid damage, and limit the ability of others (resource users and evil enviros) to directly protect or negotiate their own interests. Why is the negative role played by government any reason to bash others who use or care about the “commons”?

No libertarian is in favor of liability caps. What is he talking about?

We have seen Austrians – sympathetic to the costs to real people in the rest of the economy – rightly call for an end to a fiat currency, central banking and to moral-hazard-enabling deposit insurance and oversight of banks. In an April 9 post by Kevin Dowd on the financial crisis, we even had a call “to remove limited liability: we should abolish the limited-liability statutes and give the bankers the strongest possible incentives to look after our money properly” – but Dowd’s comments simply echoed in the Sounds of Silence. Why do you and others refuse to look at the risk-shifting and moral hazard that is implicit in the very grant of a limited liability corporate charter – not only in banking, but in oil exploration and other parts of the economy?

Removing artificial caps on liability has nothing to do with the limited liability of passive shareholders in a corporation. Their liability is limited simply because they are not causally responsible for the torts of employees of the company in which they hold shares.

6. Finally, like BP, you have understated the degree of the oil leakage; BP initially estimated 1000 bpd, but later agreed with estimates by others that the leak is at least about 25,000 bpd, with risks of an even larger blowout.

So what? It is what it is.

Good enough for Rothbard, good enough for me.

The movement that I’m in favor of is a movement of libertarians who do not substitute whim for reason. Now some of them do, obviously, and I’m against that. I’m in favor of reason over whim. As far as I’m concerned, and I think the rest of the movement, too, we are anarcho-capitalists. In other words, we believe that capitalism is the fullest expression of anarchism, and anarchism is the fullest expression of capitalism. Not only are they compatible, but you can’t really have one without the other. True anarchism will be capitalism, and true capitalism will be anarchism.

I, for one, am sick of the Robin Hood myth and movies. Or I thought I was. On the latest episode of Mark Kermode’s BBC film review podcast, there’s a fascinating discussion with Russell Crowe and “Billy Bragg” about the upcoming Ridley Scott film Robin Hood, starring (and co-produced by) Crowe. The new movie is a departure from other versions, with Robin Hood involved in the Magna Carta and also the Forest Charter which, “In contrast to Magna Carta, it provided some real rights, privileges and protections for the common man against the abuses of the encroaching aristocracy.” One line I like from the Forest Charter: “Any archbishop, bishop, earl, or baron who crosses our forest may take one or two beasts by view of the forester, if he is present; if not, let a horn be blown so that this [hunting] may not appear to be carried on furtively.”

The discussion about this with Crowe and Bragg (9:00 to about 32:10 of the podcast) goes into how the Norman aristocracy unjustly invaded the land rights of the common people, which was redressed to some degree by the Forest Charter. Sounds interesting.

Update: see Rand on the Injuns and Property Rights:

See Hoppe, “Of Common, Public, and Private Property and the Rationale for Total Privatization,” as ch. 5 of The Great Fiction, Part II, discussing the right of groups to homestead partial easements of land by use. I have written a bit on some similar matters, about how the English “enclosure” did violate some pre-existing easement rights, so in some sense “property” is “theft” as Proudhon said (meaning property rights decreed legislatively by the state that trampled on pre-existing easement rights).

Creative Common Law Project, R.I.P. and Waystation Libertarians:

From Jamin Hübner, before he became a socialist:

Another myth is more fundamental: that of “free and voluntary exchange” that underlies all market interactions. This individualistic, utilitarian, and neoliberal dogma, repeated ad nauseum by anarcho-capitalist and neoconservative apologists, was perceptively challenged by William Thompson nearly two centuries ago when he observed that people without capital (e.g., tools and materials to produce)—like former serfs who were evicted from the manor during the enclosure movement—have no choice but to sell themselves. “The selling of their labor power was not a free exchange, but was coerced. The threat of starvation was as coercive as a threat by violent means” (E. K. Hunt and Mark Lautzenheiser, A History of Economic Thought, 158).

Survivors of polygamist sect fence off 1,000 acres of US Forest Service land in southwestern Colorado:

Gene Epstein and I were discussing this the other day and I observed that it could be argued that this violates the easement rights of the ranchers/hunters, like the enclosure laws that left-libertarians have opposed (“property is theft”). I pointed out that even in Hoppe’s theory you can have group easement rights that are violated by enclosure/fencing. Here is the email I sent him:
Re our brief discussion—

Hoppe on group easements: “Of Private, Common, and Public Property and the Rationale for Total Privatization” — see in particular Part II.

Re the Forest charter, enclosures, and so on — Robin Hood, Magna Carta, and the Forest Charter. And how the enclosure movement could be seen as a type of theft of preexisting easements–a la Hoppe’s comments too.

[TLS]

Update: Grok Prompt:

from a libertarian perspective, how could it be argued that the land enclosure movement was a taking of property rights (such as pre-existing hunting and access easement?) and not pro-property rights after all, so that proudhon’s “property is theft” is not really an attack on private property but on the state’s interference in the natural property system? Consult https://mises.org/mises-daily/rationale-total-privatization https://stephankinsella.com/2024/10/polygamist-sect-fence-off-1000-acres/ https://stephankinsella.com/2010/05/robin-hood-magna-carta-and-the-forest-charter/ and “See Hoppe, “Of Common, Public, and Private Property and the Rationale for Total Privatization,” as ch. 5 of The Great Fiction, Part II, discussing the right of groups to homestead partial easements of land by use. I have written a bit on some similar matters, about how the English “enclosure” did violate some pre-existing easement rights, so in some sense “property” is “theft” as Proudhon said (meaning property rights decreed legislatively by the state that trampled on pre-existing easement rights).”

I was trying to figure out the relative wattages of various Apple power adapters I have–for the MacBook, MacBook Air, and MacBook Pro–to see which is compatible with other MacBooks. While doing this it occurred to me that it might be helpful to provide a quick little factoid/tutorial for non-EEs who get confused by the concepts of voltage, current, and power.

The electrons flowing through a conductor (wire) are a current, represented by i or I, and measured in amperes, or amps. It’s analogous to water flowing through a hose. (Note: the imaginary number i is thus referred to as j by EEs to distinguish it from current, i.) The voltage, v or V, represents the amount of “pressure” pushing the current through the conductor. These concepts are often confused by laymen, used interchangeably, etc. For example, you can be killed if a large enough current passes through your body–amps. Your body has a certain resistance R, measured in ohms, ? (or impedance, if you take into account complex (imaginary, frequency) aspects; incidentally, the analogous concept for magnetic flux is called reluctance–I’ve always loved those three terms: resistance, impedance, and reluctance; if we need another, I suppose stubbornness might do). The bigger the resistance, the more pressure or voltage V is needed to push through a given current I. There is a simple relation: V=IR, or I = V/R.  For example, if you have 10V and a 10 ? resistor, there is 1A of current. If you get electrocuted, it’s the current passing through you–the amps–that kills you.

Anyway, electrical power is measured in terms of Watts, and power, P, is determined by a simple equation: P=VI. That is, it’s directly proportional to the voltage and the current. When you see a power adapter that is rated to provide, say, 18.5V at 4.6A, as with Apple’s 85W MagSafe Power Adapter, you’ll notice that you get the 85W figure by multiplying the voltage times the current: 18.5 x 4.6 = 85.1. The point is, this is a very handy relationship to know, and it’s easy to remember: P=VI. If you know the V and I, you can figure out the wattage (power). In addition, because of the V=IR relationship, you can figure out, say, current, if you know resistance and power. Or say you have a 100? lightbulb, and it’s powered by a 110V outlet. If you want to figure out the current, it’s I=V/R = 110/100 or about 1 amp. This helps to explain why some yards use “low voltage” lighting: if there is low voltage, it’s hard for a human (say) to get shocked badly. If you touch the terminals of a 1.5V battery, the resistance of your body combined with this voltage means the current is very small. To have a decent light from low voltage, you need much lower resistance bulbs, so that you get the wattage (light) output that you want. Likewise, although homes use 110V power, this is stepped down from the higher-voltage power lines. The voltage on power lines is very high so that there is less current for a given power. P = VI, so for the same power P, if you increase V, you can decrease I. The reason you want to do this is the more current, the more heat is generated and energy wasted.