[ExI] Serfdom and libertarian critiques (Was: Call to Libertarians)

[Rafal Smigrodzki]

On Fri, Mar 4, 2011 at 12:32 PM, BillK <pharos at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Fri, Mar 4, 2011 at 4:32 PM, Kelly Anderson  wrote:
>> Bill, I'm not sure that's communist exactly. Totalitarian, possibly.
>> But London is the most camera heavy city in the world (by my
>> understanding) so big brother is watching anyway.
>>
>>
>
> You are correct. Totalitarian is a better word.
> But I am not using it to describe London as it is at present.
>
> I am using it to describe Rafal's ideal Libertarian society where an
> individual has to pay for everything they do.
>
> As Rafal said:
> "When you want things to actually work, the
> economics narrative (price, supply, demand, incentive) always beats
> the political narrative (Conservative scum, good Liberals)".
>
> You want to use my road? - Pay up.
>
> You want to inconvenience me by stopping my car so you can cross the
> road? - Pay up.
>
> Etc. ad infinitum.
>
> So you have to track every member of society to see what chargeable
> services they are using and send them a monthly bill. Is that really
> the Libertarian society you want?

### It's all a question of prices (that's my standard answer to almost
any question nowadays). If tracking and billing is very cheap, it is
efficient to pay individually for even minor exchanges. If the
overhead of payment is high, it makes sense to make other arrangements
(e.g. "I won't make a stink about you crossing the road in front of me
in exchange for being able to do the same at some other time to some
other person").

The libertarian principle here is not so much "pay for everything" as
"respect the property of others" which sometimes may lead to monetary
exchanges and sometimes may lead to various quid-pro-quo, barter,
tie-in and other setups in the arrangement of our lives together.

Rafal