Libertarianism

Howard Baetjer, economics lecturer at Towson University, is upset wtih regulations restricting or banning Uber and Lyft in some cities. Well, that's not quite right. Technically, he is upset with all government regulation. He explains this in an article for Reason Magazine titled Not All Regulation Is Bad.

Baetjer's thesis is that free markets are capable of self-regulation, thus government regulation is an unnecessary waste at best; an economic burden and a hinderance to freedom at worst.

It doesn't seem like it should be an open question. Who would possibly advocate for legalizing drunk driving? But in an article titled Legalize Drunk Driving, Lew Rockwell, founder and Chairman of the Board of the Mises Institute, tries to make the case.

A Denver Post letter to the editor by Brian Marein outlines a way Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson could win the presidency without winning the popular vote. He only needs to win one state.

If no candidate wins an absolute majority in the Electoral College, the election is decided by the House of Representatives. Thus, if Johnson were to win, say, Colorado while Trump and Clinton split all other electoral votes 50-50, the House would pick the winner.

In this series we've been looking at libertarian economics professor Walter Williams' defense of free market capitalism as outlined in his video for Prager Univeristy.

Williams defines the free market as a series of voluntary actions.

The free market calls for voluntary actions between individuals. There's no coersion. In a free market, if I want something from you, I have to do something for you.

In part 1 of this series we looked at the benefits of capitalism as discussed in a Prager University video narrated by libertarian economist Walter Williams. Williams defines free-market capitalism simply as voluntary transactions between individuals. Ideally, market freedoms lead to individual freedoms. In an ideal world, capitalism is the most moral economic system ever invented.

The last time we encountered Prager "University", we were looking at an overly simplified video extolling the benefits of a flat tax. Today we're going to look at Prager's overly simplified video extolling the moral virtues of capitalism.

Prager "University" is a website created in 2012 by radio talk show host and columnist Dennis Prager. The website offers a series of five-minute videos on a wide range of social, political, and economic topics, and is intended to provide an alternative to a "liberal bias" which Prager believes is common in university settings.

A typical video is the following attack on the progressive income tax.

The year has just begun, but 2015 is shaping up to be a good one for those who worry about the burdens placed on businesses by government regulations.