Quote:
Originally Posted by npita
a) I used to think that, but after reading a number of the policy position papers from the Cato Institute, I've come to a rather different conclusion. They are rather selective in what they consider those freedoms to be. For example, they favor so-called free trade with other nations, yet for that to translate into real capitalism, the workforce needs the same freedom to move across those same borders. I don't see a policy position paper on allowing U.S. and Chinese citizens to freely travel between the U.S. and China to compete for jobs. Instead, outsourcing takes advantage of the fact that workers cannot freely move between countries while goods and services can.
b) The Cato Institute also takes the position that the government should give vouchers to parents who send their kids to private schools. Huh? Everyone with no kids at all pays for public schools, so whatever parents decide to do to educate their kids shouldn't cost the rest of us (especially those of us without kids) to pay more if they decide to opt out of the public school system.
c) Finally, the term ``libertarian'' is somewhat ambiguous. There are ``big L'' Libertarians and ``little l'' libertarians.
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a) There is actually a logic there. People are associated with counties, not jobs. If the Americans wanted to compete with China for jobs, they would charge less for their time, not move to China. The later makes no sense. The only reason companies don't outsource to the US is because labor here is too expensive for the kinds of jobs that are outsourced.
b) The premise is that all children are entitled to an education --the rationale being that this will produce an educated citizenry that will be productive. People without children get the benefit of that educated population in the form of goods and services the population produces. The reason for vouchers is that public schools have a monopoly and have acted like all monopolies -- pushing costs up and quality down. Vouchers introduce competition and don't cost the taxpayer more -- the vouchers are for less than the per student cost of the public school system. If half the kids go to private schools, half the public schools would close.
c) Big "L" Libertarians are a political party -- and a pretty ineffective one. Small "l" libertarian is a school of thought. I am a libertarian.
