On the Separation of State and Economics - Ayn Rand - Who's Got An Axe?
Posted by deleted 2 years, 7 months ago to Philosophy
“I am for an absolute, laissez-faire, free, unregulated economy. Let me put it briefly. I am for the separation of state and economics, just as we had separation of state and church, which led to peaceful coexistence among different religions after a period of religious wars. So, the same applies to economics. If you separate the government from economics, if you do not regulate production and trade, you will have peaceful cooperation and harmony and justice among men."
I love this. How far we are from this ideal. Where is my magic axe? I lost it. Does anyone have one? I can hear all the screaming tendrils of government and corporations being sliced in half with my stainless steel 440 carbon surgical axe. Or, just whack it down on Buy-Dem to bisect him from pate to taint and watch the two twitching halves fall down.
I love this. How far we are from this ideal. Where is my magic axe? I lost it. Does anyone have one? I can hear all the screaming tendrils of government and corporations being sliced in half with my stainless steel 440 carbon surgical axe. Or, just whack it down on Buy-Dem to bisect him from pate to taint and watch the two twitching halves fall down.
SOURCE URL: https://youtu.be/JjmWZZs3KZo
All modern economies have specific sets of rules for corporations — rules that are distinct from and often opposite to those for individuals and other types of organizations. These rules violate free-market norms in two major ways: they require corporations to submit to intrusive government oversight and regulation of their activities, and they give corporations special privileges that are denied to unincorporated firms or individuals.
Corporations are brought into existence by legislative permission. They can be snuffed out of existence just as easily through government revocation of their charters. This gives governments tremendous power to regulate corporations as they see fit, and encourages corporate decision makers to seek the “friendship” of powerful government agencies and do their bidding. The result is a toxic blend of crony capitalism and a “mixed” economy, within which the marketplace is anything but free.
Chief among corporate special privileges is “limited liability,” designed to shield owners of corporations from financial risk relating to corporate negligence or misbehavior. By granting limited liability to owners of corporations and denying it to unincorporated firms, the government is creating a double standard in the marketplace, one that favors corporations over individuals.
These government-conferred competitive advantages permit corporations to grow larger than they would in a free market, “crowding out” other types of business organizations in the process. Eventually we arrive at an economic landscape dominated by corporate executives and their regulators, at the expense of everyone else’s freedom.
Suing a corporation is a difficult, expensive and time-consuming process — much more so than suing another person. A corporation can easily dissolve or go bankrupt, even as its owners continue to prosper. Since corporations can own, buy, and sell one another, a privilege rightly denied to individuals, it is easy to establish a chain of corporate ownership to conceal the identity of the true owners, by setting up the controlling corporations in different domestic jurisdictions or in other countries.
A basic Objectivist principle is that governments should not interfere with anyone’s peaceful activities, provided those activities do not violate the rights of others. This principle applies not only to individuals, but also to groups of individuals — and a corporation is simply a group of individuals who share an interlocking set of contractual relationships.
A consistent application of this principle leads to this conclusion: any activities that are legally and morally legitimate for corporations should be equally legitimate for all other private, voluntary groups of people. Conversely, activities that violate the rights of others should be prohibited to all such groups. When it comes to legal rights and responsibilities, a free society should not treat corporations any differently from the way it treats any other privately organized groups.
This leads to the further conclusion that there is no need or justification for “corporation” as a legal concept at all. An unincorporated business should have exactly the same standing under the law as an incorporated business in matters such as liability, reporting requirements, and recognition of contracts. Aside from protecting the rights of third parties, governments should have no say regarding any firm’s form of organization, purpose, or method of operation. Legal protections extended to corporations should be equally available to all other groups.
Such a set of reforms, if applied consistently, would have far-reaching effects. It would do away with any reason to treat corporations as privileged legal entities. It would remove the need for a body of corporate law, separate from individual and contract law. It would render irrelevant the legal fiction of corporate personhood, along with the torturous logic needed to justify such a concept. It would bring more consistency and fairness to government policies regarding liability and secrecy. It would ensure that any legal protections given to corporate owners and agents would also extend to unincorporated individuals and groups. Taken together, these reforms would constitute a major step toward a more free economy.
Now I agree that government should stay out of "managing" economies, trade, etc. But that is a societal value - not some sort of "separation." It is choice NOT to intervene based on a fundamental virtue that understands the primacy of the individual in determining their own future and having that seminal right protected jealously by government.
We used to have such a government - or at least arguably the best in recorded history. What if our people were of such a quality of principle that they would throw the proverbial tea in the harbor if government attempted to tax it? What if our people were of the intestinal fortitude that were willing en masse to sacrifice their "sacred honor" and lives - if necessary - to reject the corruption of governing principles both at the ballot box and through conscious objection? What a glorious world that would be!
And what would that take in practice? It would require people of all kinds and stripes to actively seek for truth above their selfish desires. To think in the long term rather than to be driven by fleeting emotion. It would require educators with a passion for these principles to instill the love of learning about truth into the hearts of the youth.
Now is this ridiculous? Can humanity itself ever reach such an enlightened state? The prognosis at this point must seem bleak to many and is lost on many, many more. But I think we are coming to an inflection point where something will have to give. Debauchery and depravity eventually hit rock bottom. It is my hope that at such a time, many who participated will realize what a monumental mistake those choices were and turn from them. Those who reject corruption will be forced to stand up and fight.
Some people do say, I would rather die than vote for ___. (the other side)
Such is the stupidity of the world which would choose to burn rather than step out of the fire.
That being said, I don't necessarily believe stupidity is in and of itself a cause for curtailment of natural rights. I support the right of every tax-paying American of legal age to vote. Emphasis, however, on tax-paying. If I were able to reform the welfare system, the first condition I would make to receiving government welfare is that you surrender your right to vote as part of the penalty. I hearken back to a comment that points out the dangers of allowing those who vote money for themselves from the public coffers to control the system of government. When people who are leeches on society have control of the levers of power in such a society, they will only continue to pull on those levers - even though it means putting the brakes on economic activity and even infringes upon the rights of others. It needs to stop.
Also the voting age needs to be raised to 25. Psychologists have researched that the maximal ability of a human to place Reason over Emotion does not occur until about age 25.
As for welfare voting...well I think government employees are welfare recipients. They can't vote either.
Non-elected ones, certainly. I am also against any public sector unions, I don't care if they're teachers, firefighters, policemen, or civil "servants," they should NOT be allowed to organize and conspire with elected policymakers to pad their own wallets.
That being said, public servant unions and private worker unions have one key component which makes the first a direct threat to society and the second a nuisance: their source of funds.
You, my dear, would should be thinking Rifles!
A new entry in my journal to write a nice Peaceful story.
I left. It was sad, a very liberal professor started the group, but to his credit he very cleverly enforced a rule: NO POLITICS in this group. It was really great, the guy was brilliant. Then he left to raise his family. Then the mental patients started running the asylum and soon the group topics went from What is the 2nd Precept of Buddhism, to Let's Look at Whiteness through the Lens of Buddhism. I wrote a 17 page scree email to the Socio"logy" "PhD" who brought Whiteness to the table, and she said she would have to think and get back to me. She never did.
I can sit on a cushion in my house or in a park or in the woods. I miss the people as people, I don't miss their Bastardization of Buddhism.