Dat inequality

[eugmac]

what frightens me most about you libertarian types is that you only seem to see things in black and white.

[wufwugy]

what frightens me most about you libertarian types is that you only seem to see things in black and white.

That we're black and white is the perception. I'm not sure what perpetuates it. The last way I would describe libertarianism is black and white, but one of the first ways I would describe what people think of libertarianism is that it's black and white.

Maybe the first step to understanding libertarianism (market capitalism) is that it's economics. It's not a branch of economics, but itself economics. Even the most "left-wing" economists, like Paul Krugman, are about a thousand times more "free market capitalist" than the public perceives them as. What makes a small handful of economists "left-wing" comes out of how popular it is with the public to be so, not things that academic economists believe. Additionally, most enthusiasts who claim to be economists, don't exactly have the credibility. I was blown away when I started reading the opinions of those with econ PhDs who still currently teach. What they say is night and day difference with what the public thinks.

[Renton]

what frightens me most about you libertarian types is that you only seem to see things in black and white.

As someone who has had a lot of experience both in libertarian and liberal circles, the main thing that struck me as different about libertarianism is that every one of its tenets is rooted in logic and scientific fact. Half of socialism is based on the false foundation that governments can do certain things better than individuals can do for themselves (examples? never mind that, socialists just accept this as fact without even questioning it) and the other half is based on the idea that you can get something for nothing, that there's somehow an infinite abundance of stuff in the world and therefore no one should want for anything.

As to that latter bit, I really wish every pro socialism person would learn about the broken window fallacy. If you know what it is, the next thing is to really think about the ramifications of it, all of the unseen (and massive) opportunity costs that are created by government policies that ignore this very simple concept.

If your problem is that we only see things in black and white, I guess our problem is that you muddle the ink of every clear cut economic issue with your tears for the unfortunate wretches of humanity. Meanwhile the statist policies you support are making the poor even poorer in spite of it.