note: this comment isnt directly about this post, it is comparing the comments of this post to the comments of one of yesterdays posts: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5006368.
Yesterday there was a debate about whether the spewing leaded gasoline fumes into the air was something that should be regulated by the govt or privately litigated. The pro-regulators handily won the votes battle, but this post is an example of why it is bad in a general sense.
The government is a giant complex system. It is also extremely prone to the slippery slope. If you allow the federal govt one new dept. they will make 5; if you allow the govt to increase budget by $1B, they will increase it by $100B; if you allow them to regulate one industry, they will regulate them all.
You can't judge the govt by a single mandate, you have to judge it as a whole. This is why federal regulations are bad in a general sense, because you start with something 'good' (the environment) but you are giving them permission to eventually regulate IP and other areas where more powerful business interests may not allow the regulations to turn out the way you want.
If you want the negative externalities of businesses (eg clean air) regulated by the govt, you have to acknowledge that they now have permission to regulate everything similar. But while the public has limited resources (energy, time and money) to fight for 'good' regulation, the corporations have essentially an infinite amount of each. It is a nebulous, interconnected system and the slippery slope is a very real dilemma here.
So its easy to downvote an anarcho-capitalist because you think the clean air act was a good thing or because private litigation is a bad thing, but you have to look at their underlying reasoning. Every inch you give the state, it takes a foot and in the end you only approve of 1/12 of the moves they make.
Yesterday there was a debate about whether the spewing leaded gasoline fumes into the air was something that should be regulated by the govt or privately litigated. The pro-regulators handily won the votes battle, but this post is an example of why it is bad in a general sense.
The government is a giant complex system. It is also extremely prone to the slippery slope. If you allow the federal govt one new dept. they will make 5; if you allow the govt to increase budget by $1B, they will increase it by $100B; if you allow them to regulate one industry, they will regulate them all.
You can't judge the govt by a single mandate, you have to judge it as a whole. This is why federal regulations are bad in a general sense, because you start with something 'good' (the environment) but you are giving them permission to eventually regulate IP and other areas where more powerful business interests may not allow the regulations to turn out the way you want.
If you want the negative externalities of businesses (eg clean air) regulated by the govt, you have to acknowledge that they now have permission to regulate everything similar. But while the public has limited resources (energy, time and money) to fight for 'good' regulation, the corporations have essentially an infinite amount of each. It is a nebulous, interconnected system and the slippery slope is a very real dilemma here.
So its easy to downvote an anarcho-capitalist because you think the clean air act was a good thing or because private litigation is a bad thing, but you have to look at their underlying reasoning. Every inch you give the state, it takes a foot and in the end you only approve of 1/12 of the moves they make.