Advocates for Liberty

A Convenient Pretense

Perhaps you have seen the Low Carbon Diet fliers in either Hicks dining hall, or at the Map Dining hall. If Bon Appetite’s management feels it is necessary to provide info on a “low carbon diet”, clearly American culture is captivated by visions of cataclysmic climate change. As Americans become more conscious of their so-called carbon footprint, many companies are finding innovative ways to profit from the guilty conscience of the average environmentalist. From the rise of hybrid cars, to the outright sale of indulgences (umm I meant to say carbon offsets), the market is taking full advantage of the latest American Apocalypse.

Unfortunately corporations are not the only group capitalizing on the Climate Crisis. The State is entering the fray. From the City Government of San Francisco banning plastic bags, to the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007, the environment is the pretense of choice to expand the power of the Federal Government. Even incandescent light-bulbs will eventually become contra-band in the land of the free and of the brave (without light-bulbs we won’t be able to be scared of the dark anymore). Tragically the increase of governmental powers due to the plight of the environment is not limited to the comic. The bill also includes provisions which greatly enhance the level of the Government’s involvement with almost all sectors of the economy.

The true threat to freedom posed by the global warming hysteria is more significant than the nationalization of the American economy. The most totalitarian systems strife to unite the citizenry into a common struggle, in the past ethnic or religious minorities were often the target of these evil states. However, after the scapegoat was sacrificed the government usually had a hard time maintaining control over the populace. The beauty of global warming (from a Statist perspective) is that all people groups can be united for an indefinite period. The sophistry employed by Gore and his cohorts is a renewable resource. For theories can always be expounded upon. New and terrible effects of almost any product can be “discovered”, the Statist dream of never-ending war is finally realized in the age of pseudo-science.

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The Corporate Social Responsibility Distortion

by Dave Gernhard

Corporations, business, CEOs, these are terms that in the modern context conjure up images of greed and corruption.  Gone is the layman who risks everything to build an industrial empire for the benefit of the consumer.  Richard Sears, Henry Ford, and Thomas Edison have been replaced by Ken Lay of Enron and Dennis Kozlowski of Tyco.  Populism has defined business ethics as a contradiction in terms, with ignominy replacing ingenuity in today’s corporate image.  The Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) movement is no different than yellow journalism.  CSR minimizes the role of corporate owners (stockholders) and lends authority to political and special interest organizations who seek to gain by destroying the competitive market.

CSR theory is based on the mantra “doing well by doing good.”[i] It is structured around the idea of the stakeholder.  The stakeholder is anyone who will be affected by the policy decisions of the copany.[ii]  Stakeholders are often divided into five categories: customers, employees, suppliers, shareholders, and communities.  The case is made by Edward Freeman of the University of Virginia that business policy can benefit both business and society when managers serve those who have a stake in the firm.[iii]  Emphasis is placed on the modern corporate social responsibility framework more than just the shareholders.  It is this aspect of CSR that makes it so dangerous for the modern firm.

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Why Microfinance is not all its cracked up to be.

By Abhilash Samuel

            “An unacceptably high proportion of the world’s population lives in dreadful conditions that consign them to Malthusian lives that are nasty, brutish and short”, says Norbert Kloppenburg, the senior vice president of KfW Entwicklungsbank, a microfinance institution based in Germany.[1] The alleviation of poverty through banking, or more precisely the provision of subsidized credit was a centerpiece of many countries’ development strategies from the early 1950s through the 1980s, but these experiences were nearly all disasters.[2] Microfinance, as it is known today, began with small experiments around 1980 that attracted official development assistance or corporation.

            The backdrop to the development of microfinance institutions was the failure of government assistance to the poor. It was appropriately recognized that government assistance to the poor often creates dependency and disincentives that worsen the standard of living in the economy. Jonathan Morduch in his paper ‘The Microfinance Promise’, says, “Despite decades of aid, communities and families appear to be increasingly fractured, offering a fragile foundation on which to build.”[3 Read the rest of this entry »

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Intellectual Property Rights: Can you own an idea?

By Blake Imeson 

Intellectual Property rights (IP) have long been a hindrance to the advance of society, giving advantages benefitting a few. This paper seeks to correct the view of IP as essential to our society and expose them to be what they really are.

                Government intervention in the dissemination of ideas has stunted the growth of our society and is stunting the growth of America’s economy. An injustice is being perpetrated upon the victims of these laws, laws that are beneficial to large companies and a roadblock to the individual and small company. 

Download and view as a PDF which makes this article much easier to read.

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Pro Sports as a Public Good

By Dave Gernhard The following is taken from a paper submitted by the author for the Austrian Student Scholars Conference at Grove City College on Nov. 3, 2007…

… Many different arguments have been used to advocate government funding of professional sports. Roger Noll and Andrew Zimblast write in their book Sports, Jobs, and Taxes, that “although the details of campaigns for sports facilities differ from city to city, the basic case for subsidizing them is the same everywhere.”[i] They outline the three consistent arguments in favor of subsidizing stadiums. The first is that stadiums generate new jobs. Secondly, cities with major league teams attract more business. Finally, it is argued that additional tax revenues and lease payments make building stadiums an investment in the long term. Read the rest of this entry »

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The Problem of Nonrivalrous Consumption in the Free Market

by Dave Gernhard

A major aspect of public goods theory is the idea of nonrivalrious consumption. This refers to cases where an “individuals’ ability to consume a good or service is not diminished by allowing additional individuals to consume it.”[i] Some simple examples of this are movie theaters or sports arenas. The cinema can admit extra people without any increase in the cost of their operation. Unlike externalities, these nonrivalrious goods are easily excludable making it harder to understand why people would claim they are part of the Public works doctrine.

What government advocates argue is that since additional consumers can be added with no additional cost, these marginal consumers are “inefficiently” excluded from consumption when the price of the good is higher than their value scales. Due to the inability of knowing exactly what value the marginal consumer Read the rest of this entry »

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The Problem of Externalities in the Free Market

by Dave Gernhard

An externality exists whenever the action of an individual brings added costs or benefits to another individual. Phrased differently, externalities exist when the participants of an action don’t reap all the costs or all the benefits of that action. An example of this can be the nocturnal bagpipe player who waits until midnight in his quiet neighborhood to play. The cost of his action can be seen on the sleepy faces of his neighbors the next morning.

In much the same manner people can experience benefits of other people’s action. A classic example is the construction of a lighthouse along a rocky coastline. The merchants who initially pooled their resources to construct the lighthouse bore all the cost but can not Read the rest of this entry »

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School Vouchers: A Step Backwards?

By Elizabeth Imeson

If indeed, "competition is merely the absence of oppression"*, than lack of competition is oppression. On the surface, the school voucher system seems appealing to those who are for the free market. But when further prodding is done, reality is discovered — "Under the voucher system public education remains public education, and nothing fundamental has changed."^[1]

With a school voucher, parents only have certain, restricted choices of schools at which to redeem the voucher. A limited choice is not a real choice at all. This would not be the case if education was privatized, in which case parents would have complete freedom in regards to decisions about where to send their children to school. Read the rest of this entry »

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Free Markets and the Third World

By Abhilash Samuel

Private property, free enterprise, free market principles are principles that might sound routine to most Americans. However, the third world often receives this jargon with hostility. Nevertheless, as a resident of the third world for twenty-one years, I feel, putting these principles into practice could be revolutionary in the least.

Today, America, takes these virtues for granted. While the third world might not have an excuse in rejecting something they have not tried, this nation should abhor anything that drives it away from the very base which made it an economic powerhouse. Read the rest of this entry »

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Can Communism Work in a Perfect World?

By Dave Gernhard

Often Christians will argue that Communism is good in theory but that in a fallen world it can never work. Yet Communism, that social theory where governments redistribute the wealth of the citizens, is not only bad in practice, it is sinful in theory. God has established an order in His creation which is both good in theory and in practice. (For if something is poor in practice how can it be in theory sound?) God, in His infinite wisdom, has given man a social institution that, when properly respected, is the foundation for all civilization. Established by God, private property is an institution that can be found in the Genesis account of Creation, Old Testament law, and in the teachings of the New Testament. Read the rest of this entry »

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