What is Anarcho-Capitalism?

The new Argentine president Javier Milei calls himself an anarcho-capitalist, but not a lot of people know what that is. You might hear people make reference to “privatized police” or things like this, but the actual crux of anarcho-capitalism goes much deeper. In fact the fundamental claim isn’t so much “anarchic” or “capitalistic” as much as it is a demand that all institutions in society, including those which provide for the legal system, be subject to the same rules of ethical behavior that everyone else is expected to follow.

What do you consider to be the defining characteristic of government? Some people might say the government is that institution that makes and enforces laws. Fair enough, but for myself and other self-described anarcho-capitalists the defining characteristic of government is that it is the only institution in society that claims an exemption from the ordinary rules of ethical behavior that everyone else and all other businesses and institutions are expected to follow. That is, it’s the only institution in society that claims the right to act immorally.

Culture is Downstream from Politics

It’s very common in conservative or libertarian circles to hear the phrase “politics is downstream from culture”. The idea is that culture is what drives major changes to our politics. This implies that if one wishes to change government one must first change the culture.

This view has a lot of appeal to conservatives. It suggests that the ultimate source of government dysfunction is our increasing cultural degeneracy. In my opinion they’ve got it completely backwards. That ultimately it’s politics that drives our culture not the other way around. Let me elaborate.

Pro-choice Politics Has Become Gross

If the left wing in the United States is looking for someone to blame for Roe v Wade being overturned they can start by looking at themselves. Over the years their views on abortion have morphed from the relatively moderate “safe, legal, and rare” of the 90’s to the morally grotesque “shout your abortion” today.

Today we’re told repeatedly by the left that abortion is just “women’s healthcare”. As if it’s in the same moral category as a knee surgery. No different. Not only is abortion of no moral significance whatsoever, but women should be proud to have had one and society should celebrate it.

On Roads and Monopoly

Twitter user @jenny_leigh_g asks:

What if the company that owned my street decided to get in the housing business and they want my house, so they jack up my toll to like $500 per use. I cant pay, what do I do? Then I move and they take my house. What stops them from doing this? Where’s the free market competition

— Jenny Leigh (@jenny_leigh_g) April 4, 2022

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Random Legal Thoughts After Arbery Trial

Thought 1: I REALLY hate felony murder statutes.

In general our society is incredibly vindictive and way too trigger happy when doling out incarceration. What felony murder statutes do is allow prosecutors to unjustly convert manslaughter charges to murder charges and send the accused to jail for longer than their crime would normally justify.

Arbery Trial Analysis

The trial of Amaud Arbery’s killers in Georgia has been highly publicized and politicized. Unfortunately, like the Rittenhouse case, the media has grossly misrepresented the facts in this case in attempt to sow racial division in the country. We’ll go through the facts here. While this case is not an open and shut case of self defense like the Rittenhouse case was, it probably should still end in a not guilty verdict.

Lots of Thoughts on GameStop

I’ve got a number of thoughts on GameStop and the markets that I’m going to list here in no particular order.

1. I’m very skeptical of the claim that this bull raid was caused by small Robinhood investors. This was a huge move in the price of GameStop and others and it just doesn’t seem plausible that it was caused by a bunch of Reddit goofballs investing $100 through Robinhood. To move the price that much you need people with a lot of money involved. One of the /r/WallStreetBets investors claimed to have invested $6 million of his (presumably much larger) portfolio in GameStop. What’s that a portfolio over $50-$100 million? A real “everyday guy”. If you could take a peak behind the trades I’d bet you’d find a lot of people like this along with large institutions.

How Much Money Makes You Rich?

I’m under the belief that the average person grossly underestimates how much money would qualify someone as “rich” and this usually leads them to support policies that would tax the hell out of people who and not rich and are just trying to achieve their dreams. For example, many people would say if your net worth is over $1 million you are rich. Is this true? Hardly. Let’s work through an example.

Every year HGTV runs a “Dream Home” giveaway sweepstakes. This year they are giving away a home in Rhode Island. Take a look:

Biden’s Tax Hikes and The Double Taxation of Profits

I’m writing this post because the tax treatment of business income is so convoluted that very few people understand it. I’m tempted to speculate that this is done on purpose so as to maximize opportunities for demagoguery and make it easy to agitate for higher taxes. For example, billionaire Warren Buffet has long claimed that he pays a lower tax rate than his secretary which he presents as evidence that taxes need to be raised. As we’ll see, this claim is almost certainly false, but it’s the complexity of the tax system that makes it so easy to make this claim and make it seem plausible.