"Sustainability" is the doomsters' rallying cry. The slogan is clever. It sparks apocalyptic urgency. But clever slogans and vivid imagery are no substitute for clear thinking about the place of private property in environmental concerns.
The Myth of Ownership stands out from most works of analytic philosophy. Usually, works by eminent philosophers cannot easily be dismissed. You may, for example, disagree with Rawls’s A Theory of Justice,
What's the difference between the cultures of the private sector and the public sector? Consider the difference between Arthur Andersen, which has no future, and the U.S. Forest Service, which will live forever. The answer can be traced to property rights, and it explains why market outcomes are always held to a much higher standard than public-sector outcomes.
According to Ludwig von Mises, socialism was doomed to failure because the lack of private property, plus the absence of a profit and loss system, meant that accurate economic calculation would be impossible in those regimes. Instead of order, there would be chaos--something that was borne out time and again as we witnessed the poor performances of socialist economies.
One major reason people are not loyal to the principle of the right to private property is that they have a misconception of its main function. Many think only the wealthy benefit from it. And even if they do not have anything against being rich, they do have something against unfair legal advantages for those who are.
While it is morally reprehensible to hate, in a true free market the freedom of citizens to associate with whom they wish must be upheld and private property rights must be enforced. There should be neither forced association nor forced disassociation. This is the social foundation of the free-market economy.
Can there be a right to freedom of speech without that right being firmly based on property rights?
In the post-attack world, in which politicians attempt to impose the national security state at home and wage war abroad, a simple point has been obscured: it all started with a multiple hijacking. The theft of the planes was made possible not with grenades or heavy explosives but with box cutters––the most dangerous weapon on board. If the hijackers had been stopped or even deterred by armed pilots, the twin towers would still be standing, and there would be no war or government power grabs (at least not more than the usual).
The lands were public and the firefighters government employees. These two facts have much to do with why they died. Walter Block explains.
