AUSTRIAN ECONOMICS ADDICT

Laurence Vance wrote these 50 questions (click here) to determine if, or to what degree, you are a libertarian or a socialist central planner (statist). Hat Tip to lewrockwell.com.

Answer these questions, to figure out where you stand on the political spectrum.

1. Who should decide whether you sell one of your kidneys?
2. Who should decide whether you smoke marijuana?
3. Who should decide to whom you sell your house?
4. Who should decide for whom your business bakes a cake?
5. Who should decide the dress code for customers at your business?
6. Who should decide the dress code for employees at your business?
7. Who should decide whether you manufacture crystal meth?
8. Who should decide whether your business sells alcohol?
9. Who should decide what kind of plants you have in your house?
10. Who should decide what kind of wedding you photograph?
11. Who should decide how much cash you deposit at one time?
12. Who should decide how many cash withdrawals you make each month?
13. Who should decide to whom you rent an apartment?
14. Who should decide whom you pick up in your cab?
15. Who should decide whether you snort cocaine?
16. Who should decide whether you make moonshine?
17. Who should decide against whom and for what reason you discriminate?
18. Who should decide how much water the toilets flush that you manufacture?
19. Who should decide whether you open a gambling establishment?
20. Who should decide whether you gamble for money in your own home?
21. Who should decide whether you give your kids wine with meals?
22. Who should decide whether you sell drugs?
23. Who should decide whether you send your children to school?
24. Who should decide how much beer you are allowed to brew at home?
25. Who should decide what size soft drink you drink?
26. Who should decide at what age your child gets a job?
27. Who should decide whether you have a smoking section in your restaurant?
28. Who should decide how many handicapped parking spaces your business has?
29. Who should decide whether and how you commit suicide?
30. Who should decide whether your business’s restrooms are handicap accessible?
31. Who should decide whom you hire and don’t hire?
32. Who should decide whom you fire and don’t fire?
33. Who should decide what you pay your employees?
34. Who should decide what vaccines to give your children?
35. Who should decide whether you vaccinate your children in the first place?
36. Who should decide whether you purchase health insurance?
37. Who should decide whether you smoke crack?
38. Who should decide whether your store sells beer on Sundays?
39. Who should decide at what hours your store sells beer on Sundays?
40. Who should decide whether you exchange sex for money?
41. Who should decide whether you exchange money for sex?
42. Who should decide whether your refinery mixes ethanol into its gasoline?
43. Who should decide whether your business offers health insurance?
44. Who should decide what kind of gas mileage the cars get that your company manufactures?
45. Who should decide whether you consume trans fats?
46. Who should decide to whom you sell a gun?
47. Who should decide whether you shoot up heroin?
48. Who should decide what hours your business is open?
49. Who should decide by how much your business increases its prices during a natural disaster?
50. Who should decide whether your business is open on Sundays?

WHERE DO YOU STAND?

If you answered, you should decide to all these questions, you are a libertarian. If you answered, the Government should decide all these questions, you are a socialist central planner.  Anywhere in between means 1) you are moving towards a better understanding of what individual liberty in a free society really means, 2) you are moving toward the belief that more of these decisions should be taken out of the hands of individuals and decided with the use of force by government central planners, 3) you are an inconsistent statist or an inconsistent libertarian.

I have a question for libertarians. What is the number of correct answers an individual would have to get for you to accept them as an apprentice libertarian who just needs some mentoring to become a real libertarian? I love my libertarian brothers, but many seem to have a 100% purity test when it comes to accepting a person into their ranks. Isn’t it our job to try to convince the people on the margin of libertarianism to take the next step in their understanding. This would move them off the margin and toward a better understanding, revealing the next marginal group to be persuaded. I wish the libertarians who have a purity test would look back and remember what they were like before they saw the light. The nature of our job is persuasion, and it is a never-ending job. You can’t persuade people on the margin by beating them over the head. That tactic should be used to have fun at the expense of true believers in central planning.

Here is what I wrote about this topic in a post linked to below.

“WHAT DID YOU KNOW AND WHEN DID YOU KNOW IT”

“We have to be very careful about condemning people who we feel are not close enough to our position. You were probably not close enough to your current position, at some point in your past. In 2007 I was nowhere near where I was in 2010, let alone where I am today. We have to keep people moving toward sound economics, and individual liberty. If they are already open to these ideas don’t blow them out of the water because they aren’t  where you are. Keep in mind the intellectual road you’ve traveled, and are still traveling. Look in the rear view mirror to see who is behind you traveling in the same direction on the same road, and realize there are people ahead of you looking at you in their rear view mirror.”

Related Article – Are You a Republican, a Democrat, or a Libertarian, at austrianaddict.com.

Related Article – How Close To Your Position Is An Acceptable Distance, at austrianaddict.com.

This entry was posted on February 16, 2016 at 1:23 am and is filed under Government and Politics. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments.

Tags: 50 Questions, Government Decision Making, Incividual Decision Making, Libertarian Quiz, Libertarian vs. Statist, Purity Tests