Shrugging Off Open Borders
Any libertarian worth his salt agrees the State, which has no business existing in the first place, ought not to enforce borders, enact wealth transfers, or infringe on association. In the world as it is, the State does all three.
Open-borders libertarians insist the State cease and desist from enforcing borders while shrugging off the wealth transfers and association infringements. Closed-borders libertarians insist the State cease and desist from wealth transfers and association infringements while shrugging off the border enforcement.
I fancy myself a purist. Whose side should I take?
Open-borders libertarians insist the State cease and desist from enforcing borders while shrugging off the wealth transfers and association infringements. Closed-borders libertarians insist the State cease and desist from wealth transfers and association infringements while shrugging off the border enforcement.
I fancy myself a purist. Whose side should I take?
posted by Tony at 5:21 AM
4 Comments:
If we are assuming a representative government, then voting is the accepted way to influence policy. And if the goal is smaller government and preferring either A: an open borders welfare society or B: a closed borders non-welfare society, I think it is far easier to reach that goal in B.
Voting for smaller government is difficult when the State can offer welfare for immigrants in exchange for votes. As long as there are a large number of people willing to travel for "free" benefits, the State's existence and growth is essentially guaranteed. While it's possible to convince the members of the welfare class of the problems of government, there's a strong incentive for them to support welfarism nevertheless.
In a closed border society, the government can't use a practically unlimited supply of welfare opportunists to press the scales on its behalf. The anti-State faction would actually have a chance and I can imagine that border controls could be eliminated in the process of shrinking the State.
I wish the government had neither taxing nor border-control powers. In fact, I wish the monopolists of violence would just go away altogether. I favor a fully privatized social order. Then immigration would be handled as a question of potential trespass.
Yes, that is the ideal situation. But how to get there? I forgot to mention that my answer is predicated on the fact that immigrants tend to vote for bigger government. If they were hostile to government, I'd be in favor of open borders.
Not that the Republican party is any great ally, but they're a better representative of my interests than the Democrats. And it's interesting that the immigrant groups that most voted Republican were the Cubans among the Latino community and the Vietnamese among the Asian. My guess is that they have a better understanding of the dangers of big government.
You're probably right. I don't know. It seems like a lot of Republicans are open-borders types. I don't know how we get there from here. I just know I prefer separation of borders and state.
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