Arthur C. Clarke vs. Economics and Capitalism

(Austrian) Economics, Pop Culture, Science, Statism, Technology
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A few years ago in honor of Arthur C. Clarke’s then-recent birthday, I wrote on my own blog that he must never have read Ludwig von Mises and Murray Rothbard,

because according to this quote cited by Gregory Benford in his happy-birthday letter in Locus Magazine (January 2008), he claims that “there are some general laws governing scientific extrapolation, as there are not (pace Marx) in the case of politics and economics.” Well, far be it from me to disagree that Marx was wrong about a lot of things, but Clarke is wrong here. Sir Clarke, you may be 90 years old now, and happy birthday by the way, but it’s never too late to acquire a firm grasp of sound economic theory.

As disappointing as it is, it’s not surprising that he had a natural-scientistic bias against economics. Sadly, he died only a few months after my post.

In a more recent article in the Sri Lanka Guardian, more of Clarke’s economic ignorance is on display:

While researching for this article I came across a searing indictment by Clarke on the American capitalist system. After observing that the structure of American society may be unfitted for the effort that the conquest of space demands he continued, “No nation can afford to divert its ablest men into essentially non-creative and occasionally parasitic occupations such as law, insurance and banking”. He also referred to a photograph in Life Magazine showing 7,000 engineers massed behind a new model car they had produced as ‘a horrifying social document’. He was appalled by the squandering of technical manpower it represented. All this indeed makes one wonder whether he really was a closet socialist.

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For A New Activism

Anti-Statism, Business, Libertarian Theory, Technology
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Unlike the political activism of the past, I’m excited to see that direct action, especially entrepreneurial action, is the libertarian activism of the 21st century. If you missed the agora.io online-only conference etienne this weekend, please visit the archives of the conference. The introduction to the conference by George Donnelly is here. There were four channels that ran concurrently. I participated in the channel sponsored by the AnCap Entrepreneur Network, a new site founded by Mark Thomas that is just kicking off and organizing. I spoke about my research and “open source entrepreneurship” which you can find here.

Relatedly, I have also learned recently of The Society of Libertarian Entrepreneurs which are a series of meetups dedicated to self-improvement and the building of libertarian networks and businesses.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OinbqNb7Uno&w=640&h=390]

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Does the Amount of Money Change the Logic?

Business, Corporatism, Libertarian Theory, Pop Culture, Taxation
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“You had ample time over the last two years to make a proposal that would be fair to both sides, but you failed to do so. During the last week of the mediation, we waited the entire week for the NFL to make a new economic proposal … That proposal did not come until 12:30 (p.m.) on Friday, and, when we examined it, we found it was worse than the proposal the NFL had made the prior week when we agreed to extend the mediation.”

~ Letter from NFLPA to Commissioner Roger Goodell

While one would hope the fans and the public would understand what’s really going on with the NFL lockout, it is quite possible that not everyone will “get it.” Some people—and some libertarians—have used a somewhat misinformed, if catchy, description of the situation. That description is: The NFL lockout is millionaires fighting with billionaires over money. While certainly punchy, and containing a nugget of truth, this description also misses the point.

Consider: If this labor negotiation were between business owners and their workers in almost any other endeavor, but particularly one where the workers were paid sums of money that were more “normal,” almost no one would make such a statement. Were this ostensible dispute—it isn’t really a dispute, but more of a money-grab—between the owners of a string of car manufacturing plants and their assembly-line workers, not only would the public side with the workers, but the supposedly liberal media and some members of Congress would be crying loudly as well. Why? In those cases, it would be easy to sympathize with workers. In fact, in that scenario, it’s a safe bet that some would compare the plight of these workers with that of the Wisconsin teachers union. (That would be a huge mistake, but not one that will be explained here. Maybe in the next rant.) The amount of money has nothing to do with the logic.

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