there’s a strong liberty interest in letting people make their own choices in response to the pandemic, although externalities and the risk that (especially employees’) choices are coerced may override it. that’s a serious discussion. 1/
but what is the case for overriding liberty interests in order to compel activity by businesses as essential as, um, Pottery Barn? (Which, if you are in urgent need, will in any case offer an appointment) 2/
Stone writes “Maybe [lefties] believe govt should continue to write checks forever”, suggesting an obligation that might override a liberty interest in trading off ones own economic well-being against health risks for “the economy”. 3/
In other words, people should accept a risk of harm or death beyond their own considered interest, because of the positive externalities of an open Pottery Barn. This mirrors Trump’s “warriors” rhetoric with respect to Americans “opening the economy”. 4/
Putting aside the strong negative externalities of indoor retail that might balance out those positive externalities, people with this view have a really stark choice to make. 5/
Are you guys about liberty? Or about a form of sacrificial communitarianism devoted to the abstraction of “the economy”, such that the immediate-term economy is a thing one should literally risk death to support as an obligation of citizenship? 6/
A more cynical read would be that it is not the immediate-term economy, but the immediate-term election cycle, that demands a sacrificial communitarianism. /fin
