Thread by @RealSteveCox

Quick explainer:
I’m a left-wing libertarian.
Right-wing libertarians typically only care about negative liberty, which is about *preventing* (thus, “negative”) the government from interfering in your life. But on the left side of that...
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On the left side of libertarianism (which is actually the root of the libertarian concept), we care about negative liberty but also *positive* liberty, which is not just about preventing interference in your life, but actually empowering people to be *able* to live freely.
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Conceptually, think about the right to travel wherever you want. Negative liberty would just prevent the government from stopping you. Positive liberty builds the interstate highways, airports, railroads, etc, that enable you to actually travel.
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The empowerment of positive liberty requires me/us to look not only at government behavior, but also corporate behavior. If we truly believe in the cause of freedom, that must mean that “necessities” be handled by a truly representative government body.
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68,000 Americans die every year—pre-pandemic—due to lack of affordable health insurance, and millions more face bankruptcy every year as a result of healthcare costs. The empowerment model of “positive liberty” would be universal, single-payer healthcare.
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Using the empowerment model of positive liberty, *all* necessities should be controlled by a truly representative government body just as healthcare should.
Water
Electricity
Internet access
Oil
Those are all captive markets and captive markets are a form of theft.
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If you remove the price-gouging of captive markets and control those markets with a truly representative government, it frees up tons of money in the marketplace to serve actual free markets, which are competitive due to their lack of necessity. Like TVs.
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Nobody needs a TV. You can just say no to all TVs on sale if none fit the price and features you want. That drives quality up and prices down, and it spurs innovation as a result. Free markets are not bad. Laissez-faire capitalism is bad. They aren’t the same things.
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But I also support worker-owned companies and co-ops and I’d like all free-market companies to be owned by their workers. With a truly representative government, there’s no need for anybody to profit off of other people’s labor.
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But here’s the kicker: If you really want a society where people are free and empowered to do as they want, labor should be a choice. We’re a ways off from this, but in an ideal world, automation would be publicly owned and utilized to free people from monotonous work.
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A truly free people can’t be forced or coerced to do *anything* they don’t want to do. And this is where positive liberty raises wages: If someone needs your labor, and your needs are taken care of, they’ll have to pay you more to get it. It would be strictly voluntary.
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And two people/entities choosing to work together under terms reached without coercion? That’s always good.

Slave wages exist primarily because workers have no safety net/choice.

This has been my TED talk for today.
CrowdPAC.com/c/stevecoxforc…
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