Actually, Darling, Elites Hate Free Markets. Everyone Knows That.

The realm of political action is awash with the view that free markets are the enemy, and that more government controls are the key to bringing about a more just society. Popular is the view that free markets only favour the elite and that only the elite favour free markets.

Never mind the government is already responsible for over 40% of spending, and that 19% of the population is employed in the public sector (in the UK). The state controls the money supply, sets the interest rates, and is responsible for regulating each and every facet of the economy from the provision of energy, to the conditions under which someone can employ another person. There is no part of the society left untouched by the machinations of the state. But it's free markets that the elite want. Free markets.

That is really quite an astonishing statement given the vast majority of the population have not even heard the term libertarianism and cannot distinguish between laissez faire and crony capitalism. Your average person has been given indoctrinated in the false dichotomy of left vs. right paradigm. Indeed for most of my life I believed that because I was against war and for civil liberties I must therefore be on the left and a socialist. The idea that you could be for free markets and for all that other good stuff was never presented to me, and when it was at first I thought it was a contradiction in terms.

If the elites want free markets why don't they just take them? Would the world be as it looks if they did?

Since the elites own the media you'd think they'd be pumping out libertarian propaganda in the news every day - whereas if you ever have actually watched the news you'll hear all the debates start with the premise that - whatever the problem - government should solve it by either doing A, or doing B (sometimes some maverick will suggest C.)

Given the elites control and created the education system you'd think everyone would be indoctrinated in the wonderful virtues of laissez faire, but no, most of the history taught consists of war (caused by government and a lack of free trade - but they won't tell you that) and myths about how the government stepped in to save us from every poor historical condition imaginable. They don't even teach that classic liberalism (the forerunner to libertarianism) was seen as the opposite of conservatism before the 20th century and it was only then that the major debates became between conservatives and fascists on one extreme and socialists and communists in the other extreme.
You'd think they'd want to teach that to everyone if the elites wanted free markets, wouldn't you?

Even economics students do not get taught free market economics but mostly Keynesian and Chicago school which are both statist compromises for the mixed economy. They do learn far-left theories as well though!

Our philosophy simply doesn't get taught. I have a client who recently got in touch and told me she had just looked up libertarianism and was shocked and appalled that despite doing a philosophy degree (which included political philosophy!!!!) she had never even heard of it!
Doesn't sound much like the elite is using their influence, if indeed they want libertarianism.

Almost everyone who does study at uni, regardless of department, will cover Marx and the influence of Marx, of course in some capacity or another. Not his contemporary Baukunin though since he was an anarchist socialist. They only teach pro-government philosophies.

Ludwig von Mises, despite being the greatest economic mind of his time could not find a university post. Everyone has heard of Karl Marx but very few of Carl Menger. Not to mention Bohm-Bawerk, Bastiat or Murray Rothbard.

Why is it that corporations lobby for regulation and to pass laws rather than to remove them?

Elites have and always will oppose free market because they force them to provide value for value like non-elites have to, prohibit them from receiving government contracts and preferential treatment, and because the poor - who have more to gain and less to lose - will always outcompete and undercut decadent elites with more overheads.

The trick is simple, you just convince people that what we have is capitalism and use any criticism of the present system to attack free markets on principle. Most people will not look hard enough to untangle the trail of cause and effect back to the precise government interventions which caused these conditions. But it can be done! That's the purpose of this blog, please stay tuned.


A. S. 27/11/2016

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