This post is the sixth in a series.
In the early 1990s, I wrote a paper titled “Government Without Taxation.” In the paper, I examined various ways to finance government without coercive taxation. At the time, I thought that this would be a good topic for a book and made several futile attempts to write such a book. In the late 2000s, I decided that, if I was going to write the book, then I needed to get serious about it.
One of the challenges that I had faced in early drafts was the context that was necessary to show that government without taxation is practical. The government’s current size and scope could not possibly be financed through voluntary means. However, if government were limited to its proper function—the protection of individual rights—then the size and scope of government would be considerably smaller. And then, government without taxation would be practical.
It was at that point that I realized that I needed to write a book that set the proper context. Government without taxation would be one chapter. The result was my first book, Individual Rights and Government Wrongs. In the book, I examine private alternatives to government services. I look at mail delivery, libraries, parks, education, roads, and more. The book represented a return to the general theme of my earliest writing—free market alternatives and solutions.
The book demonstrated that when property rights are protected—when individuals are free to produce and trade—they will find innovative ways to provide the products and services that consumers need and desire. At the same time, I showed how government intervention can stifle production and trade to the detriment of all.
Since the publication of that book, my writing has focused on demonstrating that protecting property rights is both moral and practical. Property rights are moral because they protect the individual’s freedom to produce the values that his life requires. They are practical because when individuals are free to produce and trade, everyone benefits.
My latest book, The Affordable Housing Crisis: Causes and Cures, applies this principle to a specific policy issue—housing. I examine a wide range of controls and restrictions on both housing producers and housing consumers. Those controls and restrictions caused the housing crisis, and their continuance has only made the problem worse.
My study of history was particularly useful in writing these books. History is a philosophical laboratory. If we study history with a focus on the dominant ideas, we can see how support for particular policies develop and grow. As an example, during the Progressive Era (the late 1890s to about 1920), government’s regulatory powers greatly expanded. But the creation of new regulatory agencies did not occur in a vacuum. It was the culmination of the German Idealism that had first been introduced to America in the early 1800s. Those ideas were not challenged, and their acceptance and influence gradually spread throughout the culture.
Of the German Idealists, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel exerted the most influence on American intellectuals, many of whom obtained their PhDs from German universities in the years after the Civil War. Hegel held that the individual has a moral duty to serve the State. In Germany, Hegel’s ideas made Hitler possible. In America, Hegel’s ideas made the regulatory state possible.
Understanding this allowed me to examine housing issues from a unique perspective. While the book isn’t overtly philosophical, I spend considerable time demonstrating the flaws in what I call the Progressive framework. That framework still holds sway today, and it explains why the housing crisis continues to grow worse.