|Peter Boettke|
The formidable husband-wife team of David and Emily Skarbek have a piece in The Atlantic arguing for the abolition of FEMA. David and Emily both wrote their PhD dissertations under my direction, and both were students at GMU during the time we were all engaged in the Katrina project. David has published earlier work on occupational licensing and recovery in the wake of natural disasters, and Emily has a series of papers addressing private and public sector efforts at rescue, recovery, and rebuilding.
Emily is a fellow at the Center for the History of Political Economy (CHOPE) this year, while she is on leave from San Jose State; and David is an assistant professor in the political science department at Duke.
Congratulations to them on this piece and best wishes for their continued success.
... and anyone in Western NC, Eastern, TN, or Northern GA should come see them speak at WCU on September 29th and 30th!
Posted by: Steve Miller | September 14, 2011 at 06:40 PM
Congrats to the Skarbeks on this.
Posted by: Barkley Rosser | September 15, 2011 at 06:00 PM
Anyone notice how hostile the comments were?
Posted by: Mupetblast | September 16, 2011 at 02:57 PM
Rather than commenting on here about how hostile the comments are, why not respond to a few of those comments and try to get the hostile commenter's to think differently for a moment?
I'm always saddened by how little effort is made by academics in involving themselves in these types of discussions with the general public. My personal opinion is that an earnest effort, requiring nothing more than a few remarks, would do more for promoting the kind of diversity of opinion necessary for a healthy society, than allowing for the kind of group think that's currently being exhibited in the Atlantic's comments section.
And given your deep understanding of these issues, I doubt you would embarrass yourselves by ending up on the losing end of an "argument" with pseudo-intellectual.
The cause of freedom needs you to be more openly engaged, even with the ruffians.
Posted by: complexphenom | September 16, 2011 at 06:21 PM
"And given your deep understanding of these issues, I doubt you would embarrass yourselves by ending up on the losing end of an 'argument' with pseudo-intellectual."
Who said I have a deep understanding?
Thanks for the implication that I'm an academic.
Posted by: Mupetblast | September 16, 2011 at 06:40 PM
@ Mupetblast
Though your initial comment made me aware of the issue I highlight, my initial comment was directed at anyone who is an academic and a reader of this blog.
I wasn't singling anyone out, though I should have been more clear where you quote me (though I did say "yourselves" in the same sentence).
Posted by: complexphenom | September 16, 2011 at 07:32 PM
Yes, the Skarbeck's are to be congratulated for a very thoughtful and informed piece, but I think the previous comments make a good point: you can't publish libertarian commentary in liberal periodicals like The Atlantic and hope to make an impact. The result would be the same if the editor of The Atlantic published a piece in The Freeman. Can you only imagine the reaction the people here would have to it? As much as people like Professor Boettke believes in the power of ideas in shaping social policy, the truth of the matter is that it is just not that simple. I don't believe we changed the mind of one reader of The Atlantic. One must already accept Hayekian theory if we are to be persuaded by the Skarbecks' piece.
Posted by: austrian away | September 17, 2011 at 11:29 AM
@austrian away,
I wouldn't even call The Atlantic particularly liberal, but rather centrist. Megan McArdle is over there. Their writers are elite college educated, which tends to make economic views fairly moderate (read: not populist).
This makes the comments even more alarming.
Posted by: Dain (Mupetblast) | September 17, 2011 at 08:17 PM
The same Megan McArdle who said this about Ron Paul?: "he doesn't understand anything about monetary policy. He might actually understand it less than the average member of Congress. My personal opinion is that he wastes all of his time on the House Financial Services Committee ranting crazily."
Sorry, I don't think I can take her seriously as a libertarian commentator, or as a libertarian even. Not because she happens to disagree with Ron Paul on monetary policy, but because of the way she disparages Ron's understanding of monetary (a Rothbardian and Hayekian [competing currencies] take). Her canard leads me to question her own understanding of monetary policy. Her superciliousness is unwarranted and unfounded.
Posted by: complexphenom | September 18, 2011 at 02:20 AM
And I would just point out that The Atlantic is very liberal for the very reasons you mention: they are elite, college-educated, non-populist types. That is the essence of liberal. They may not be as explitic as, say, The New Republic, but the ideology is the same. Most elite liberals of this variety believe that the public are mistaken and that reforms must be taken despite their resistance. In fact, Mr. Chait, the editor in chief of the New Republic, makes this point repeatedly in his introductory essays in that magazine.
Posted by: austrian away | September 19, 2011 at 07:46 AM
Classical liberal free trade advocates ensconced in universities and think tanks are also elites, going against public sentiment and believing the public is mistaken.
Libertarians got the workin' man's back when it comes to his revealed preferences. Liberals got the workin' man's back when it comes to asking him what his preferences are.
Posted by: Dain (Mupetblast) | September 19, 2011 at 09:23 PM
The result would be the same if the editor of The Atlantic published a piece in The Freeman...this is a great work!Keep it up!
Posted by: privat alarm | October 05, 2011 at 12:15 PM
Ack, another Small Government Non-Sequitur (SGNS)! Man, if I had a dollar for every time I ran across one of these I'd be at least a dozenaire.
This is the basic construction of a SGNS...
1. Competition is the basis for efficiency
2. The government is not efficient
3. Let's reduce the size of government
Here's the last SGNS I ran across...Taxes, Competition and Pricing.
Here's one also coincidentally related to FEMA..."For this is the salient point: private organizations, whether for-profit or non-profit, perform or lose their customers or their donors. When a private entity fails to deliver on its promise, or actually causes harm, it is held liable for the failure and pays the damages. When government fails, it gets a bigger budget and even more power." - Mary L. G. Theroux, Public and Private Responses to Katrina.
Here's CATO with the same SGNS...Government Efficiency.
China used to be really fixated on planning their economy. Then Deng Xiaping went around saying that it didn't matter whether a cat was black or white...what mattered was whether it caught mice. Now China is catching mice while we're debating whether the government should be big or small.
We have so much evidence that switching from a planned economy to a market economy is a really smart move...so it really weirds me out that nobody has advocating applying market principles to the public sector.
Here's how to fix the SGNS...
1. Competition is the basis for efficiency
2. The government is not efficient
3. Government organizations should compete for taxes
We should simply allow taxpayers to directly decide how to allocate their individual taxes among the various government organizations at anytime throughout the year. This is otherwise known as pragmatarianism.
What's great is this concept is as progressive as they come. It was a liberal step when control of taxes was passed from the king to parliament and it will be a giant liberal step when control of taxes is passed from the parliament to taxpayers.
Posted by: Xerographica | October 11, 2011 at 09:28 PM