"Free From What?"

I had meant to write an article in favor of freedom.  I was beaten to it. Although, my article would not have been as good.

I'll probably quote from this next time I debate the left.

Free From What?

Quotes:

"And it is not difficult to understand why it is so - 310 million distributed brains focused on rational self-interest have a higher aggregated IQ than do a few dozen civil-service central planners whose priorities are more time off and early pension."

How about another?

"America happened, with its free enterprise system and its Constitutionally-limited government.  For the first time in history, people owned themselves and the fruits of their labors.  They kept what they produced instead of turning it over to a king, priest, dictator, warlord, tribal chief, colonial governor, general, emperor, commissar, or entire village. 

People who can keep the surplus they produce, produce in surplus; those who can’t, don’t.  The word economists use to describe this phenomenon is “duh”."

 

Another?

 

"You don’t need a Ph.D. in economics or commerce to test that theory.  Simply look at any of the most miserable and impoverished countries – North Korea will suffice – and run down the list of what else they don’t have besides prosperity: religious freedom, freedom of speech, gun rights, freedom of association, political freedom, economic freedom. 

And then look at the countries whose living standards are rising the fastest – China will suffice – and ask yourself: why there and why now? What changed to lift them out of abject poverty, starvation and oppression?   The government changed, that’s what.  

It rejected central planning and embraced free enterprise; and the results have been nothing short of miraculous.  Since 2000, the United States created roughly 6 million new businesses; the Chinese started an astonishing 43 million. The shift from government enterprise to private enterprise in China has transformed the economy so that 70% of China’s output is now generated in the private sector.  

Free enterprise has raised the average manufacturing wage in China from 58 cents per hour in 2000 to nearly $6 per hour today.  Let’s connect the dots for the UW grads: government lets go of the rope, 43 million new businesses are formed, the economy is 70% liberated, and wages go up 10-fold in a decade.  Get it?"

 

One more?

 

"North Korea has roads and schools and free health care and food stamps and public transportation all those other things the “you didn’t build it” crowd thinks made this country great.  So did China when it was wasting two generations on a failed system that relies on someone else to “make that happen.”   What happened is that tens of millions of people starved to death and millions more were killed for complaining about it."

Read the whole thing.