Austrian Libertarian follower’s call for the abolishment of governments is a joke at best and seditious at worse.
IN my column two weeks ago, I called on the police and immigration to step up their operations to weed out illegal foreign workers employed by coffee shops in Miri .
I received numerous response from various quarters, some supporting and some not so flattering. I always respect the right of everyone to express their opinions even if they disagreed with me.
I can understand the economic incentive for employers to hire cheap illegal immigrants to maximise profits, and I can accept that government bureaucracy can be very frustrating at times.
However, I have to express particular concern to the very extreme views of ML, a disciple of the Austrian Libertarian economic principles, who claimed that there was nothing wrong for coffee shops to employ illegal immigrants, and that the government must not interfere.
Let us me try to highlight some of the points he had stated in his disturbing piece that has appeared in several online papers.
ML claimed that my call to “to eradicate the scourge of illegal workers once and for all”, demonstrated my prevailing aggressive attitude against voluntary agreement and exchange between employer and employee and more importantly, the spirit of entrepreneurship.
If we were to take him seriously, we must not enforce drug laws as well. After all, it is a voluntary agreement for drug dealers to sell drugs to addicts, no?
After all, according to ML: “The set up of business is to serve the needs of customers, not the needs of the government. To succeed in a free market, business must please customers, not please government”.
So isn’t the drug pusher serving a need for the drug addict and pleasing him by providing for his craving for drugs? Is that Austrian Libertarian economic nirvana?
Is it not a voluntary agreement and in the free spirit of entrepreneurship for a 13-year-old to prostitute herself? A person’s body is her property, no?
What right has the government to intervene by enacting statutory rape laws? Why is the police interfering in her entrepreneurial spirit by enforcing such laws? Why do we need to license massage parlours to make sure that there are no brothels?
We must remove the warning announcement on board arriving aircraft: “Please be reminded that drug trafficking is a serious offence and the punishment upon conviction is the mandatory death penalty.”
It will interfere with the airlines’ ability to carry more passengers and affect tourists and with drug traffickers’ spirit of entrepreneurship.
ML went on to state: “These workers are illegal? Illegal means a type of immigration intervention that the state has decided to deploy aggressive action against voluntary agreement and exchange between employer and employee. Bear in mind, you simply have no right to imprison or punish a man for using his property in whatever way he wants.”
So the illegal workers are the property of the coffee shop owners. Is that not slavery? Is the body of the 13-year-old girl her private property as well so she should be allowed to decide what she wants to do with it?
We should not have traffic laws so the entrepreneurship spirit should prevail for million-dollar cars to drive without speed limits and motorcyclists to go on illegal racing.
We should not have traffic lights so that the government cannot interfere with our freedom to cross road junctions anytime we want.
ML claimed that “with half of the outlets having to cease operations temporarily because they had no workers left, proved that they had been employing illegal immigrants all this while. This was the unintended impact of policy targeting illegal workers. The owners lose money, productive capacity and customers. Again, I see that further government intervention is causing more problems”.
If we follow ML’s twisted logic, we should not enforce intellectual property rights as well. After all, those who are entrepreneurial enough to make fake copies of DVDs should be free to profit from them without any government intervention. We must allow beer smuggling so that price of beer will be five cans for RM10.
Secondly, if they (illegal foreign workers) really take our jobs, the same logic should be applied to any technological advances.
Because technological advances would prove a threat to our economy. For example, the pick and shovel and kereta sorong, to say nothing of the big trucks, can do the work of thousands of workers. Are we to improve ourselves or impoverish ourselves?
I have never questioned technological advances. In fact the minimum wages and the need to weed out illegal workers will encourage, even compel coffee shops, to adopt technology so that they do not need so many workers.
We can already see this happening. Coffee shops are making use of iPads, walkie-talkies to take orders and POS terminals to manage their accounts.
This will lead to productivity level increasing which will lead to wage increase and will be beneficial to the real economy, with the greater purchasing power for workers and higher domestic consumption. This will in turn allow legitimate business to prosper, leading to a virtuous cycle and economy progress, not a vicious one and a race to the bottom.
ML had gone on record in numerous articles calling for the abolishment of governments as the solution for all. Amongst his many extreme claims are:
“This is why I never hesitate to say abolish the government once and for all. Any form of taxation is a recipe for economic disaster.”
ML can with some justification, question the fairness of some laws and Malaysians generally can just legitimately complain about selective enforcement.
I can even agree to liberisation of trade rules, but for ML to call for the abolishment of governments is a joke at best and seditious at worse.
ML seems ignorant that democracy, despite its flaws, means a government of the people, for the people, by the people.
ML should live in some region in Somalia where there is no working government and hence, no government intervention so in his logic, will be perfect example of Austrian Libertarian economic nirvana.