More Collectivist Cliches; P. Smith

It is unfortunate that the Soviets take this ap proach, but it is even more unfortunate that the world press will let statements like this go un challenged. In the newspaper accounts, not a single journalist felt obligated to point out that while Thatcher was addressing the question of human rights, Gorbachev's response dealt with human privileges. Just as it is intuitively and logically obvious that all men have the right to be free, so it is also obvious that no man has the inherent right to be given a home. It is with exactly these types of issue-con fusing answers that the collectivists continue to delude the world press. By reporting the above conversation as if both arguments had equal merit, the press imply that the problems of pov erty, unemployment, and homelessness in the free world are the moral equivalent of govern ment oppression in the communist world. Let us address each of Gorbachev's issues individu ally and explain why they are not the result of "human rights violations."

Philip Smith is a freelance writer living in southern Cali fornia. First, consider homelessness. Obviously, every man has the right to buy a home, as suming he can find someone willing to sell him one at a mutually agreeable price. It is unfortu nate that some individuals neither have the funds to purchase a home, nor the ability to raise these funds. The collectivist, however, would have us believe that we are somehow morally obligated to provide these individuals with homes. Naturally, the homeless are free to seek ways of earning income, and to use this income as they see fit. By the same token, I should be free to earn my income, and also should be free to do with it as I see fit; and this includes no obli gation to provide homes for strangers. When the collectivists grant the so-called "right" to a home, they remove my right to do as I please with my property-and this is a true, basic right. Robbery is robbery, whether the home less steal directly from me to provide them selves with a home, or whether government steals it first and then hands it to them.

Unemployment Just as with homes, the collectivists imply that we are somehow morally obligated to pro vide a job for every person, regardless of this person's abilities, skills, or productivity. To say that every person has the right to a job is to imply that someone else has an obliga tion to give him one. Here in the free world, we recognize a man's right to seek employment, so long as there is someone willing to employ him. But to insist that someone (or everyone) provide him with a job, denies the right of the employer to do as he chooses with his own property. Once again, by establishing a false ,'right, " the collectivists actually have taken away a basic human right: the right to use your earnings as you choose. What the collectivists fail to mention is that in a free, capitalist society, the natural unem ployment rate is very low. The most significant cause of high unemployment is government in tervention in the economy, particularly min imum wage laws. By establishing a minimum wage, the government effectively declares that all persons whose productive value to an em ployer is less than this wage shall remain unem ployed. The implication is that it is morally su perior to live on welfare than to become self sufficient by earning a "low" wage.

Poverty Homelessness and unemployment often are accompanied by poverty; indeed, it seems the three are nearly inseparable. Poverty, like homelessness, is the direct result of an indi vidual's lack of funds. Once again, the collec tivists imply that we should feel morally obli gated to give our earnings to those who haven't earned anything of their own. Just as in the previous examples, to force someone to give up his earned income or goods to support strangers robs him of his natural right to do as he wishes with his property. It becomes apparent that the A Mirage 371 collectivists' accusations are all built around this common fallacy: that some men have a right to the earnings of others. In the free world we recognize this as false. Now, before anyone cries out that this is a cruel and unjust state of affairs, let me point out that voluntary charity is perfectly compatible with freedom. In a pure, capitalist society, ev eryone has the right to do with his income as he pleases; and if it pleases him to give it to the poor, then no will stop him. If it pleases him to give jobs to the incompetent or unskilled, then he is free to do so until his funds run out. If he wishes to provide homes for the homeless, he not only will find himself unobstructed, he probably will be congratulated as well.

The one thing that no man or government has the right to do is to take the property of others by force. This is what our own government does when it removes some of our income (by force) and gives it to others. This is the prin ciple on which the whole collectivist economy is built: the right of some to rob from others in the name of "justice. ' , As long as the press continues to report both factual and fallacious arguments as if they held equal merit; as long as Soviet cliches go un challenged; then the collectivists will continue to pull the wool over the eyes of millions. Since publications devoted to exposing these cliches are few and far between, it is up to us, the de fenders of freedom, to spread the word. 0 IDEAS ON LIBERTY S ocialism is a fantasy, and the illusion that it is being approached is in the nature of a mirage. No country in the world has attained even an approximation of the socialist vision. In communist countries, the state has not withered away, as Marx predicted; instead, it has grown in power and sway. Nowhere does "from each according to his ability, to each according to his need" prevail, nor can it do so. "Need" can no more be measured than men can be induced to produce according to their abilities when rewards are separated from efforts.

-CLARENCE B. CARSON 372 The Impracticality of Zoning by John Gillis Z oning, like any other public policy, should be analyzed on two levels-its moral status and its practical conse quences. For the purposes of this essay, I will concentrate on the practical aspects of zoning. I will leave aside the basic moral questions sur rounding the use of government coercion to prevent people from using their own property as they see fit. What Is Zoning? Zoning is government control of privately owned land in these two broad areas: - The use of property. - The size of a building on a property, or the portion of a property covered with buildings. There are hundreds of subsidiary and corol lary controls imposed by zoning, but most fall under these two classes of control. Most zoning laws control the use and bulk (the technical term for size) of any buildings on a parcel of land. There are extensions of zoning laws called growth controls which (in a simplified way) can be described as inhibiting the timing of building. Such controls go beyond use and bulk, and take the form of moratoriums on any development of a certain kind. Alternatively, they may control the amount of a specific kind of building that may be constructed each year.