government intervention — VOICES for REASON

Most states have tax-funded film commissions that subsidize or grant tax credits to movie production companies, provided they agree to film scenes within the state’s borders. According to this article in The New York Times, some of these state agencies are getting nervous about the kind of films they are being asked to fund.

The Michigan film commissioner recently rejected a funding request from producers of a horror movie replete with “realistic cannibalism.” In Texas, a film company was told it need not apply for financing of a picture about the FBI’s Waco raid because of inaccuracies in the script. And in Florida, the legislature recently flirted with a proposal to deny tax credits to films that exhibit “nontraditional family values.”

There’s much to challenge in the notion of allowing states to lure in film production; for a start, look at how such programs violate the rights of taxpayers. These programs take money from ordinary taxpayers (a violation of their property rights) and use it to fund movies those taxpayers may well find abhorrent (a violation of their free speech rights).

The solution is not to dictate content according to some pseudo-standard such as “family values.” Rather, the solution is to end all government funding of film production. A state government’s job is to protect its citizens against criminals, not to attract moviemakers. Private individuals and companies wishing to attract film projects to their localities are free to offer whatever incentives (such as discounts on lodging, or attractive settings for filming) that they deem likely to benefit themselves.

Hollywood is quite capable of finding investors to fully finance its ventures. Producers who cannot attract private financing have no right to draw from the public treasury—whether their films depict cannibals eating human flesh, or Bible-toting families gathered for a Sunday picnic.

[Update: Thanks to Steve Simpson at the Institute for Justice for linking here. Welcome, readers of Congress Shall Make No Law, IJ's free speech blog.]

Image: WikiMedia Commons

Once again, an episode from Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged leaps to life from behind closed doors in Washington, D.C. According to a recent report from The Washington Post, President Obama is angry about the British Petroleum oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico:

Since the oil rig exploded, the White House has tried to project a posture that is unflappable and in command.

But to those tasked with keeping the president apprised of the disaster, Obama’s clenched jaw is becoming an increasingly familiar sight. During one of those sessions in the Oval Office the first week after the spill, a president who rarely vents his frustration cut his aides short, according to one who was there.

“Plug the damn hole,” Obama told them.

That’s the politician’s answer to every intractable problem: give orders, issue threats, and wait for obedience. But the creative human mind cannot take orders like that. Notice I didn’t say, “refuses to take orders.” I said, “cannot take orders.” Read the rest of this entry »

In today’s Washington Examiner, ARC’s Yaron Brook and I discuss the continuing political war over Toyota.

How many congressmen does it take to identify the cause of a runaway Toyota Prius? No, it’s not a trick question. A congressional panel issued a draft report recently on a case of supposed runaway acceleration in San Diego.

Why wasn’t that left to the objective assessment of the police and courts? The answer to that question was made clear during last month’s congressional hearings on the Toyota recalls.

You can read the whole article here.

Image: flickr

We’re told that ObamaCare aims to make health care more affordable to more people, but in fact it threatens the rights of everyone involved in health care—doctors, patients, and health insurers—and thus the future of the industry.

Before Congress greases up yet another ramp on the already slippery slope toward socialized medicine, let’s pause to identify those endangered rights and some of the destructive consequences.

• Insurance companies are profit-making businesses, not social welfare agencies. They have the right to charge premiums that reflect actual risk. But ObamaCare would force them to cover almost every American—no matter how sick they already are, no matter how bad their health habits, no matter how high the cost of their exotic treatments–and to raise everyone’s premiums accordingly.

• Doctors are morally entitled to regard themselves as profit-making professionals, not public servants. They have the right to charge fees that reflect the value received by all parties to the transaction. But ObamaCare, by driving down permissible fees, will force physicians into a deadly conflict of interest: Either lose money by doing everything necessary to meet patients’ needs, or make money by satisfying some minimum bureaucratic standard.

• Patients are sovereign individuals, not particles in a social organism. They have the right to buy all the health care they deem necessary and can afford, without apologizing to those who can’t afford it. But under ObamaCare, patients will have the moral status of beggars at a soup kitchen who must uncomplainingly accept whatever gruel from the health-care pot happens to land in their dish.

Let ObamaCare be seen for what it is: yet another offensive in the long-running assault on individual rights in medicine.

Image: WikiMedia Commons

In the Christian Science Monitor, Don Watkins and Yaron Brook draw on Atlas Shrugged to illuminate a crucial difference between two opposite kinds of businessmen in our economy:

The producers, such as Hank Rearden [a character in Atlas Shrugged], inventor of a new metal stronger and cheaper than steel, work tirelessly to create products that improve human life. The looters are basically pseudobusinessmen, like the incompetent steel executive Orren Boyle, who get unearned riches by getting special favors from politicians. Their business isn’t business, but political pull.

The CSM titled the piece “Apple vs. GM: Ayn Rand knew the difference. Do you?” It’s a good oped that sheds light on how government intervention in the economy distorts the behavior of businessmen.

Read the whole thing.

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Last week I spoke at the 13th annual Energy & Environment Conference and Expo in Phoenix. This is one the largest events in the U.S. devoted to energy and environmental issues, with over 650 speakers and more than 2300 attendees.

Marketing slogan: “650 speakers tackle solutions for USA’s energy independence and reducing carbon emissions.” Well, make that 649, because the gist of my presentation was to argue against the “solutions” that every other speaker had to offer.

As I told the audience attending my panel session, I was there to make the case for not doing anything about climate change—or, more specifically, for not imposing a massive regime of government controls, regulations, or market interventions aimed at restricting greenhouse gases in the name of allegedly fighting climate change.

Mine was definitely the most controversial talk on my panel session. I was even attacked as a “denier” by one of my co-panelists, the executive director of the American Solar Energy Society. But there were a number of people in the audience who came up afterwards to thank me for presenting a contrarian view that they felt was badly needed at this conference.

Read the rest of this entry »

He increased government spending to historic highs. He poured vast amounts of money into a half-baked scheme to “stimulate” the economy. He bailed out failed companies. He expanded government control over medicine. He denounced “corporate greed” and saddled businessmen with crippling regulations and controls.

No, I’m not talking about President Obama. Read the rest of this entry »

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg doesn’t like the amount of salt that Americans consume—and therefore he wants to force us to consume less. The newly launched National Salt Reduction Initiative seeks to reduce Americans’ consumption of salt by 20 percent over the next five years. The program is described as “a coalition of cities, states and health organizations working to help food manufacturers and restaurants voluntarily reduce the amount of salt in their products.” This coalition will set reduced sodium targets in a broad array of foods, and businesses who sign on will pledge to meet those goals.

Seems harmless, right? After all, too much salt is supposedly unhealthy and, if you disagree with the goals of the program, well, it’s voluntary. Except that “voluntary” government programs are anything but. Just as the trans fat ban Mayor Bloomberg instituted in 2008 was preceded by a call for restaurants to “voluntarily” eliminate the lipid from their kitchens, so the National Salt Reduction Initiative is a warning shot for food producers and restaurant owners to reduce salt levels . . . or else.

Read the rest of this entry »

The Wall Street Journal had an interesting article recently reporting on, of all things, the question of whether horse-teeth floating—the filing down of horses’ teeth to maintain their oral health—should be subject to government regulation. According to the Journal, the Texas board of veterinary medicine has been aggressively lobbying the state to take action against those who float teeth without a veterinary license, and has ordered two dozen such floaters to cease and desist. Four of these floaters have responded with a lawsuit, arguing the cease-and-desist orders violate their rights under the Texas constitution.

This case raises the issue of government licensing in general, which has been rapidly expanding over the past half-century. The Institute for Justice, which is backing the floaters in their lawsuit, reports that the number of American workers subject to such government oversight has increased from 3 to 35 percent in the past 50 years. Licensing laws are a critical point of entry for government intrusion into individual lives, with everyone from real estate agents to hairdressers (!) being forced to obtain government permission to make their living.

People often view licensing as a necessary safeguard against unqualified practitioners of a trade. But there’s an important distinction between government licensing and private certification. Private agencies exist in many fields, from interior design to bookkeeping, that offer certification assuring a level of professional competence. There is no reason why, on a free market, customers would have difficulty obtaining an independent assessment of a given practitioner’s qualifications and skill. Indeed, there are often multiple private certifying bodies competing with one another to offer the best guarantee of excellence. And companies such as Consumer Reports and Angie’s List offer advice on a huge variety of products and services.

But such agencies merely offer their expert opinion, they don’t have any power to force their judgment on anyone. Read the rest of this entry »

In my last post, I commented on how government central planning, being subject to shifting political agendas, makes long-range economic decision-making impossible. It’s worth looking at other examples of the chaos and market distortions that government intervention causes.

Consider the government’s support for alternative fuel vehicles, which—like the solar power plants in the Mojave desert—is driven purely by green ideology. It currently doesn’t make any technological or economic sense to try to replace the petroleum-powered internal combustion engine with currently existing alternative fuel technologies. (Just as it currently doesn’t make any sense to try to replace fossil-fueled or nuclear-powered electricity with solar or wind.) Nevertheless, the government is determined to do so.

In 2003, the Bush administration launched a 1.5 billion dollar initiative to subsidize the development of hydrogen cars—cars that use hydrogen instead of gasoline as their source of energy, producing water as their only emission.

Now, there are all kinds of reasons why hydrogen cars would never make it today on a free market. Critics cite legitimate safety concerns, the high cost of hydrogen fuel cell technologies, and the need for a huge, nationwide build-out of hydrogen refueling stations. Read the rest of this entry »