My father was something of a libertarian. We were once talking about illegal drugs and he said, "Why should we stop anyone from eating rat poison or banging their head against a wall?" Fair enough. Yesterday my gal and I were driving around Los Angeles when we passed an electronic billboard reading, "Click it or Ticket." I got to thinking. First of all, why not a message like "Have a nice day" or "LA, We Love It!" Why is the default always some sort of Big Brother warning? Then I began thinking why on earth are the police able to profit from a person's decisions? Personally, I would never drive a car without buckling up. When did that stop being my choice? There's also a certain amount of cynicism in California's mandatory seatbelt law, for if they were really concerned about safety, the State would mandate roll cages, helmets and five-point harnesses, reducing the California's annual 4000+ motoring death rate to almost zero. Or, taken a bit further, if I want to, why can't I purchase a vehicle without 20 airbags, ABS, electronic interference and (gulp) seatbelts? Free market? Or am I just nuts?
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I tend to agree. There is the argument that not using seatbelts raises all our insurance rates, but I tend to think personal freedom is worth it, just as I feel personal freedom is worth not having a full body cavity search at the airport, just in case someone is smuggling a bomb up their butt.
I’ve been saying this to anyone who will listen to me for years! I get my way in the summer with my motorcycle.. but for icy days a 4 wheeled car with a roof would be nice. The only way around it here in pa is buying a kit car (which may still require a seat belt) or buying something built before seatbelts. I’m looking for a 50’s rambler! Great miliage, seatbelts were (mostly) optional, and you could probably pick one up.. literaly
You can purchase a vehicle like that. It just won’t be one built since the late 1960s. I love old cars, but they sure seem like deathtraps. No seatbelts, no padded dash, no collapsible steering column, lousy brakes, bias-ply tires…
I was raised to wear seatbelts. It weirds me out that there are people who don’t want to wear them. That said, I am a cranky libertarian enough that I don’t like mandatory seat belt laws.
no!
I’m with John Stuart Mills on this one:
“The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others.”
Sure, you could consider it economic harm to society if the person is injured, but I’d think he’d need a special insurance package to cover him for not wearing his belt so if he paid for it, who cares? In the long run I think we’re better off with natural selection. Let people buy an unsafe car if that’s what they want! Myself, I’m sticking with 4 stars as the minimum.
Yes, there should be a law making it illegal to mandate anything and everyone should have to abide by it. See how stupid that is?
I’m so free to do anything I want, when I want and how I want! Except for the fact that I was born into society, grew up in society and am a memeber of society.
Seatbelts are mandatory up here in Canada, and I was raised with them, so It doesn’t bother me to always put it on.
I’m all for added safety features, but I don’t feel that it’s the governments job to enforce me using them.
I want a stripper (car) with out any of the extra stuff weighing me down. With a nimbler car that stops/turns on a dime, I should be able to avoid the crash in the first place!
I think one should be allowed to forgo seat belts (car) and helmets (motorcycle), but must be an organ donor to do so.
There’s a happy medium.
Something as fundamental as seatbelt use should be mandatory. I hate rules as much as anyone, but Click-it-or-ticket is a good one. Prevents a lot of Darwinian deaths.
On the other hand, safety equipment has gotten out of hand. Give me front and side airbags, 4-channel ABS, and 4-star protection all-around (with corresponding weight loss), and I’ll be happy.
I had a buddy in college who refused to wear his seatbelt. Interestingly, he was also a scaredy-cat who would death-grip the oh-sht handles at 6/10ths driving (such driving usually caused him to put on his belt). Thought that was a weird dichotomy.
Nothing IS mandatory, people in positions of authority just impose additional penalties for decisions they don’t like. Hopefully, they do so because they believe in is for the greater good. Often, they are right.
Here’s the flip side… All of the mandatory safety equipment and standards accomplish two negatives in today’s car market:
1. They add weight. This reduces MPG.
2. They keep a lot of really good, high MPG cars out of the US market.
Drivers owe each other a few things, such as basic courtesy and a modicum of car control.
Seat belts help a driver to maintain car control. If you are flopping around the interior like a rag doll, your hands aren’t on the wheel and you aren’t planted in the seat where you belong. That means you are less likely to be steering and using the other controls that might save some lives and property. That harms me, and I am owed that much.
Drivers need to learn that while they are free to travel where and when they wish, they are not free to be completely oblivious to the needs of their fellow members of society while they are doing it. That means that you should choose the appropriate lane, appreciate that I shouldn’t need a psychic to predict your lane changes, and wisely choose a speed that is slotted somewhere in between the pace of a drunken snail and the latest land speed record. And yes, that includes using the belt.
(Hopefully, that also means keeping both hands on the wheel, and keeping the lattes at Starbucks where they belong, but I can’t force anyone to do that.)
It would be fine not to have anything mandatory, but there is huge however.
Been USA what it is, I really think it is not fare for tax payers to pay for life benefits for disable person, who happens to fly thru windshield because he or she did not feel like buckle up. Same can be apply for motorcycle helmets. If it was not for law suits, and disability payments, I would agree with you regarding too much control from Big Brother. Until people will take personal responsibility more seriously, let it be.
Then there is the argument among some economists that safety equipment causes people to be more careless drivers, as it reduces the cost of carelessness. Perhaps better to increase the cost of recklessness. To quote someone (I forget who), the best piece of safety equipment would be a sharp spike emerging from the steering column, pointing at the driver’s heart.
I like that were I live cops are not to hard most of the the time. Drinking and driving (sometimes), no seatbelts, no registration, tinted windows , not license, parking overnight etc etc…They are ok with it a lot of the time.
I see big brother as a humanitarian angry needy co-dependant. Sad, sad people, that I feel angry about often enough. It could be worse though. Also I am slowing working my way up to doing something about big brother. I can’t do it alone though. Sharing here is part of the process of change though.
Absolutely not. “Demolition Man” was an entertaining movie, but it’s becoming reality. Safety recommendations are all we need.
Here in Canada where we have universal health care, so the cost of stupidity and recklessness is spread across the whole of society. Under such circumstances, society tries to limit its damages by implementing rules that supposedly restrict your chances of becoming injured. It’s kind of like putting a curfew on your teens to keep them out of trouble. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t.
seoultrain- that doesn’t seem very happy medium to me.
Pch101- I don’t think any normal driving conditions will cause you to rag doll around in a car.. now if you are trying to safly drive at 200 mph on a back road then i see your point
Then there is the argument among some economists that safety equipment causes people to be more careless drivers, as it reduces the cost of carelessness.
It’s a poor argument. We have decades of accident data that shows that safety equipment saves lives, and reduces injury and collision rates. Facts trump theory every time.
I do not want to entrust my life to someone else’s ability to pump brakes or to handle a car in a spin. I want that risk factor that is imposed upon me by others to be reduced. I certainly don’t want to pay for someone else’s mistakes.
Do You Like Mandatory Anything?
I’m going to take it that a reply needn’t be narrowly auto related – though I’ll try to work in something about cars.
Libertarians always strike me as sophmoric. Hope I’m not offending anyone. It’s a philosophy that can be summed as this way – “You’re not the boss of me!” Or more accurately “You shouldn’t be the boss of me!”.
It’s not the Libertarians are always wrong (nobody bats 1000) it’s just that they always want to take things to extremes. Many times, if you bring up the right examples, Libertarians might agree with some regulation.
As a matter of law and public policy should racial discrimination be allowed in employment or housing? Hey, it’s your company. It’s your appartment building. Shouldn’t you be able to do exactly as you like?
Should we really let people smoke crack if that’s what they want to do? Should we really take the junkies expressed preferences at face value? Is this really the life they want? Or do we know there is a better life if we can prevent them from becoming addicts. (Whether or not our drug laws actually deter anyone is another matter altogether).
How much laxity can we really live with? Can you play your stereo as loud as you want, or do I have some right to peaceful enjoyment of my property? Do we need a regulation here?
It seems self-evident to me that we need plenty of regulation in life. Do we go overboard at times? Sure. But then, there’s that old saying – Don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater.
I can go along with no helmet on a cycle. It’s your head, crack it if you like. If you fall you no longer have control anyway, and if I can’t avoid running over your head, it really makes little difference to me whether you’ve got a helmet on or not.
I have to agree with PCH on belts though – you owe me some sort of responsible safe driving to minimize danger to me. Belted in, you have at least a chance of controlling your car.
One more thing. Over memorial day weekend we had a family party near a lake. I rented a boat. I served several years in the Coast Guard and wouldn’t dream of being in any boat, on any body of water w/o a life jacket. My neice, 18, didn’t want to wear one. Ok. Her decission. It was a stupid decission, but it was her’s to make.
I don’t think any normal driving conditions will cause you to rag doll around in a car.
They will if you are involved in an accident.
One of the main purposes of a seat belt is to give the driver as much control as possible if involved in an accident. Since most accidents aren’t scheduled, wearing the belt keeps you prepared in the event that it happens. Particularly during a low- to moderate-speed crash when you may be able to steer and brake around it, this element of control enhances the safety of those around the driver.
Seat belts save us money, insurance, medical, lost productivity. AND think of the families being protected from the psychological and fiscal damage of have one or both parents injured or killed.
IF one is not wearing a seat belt (manditory or not) that person should bear the cost of injuries that were caused by an accident, no matter who is at fault.
I’ve never understood the anti seatbelt crowd. Seems pretty stupid not to wear one, I can’t really think of a down side to wearing one.
I can at least understand the motorcycle rider wanting the wind in their hair (or on their scalp) but even there it seems like the right thing to do.
For accidents and acute illness we have universal health care in the US also.
If you are acutely ill or injured in an accident you are cared for regardless of your ability to pay.
Insurance if you have it.
Your assets, higher than required hospital charges (to cover unreimbursed costs) and tax subsidies to hospitals help cover any uninsured costs of care.
You can’t opt out of this coverage (show up in an ER and you will be taken care of) so please use your seat belt as a courtesy to the rest of us.
It would be great if government mandated seatbelts for the reasons PCH outlined, and we all went along.
Instead, at least in Texas, government mandated seatbelts because they didn’t want to pay the bills for increased costs after accidents. In other words, because the voters couldn’t stomach the idea that people might have to go without healthcare, they made a rule restricting everyone’s liberties and taxing them all. Okay, maybe the seatbelt law is a good compromise on that, but I liked it better when people had to get charity for bad fortune. That way, they weren’t entitled, and we at least got some benefit for taking care of them.
Once we decide that we don’t owe everyone food, lodging, healthcare, a tv, and a car, we might be able to go back and get rid of a lot of the mandates.
Frantz – care to elaborate? I admit my post was a bit vague, but what I’m willing to compromise is surely not the same as everyone, which is why I personalized it. My point was that few people will want no safety features and few will want/need 20 levels of electronic nannies.
1981.911.SC – I think people want that sense of freedom, pretty similar in principle to riding a motorcycle without a helmet (but much smaller in magnitude). They get some sort of sense of superiority over the masses, who are buckled and constrained. I’m sure there’s a lot of psycho-babble that could explain it better.
Here’s the flip side… All of the mandatory safety equipment and standards accomplish two negatives in today’s car market:
1. They add weight. This reduces MPG.
2. They keep a lot of really good, high MPG cars out of the US market.
With tongue mostly (but not completely depending on my mood and how many idiots I see on the road) in cheek, I would add that we’re allowing too many very stupid people to survive long enough to produce even more stupid people who are even stupider.
Do I like mandatory – no.
Am I glad certain things are mandatory – yes.
I’m glad 99.9% of people stop at red traffic lights, I’m glad 99.9% of people on the road have passed a driving test,
I’m glad we’re driving cars that aren’t engineered like Ford Pintos.
So we sacrifice a modicum of personal freedom – I think it’s a price worth paying.
Also, show me a parent who wouldn’t prefer to see their offspring seat-belted or crash helmeted…
Dynamic88: “Libertarians always strike me as sophmoric. Hope I’m not offending anyone.”
That may be the most (unintentionally?) hilarious comment yet seen on these boards. While it is difficult to take seriously an argument prefaced thusly, I will nevertheless respond.
The libertarian philosophy is not ‘you’re not the boss of me’. Rather, it is ‘each individual is best able to determine what is in his or her best interest and will therefore be allowed to pursue that to the extent that it does not infringe on the rights of others’. Sentiments like those expressed by Dynamic88 (among others) are derived from the belief that government (or some other authority) is best able to determine what is in each individual’s best interest. This is, in my mind, the ultimate condescension.
I consider myself libertarian in many respects. To answer your the questions posed above: yes, one should be able to discriminate in any way one wishes with regards to one’s property. Information regarding such discrimination would of course be disseminated by word of mouth and the media, and the free market would take care of such bigots. Yes, people should be free to use whatever drugs they wish. I absolutely agree that drug use is incredibly stupid based on what I value in life; if your values differ feel free to ruin your life. Again, employers are free to administer drug tests as a condition of employment. No, you may not play your stereo as loud as you wish as of course this infringes on the rights of others.
With regards to the seat belt laws, I do see some merit to the argument that one may have less control of one’s vehicle in a crash when not using a seatbelt. However, in the event of a crash severe enough that a seatbelt is required to keep a driver in place, will that driver actually be able to exercise any control of his or her car? I tend to doubt it. Further, can we then agree that (at least once government involvement in the insurance domain is removed) adult passengers are free to forgo use of a seatbelt?
What are the odds that many of the people who think we should have mandatory “things” would be horrified if I were allowed to dictate to them?
How would you feel if my personal desires were allowed to dictate the color of your home (because it affects land values) the type of car you drive, the type of foods you eat, the movies you see, what alcohol you’re allowed to drink, etc, etc, etc….
It’s very easy to claim that people have to be told what to do for “everyone’s” benefit if you don’t realize that not everyone shares your idea of what constitutes a benefit.
Let’s take seatbelts, for example. I don’t think that the safety gains and cost reductions we get are worth the sense of entitlement those laws give a government.
You may think that’s ridiculous, but the point isn’t whether I’m ridiculous or not- the point is that you’ve blithely decided that everyone should follow your dictates without any regard for whether or not they share your perspective.
I’m not happy with that, and I wish we leaned more towards freedom of choice than free checking.
Pch101:
It’s a poor argument. We have decades of accident data that shows that safety equipment saves lives, and reduces injury and collision rates. Facts trump theory every time.
All collisions? Steven Landsburg, economist from the U or Rochester, has opined that collisions have increased but injuries/fatalities have decreased due to safety advances. (This is all per vehicle miles driven).
It sounds intuitively correct to me. And maybe fewer injuries deaths is worth the trade-off of more minor accidents. But the More-Safety-At-Any-Cost crowd isn’t really known for rational cost/benefit analysis.
Note that Landsburg has also stated that driver behavior would vastly improve if airbags were replaced with exploding spikes. He’s got a point – but it wouldn’t be worth the carnage.
All collisions? Steven Landsburg, economist from the U or Rochester, has opined that collisions have increased but injuries/fatalities have decreased due to safety advances. (This is all per vehicle miles driven).
John Kenneth Galbraith once remarked that economists offer their opinion not because they know, but because they are asked. Does Landsburg have any evidence to back this opinion?
I’ll agree that injuries/fatalities are down due to saftey advances. (We seem to agree then that the equipment works) but I seriously doubt if people are being more reckless because the safety equipment is now standard.
I’ll make the argument FOR mandatory driving behaviors.
First, if the mandatory behavior is not hardwired into the car, you can always choose to break the rules. You simply face the risk of discipline, usually in the form of a small fine.
Second, and most importantly, these rules give us (the responsible drivers) a host of built in defenses should we find ourselves in an accident, due to someone else’s negligence, in which someone was seriously injured. Take seatbelts. If you’re in an accident and the other driver goes through the windshield because they weren’t wearing their seatbelt, it’s not your fault – they should have been wearing their seatbelt. If there were no rule requiring the use of seatbelts the situation would be much more murky.
Net net, I think having rules like this in place gains me much more than it costs me.
seoultrain- sure thing. I don’t have a problem with the options you said you wanted all your cars to have.. but i don’t think they should be more than options. As a biker I’m used to the dangers of an accident and you can bet your @$$ I’m far more careful on a motorcycle than I am in a car. Just like i’m alot more careful in my 66 rambler with 4 wheel drums than my 96 jeep with abs. Maybe I’m smarter at driving than some people are when it comes to knowing my vehicles limits for sanity, but why should i be forced to have any airbags or even abs if i want not too? I hate laws that protect against my stupidity. The idea of letting people get hurt is cruel, but I’d rather take that than risk losing my freedom. I’m not talking super extreamist things like owning a nuke reactor in my basement, but airbags are not my thing. Sorry for the rant
No. That is why I’m voting for Ron Paul. Whether he’s on the ballot or not.
Steven Landsburg, economist from the U or Rochester, has opined that collisions have increased but injuries/fatalities have decreased due to safety advances. (This is all per vehicle miles driven).
I guess that Dr. Landsburg was too busy writing up fallacious reports to spend five minutes with Google to look up the data.
Here’s some data from NHTSA:
Year / No. of collisions / Vehicle miles traveled (billions)
1995 / 6,699,000 / 2,423
1996 / 6,770,000 / 2,486
1997 / 6,624,000 / 2,562
1998 / 6,335,000 / 2,632
1999 / 6,279,000 / 2,691
2000 / 6,394,000 / 2,747
2001 / 6,323,000 / 2,797
2002 / 6,316,000 / 2,856
2003 / 6,328,000 / 2,890
2004 / 6,181,000 / 2,965
2005 / 6,159,000 / 2,990
If we crunch those numbers, we can see that during that period, the number of collisions declined by 8%, while vehicle miles traveled increased 23.4%. So when measured on the basis of accidents per the number of miles traveled, the collision rate fell by 25.5% during that eleven-year period.
His thesis appears to have no merit at all. He would have to prove that the accident rate would have fallen even more than that without the safety equipment. I seriously doubt that he has anything but mere fancy to defend that position.
At some point in time society must keep the idiots from screwing things up for the rest of us. On one hand I’ve always worn seatbelts. I don’t get it. They can throw you off an airliner for not wearing your seatbelt. Why not cars? If you, not wearing your seatbelt, get thrown from your car in an accident and it drives up MY insurance rates because your medical coverage ran out, where the fairness in that?. Same thing with motorcyclists and helmets. Here in Florida when they rescinded the helmets laws the only stipulation was that one had to carry $10,000 worth of medical coverage. Come on, how far is that $10,000 going to go when your head smacks the pavement and you are rendered a vegetable. And how much are MY premiums going to go up? Incidentally, motorcycle fatalities are up since the helmet law was rescinded. Granted there are more bikes on the road now as everyone has to have a Harley even though they can barely ride a bicycle. The fataility rate for those not wearing helmets is way higher than those who do. I think when government steps in and requires things like helmet and seatbelt usage they are doing that “promote the general welfare” thing…the verb, not the noun.
I wear seatbelts, but I have yet to own a car equipped with airbags. Driving defensively means that you dont put a car into a spot where some idiot can pile into you. Hell, I stop at intersections when I have a green light if my view of the intersection is obstructed.
NO!!!
Gregzilla :
June 2nd, 2008 at 7:25 pm
At some point in time society must keep the idiots from screwing things up for the rest of us…. If you, not wearing your seatbelt, get thrown from your car in an accident and it drives up MY insurance rates because your medical coverage ran out…
YOUR rates?
How much money have you cost me in mandatory safety options and fuel costs?
Since your big argument is based on how much money other people cost you, I demand that you quit forcing me to buy expoensive and heavy safety items.
After all- how much money you cost me is the important issue here, right?
By the way- your insurance premiums are driven by the stock market, not claims. That’s why premiums dropped after Katrina and they’ll be going up this year.
thebigmass rightly said that the libertarian philosophy is based on the idea that ‘each individual is best able to determine what is in his or her best interest and will therefore be allowed to pursue that to the extent that it does not infringe on the rights of others’.
Which is fine, and would be a fine philosophy if each individual *were* best able to determine what is in her or her best interests and act accordingly. But they aren’t.
How do I know that?
Because people ride motorcycles without wearing helmets!! What better evidence could you ask for that people don’t always act in their own best interests?
At the same time, we have to admit that the fact that people aren’t always the best ones to determine how they should act doesn’t mean that the law should always be there to step in.
Sometimes the social cost of enforcing a law is greater than the ill it’s meant to prevent, and when that’s the case, you shouldn’t have the law. So says H.L.A. Hart (someone else quoted Mill, so I get to refer to Hart).
So how is it with helmet laws and seatbelt laws? Well, given that they don’t seem to work too hard to enforce these laws in most places, and yet, the laws still seem to convince some of us who otherwise wouldn’t to wear helmets or seatbelts, I think those laws are in pretty good shape.
So there.
I think the libertarian philosophy is based partly on the notion common to economic theory that consumers always have perfect information and always work to maximize their utility. (Are you maximizing your utility yet?). In fact, it is increasingly recognized among economists that consumers never have perfect info, and economic psychologists are showing that most people don’t even know how to maximize their utility (see Stumbling Towards Happiness, by Daniel Gilbert).
I would still say that in most cases where an individual’s bad choices have minimal impact on society, the individual should be free to make bad choices. But not where those choices harm society.
Of course, we can probably then argue long and loudly over what constitutes harm to society. There are rarely easy answers. But this is the kind of thing that makes the posts on this website so interesting.
Dynamic,
Please don’t quote Galbraith. That guy has been proven to be wrong more often than a broken watch. He is the poster child of the ivory tower idiots of North America. I would put much more faith in your thoughts than his, anyday.
It’s not the Libertarians are always wrong (nobody bats 1000) it’s just that they always want to take things to extremes. Many times, if you bring up the right examples, Libertarians might agree with some regulation.
As a matter of law and public policy should racial discrimination be allowed in employment or housing? Hey, it’s your company. It’s your appartment building. Shouldn’t you be able to do exactly as you like?
Should we really let people smoke crack if that’s what they want to do? Should we really take the junkies expressed preferences at face value? Is this really the life they want? Or do we know there is a better life if we can prevent them from becoming addicts. (Whether or not our drug laws actually deter anyone is another matter altogether).
How much laxity can we really live with? Can you play your stereo as loud as you want, or do I have some right to peaceful enjoyment of my property? Do we need a regulation here?
It seems self-evident to me that we need plenty of regulation in life. Do we go overboard at times? Sure. But then, there’s that old saying – Don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater.
Dynamic88, not to pick on you, but maybe you should read this wikipedia link: Logical Fallacies , then go back and read your post.
Specifically, you pigeonhole libertarians as something they’re not, then attack that false image of libertarians you’ve build up. It’s called the Straw Man fallacy. I’m not sure if you’re doing it on purpose, and that method does rile people up, but it’s a dishonest argument. Demagogues, like talk radio commentators, do this all the time. Are you a demagogue?
Anyways, to contribute to the discussion, I think the government should get rid of laws to protect the stupid from themselves, and let natural selection do the rest. This way, the best genes survive. For example, helmets on motorcyclists. If you want to be an idiot and not wear your helmet, be my guest – you should be free to make that decision.
But I’m open to discussion. Someone, please tell me why I’m wrong.
Is it just me, or has TTAC gotten way too political the last 2 days? Between this article and the Ford credit story turning into a gay issue, it’s a little more than I bargained for when I clicked the TTAC icon in my link bar.
What is nice is that the discussion seems to be pretty intelligent and rational.
I think that forcing people to wear their seatbelt can certainly be seen as “preventing harm to others”. When I was learning to drive, my dad made the point that if you get into an accident you may be able to keep control of the car if the seatbelt is holding you in place. You won’t be able to keep control if you’re knocked out and thrown into the back seat because you were unbleted. Besides, I personally don’t see how anyone can be comfortable driving without being buckled in.
Now that a triple overtime hockey game has me wide awake I suppose I’ll respond to some of these posts.
First: blau, your assertion is that the fact that some people don’t wear motorcycle helmets (while riding a motorcycle) is prima facie evidence that many people do not act in their own best interest. The fallacy in this is that you are imputing your values to all people. Some people evidently value whatever sense of freedom they feel from riding sans helmet more than they do their life and health. I agree that this is foolish, but it is not my decision to make. There are many instances in which people do not act in their best interest. Have you ever seen a morbidly obese individual eating a Big Mac and french fries? Is this not self-destructive behavior? I myself have 4 partially torn ligaments in my knees as well as torn cartilage in each (I have had an ACL reconstruction so I know well the pain of surgery) and yet I play hockey twice weekly. Is this self-destructive? I am close with someone who suffers from severe depression yet refuses to see a counselor or take medications. He writes poetry and music and his art thrives (or so he says) on his pain. Should any of these behaviors be regulated?
Gregzilla: Please do not flippantly bandy the General Welfare Clause. There is tremendous debate as to the actual meaning of those words and the powers they grant (James Madison tied them to the other enumerated powers while Alexander Hamilton held a more liberal view; the debate predates the ratification of the Constitution.)
David Holzman: I agree entirely that consumers rely on imperfect (or a dearth of) information when making their decisions. The alternative, however, is a cabal of politicians making decisions for everyone based not only on incomplete information but often on ulterior (or worse, sinister) motives. The idea that any of our three remaining presidential candidates or our fine congresspeople are well equipped to regulate the minutiae of daily life for a nation of 300 million is specious.
Landcrusher
Please don’t quote Galbraith. That guy has been proven to be wrong more often than a broken watch. He is the poster child of the ivory tower idiots of North America. I would put much more faith in your thoughts than his, anyday.
There isn’t any economist who hasn’t been proven wrong numerous times. The only purpose of the Galbraith quote was to emphasize that one should take everything economists say with a grain of salt.
Adonis
I’ll suggest you read the wiki article on Libertarianism.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarianism
I talk to Libertarians whenever I encounter them. I even used to lean towards the philosophy myself. They do frequently say things like “all drugs should be legal”. (I used to believe that myself) So, I don’t believe I’ve built up a strawman. IMO they don’t think hard enough about the effect of individual decissions on the whole society.
“… if I want to, why can’t I purchase a vehicle without 20 airbags, ABS, electronic interference and (gulp) seatbelts?”
You can. They call them “motorcycles.”
Even in the 1950s, one could not go down the drag strip without a seatbelt. Ergo…
Brownie made the best point so far for seatbelt laws. That it gives a person a reasonable defense in a lawsuit because the other person was doing something illegal (not wearing their seatbelt) and therefore more culpable for their injuries. But perhaps the real problem here is the ease at which people can sue each other. In a civil suit the burden of proof generally falls on the defendant. I have felt for a long time that this system needs to be overhauled.
As for legalizing drugs, if we put 1/100 of the money we spend in the so called “war on drugs” on education and rehab, and improving the social conditions that cause drug abuse, like poor schools, we would have a much smaller drug problem. In countries where drugs have been legalized, there has been no huge increase in addicts. The truth of the matter is, the “war on drugs” is big business. From weapons manufacturers all the way to the prison industry, there’s a lot of people making money off it. The idea of putting a drug user in jail instead of in rehab seems ridiculous until you realize that they have become a form of slave labor. Then it starts to make sense. http://www.proliberty.com/observer/20041205.htm
Campisi:
Actually some motorcycles now have ABS & Traction Control (ABS: I think the FJR and Goldwing can be purchased with ABS, and the new gixxr’s have traction control). I think the Goldwing has an airbag option.
All:
I am all for people being able to do what they want, as long as it doesn’t affect me. Unfortunately in an interdependent society this seems less & less possible without regulation.
People can drive without a seatbelt as long as they aren’t in MY insurance plane and MY Premiums don’t go up when they are critically injured.
People can ride without a helmet as long as they aren’t in MY insurance plan… (blah blah see above).
People can take out interest only sub-prime loans as long as MY TAX DOLLARS are not going to bail out the banks or the homeowners down the road.
We have all these bad choices by other people that we can’t control that affect us and have no say in, yet insurance industries are able to discriminate on items that we simply can’t control:
I have been refused health insurance because I wear hearing aides & hearing loss is a pre-existing condition! This is something I was born with and is not fixable!
My car insurance has gone up slightly because I’ve made about 6-7 claims in a 2 year period. ALL CLAIMS EXCEPT ONE were vandalism (keying) or people hitting my car/motorcycle while it was parked! Why should my insurance go up? I didn’t do anything wrong. I was threatened by the insurance company that if I made more claims they’d drop me!!!
The list goes on… The question becomes — where do you draw the line between personal freedom for an individual and the right for another unrelated individual to not be harmed?
So my personal outlook has been that most people are screw-ups and really don’t care about others. My plan is to move to away from people and have their bad choices affect me as little as possible.
I am currently in a large city (Chicago area), however I would love to move 50-60 miles out & commute in by train/bus/bike (or some combination).
Living in a rural area brings lower property prices & less instability in property prices.
Living in a rural area probably will allow me to have a house with a garage so that people can’t (easily) key or hit my car when it’s parked.
Living in a rural area will cost me alot in commuting time & $, but in my opinion is well worth it.
Living in a rural area generally brings less crime. (The bank around the corner from me was robbed 2x in a week about 2-3 weeks ago!)
I am all for people being able to do what they want, as long as it doesn’t affect me. Unfortunately in an interdependent society this seems less & less possible without regulation.
The inclination for libertarians is to argue that everything is acceptable just so long as it creates no harm to others. That’s a fair theory, but when applied to specific situations, it becomes clear that this is difficult to apply because the lines of demarcation among individuals are not clear.
In my mind, the seat belts are a no-brainer in favor of the mandate. You owe me your presence in that seat if you are going to pilot a vehicle, and that belt will undoubtedly help to keep you there. The inconvenience to you because of the mandate is effectively non-existent (if you have a psychological hangup about wearing a belt, that’s frankly your problem, not mine), so the scales tip heavily in favor of the law.
Motorcycle helmets are another issue. Helmets don’t help motorcyclists to ride any better. If anything, they may make their riding worse by limiting their visibility.
Imposing such laws based upon pooled insurance costs is a verrrrrry slippery slope that leaves plenty of room for abuse. For example, using that as a benchmark, I should have the right to force you to reduce your meat intake, eat more fiber and get more exercise, because your failure to do so costs me money in higher health care costs.
In the case of motorcycles, if the goal is for society’s dollar savings, then we would be better off keeping people off of motorcycles entirely, as the data suggests that safety enhancements are of little to no benefit to motorcyclists. While truck and passenger car fatality and injury rates are falling quickly, they are rising dramatically for those on the bikes, and are substantially higher than they for every other vehicle class. (The intrinsic lack of crumple space must have a lot to do with that.)
Using costs, revenues and profits to determine social justice is never a good idea. Freedoms and restrictions should be based upon balancing individual freedom and social responsibility, not on whether it purportedly makes or saves someone a buck to take a liberty away.
If cash is king, then I can assure you that it won’t take long before we have no freedoms at all, because practically everything can be forbidden on the basis of that argument. You can also bet that with that mentality, the fines and punishments meted out for failing to comply would be motivated by money, rather than justice.
Motorcycle helmets are another issue. Helmets don’t help motorcyclists to ride any better. If anything, they may make their riding worse by limiting their visibility.
Are you serious? Do you ride? I do. I’ve been riding for 7 years. I have a full face and a shorty helmet. NEITHER helmet restricts my vision in any way. I have been in a low speed crash with a helmet that saved me TONS of money because it put a ding in my helmet rather than my skull. I shudder to think what would have happened had I not been wearing the helmet. Does wearing a helmet make anyone a safer rider? I don’t know, but it can mean living to see another day.
In a high-speed crash, a helmet probably will not do much, just like a seatbelt/airbag combo probably won’t help you in a high-speed crash in a car. That is not what the safety features are designed for, they are designed to make low to medium speed (below 40-45mph) accidents survivable. You notice how even the non-government “watchdog” safety organizations don’t crash test above 40mph? It’s because crashes above that speed greatly increase the probability of serious injury/death.
IMO if someone doesn’t want to wear a helmet/seatbelt, they need to have their head examined. I agree with an earlier poster that given the lax enforcement of seatbelts (helmets are more diligently enforced and rightly so), it’s almost a non-issue. It’s mostly used as a reason to pull over suspicious characters to see if they are up to no good and add charges to drunk/reckless drivers (they infringe on your right to life, especially if they kill you in an accident).
WOW, is all I can say here! It simply amazes me to see so many grown men talk like a bunch of little children that believe it is their parents responsiblilty to make sure everything is right in the world for they after they F@#K Up!
Society does mandate some actions and behavior becuase it is in the overall best interst of our society at large. 99% percent of us are incapable of managing our lives after we suffer a major life changing injury. All this talk about, “I have insurance” is a bunch of BS! What you have is a policy with a private company that can go out of business and leave you high and dry. Yet you do live in a society were someone or something else is supposed to be there to step in and help your self-induced cripple a$$ wipe yourself when mutual of whatever decides to do a disappearing act.
Personally I have the right to NOT see your sorry a$$ get ejected through your windshield because YOU decided your too cool to wear your seatbeat. As a society we have a right to enact rules to protect us all. Notice that we do NOT triage non-seatbelt wearing accident victims in the emergency room! Maybe we should! Why allow fools to clog up our limited medical infrastructure with self inflicted injuries? Also the seatbelt law is meant to protect the OTHER passangers in the car! Front seat passangers have been crushed by unbelted drivers and vise versa. Pregnant women have lost babies because they were unbelted. Unbelted rear-seat passangers routinely kill front seat passangers in collisions. So how much auto insurance do you have??????
Same with motorccyle helmets, maybe the police, fire, and EMS services should just ignore helmetless motorcycle accident victims. Why should society devote resources to fools that would ride a 100hp motorcycle without at least a helmet! I am sure the majority of folks here would be highly offended if the county sent them a bill for cleaning their son’s or daughter’s brain off the highway!
So what about dependents of those people who are, to put it gently, not as risk averse? Do we just let them go on the streets to beg?
While there is much to admire in libertarian philosophy, it is often just a convenient disguise to pure selfishness or other ignoble motives. For example, following the dictum of “your rights end where mine begin”, a true libertarian might require people to pollute a big fat zero, since that is something that imposes costs on other people and violates their rights. No carbon credits or other nonsense, but an actual requirement to sequester the pollution you produce no matter what the cost. Government exists to handle the collective action problem of dealing with small injuries that affect many people but not individually enough to force action…
thebigmass:
the trouble with your response is that you’re claiming that a person’s values are to be inferred from their actions. if i don’t wear a helmet on my motorcycle, it means that i value my hair’s freedom more than my own physical safety. but isn’t it more likely that if i’m not wearing a helmet, it’s because i value my hair’s freedom as well as my own physical safety, but i just don’t take seriously the possibility that i might get in a crash?
imagine telling your average non-helmet-wearing motorcyclist that he is, for sure, no doubt about it, going to get in an accident on his bike on wednesday. do you think he’d bring his helmet on wednesday? or do you think he’d say, all along i’ve valued my hair’s freedom over my own physical safety, so why should i change now?
Think of seatbelt laws as just another rule of the road. You drive on the right side of the road, you stop at red lights, and you wear your seat belts when you are in a car.
For years I drove without seatbelts, untill I received a $75 ticket. From then on, using them was automatic.
One day, someone came across 6 lanes of trafic and hit me head on. The seatbelt law save my life and I consider the $75 fine my best investment.
also,
pch101 is absolutely right about the insurance argument slippery slope. not to mention, keeping my insurance premiums a little lower is a pretty poor motivation for wanting other people not to be maimed or killed in auto accidents. i can understand why insurance companies think that way, but i can’t understand why the rest of us would.
@ whatdoiknow1 – you lost me at “?????”, but thanks for speaking as a grown man.
I have a full face and a shorty helmet. NEITHER helmet restricts my vision in any way.
A study I saw referenced indicates that helmets reduce peripheral vision by about 3%. That’s not much, unless the guy who hits you who you didn’t see was in an area obscured by that 3%. I suppose that you can turn your head that much more to make up for it, but I’m guessing that there are a few instances when people don’t.
I’m not against motorcycle helmets. If I valued my life so little so as to sit atop a street bike, I’d probably wear a helmet, full body armor, a Michelin Man suit and a couple of Trojans to be as safe as possible.
What I’m questioning is whether helmets create enough benefit to the society that all of us benefit by requiring individual riders to wear them.
Based on the numbers, I’d say it’s debatable. The reason I say this is that statistics about motorcycle accidents are horrifying, and it is clear that helmet laws have failed to reverse them. Every year, the fatality and injury rates are increasing. While I wouldn’t blame the helmets per se, they clearly aren’t potent enough to do anything to reverse the numbers.
In other words, motorcycles are inherently dangerous in comparison to cars. The combination of speed and a lack of crush space make for a deadly and injurious result. Whether a helmet adds enough benefit to change this reality, I don’t know, but it obviously hasn’t been enough so far to lower the fatality statistics.
If society really cares about the toll, then the obvious answer would be to ban motorcycles, because helmets alone obviously don’t do very much. But as a free people, we have decided to accept the price and allow riders to choose whether they wish to roll the dice.
I can live with that. If I have to pay a few bucks to take care of some of those who are hurt, I can accept that price as part of the cost of living in a republic, where people are free to make choices without consulting with their spreadsheets and accountants.
The government tests whether there is a compelling governmental interest when regulating.
And lets face it – with regards to seatbelts and many other health and safety issues there is a compelling argument – it saves money
And it saves ME money
the less people that wind up needing emergency assistance, the less of my tax money is needed to pay emergency responders and medical professionals their salary
wear your helmets and leathers you squids, I don’t want to pay to wipe you off the road the next time you drop your bike.
blau:
I did indeed couch that argument poorly (it was quite late and I am no wordsmith even at my best). I should not have attributed the individuals’ action to a particular value. I don’t know why people ride/drive without helmet/seatbelt (foolishness would be my best guess). I’m not sure your hypothetical scenario is of value though. Given that information, would not your biker forgo riding his bike that day? Riding a motorcycle is inherently dangerous. I myself wouldn’t ride one. When deciding to ride a motorcycle, an individual has (likely unconsciously) decided that x amount of enjoyment on a bike is greater than y probability of being killed/injured. People are (rightly) allowed to make this decision because government does not have access to the information necessary to make such a determination. Why shouldn’t this freedom be extended to helmet use?
akatsuki:
I’m sure many people adhere to libertarian philosophy out of selfish reasons. But you are arguing that the government should spend money it has taken (under threat of force) from me (among others) to support a campaign (click it or ticket) that I do not support. Is that not selfish as well?
whatdoiknow1:
Wow. Just, wow. Perhaps you should hire an editor (and a therapist and tutor as well).
In 2006 there were nearly 6 million reported motor vehicle traffic accidents. I think mandatory safety laws and safety devices are in the public interest. Even if a driver or passenger doesn’t car we all pay for the injuries.
In general, I don’t like the government interfering with my choices unless they directly harm another person. Therefore, I do not like seat belt laws, helmet laws, etc. Other driving regulations like stopping at a red light, no right turns from the far left lane, etc. make perfect sense because they will harm the other drivers on the road, but if I get in an accident and my injuries are more sever because I wasn’t wearing a seat belt, that’s my problem. Of course, not only do I fully support the right of people to make dumb decisions like not wearing a helmet while riding, but I also believe those people should pay for their stupid decisions with no government interference on that end of the equation either.
Just For the record>
I am a motorcyclist with a crotch rocket (smallest one, 600cc). Before I rode a motorcycle I practiced wearing gear while on other peoples smaller bikes. I go with no less than a jacket (body armor, not just a leather thing), a helmet (full face snell + DOT), and gloves.
If I don’t have those pieces of equipment, I will not ride PERIOD. I also regularly wear armored boots & have just bought thick (1.2-1.4mm) leather pants. The only accidents I have been in were as follows
1) I signaled a right turn in no traffic (just one car several car lenghts behind me , and was in the left side of a 1 lane road with parallel parking spaces next to the lane. The person behind me, after I signalled CUT TO MY INSIDE ILLEGALLY THROUGH PARKING SPACES & cut me off and passed me in a little 12 year old econo-crapbox.
I STOPPIED (yay for good brakes) and flipped over the handlebars at sub 20mph, the back of the bike went vertical.
To this day I know the guy was so close passing me, I could have reached out & grabbed his door handle over my handlebars while I was going vertical/forward.
2) I was riding in December and hit some sand/salt/gravel and I lowsided.
In both cases I ended up sliding across the ground for several feet on concrete & I came out without a scratch.
Regarding helmet visibility>
Not having peripheral vision in a helmet is the absolutely wrong reason to not be wearing one! If you took an MSF course you would know this, as you have several safety zones measured in “seconds” with the longest one being 12 or 13 seconds out! You should ALWAYS know who is around you, where your escape routes are, etc when riding a motorcycle (and probably a scooter or bicycle as well). Also, many reports have been done (I believe the hurt report is one) about helmet vs non-helmet use & visibility being a factor in crashes. It simply is not a factor on people wearing helmets.
I missed a lot being out of town over the last few days.
I had to drop in and comment on the motorcycle helmet and libertarians.
On helmets, one could make an argument (thought it’s a bit of a stretch, that a cyclist without a helmet is a really big bullet when he gets hit in the face with flying debris and bike lodges itself in a car killing it’s occupants.
I would posit, though it’s just a guess, that if accident and fatality “rates” are increasing (rates is in quotes because I find the term gets applied liberally, rather than properly) it would be due to many more people than normal joining the ranks of riders late in life. I will always believe that folks that have ridden bikes on dirt tracks (usually a youth activity) and know better how to play at the edges of control will be less likely to fall prey to anything other than bad judggement.
Lastly, libertarians are no less diverse than so called “conservatives” and “liberals”. They are in fact quite diverse and so our generalizing is not likely doing them or the label good service.