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Free Riders


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http://www.businessdictionary.com provided a straightforward definition of a free rider as a [p]arty that enjoys a benefit accruing from a collective effort, but contributes little or nothing to the effort.

Somewhat ironically, Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, even offers an entrée on The Free Rider Problem.

This question was submitted to and addressed in The Objectivist Newsletter: Vol. 3 No. 2   February, 1964 Intellectual Ammunition Department: What would be the proper method of financing the government in a fully free society?

Two excerpts from the response:

In a fully free society, taxation-or, to be exact, payment for governmental services-would be voluntary.

The question of how to implement the principle of voluntary government financing-how to determine the best means of applying it in practice-is a very complex one and belongs to the field of the philosophy of law.

This is a good example of a canned response. While she highlights several potential ‘how’, she also indicates that:

Any program of voluntary government financing is the last, not the first, step on the road to a free society—the last, not the first, reform to advocate.

“But,” they counter, “what about the free rider problem?” Never mind that a program of voluntary government financing is the last step on the road to a free society, not a precondition to one. This brings to mind a quip from “Faith and Force” from page 59 of Philosophy: Who Needs It:

Observe how noisily the modern intellectuals are seeking solutions for the problems—and how swiftly they blank out the existence of any theory or idea, past or present, that offers the lead to a solution.

Apparently, if a yet unanswered question which appears to undermine or stump those who claim to have knowledge is asked and goes unsatisfactorily answered, the method for deriving knowledge can also be inferred to be impugned.

Miss Rand addresses free riders in “This Is John Galt Speaking” bridging page 145 of For The New Intellectual, albeit from a different context:

"Your code divides mankind into two castes and commands them to live by opposite rules: those who may desire anything and those who may desire nothing, the chosen and the damned, the [free] riders and the carriers, the eaters and the eaten.

The free rider, in this context, counts on guilt derived from a moral code which cannot be practiced if accepted. Of course, if the free rider problem is something other than a gift of a type of government necessary for identifying and upholding individual rights, such an equivocation can be rather effective.

Edited by dream_weaver
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