On Basic Standards of Human Existence
A society is only as good as how it treats those with the least power, but raising the floor also raises the ceiling when it's universal.
Dear Friends,
We live in the most technologically and economically advanced society the world has ever seen, where communication is nearly instant across the globe. Open skies policies, except when interrupted by war, allow for more public diplomacy than ever before.
Such wonders of the modern age would astound and amaze Thomas Jefferson, whose interest in scientific advance and societal change inspired the drafting of the Declaration of Independence.
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal…”
The equal dignity of all human beings, regardless of where they are born or who they are born to, is even more fundamental to liberty than the Constitution. The Constitution is the how, but the Declaration is the why.
Libertarians believe that all individuals should be protected from government interference with their lives, their liberty, and their pursuit of happiness.
When gangs of people interfere in the pursuit of happiness under the color of law, perhaps by criminalizing their personal life choices, all Americans should stand up for the equal liberty of disfavored minorities.
A good focus for policy change is to raise the floor of human existance for people in the United States. We have made great strides in food security, but housing in our country is turning into a war between those who want to see their real estate investments grow and those who want to have a place to live that they can afford.
We don’t have starvation anymore in America because we want to live in a country where no person starves. Are Americans ready to decide that we want to live in a country where no person is unhoused?
When everyone has a safe place to store their belongings, to sleep at night, to have privacy and security, we will get closer to the country where every person would sleep under their own “fig tree and vine, and none shall make them afraid.”
We need a national commitment to end homelessness, not through economically disastrous rent control policies, but by direct cash transfers to unhoused Americans to give them a safe place to live.
The shining city on a hill shouldn’t have people sleeping on its streets.
Yours truly,
Nick
P.S. There is a lot of good debate on how to best guarantee housing, but the most economically efficient is a universal basic income.