Steven Pinker says it's no coincidence that there are zero libertarian countries on Earth; social spending is a shared value, even if the truest libertarians protest it, as the free market has no way to provide for poor children, the elderly, and other members of society who cannot contribute to the marketplace. As countries develop, they naturally initiate social spending programs. That's why libertarianism is a marginal idea, rather than a universal value—and it's likely to stay that way.
Now there is an argument that Pinker and his Brain consistently miss the mark on one major point that I think has already emerged as a power player, and will almost certainly play the bigger role en route to 2030.
The market does have solutions to providing for infants and the elderly and the impoverished, and they've been there since we had a heartbeat and a spare dollar. The market solution is affluence, and the vector is family, friends, and community.
I think many notable economists that would protest that state lead social care has not only directly nurtured dependency, but also indirectly curbed our instinctive care for those in our kin and care. The tribe has gotten a little bit social loafy. Responsibility is too diffuse when it comes to taking care of our communities.
Regardless, parents with money drive market solutions toward children with problems, and children with money drive market solutions to parents with little economic value. Their value, substantial savings and experience aside, is the concern they curate from their economically agile children; thus why we see billion dollar industries springing up to house, entertain, medicate, and pamper the [select] elderly.
Pinker seems to miss this point regularly, and it does seem to scale up to the global level. We've spent centuries stifling our quiet altruistic instincts because we loudly champion our much stronger judgmental instincts. We've shat on anybody who tried to turn a buck helping people over and over while taking for granted that exploitation was the road to riches.
We've perennially insisted that people should help each other because they're good and that anybody who does it for glory or gain is evil.
Well wouldn't you believe it we went a millennia building castles on corpses and churches on lies and New York City on exploitation, and the boldest and brighter of every graduating class at every ivy league school have been shuttled off to Coca Cola and IBM while Johnny Dreadlocks dropped our and went poor feeding starving children.
Where I'm going with this is that everything changed in the 20th century, and the changes caught fire in the 21st. Lucrative Benevolence (Bastien, 2007) has proven to be a global force for good, and with all the same stigma and misunderstanding we've ever had the market has barreled forward making people wealthy all over the world by helping the poor all over the world!
Our interconnected global market has rocket powered our interconnected global information system and the hive has spoken boldly in favour or rewarding those who solve their problems.
People are getting rich left and right providing cheap housing, cheap cars, cheap telecommunications, accessible health care, protection, entertainment, shoes, and even drinking water.
We're in the seminal phase of this shift, against all efforts, and as we catch on and redirect our best and brightest to benevolence, the wave will cascade and spread like malaria lol.
The way of the near future is everybody competing to most effectively help people because that's where the money is.
It's a beautiful future and the market is an ally!
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