Links to Consider, 11/12
Rob Henderson vs. libertarianism; Foreign Money Corrupting Higher Ed; at Harvard in particular; and higher ed is a big industry; Alice Evans on Economic Development
Last year, Rob Henderson wrote,
Highly educated and affluent people are more economically conservative and socially liberal. This doesn’t make sense.
The position is roughly that people shouldn’t have to adhere to norms and if/when they inevitably hurt themselves or others, then there should be no safety net available.
It’s a luxury belief.
The phrase “people shouldn’t have to adhere to norms” is doing a lot of work here. Does it mean that there should not be any social norms? Or does it just mean that there are social norms that should not be enforced using police, courts, and prisons?
I have a very conservative view of the social norms that people should adhere to. I am against using marijuana. I am also against getting drunk. My preferred pronoun is “grandpa.” I am even against using four-letter words.
But don’t tear up my libertarian membership card just yet. I didn’t say that there should be laws concerning these things.
I believe that marijuana legalization has gone poorly, because too many people took it as an endorsement of marijuana. I think that it was a terrible idea to pry open the door to legalization by using the expression “medical marijuana,” which is mostly an oxymoron. Generally speaking, from a health standpoint, the ratio of harm to benefit from marijuana is very high.
But the principle of not jailing people for doing things that cause no harm to others seems right. On the one hand, people should not have to adhere to norms if what you mean by “have to” is that policemen with guns make you adhere to norms. On the other hand, a lot of norms are good. I would like to see more people adhering to good norms.
The Network Contagion Research Institute reports,
Over the last decade, institutions of higher education across the United States of America received billions of dollars from foreign donors that were not reported to the U.S. Department of Education, as required.
They found that this money was associated with a decline in free speech norms and an increase in anti-semitism on campus.
Pointer from Bari Weiss, who writes,
At the very least, the NCRI’s findings may explain why university presidents, whose main job is fundraising, may have been so slow to respond in the wake of the October 7 massacre, and when they did, they for the most part released weak statements.
One thing I have a hard time believing is that these countries give nine- and ten-figure gifts to universities expecting nothing in return.
In a must-read related piece, Rachel Fish writes,
[In 2002] I learned that the Harvard Divinity School had recently accepted a gift of $2.5 million from then-president of the United Arab Emirates, Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan al-Nahyan, who was promoting anti-Americanism and antisemitism through his research think tank, the Zayed Center for Coordination and Follow-Up, where, among other things, they attempted to resurrect the blood libel of medieval Europe. Zayed’s think tank would sponsor the translation of antisemitic texts into Arabic and disseminate them throughout the Arab world.
Also, Rikki Schlott and Greg Lukianoff write,
Just for some perspective, the market size of the U.S. higher education industry is just over $1 trillion. That’s more than three times larger than the U.S. food and beverage industry and over two times the size of the U.S. electricity industry. . .
Meanwhile, the collective endowment of U.S. public and private nonprofit universities—which represents just one element of their total assets—sits at $932 billion, according to their 2021 reports. That’s nearly as much as all of Apple’s, Microsoft’s, and Amazon’s total assets. (Plus, you can add in higher education’s $711 billion in tangible assets.)
Alice Evans has written a tiny textbook on international development.
It synthesises the empirical literature on land reform, trade, industrial policy, institutions, authoritarianism, famine, climate breakdown, sovereign debt crises and gender.
From time to time I think I should write a tiny textbook on human interdependence.
substacks referenced above:
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Relatively easy exit was the genius of the U. S. federal system. People could leave town if the local government or social environment abused them. People didn’t need to cross an ocean or an international border. That is no longer the case. We have centralized domestic policy more than is good for us. People can still exit places like California or Portland, and they increasingly do.
They can’t get away from the small town social environment.
Here is the comment I posted on Rob's Substack:
You are confusing personal preference and morality with government policy positions. My stance comes from the view that competent adults should have the freedom to make their own decisions, even if others disapprove, as long as they don't infringe on the rights of others. I see drug use, gambling, and prostitution as victimless crimes that should be matters of personal liberty and should be legal..
While I refrain from these activities and would advocate that others avoid them, my personal preferences or moral views should not determine legality. The government oversteps its legitimate bounds when it regulates behaviors that don't violate the rights of others.
In the economic realm, I have similar views favoring personal freedom. Individuals should have the right to decide how to spend their money and manage their financial affairs free of government interference or overregulation. This fiscal freedom aligns with my socially liberal views on personal liberty.
In summary, while my personal choices are socially conservative, my policy views are both socially liberal (on personal freedoms) and fiscally conservative (on economic freedoms). I arrived at this position through my overarching belief in libertarian principles of limited government and maximal personal autonomy.