Freedom, Society, and State - Ludwig von Mises Institute

wr itt en, " The consis ten c y 0 f rna r ketchoi c e i sachie ve d
Wittlout the overruling of minority values as would be
in the case if ordinary political voting were made consistent.
Therefore, in a very real sense, market decisions
are comparable to political decisions only when
unanimity is present."(76)
The inefficiency of democracy relative to the market
is widely acknOWledged even by democrats. The obvious
question is why not dispense with democracy and
rely entirely on the market? The usual response is that
in many cases those affected by an exchange are not the
sam e a s thoset ran sac tin g the ex chan g e • Co 1 I e c t i ve
goods are goods whose benefits cannot be restricted to
the transacting parties, but ttspillover," gratis as it
wer,e, onto third parties. Since individuals will reap
the benefits of the collective good regardless of
whether they pay the costs, there is no incentive to
pay. But if everyone thinks this way, no one will pay.
Thus, if payments were voluntary, the collective good
would not be provided at all, or at only a suboptimal
level. Coercion, i.e., government, is required to
overcome the "free rider" problem.
The real choice, according to the democrat, is
not between permitting each individual to purchase his
optimal qua n tit Y 0 fag00d 0 r s e r vice ,andimposing 0 n
the e n t ire soc i e t y a pa r ticu 1a r qua ntit Y t hat i s nonopt
imal for all but the median voter. Rather, it is a
choice between providing a good, albeit at a nonoptimal
level for most, and not providing it at all. Since
everyone is assumed to desire at least some quantity of
the good, a nonoptimal supply is better than none at
all.(77)
In response, the anarchist argues that the number
of collective goods is exaggerated and that nearly all
goo d sea n be b r 0 ken down i n t 0 rna r gina I un its and sol d
onth e mar k e t. And for tho s e goods t hat ar e act ua I I Y
collective, effective noncoercive means can be found
for their provision.
With this in mind we can now examine the specifics
of the anarachists paradigm.
263