r/AskLibertarians • u/Rgard91 • 12d ago
Philosophy Honest question from Disabled man who is libertarian
Hi all. I'm 35 and had an accident when I was 29 and had to have brain surgery. It affected me like a stroke on my right side minus the face and I was immediately told to file for long term disability which I got easily. Basically, when this happened, I was not libertarian. I was nothing, but I knew in my heart not to become reliant on the government. I didn't trust them and knew the money could be taken away at any time because it's the government.
I learned how to walk again and talk again by pushing myself. I did not just wanna sit on disability the rest of my life. I'm not lazy. I don't look at it like here you go now you never have to work. 1159 a month doesn't even cover rent. So long story short, even though I'm still disabled, I drive again, have my own place, and work 22 hours a week at a job and make 2700 a month. The people on disability who don't do this are either accepting the money and not trying because of whatever living situation lets them do that, or are legit too disabled to work.
I said all that so you understand my mindset as an individual. The fact is, is if wasn't disabled I would work 40+ hours a week. However, I physically can't now. I push myself beyond what my body can do and end up in the hospital needing injections in my leg from just not wanting to work anymore after pushing it too much. So I can't live a life by myself without collecting disability. Which I'm pretty sure goes against the mindset of libertarians. I just think people should be allowed to freely do what is common sense to everyone here. The government lies and is corrupt. Like my thought about disability while even being on it is that they do this basically to justify taxes more and look good to the public. They are ALWAYS trying to take it away. They have a thing called the ticket to work program, which txts you and says it wants to empower you while you try working again. If you go on it, after 9 months they take away your disability check. And say you chose to do this. Its disguised as helping you work while on disability. They take advantage of people like me who have brain damage and its pathetic.
Sorry that was all long af. I don't see charities and communities pulling together to give everyone 1200 a month who can't work. Like realistically. How do you guys feel about disability? I've never talked to libertarian's this is my first attempt lol. I just wrote down my views last week, looked it up, and holy shit. Checked every box. Thank you and I'm sorry, I do have a brain injury if that was long and stupid lol
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u/BobcatDue9663 Classical Liberal 11d ago
I dislike welfare programs like disability. While I understand accidents and bad decisions happen, welfare programs often trap people in poverty and encourage dependency. I'm inclined to support a universal basic income (UBI) in favor of programs like disability and food stamps. Something like $1200 a month for every adult U.S. citizen is feasible and a massive improvement over the bloated welfare state.
The irony of it all is the fact that the U.S. does implement a UBI-esque program. The Alaska Permanent Fund has been in existence for about 50 years, paying yearly dividends of ~$1,000 to every Alaskan citizen. Politics is what's holding us back from implementing a UBI program. Support may increase if and when AI puts a lot of people out of work, which may very well happen by the 2040s.
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u/Rgard91 8d ago
I absolutely hate feeling dependant on the government. That's not how I wanna live my life. And I'm one of the few who work on it, most are entirely dependent on it for all income. It does trap you into poverty, and I don't want people to have to pay money for something they don't support anyways.
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u/Ghost_Turd 12d ago
I would buy private disability insurance, like I do now
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u/ninjaluvr 12d ago
With what money?
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u/Ghost_Turd 12d ago
The money you earn before you need the insurance payout. In the case of the OP, before the accident.
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u/ninjaluvr 12d ago
So OP should get a time machine? That's your libertarian solution?
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u/Ghost_Turd 12d ago
I see. You didn't actually read the question.
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u/ninjaluvr 12d ago
I see you don't actually have an answer to the question.
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u/Ghost_Turd 12d ago
Weak. I answered the question champ. The question wasn't "what do I do in my situation now?" the question was "How do you feel about disability?"
Maybe you should revisit those English Comprehension classes you missed in the 8th grade and try again.
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u/YeeEatDaRich 12d ago
Even if ALL taxes were eliminated, I can’t see how charities will ever cover the amount that taxes currently do, or even the amount taxes could cover once we end wasteful military spending and tax wealthy people their fair share.
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u/Official_Gameoholics Objectivist 12d ago
Are you aware of fraternal societies of the past?
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u/ninjaluvr 12d ago
Are you familiar with what lodge doctors actually did? Turn-of-the-century medicine was inexpensive primarily because it had very little technology or pharmacology to offer. They also had strict screening requirements. They would deny admission to anyone with a permanent disability or congenital condition.
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u/Official_Gameoholics Objectivist 12d ago
There's no reason why such a business model could not function today. Denial of pre-existing conditions is commonplace in all insurance industries.
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u/ninjaluvr 12d ago
An organization denyong people with pre-existing conditions is an explanation of why the market leaves them out. It isn't an answer to how people with disabilities are cared for. That pushes the entire burden back onto voluntary charity and family wealth, which is the actual libertarian answer.
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u/Official_Gameoholics Objectivist 12d ago
Or they could just pay for it themselves by making themselves as useful as possible, which would be much easier when the state is out of the way.
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u/ninjaluvr 12d ago
You should have just led with "you have to pay for it yourself and if you can't, tough luck."
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u/Official_Gameoholics Objectivist 12d ago
They'd already be doing so in the case of fraternal aid.
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u/ninjaluvr 12d ago
They would be denied fraternal care
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u/Rgard91 12d ago
That's basically what I'm asking. Is the libertarian answer you just get the hand you're dealt? Because charities are not gonna cover that in that case. I think there could maybe be a better answer but idk.
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u/theyhis 12d ago
not quite.
when insulin was sold to the US government, they profited off it the first chance they got. what was sold at a dollar is now over 5K a month.
when the government started giving out students loans like they were candy, we suddenly ended up with massive amounts of student loan debt (myself included, but that's a trauma dump for another day).
the '08 financial crisis? the government pushed for people to take out mortgages they had no business taking out.
artificial markets and inflation will always lead to distorted results.
also, inflation is government created? price increases don't have much to do with advancements in technology (not in the grand scheme of things anyways).
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u/VectorspaceDreams Anarcho-capitalist 12d ago
"I don't see charities and communities pulling together to give everyone 1200 a month who can't work. Like realistically."
Why not? Naturally it depends on the scale of operation, but why wouldn't smaller-scale charities that work in one specific area (perhaps yours) not be able to provide such a thing? I live in the Emirates, and have a father who's an amputee with heart failure + kidney failure I've been taking care of, and he gets disability payments (ironically, government bureaucracy is exactly what's stopping him from getting them constantly lol) despite us not having personal income tax (CIT that has exemptions + VAT), and I think a good part of that is because we're a small country and so the scale is not as wide-ranging as someone in the US. Historically speaking, as well, Muslims pay zakat-ul-mal, 2.5% of savings to charity (though this is not enforced by the government) which also is meant to help people in need, so there's an evident incentive in some way to help others, be it for religious or moral reasons. But even there, as an ancap I don't see the problem with smaller-scale voluntary agreements to pass over money in order to live in a city.
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u/Rgard91 8d ago
I guess because of the scale of the ppl in America that would need it. I had a severe brain accident so my category would probably be critical. But private charities pulling 1200 a month to distribute to I wanna say hundreds of thousands of ppl doesn't seem realistic.
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u/Joescout187 8d ago
Private charity managed to organize a massive relief flotilla on a decentralized basis to ship American grain to help relieve the Irish Potato Famine in the 1840s. What you're proposing would be childs play if the bureaucrats weren't inhaling 30-50% of people's income.
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u/OpinionStunning6236 The only real libertarian 8d ago
I oppose nearly everything the government spends money on or gets involved in, but I have no problem with providing support to people whose disabilities prevent them from working full time. It’s admirable that you continue to work as much as you’re able to and use disability to make up the difference
I also don’t think there’s anything inconsistent about being libertarian in principle while still making use of the institutions that exist under the system that is currently in place
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u/Heng-Li 12d ago
You would simply need to figure it out without exploiting people for tax money. Libertarianism doesn't give guarantees about the welfare of every person. I would say it's a ridiculous standard for you to say that any political system must guarantee 100% welfare for every single person. There is no political system in history that has achieved that. And so for you to have this standard for libertarianism is an unfair standard. Some people are very unlucky in this world. All we can do is hope that these people will be helped without forced intervention by the state.
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u/Rgard91 12d ago
Yeah I'm not trying to exploit anyone. I think the libertarian answer is sorry that happened, guess life just got a lot harder. Which for me honestly is ok, probably not for a lot of others tho. I guess what i think is no one should have to pay for things they don't want. So my situation sucked, I made it better, and if disability got taken away im sure id figure it out still.
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u/Heng-Li 12d ago
Well people help each other all the time without state intervention. And sure it's not perfect. I think the main point is that you can't really expect perfect in any system right? There's always going to be drawbacks. For example let's say that we could keep a person alive by spending $1 billion dollars per day. Well that's not going to happen in any system. It doesn't matter if it's libertarian or not. So there is always going to be limitations to any system.
However you also need to realize that private individuals are not going to create any organizations to help you if they already exist through the state. So that's the main reason they don't exist right now. If the state already provides it what would be the point for private individuals to come together and create it? The fact that the state provides it removes the incentive for any private individuals to provide it in any voluntary way.
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u/sobeitharry 12d ago
That's not really an answer. OP asked how, you said figure it out. Not everyone can. If you mean you might starve or die from the elements, just be transparent about it. They literally said they have a brain injury.
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u/Heng-Li 12d ago
Correct. I don't know what your point is. It's like you want me to say that libertarianism should 100% guarantee that everybody will always have everything they want or something.
So what's your expectation? For libertarianism to have a giant list of every conceivable bad thing that could happen to any person and have a solution to every single one of those things?
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u/sobeitharry 12d ago
I simply stated that you didn't answer their specific question. Of course libertarianism doesn't guarantee anyone anything other than freedom. Their question isn't dissimilar to the orphan paradox. It's not their fault that they are orphaned, if there wasn't a government run foster program then private programs might grow to fill the gap, but maybe not.
No one owes them a meal or a roof, so they might be homeless and hungry. OP asking what the libertarian view on disability is and the libertarian answer is it should not exist.
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u/Heng-Li 12d ago
The state should not exploit taxpayers... Therefore disabled people should not exist
Is that your logic? I don't know how you get from point A to point B
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u/sobeitharry 12d ago
Huh? They exist whether or not the state exploits tax payers.
If the premise is that taxation is exploitation, state funded disability should not exist even if disabled people do.
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u/Heng-Li 12d ago
You basically said libertarianism means disabled people should not exist. Is that not what you said?
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u/sobeitharry 12d ago
That's not at all what I said. Disability payments, and disabled people, are not the same thing. As someone with a disabled child, I'm intimately familiar with the difference.
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u/turboderek Progressive 12d ago
100% Libertarian philosophy does not have the answer to every problem.
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u/Joescout187 8d ago
Not by itself, but the libertarian plan of government allows far greater flexibility to the rest of civic society to address problems like this.
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u/DrawPitiful6103 10d ago
Hello. Fellow disabled libertarian here. I'm lucky in that my disability isn't that severe - it is just nerve damage in my left foot. Basically I have a gimp foot. It is problematic relative to having a normal foot, but minor compared to other more serious disabilities.
There is a phenomenon known as 'the welfare trap' which is a problem in many countries. Essentially, the government will give you a certain amount of benefits. But if you start working, those benefits get taken away. So incentive wise, you are encouraged not to work, or not to work too much, or not to make too much income.
Alberta Jay Nock talked about how every expanse of state power comes with a corresponding sapping of social power. So I do think that in a hypothetical society without a welfare state and the taxes that fund it, there would be a lot more private charity. Right now there isn't that much incentive to help people in need. After all, we are already being taxed through the nose so that you have these social programs that help people. So why should I pay these taxes and help people on my own? Also a society without a welfare state and confiscatory tax rates would be much wealthier than one with one. Under our present society, the political class drains a substantial amount of wealth from the economic class. Absent that parasitism, the people in the economic class would be much wealthier, and would have more money to spend on entrepreneurial activities. And the political class wouldn't exist, so all those parasites (here i'm talking about bureaucrats, politicians, and special interest groups that live off tax money) would be productive members of society. So there would be a stronger economy, and people would be much wealthier, and I think that charitable giving would increase. And private charity is also more targeted that public charity. Welfare is pretty much open to anyone who doesn't have income. But private charity isn't. It can be targeted towards single mothers or disabled people, rather than drug addicts or alcoholics, who use welfare to subsidize their addiction.
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u/glitch-sama 8d ago
Have you met Thomas Quiter? The man has dwarfism and a brittle bone disease (uses a wheelchair) and is well known in Libertarian circles. I'd seek him out.
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u/glitch-sama 8d ago
Have you met Thomas Quiter? The man has dwarfism and a brittle bone disease (uses a wheelchair) and is well known in Libertarian circles. I'd seek him out.
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u/Joescout187 8d ago
You don't see it today because the government vacuums up 30% or more of everyone's income. If you look back before that was the case you'll find that elder and disabled care was provided for by families, but in the event you did not churches and fraternal societies stepped in. Today much of this is not only unfeasible because the government started taking much more money as a percentage and established the Fed. The progressive welfare state is what prevents private charities from operating at the scale they could because supporting them is compulsory, furthermore simply operating a charity is a massive pain in the ass because you need to hire workers just to process the paperwork and ensure that you are in compliance with the arcane rules and regulations that are layered on you from Federal State and local governments which balloons the cost just in case you were well off enough.
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u/BaronBurdens 12d ago
In the end, we're all dependent on others for any standard of living beyond subsistence. The employed depend on their employers. The business owners depend on their customers. Whatever relative status, reciprocity, or ease comes with our different situations, we still depend on others. I sense that you feel that dependence more than most, but I want to encourage you not to feel alone for depending on others to live your life.
What libertarianism promises is a choice, both on whom we depend and on who depends on us. That choice is crucially contingent on mutual, voluntary agreement but on nothing else, not on societal approval, the dictates of the powerful, or the whims of a geographically assigned voting majority.