Defunding Planned Parenthood Does Not Mean It Will Cease to Exist

For the umpteenth time, read this timeless quote by Frederic Bastiat. Read it well and let it sink in for a minute what he's saying and what still holds true today:

"Socialism, like the ancient ideas from which it springs, confuses the distinction between government and society. As a result of this, every time we object to a thing being done by government, the socialists conclude that we object to its being done at all. We disapprove of state education. Then the socialists say that we are opposed to any education. We object to a state religion. Then the socialists say that we want no religion at all. We object to a state-enforced equality. Then they say that we are against equality. And so on, and so on. It is as if the socialists were to accuse us of not wanting persons to eat because we do not want the state to raise grain.” ~The Law, 1850

Got it? Just because you don't want the government, i.e. taxpayers, to pay for something does not mean it will not exist. A modern and current example of this is the fight to defund Planned Parenthood. Planned Parenthood will not disappear if government funding all of a sudden were to vanish any more than art would disappear from society if we stopped funding the National Endowment for the Arts (and yes, let's defund that, too).

Planned Parenthood currently receives over $500 million dollars of taxpayer money or around 40% of its budget from Government Health Services Grants and Reimbursements. By law, none of that taxpayer money can be used for abortive services except in extreme circumstances of rape, incest, or endangerment to a woman's life so conservatives are just grasping at straws and waging a war on women once again, right?

Wrong. It doesn't matter whether that money goes directly to abortive services or not. There are huge swaths of people who disdain the fact that their hard-earned money goes toward an organization that performs abortive services at all, even if they don't directly fund the offending services.

Think of it this way, what if $500 million dollars of government funding went to a Christian organization that provided food and shelter for needy people? They had food banks and thrift stores, shelters for homeless people to get back on their feet, counseling for abused women and children, and job training programs. Yet also as part of their services, they had counseling sessions for LGBT youth that was tantamount to "pray away the gay" counseling in which they urged young people to renounce their sins and accept Christ as the Way and the Path forward. Even if it were just 3% of what that organization did and 80% of what they did was extremely valuable services for needy families across the nation, do you think liberals would sit idly by as their tax money went to fund such abhorrent practices? No! And they would have an equally valid grievance as those conservatives who are appalled that their tax money goes toward funding an organization that engages in what they see as nothing short of murder.

In both cases, defunding such organizations would not mean they would cease to exist. It just means that in neither case is there a gun being held to someone's head by Uncle Sam with his hand outstretched saying "Fund this organization that you find repugnant or else, Citizen." Those who do find value in those organizations can reach into their own pockets and fund it themselves instead of picking the pocket of their neighbors and forcing them to contribute to something they might find detestable. It's as simple as that. No, really, it is.

Lastly, defunding Planned Parenthood is no more a war on women than defunding the hypothetical Christian organization I mentioned is a war against Christianity. Women keep saying that they want the government out of their bedroom, then they need to accept that that means no longer making the government pay for her reproductive choices. You don't get to have it both ways. If you want the government out of your uterus, then you must reject government funding and all the strings that come attached to it. As a libertarian I can say this without hypocrisy because I would say the exact same thing for male reproductive choices as well.

Bottom line: Organizations like Planned Parenthood can and will exist without government funding. They do provide important health services for many women across the country and I myself have used their basic services when I was in college and my early 20s. If you find value in what they do, as is clear that millions do, then reach into your own pocket and make up the difference with your voluntary contribution to the organization. Don't hold a gun to your fellow citizen's head and make that person pay for something against their will. V is for voluntary. Use your money to voluntarily support causes you believe in. Let's get away from the 'V is for violence', the threat of which is used when Uncle Sam puts his imaginary gun in your ribs and says "Pay up or else," in the same manner a robber would. Learn the difference. Read Bastiat's "The Law" or just read the opening quote as many times as you need to until you understand that government =/= society and those organizations can and will exist without forcing those who don't support it to pay for it.

 

Who's Afraid of a Little Competition?

More people than you think. In a recent article in Forbes magazine, Art Carden explains the difference between being pro-business and pro- free market. There are many businesses large and small along with just as many politicians who may take a pro-business stance but who are decidedly anti- free market.

Carden goes on to illustrate the difference between the two notions:

"A private company wants a patch of ground on which to build a hotel, a grocery store, a shopping center, or an office building. The “pro-business” solution is to seize the land via eminent domain and claim that the increased tax revenue is a public benefit (if increased tax revenue is going to be our standard, why don’t we compel labor force participation and make everyone sell their property to special interests?). The free market solution says “if the owner will sell to you, it’s yours, but don’t expect to be able to get government officials with guns to go get it for you.”

Pro-business essentially means making laws or implementing regulations that will benefit one business or industry at the expense of another. This is also known as picking winners and losers in the marketplace. Rather than not providing any government favors or assistance whatsoever and letting the market i.e. consumers, decide which products and services are worthwhile, governments instead substitute their judgement for the judgement of the consumers.

Businesses themselves often try and work counter to the free market by lobbying the government to write laws or regulations that will benefit them at the expense of some of their competitors. If one wonders how we get money out of politics, one must look to the source of why there is money in politics in the first place. In his succinctly classic book, The Law, French philosopher Frederic Bastiat put his thumb on the problem two and a half centuries ago.

"Sometimes the law defends plunder and participates in it. Thus the beneficiaries are spared the shame and danger that their acts would otherwise involve… But how is this legal plunder to be identified? Quite simply. See if the law takes from some persons what belongs to them and gives it to the other persons to whom it doesn’t belong. See if the law benefits one citizen at the expense of another by doing what the citizen himself cannot do without committing a crime. Then abolish that law without delay - No legal plunder; this is the principle of justice, peace, order, stability, harmony and logic.”

When we turn the law from an instrument of merely protecting property into an instrument of plunder, "...then everyone will want to participate in making the law, either to protect himself against plunder or to use it for plunder.”

We see this today in modern examples. I've mentioned  before the plight of new ride sharing apps like Uber and Lyft who are being prohibited from operating in certain states and jurisdictions. In many cases this is due to the taxi cab industry lobbying the government to erect laws preventing any competition from entering into the market. This benefits the taxi cabs at the expense of these new start-ups and at the expense of the consumers yet nonetheless it could still be construed as a "pro-business" maneuver by legislators.

Similarly, the popular accommodations provider, Airbnb, has come under fire in many large cities. There are certainly some legal fig leaves that give complaints about such businesses an air of credibility, but at the heart of it you can be sure to find the powerful hotel lobby amongst many others behind the scenes creating a stink trying to get legislators to "do something" about this pesky new business model that is causing them to lose business.

One will often hear liberals and progressives cry for tougher regulations on corporations and industries that have come under fire for one reason or another. They often call for these regulations in a misguided attempt to try and diminish the power of these corporations (who run our lives, dontchyaknow?) without realizing that many regulations actually benefit the largest corporations at the expense of smaller businesses.

Think about it, if you're Walmart or Amazon, industry giants, and the government slaps another regulation on that industry, closing a tax loophole, for instance, which will increase the cost of compliance and cause a monumental increase in paperwork to be filed for the regulatory agencies, who do you think is going to feel the brunt of this regulation the most? Will it be Walmart with billions of dollars in sales or will it be a smaller competitor, perhaps a local chain trying to go national that is still operating under thin margins while trying to gain a foothold in the industry? In the end, sure Walmart might have to pay extra to file their paperwork but it will hardly be a dent in their bottom line whereas the same regulation might be acutely felt and even completely stifle any growth of a potential competitor. In trying to diminish the power of a corporate giant, some of these regulations have the complete opposite effect which is to make competition imminently more expensive and cost prohibitive for smaller businesses thereby stifling competition.

It is no accident that after the passage of Dodd-Frank in the wake of the financial crisis, a leviathan of a bill with over 2,000 pages of legalese, that the Too Big To Fail banks the bill was intended to regulate are now even bigger than they were five years ago and the number of banks in America is at an all time record low.

Industry giants are very aware of this regulatory phenomenon and, believe it or not, are actually often the source of government lobbying for increased regulations. A very clever way of increasing market share while giving the appearance of trying to be responsible corporate entities.

It is important we remember these differences and allow the free market to let new businesses freely enter and exit the business arena. We all benefit from this by increased consumer choice, more job/income opportunities, a better allocation of tax dollars, and better uses of resources. Who's afraid of a little competition? It turns out, quite a lot of people. Competition is cutthroat, as anyone who pays attention to sports knows, but it is also the vehicle through which improvements, innovations, and advancements are made. Rather than fear it and try and regulate and legislate competition out of existence, we should embrace it and welcome the advancements that emerge when businesses are forced to legitimately compete in the marketplace of ideas.