Insightful thinking

Often the most insightful thinking can be found in the most secret and hidden of places. Not so say that anything is being hidden on purpose, but rather that something can be found only after doing a little digging.

An example is found here, in a comment to an entry on the Mises Economics Blog:

The turning point in the global warming debate will come in about 10-20 years when the weather is observed to be the same as it is today for all practical purposes. Then we will stop worrying about actively doing anything to stop CO2 increase. In the interim, we will actually do nothing about it. How do I know we will do nothing? I only have to observe how angry people get about high gasoline prices.

Oh so true! People, who during their daytime job (as Leftist public opinion analyzers) complain about gasoline prices, write articles and reports every day, saying that man should reduce its energy consumption for the sake of reducing energy generation. Is that not some kind kind of hypocrisy? I can't see how not.

Another comment on the same post is a long speech about the great wonders of nanotechnology and its ability to greatly increase energy generation using solar power (vastly superior to the modern day, space demanding solar panels).

We are awash in energy (10,000 times more than required to meet all our needs falls on Earth), but we are not very good at capturing it. That will change with the full nanotechnology-based assembly of macro objects at the nano scale, controlled by massively parallel information processes, which will be feasible within twenty years. Even though our energy needs are projected to triple within that time, we'll capture that .0003 of the sunlight needed to meet our energy needs with no use of fossil fuels, using extremely inexpensive, highly efficient, lightweight, nano-engineered solar panels, and we'll store the energy in highly distributed (and therefore safe) nanotechnology-based fuel cells.

If these words are correct, this will mean one thing, and one thing only: Entrepreneurs will pump money into this new, superior way of generating energy, and eliminate all competition from companies who depend on expensive and risky oil-drilling methods, at best an extension of a principle of putting a hollow metal object in the ground where oil is located. The market will soon put the these words to the test. No other action is needed, let alone government action!

Magnificent speech!

I must encourage everyone to see (and hear) this speech! It is truly an inspiration to anyone who believes in liberty and opposes State coercion and violence! Full text here. Enjoy! I know you will!

"The more the plans fail, the more the planners plan!"

Why the hide and seek?

Those who strain themselves to give taxation a moral character are under obligation to explain the state's preoccupation with hiding taxes in the price of goods. (#)

Yes, indeed they are! But they won't. They won't try to justify taxes on goods, because people assume goods are taxed. Once you don't have to justify why you are beating the person, because the person has gotten used to the beating, you won't!

The politically challenged employee

Why does the federal government so consistently fail to carry out even its most basic and necessary functions? Why is it that Wal-Mart can get supplies to Katrina victims days ahead of FEMA? Why do private veterans hospitals provide top-notch care, while government run facilities like Walter Reed fester? Simple. They have better administrators. Why are their administrators and managers better? Because they aren't hamstrung by politics, and constantly changing priorities. Think about how difficult it must be to be a government bureaucrat. For four years, you're told to do things one way, then four years later, you must do things entirely differently. Your priorities, goals, and methods are always in flux. Is it any wonder why bureaucrats get such a bad name? (#)

This is a point that is never made too often. It is not just that public officials, contrast to private employers and employees, are protected from competition and sheltered behind a thick wall of regulations and laws. It is also their great curse to have shifting managers that have to dance the political dance to get themselves anywhere in their job. Imagine a company that one day decides to follow some kind of Lean-method, and changes the whole structure of the company to meet its principles. Imagine that the next day, Lean is no longer the goal, but some entirely different approach. How will this company succeed? How will it satisfy its clients? It won't. It will waste resources and time and slip into bankruptcy. Why this hasn't happened to any public agency is no mystery. Taxes and regulations sustain the unsustainable. This is why a private company will always outperform the public, political one.

The Filthy Environmentalist?

A friend of mine, a single young male living alone, once told me that sometimes he didn't bother to do the dishes. He could usually find a plate and a glass that were "clean enough" to eat of and drink out of. He wasn't making any special point by telling me this. I too am a single young male living alone and I know this approach to dirty dishes and glasses all too well.

However, there could perhaps be a message in all of this. What do we need to wash our plates and glasses? We need running water, soap, a plastic brush, and access to a sewer. The water comes from the ground (in our case), the soap comes from a chemical factory, the plastic brush is made up of oil and usually some colur-chemical, and the sewer leads to the ocean where it dispense of all the soap and the food-leftovers from the dish.

In other words; washing the dishes and glasses is very "bad" for the environment.

Then would not a Leftist-Green person celebrate the filthy lifestyles of me and my friend? Would they not compliment us for using less resources and pumping fewer chemicals into the ocean? He should, compared to his general philosophy of life. He should compliment people who don't wash their clothes, don't shower, don't do the dishes and don't buy chemicals and plastic brushes.

The fact is, of course, that Leftist-environmentalism is a philosophy of filth and human misery. It damns all which uses natural resources and leads to disposal of foreign agents into the nature. It celebrates that which preserves nature in its current state. It attacks the lifestyles of the clean and celebrates the lifestyles of the filthy.

I guess that is why many people who say they are Leftist-Green ignore themselves so much harder when they travel the world in private planes, wearing clean cotton shirts, silk ties and shiny leather shoes, just after eating of clean dishes and drinking from sparkling glasses.

The Libertarian Persuasion Problem

The persuasion problem of the libertarian, free-market, anti-state cause is an interesting one. The libertarian is usually forced to argue for something that is not the present state of things today. The libertarian must persuade his opponent that the State should liberalise, privatize, lower taxes and de-regulate. The opponent is usually supportive of the status quo, and will demand that he is convinced of changing his mind, and focuses much less on argumenting for the the status quo. Who, for example, has heard good, general arguments for State-run police, other than that it must be State-run or no police will exist at all? My guess is very few, and for good reason, because no good logic exists!

This means that the libertarian is forced to sit in the chair of the prophet - the oracle - who tells the future and how things will become. This is troublesome. What will happen if the State abolishes State-run police or education? Will children become educated? Will private property owners get protection from thieves and other criminals? This is an argumenting problem that very difficult to solve. No-one can really tell the future. This, however, is what is demanded of those who promote free markets and a smaller State.

Of course, one could turn to history and describe the function of previous market-solutions to nowadays-State run "problems", or find mini-examples of a private enterprise that simulates some of the functions of the State today. Although I see the light in this kind of argumentation, I don't find it very convincing. The average person will tend to see the good sides of the status quo - the situation as it is today and just needs minor corrections to become perfect - rather than thinking in terms of sound logic and reason. No-one can tell the future, so why risk dramatic change?

The Libertarian Persuasion Problem is not an easy one to crack. It seems it has to be solved in small steps, like a finite element problem, where each connection is explained in simple language, and then applied to the big problem. To explain the total function of a completely free society is not a practical method in the general discussion, although useful in internal discussion between libertarians and in discussion with those who are beginning to see the big picture, but haven't made it all the way.

My kind of Just-in-case!

Whether global warming comes or not, it is certain that nature itself will sooner or later produce major changes in the climate. To deal with those changes and virtually all other changes arising from whatever cause, man absolutely requires individual freedom, science, and technology. In a word, he requires the industrial civilization constituted by capitalism.

The Toxicity of Environmentalism is truly an inspiring piece of writing. The above statement says it all, and serves as a useful reply to the Leftist-greenie "we should abandon the modern society for the sake of possible human-induced global warming" with a more appealing way of thinking, namely:

Just in case global warming (or cooling, or whatever) is on the way, we should endorse free markets, liberty and economic growth, because rich people can better adjust to changes in the state of nature.

So, for the case of argument, we assume that drastic changes in the climate are around the corner (be it natural or not), and realize that the best way to tackle those changes is to become wealthier and healthier and better prepared for whatever is at hand!

Just in case what?

Now that science, reason and logic has left the climate change debate, one thing stands behind: The Just In Case (JIC) argument. Its core and soul is that mankind must cut his use of carbon based fuel drastically down. If that isn't done, men will "tip the ice" of drastic human-induced climate change that will lead to famine, droughts, floods, freezing, drying, rising ocean levels, more hurricanes and what else there is that is bad and can be blamed on mankind.

This is just about the only "climate science" left in the debate. The numbers show nothing of interest: A slow and steady increase in temperature, measured in points of degrees for each decade. A swinging number of hurricanes, falling nicely into a pattern of at least 50 years of varying hurricane-frequency. Ever-shifting ice on the poles, where ice is somewhere on the run and somewhere gaining ground. Shifting solar spot activity, often matching a change in temperature but sometimes not. The examples are endless and conclude nothing, which would in any case not make any difference, because hundreds of millions of people rising out of poverty is far more important than hundreds of millions being kept there, and rich people can adapt to anything much more easily than poor people.

So we have the JIC-argument standing alone behind as a useful tool to influence the way people think about the climate and its ever-changing nature. The JIC-argument is the core feature of the recent Oscar-winning propaganda-film, "An Inconvenient Truth", and of the famous report sponsored by the climate-alarmist Tony Blair's government, "The Stern Report" (as it is known as). Thousands of reports and pamphlets are published to promote the JIC scenario, and more or less have one thing in common: The message that men must cut down on carbon based fuel consumption, or else!

Of course there are ways to do that, and the fact of the matter is that for the last decades, energy consumption of any kind has been on the run because of better technology and alternative sources of cheaper energy (nuclear, hydro power and so on). This trend will continue on the free market because fuel is expensive, and less use of it is cheaper than more! But this is neatly ignored, because action is needed "now" according to the JIC-alarmists, not in 10 years or 20 years.

So how to tackle this debate? An analogy comes to mind. How was the nature of Communism exposed to the public? Communists could for some years claim that communism is some kind of science - that Karl Marx and his followers had somehow managed to create a system of thought that was consistent with reality and could be implemented in a human society. This myth was exposed, but it took time and energy. Decades went between the earliest predictions of the Soviet collapse (such as these), until the collapse finally took place. By then, everyone knew what communism really stood for. Will it take decades to expose the JIC-alarmists, and will we have suffered greatly in material well-being and standards of living by then, while hundreds of millions of people still live in desperate poverty?

I truly hope that now when the science is out of the debate, and alone stands the weak argument of JIC, we will slowly but surely be able to stall all expansion of State-control and green taxing as much as possible, and hope that the coming of the next Ice Age will cool the global warming debate down (as it happens, the alarmists shift between the coming of the next global warming and global cooling period, thereby resetting the debate every 20 years or so). Is it enough to stall the statism of green State-expansion? Perhaps not. But for now, it seems to be the most practical thing to do in terms of effort and results.

Just in case?

A forgotten truth: "Real scientists understand uncertainty. Real science deals with uncertainty through relentless, skeptical inquiry. Real science resolves arguments not with consensus, but with data." (#)

This simple truth is forgotten today. Today we are either yes-sayers og no-sayers when it comes to many complicated, uncertain, evolving science, most notable the science of climate change (be it natural or man-induced, short-term or long-term).

Anti-state, pro-market and the world will make sense!

Being an anti-state, pro-market believer is a beautiful thing indeed. I'm not a "believer" in the sense that I accept religious sense philosophy - I didn't just read a book by some clever man who wrote a whole lot of "I think the State should.." or "I feel we should do this and that..", but a believer in the sense that I accept the existence of logic and reason (man), and hence the preachings of men like Ludwing von Mises, Murray N. Rothbard, Hans-Hermann Hoppe, Walter Block and the like. In other words: The message of the Mises Institute and the likes (for most part).

What is the anti-state, pro-market attitude? It is a one of reason and logic, that of acknowledging the self-ownership of individuals and hence their private property rigths, automatically meaning the denial of "public" ownership over individuals and their property.

How does this attitude simplify the world? First of all, it divides men into two types: Anti-state (anarcho-capitalist libertarians) and Statists (pro-State libertarians, anti-State socialists, and everything in between). A great majority of people fill the second group, and they waste their time discussing the pros and cons of different State-actions (wars, welfare-subsidies, taxation and so on). The exception is perhaps the anarchist Socialist, who does not approve of the State-apparatus, but denies human logic and reason. All others are stuck in a huge confusion of self-contradicting endless discussions about the acceptable role of the State.

What Statists fail to see that if a State is created, and it is allowed to perform actions while banning others from the same actions (taxation, monopoly of law-enforcement and dispute-solving), they have given up their self-ownership and private property rights. If you accept "some" loss of self-ownership, you have created a monster that will, if it can, swallow up the rest of it. Constraints are made on the State in most places (constitutions being the most popular one), but even though you chain down the dragon, the risk always exists that it will find the key to the lock or break free from it, and eventually fly over your village and burn it down.

Anti-state, pro-market attitude is a beautiful thing. Of course it creates a lot of irritation in a world of Statists, but contradictions and confusion is eliminated.

Do two individuals gain or loose rights by forming or living under the rule of a State?

I bumped into an interesting article the other day, on an Icelandic website called Vefritid.is (the humble name "The Web-magazine" in loose translation). The article is called "The rights of individuals and libertarianism" and discusses a seemingly obscure book-review by Thomas Nagel, who seems to be a philosopher who sometimes dips into the political debate. The book under review is the famous but fuzzy "Anarchy, State and Utopia" by Robert Nozick.

According to the Icelandic article, Nagel's critic on Nozick attacks Nozick's claim that individuals have rights and those rights cannot be violated. Nagel's stand (according to the article, I repeat) is the following: "The fact that the rights of governments (!) are derived from the rights of individuals does not imply that we can find out about the rights of individuals without considering the State; this can be seen by the fact that since the properties of molecules rest on the properties of atoms does not mean that we can find out about the properties of atoms without studying molecules."

Amazing statement, but the argument doesn't end here. It goes into a Rawlsian mode where individuals don't have rights of their own, but rights derived from the kind of society we would "like" it to look like. In other words, rights of individuals derive from the rights of groups of individuals who in one way or another live under the rule of the State.

Of course it is always tempting to imagine how society "should" look like, for example by writing a book about some non-existing think-tank of human ghosts who own nothing (not even a body of their own) but have some kind of knowledge in economics and other science. But how does this shake the libertarian theory? It doesn't. It might make a dent in Robert Nozick's complicated, self-contradicting fuzzy-logic about the minimal state, but casts no shadow on a more robust and radical libertarian theory.

You are an individual who chose to read these few words without asking permission. You thereby took charge over your own body, and by doing so, and not physically subjecting other individuals to the same task, admitted your self-ownership of it. No smart philosopher can write you out of that stone-cold fact.

Doomsday, again?

Yesterday, the IPCC released its "[s]ummary for Policymakers of the first volume of “Climate Change 2007”, also known as the Fourth Assessment Report (AR4)". Once again, doomsday is at hand, and once again, its because of actions of man.

The media will cover this well. Already, as a response to the (politically polluted) summary of the IPCC-report, big headlines in many newspapers have stated that man is destroying the climate of Earth with his fossil-burning activities. People get scared, understandably, and demand action from politicians. Politicians respond with increased State-control, more regulations and higher taxes. They grasp every opportunity they get to do that, and having the public on-board is certainly not making it harder.

Thankfully, there is a weak sound of logic and reason in the debate, although not as readily heard as the doomsday-stories. In that respect I must give a great applause for the work of the Cato institute. Two articles have already appeared on its website, New Climate for Global Energy Policy, and Live with Climate Change. They are a must read for the calm-headed, and I will do my best to spread them to those I think still have the ability to think sceptically about the coming of Doomsday.

Not to say that I am fully convinced that forecasting the weather for the next 100 years is anywhere near of being called a robust science, personally leaning towards attitudes like these, but any protest against the political correctness of the public climate change debate is better than none.

Slavish mind-set

An excellent point:

If only one be tactful enough not to name the hated names of Socialism, Bolshevism, Communism, Fascism, Marxism, Hitlerism, or what not, one finds no particular objection to the single essential doctrine that underlies all these systems alike — the doctrine of an absolute state. Let one abstain from the coarse word slavery and one discovers that in the view of many Americans — I think probably most of them — an actual slave-status is something that is really not much to be dreaded, but rather perhaps to be welcomed, at least provisionally. Such is the power of words.

And how true!

A Dreadful development

I seems that a dreadful development is taking place. The powerful globalization that has been taking place for the last 25 years or so, liberating hundreds of millions of people from poverty, is now loosing its momentum! It seems that the Leftist-green is gaining the upper hand. Free trade and open markets are being replaced with "fair" trade and protectionism in many areas of the world. South-America is falling for socialism, Africa is stuck in its usual place of poverty and disease and the West is regulating and taxing itself to economic drowsiness in the name of environmental issues and social "justice".

This is a horrible development indeed. Milton Friedman died without an obvious successor in the public debate, while the Left produces men like Al Gore and Michael Moore, who make propaganda look like science and George W. Bush look like some kind of a symbol of the Right. The result is as expected: Liberty looses ground, globalization is put on hold and hundreds of millions of people get stuck in poverty and disease.

How to fight this? How to fight the Left that in many ways controls the public debate, has a firm grip on the ever-expanding State and has falsely managed to paint itself as the guardian of the environment and "public" health? For myself I can see no other way out than the one which created the freedom momentum 25 years ago: Tireless criticism of the statist popularism, preaching of the unpopular rational thought and recycling of the works of the great minds of libertarian thought (who I see as Rothbard and Mises and to some extent, Milton Friedmand and Hayek). Or is there another way?

A convenient truth

The "debate" over man-made climate change has, for a long time, not been about science, potential threats to the environment or anything of the sort. The debate has instead turned into a fierce battle over political intervention on the free market. Leftists pick those science data and speculations that indicate that man is having devastating effect on Earth's climate, and use it to suggest a bigger government, heavier taxes and stricter regulations. Those to the right play the opposite game, also plucking those science research and speculations that fit their cause - that of a smaller State and freeer market.

As uninteresting as this is, I sometimes feel myself forced to enter the "scientific" debate about potential human-induced climate change to fight the statist propaganda. One tool to help me do that are reports like these, Positive Environmentalism: A Convenient Truth:

Wealth is vital if we are to adapt, and help poor countries adapt, to climate change if that becomes necessary. And wealth is also essential to the development of those new technologies that truly have the potential to set us free from environmental danger.

The tone of the report is not the one of unlimited optimism or denial of "potential" climate change. Instead, the approach is this: If any climate change is on its way (or already in progress), then the correct way to handle it is not to keep mankind down with regulations, taxation and other State interference, but to focus on that which will allow mankind to become wealthier and in that way give a bigger proportion of mankind the necessary means to survive and be comfortable in the new, upcoming climate.

It's not my favorite thing in the world to argue for freedom on these terms, but I guess it is useful while the Leftist-environmental movement is slowly being exposed as the statist-movement it is, and its agendas exposed as just another way to expand the State and strangle the free market.

Why Socialism/Statism is popular

Why is it that not everyone is a freedom loving libertarian? How is it that many choose to support Statism, Socialism, Conservatism and other forms of the (democratic/autocratic) rule of the many over the few (and the other way around)? Is it because the arguments of libertarianism are faulty? No (then this would have been demonstrated). Is it because some people enjoy paying taxes and giving away their liberty and property to a few elected individuals? No (or else people would just give money to the State and follow moral codes similar to State-law, instead of just obeying when the tax-collector comes by). The reasons for the popularity of Statism are simple: Everyone thinks they know better on behalf of others, or is out to grab others property for either selfish reasons or their own "noble" reasons.

This can be explained with a hypothetical example: Suppose Mr Jones, a Leftist, believes "everyone should have equal access to higher education". Mr Jones will claim that this is a "human right", and a natural demand to make. He will present results from studies, which clearly indicate that education is a good investment for the student and "the society", and that poor individuals should not be stopped from educating themselves for "financial reasons". No, the Leftist says, education should be "free" and open to "anybody" who wants to seek it.

But how will the Leftist plan to accomplish his wish? Will he ask people to donate money, which in return will be given out as scholarships to students, for example poor ones? No. Will he donate money himself to support those who wish to seek higher education? No. Will he do anything which, in a voluntary way, eases access to universities for the few and the poor? No.

What he will do is say: "Dear politicians, please raise taxes on people's income and capital savings and use the proceeds to finance State-run schools so that every interested applicant can attend the study of his or her choice."

He will also say: "People are selfish and greedy and won't support students who want to seek higher education but have tight financial means to do so. Therefore, you must listen to my noble and just plan, and force it on everyone else, and never even try the voluntary way."

So, what does this teach us? How come Leftism is so popular? Because, either Mr Jones is himself a student in some higher education and wants others to subsidize his choice of investment/consumption, or he believes his opinion is so noble and so just that no-one should really have the right to protest in any meaningful way. And this is why Leftism enjoys wide popular support in many groups in society (notable the intellectuals and those who want to grab from the rich and bring to themselves).

Why Socialism is evil

In my last entry I said, with very little backing up, that Socialism is evil. I will now spend a few more words than last time and explain what I mean (and didn't explain earlier).

Socialism can be described in the following way:

[A] broad array of doctrines or political movements that envisage a socio-economic system in which property and the distribution of wealth are subject to social control.

The key concept behind this system is the abolition of private property (everybody owns nothing). In theory this applies only for property rights over material things. In practice, and inevitable so, the individual's self-ownership is also abolished ("society", "community", "the collective" and other such words always refer to many individuals, and each individual by himself is therefore not an entity in a system of Socialism).

Some people say that Socialism is a "beautiful" or "charming" thought. Individuals who hold this opinion say, or think, that individuals can become "equal" in some respect (for example monetary income) if "society" (for example the State) is placed higher than the individual. Everybody would then become less greedy, more equal and happier. Envy would become extinct. No-one would have lots of money and no-one would be desperately poor. Or so the Socialist says.

But Socialism is not a beautiful thought. Socialism is the system of ants - of a society where each individual is no more than a slave to "society", and whose talents, ambitions, preferences, interests, needs and cravings are no different from any other. Ants live for "the colony" - for the physical well-being of one queen - and each individual is therefore worthless as long as others can take its place. No ant suffers from envy because all are the same. No ant har more or less talents than the next. No ant gets business ideas and takes risks while implementing them. No ant discovers new and improved methods in hope of profits and wealth. No ant has any value by himself. All are equal. None is special.

How an individual, with a free mind and having a recognized self-ownership right in a free society, can call Socialism a "beautiful" thought is beyond me. The beauty of humanity is the diversity of its individuals, be it in talents, tastes or looks. A system based on enforced "equality", be it in monetary income or something else, does not see the individual, and denies him as a basic "unit" in society.

Socialists want to abolish the private property right (that can actually not be done, but at least they want to outlaw it). At the same time they often deny that they want to outlaw the individual's self-ownership right. This is the same as to say that a person can own a car, but the "society" decides where and when it should be driven. If the individual owns his own body, but cannot apply it the way he sees fit (for example, sell labor to a factory-owner or keep the apples he picks from the "public" trees), then the term self-ownership is worthless and meaningless.

Socialism is not a system suited for a society of individuals, and every attempt to impose Socialism is un-humane (if logic doesn't tell us that, then history sure as hell does). Socialism is State-enforced slavery, and evil.

How to beat the evils of Statism

Some people believe socialism is a "beautiful thought", but a very difficult one to implement. The same applies for all the little bits of socialism we discuss everyday: Socialized medicine, socialized schools, socialized roads. Of course this is nonsense. Socialism is not a beautiful thought in any way, and the right way to beat it is to show why that is.

Here is a useful quote:

So long as people believe that socialized medicine is a noble plan, there is no way to fight it. You cannot stop a noble plan -- not if it really is noble. The only way you can defeat it is to unmask it -- to show that it is the very opposite of noble. Then at least you have a fighting chance. (#)

This is an important lesson. Never allow a Leftist to catch you agree with his notion of a "beautiful thought" or "noble idea". Socialism is pure evil, designed to mold humans into little packages of equal monetary income and destroy individual liberty. Humans are not equal, but different in every single aspect (talent, intelligence, will, preferences, etc). A system designed to equalize individuals is therefore un-human, and a horrible, evil idea.

To demonstrate that is the way to beat the evils of socialism.

Update: This entry has been picked up by an Icelandic Leftist. So far, not good, but hopefully that will change (with the next entry).

Unions decrease the quality of living for everyone

Unions are a dreadful thing in any society. No, not the kind of unions which, in return for dues, simply provide legal service and help people save up for holidays and bridge the financial gap between jobs, but the kind which is sheltered by the State and is legally, although immorally, allowed to use force and violence against employers.

Here is a useful quote:

"Those who tell you of trades unions bent on raising wages by moral suasion alone are like those who would tell you of tigers that live on oranges." The result of union activity, therefore, is to reduce the number of jobs in an industry and to raise the money wages of union labor, while at the same time relegating many workers, driven out of this line of work by the decreased quantity of labor demanded there, to other lines of work, whose money wages must decrease as a result of the greater supply of workers now forced to compete for them. (#)

This shouldn't be a mystery to any rational thinking person. Unions are a kind of price control, distorting the relationship between supply and demand. By increasing the price of one group of workers, they decrease the price of everyone else. By using law and State-force to uphold a manipulated price of one kind of work-labor, thereby decreasing the demand for it, all other workers must suffer with lower prices for their labor, since it is now artificially higher in supply.

The lesson? Abolish State-protection of union-activity, and returning to the time when "real wages in manufacturing climed an incredible 50 percent in the United States from 1860-1890, and another 37 percent from 1890-1914", and that's it.

The State is Not a Market Player

The Trouble with "Just Compensation" - Mises Institute:

Even when a state buys assets from willing private interests, it cannot be said to be paying 'just compensation,' since the ones doing the compensating — the taxpayers — are not themselves acceding to the transaction voluntarily.

Heyr heyr!