Button, Button, Who's Got The Button? Or, Those Chips Will Fall Where They May Anyway

Leonard Read:

If there were a button on this rostrum, the pressing of which would release all wage and price controls instantaneously, I would put my finger on it and push!

Murray N. Rothbard:

The genuine Libertarian, then, is, in all senses of the word, an "abolitionist;" he would, if he could, abolish instantaneously all invasions of liberty, whether it be, in the original coining of the term, slavery, or whether it be the manifold other instances of State oppression. He would, in the words of another libertarian in a similar connection, "blister my thumb pushing that button!"

Donald J. Boudreaux:

My confidence in free markets is so high, and my faith (for faith is required) in government is so low, that my presumption is that nearly all government interventions into the economy are, on net, unjustified and harmful. This presumption fuels my instinct that these interventions should be eliminated pronto. But I’m also sufficiently influenced by the works of Adam Smith, Edmund Burke, Lord Acton, and F.A. Hayek to understand that large, sudden changes to an economy or society can be dangerously disruptive, even when such changes involve reversing policies that should never have existed in the first place. So even if I had the power to eliminate all government interventions that I believe are harmful, I would not press a button to eliminate all of them.

Me:

Yes, I'd press the button.

Well, there is no button, but we're playing "what if?" here.

The argument that "large, sudden changes to an economy or society can be dangerously disruptive, even when such changes involve reversing policies that should never have existed in the first place" is flawed.

It's flawed because "large, sudden changes" are going to occur anyway, and they're going to be just as disruptive when they inevitably occur on their own as they would be if they occurred because I pressed that imaginary button.

Every "instance of State oppression" -- and every state -- comes crashing down sooner or later. Always with various disruptive consequences, some of them negative for some people, and almost never in anything resembling an orderly, considered manner.

Button or no button, the chips will fall where they may, so the hypothetical button is really just a (reasonable) purity test for those who claim they oppose the state.

Why is that purity test reasonable? Because it tells us who to trust (or not trust) when it comes to cleaning up after the Great Falling of the Chips.