Minor Thoughts from me to you

Another common formulation of the “libertarianism is selfishness” argument is the claim that libertarians are narrow “individualists” who deny the importance of social cooperation. In reality, however, libertarian thinkers from John Locke to F.A. Hayek and beyond have repeatedly stressed the importance of voluntary social cooperation, which they argue is superior to state-mandated coercion. As Hayek (probably the most influential libertarian thinker of the last 100 years) put it:

[T]rue individualism affirms the value of the family and all the common efforts of the small community and group . . . [and] believes in local autonomy and voluntary associations . . [I]ndeed, its case rest largely on the contention that much for which the coercive action of the state is usually invoked can be done better by voluntary collaboration.

... In reality, however, the available evidence does not support the view that libertarians are, on average, more selfish than advocates of other ideologies. For example, Arthur Brooks’ research shows that supporters of free markets donate a higher percentage of their income to charity, even after controlling for both income levels and a wide range of demographic background variables. ...

Some leftists claim that opposition to taxation or other forms of government intervention necessarily implies selfishness and indifference to the welfare of others. But that assumption simply ignores the possibility that anyone might sincerely believe that imposing tight limits on government power actually benefits the poor.

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