I have to announce today my apostasy from bleeding heart libertarianism. As of now, I am a bleeding heart socialist instead. You see, I recently became aware of a knock-down argument against free markets. I call this argument the “Positive Duties Exist Argument against Free Markets”. It goes as follows.

The Positive Duties Exist Argument against Free Markets:

1. We have general duties of beneficence towards one another, and in some cases, we have specific obligations to help strangers.
2. If we have general duties of beneficence towards one another, and in some cases, we have specific obligations to help strangers, then free markets are morally wrong.
3. Therefore, free markets are morally wrong.

On behalf of premise 1, consider, for example Singer’s Drowning Child thought experiment: You are walking along one day, when you see a toddler drowning in a pool of water nearby. You could easily save the child at no risk to yourself, but in doing so, you would damage your $500 blue suede shoes. (You don’t need these shoes–they are just a luxury good.) Now, most people, including me, think you have a moral duty to save the kid–it’s not merely a nice thing to do, but something you must do.

Premise 2 is just painfully obvious, so I won’t argue for it here.

Thanks, Amia Srinivasan, for showing me the light! It’s amazing that you managed to take down all of free market thinking, despite, as far as I can tell, having never read any free market thinkers, including Nozick! The Positive Duties Exist Argument is so powerful one can just ignore all that. One can destroy free market thinking despite being ignorant and misinformed about what free market people think and why they think it.