Libertarianism in action.

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Now imagine this on a wide scale.

http://www.tennessean.com/article/20101 ... 5-town-fee

This is a prime example of the incompetence of Big Government. The blame for that lies squarely on the Obama administration's fiscal irresponsibility. Clearly, a corporate owned fire department wouldn't allow this to happen. The free market wouldn't allow it.

So if I understand you two correctly, a government fire department refusing to put out a fire due to some city policy after someone "offered to pay whatever it would take to get the firefighters to act" is a fault of the free market? Capitalists like money.

In a free market, insurance companies would likely pay fire departments as has happened historically in the United States and Europe before the era of public fire departments (and banks usually require fire insurance against a loan on a home).

Quote from the affected homeowner:

"I thought they'd come out and put it out, even if you hadn't paid your $75, but I was wrong," Cranick tells the Paducah, Ky., TV station.

So what's the problem here? Someone CHOSE not to pay for a service, yet expected it to be provided anyway? Most places don't give you the choice to decline the taxes that pay for firefighters, this guy had the option and took it, and suffered the consequences.

How is this supposed to be an indictment of libertarianism again?

I actually don't think this story makes a good case for any political argument. It's simply a case of incompetence and an ethical failure on the part of the town / fire department. Whether it's government or a private company at fault in a situation like this there should be outrage.

The sarcastic comment was just my prediction of what would develop.

Not containing the fire was irresponsible as the neighboring property (whose owner had payed the fee) also suffered significant damage as a result.

Dox's mentality illustrates how this relates to libertarianism. While this was not the result of libertarianism, libertarians posses a mentality which would trigger such scenarios as houses burning down because a fee was not, or could not be paid.

And what if the neighbor had not been home to call? His house may have burnt down as well.

How does the blame lie on the Obama administration? Or the Bush administration? Or any administration for that matter. The economy is not a beast mastered by any one man. But if any administration is to blame, it's only in that they did not impose sufficient regulations to contain malignancies within the free market. Malignancies that offered loans to those who should not have been loaned money, malignancies that drove a culture of excessive risk taking, malignancies that propagated moral liabilities and penalized those with sound business ethics.

People who made $40,000 a year and took out $2,000,000 dollar sub-prime, variable interest rate loans, to buy $600,000 suburban tract houses, SUV's and boats. Lending companies who fired lending officers for not meeting unreasonable quotas, and the executives who knew they were driving the economy into the ground and didn't care because they'd exit with their millions before it all collapsed.

I'm not a communist but if you think an unregulated free market is any better than a tightly regulated government, you are out of your mind.

Well if you don't pay a tax or other government fee on something, chances are you are going to suffer some sort of consequence from it. If I take the driving test and don't pay the 20 dollars for my driver's license or the money for the plates for my car, then I'd say it's pretty fair that I'm not allowed to drive.

This person, for whatever reason, wouldn't pony up 75 measly dollars to protect his house which cost a lot more than seventy five dollars. The consequence is that his house goes unprotected and therefore burns down to the ground. Does that sound unethical to you?

Sure, it seems bad that the city penalized him that way for not paying the fee, but the fact is that if you do not pay a tax levied by a government, you are in DEBT to the GOVERNMENT. This is a position you should NEVER be in. In this position, the government can pretty much do whatever the hell they want with you, however unethical it may seem.

The following advice is designed to prevent government harassment for unpaid taxes (and possibly to prevent your house from burning down!):

When a federal, state, or local government levies a tax in your area:

1. Pay it
2. Complain about it later.

I don't really see the problem here. He didn't pay his optional $75 fee, that was his gamble. I'm sure they would of saved anybody trapped inside but it was just the house. Nobody would pay the $75 fee if they provided their service anyways. I think they probably could of billed him later when he verbally agreed pay whatever when his house was on fire but I can see how that could be potentially hard to collect on if he decided that he didn't want to later.

Hopefully the home owner has insurance and he better hope they don't drop him for his own negligence. They guy actually started the fire by burning debris in his backyard. Combine that with him not paying the fee, it's just dumb on the home owners part.

It doesn't. I was being sarcastic. Sorry.

Think this one through though. If insurance pays for his loss - rates go up. Now imagine a broad scale of insurace comapnies having to pay for preventable losses and the huge increase in premiums that would become the result. Everyone would be paying more because of those that do not pay. On the flip side, insurance won't cover his loss and now the guy is homeless with a mortgage for a worthless property (land has little value by itself out in the sticks) and so he becomes either an indebted burden on society by using social welfare programs to make ends meet, or he defaults on his mortgage in order to pay rent, adding to the loses by the banks and further reducing their willingness to make loans as well as adding to housing crisis by the major devaluation of his property and now his neighbor's property as well.

No one wins by letting his house burn. The right thing to do is to prvent the loss in the first place, both ethically and econimically.

I'm sure this will suck for this home owner but you're speaking as if this happens everyday. This is just one guy. The reason that they do this is because it's such a rural and sparsely populated area. I don't think this happens enough that it will have that great of an effect either way. I'm willing to bet the fire department collected a few more $75 fees since this happened too.

I agree. Another problem I see is that this kind of policy would never work in a more urban environment where a fire could spread. Only out in the sticks can they get away with it. I can see how this policy might have come about if the town fire department was completely cash strapped and refusal to pay the fee was a widespread problem. I just think there has to be a better way of going about it. It also doesn't look like this was a new problem due to current fund shortage. They've had this policy since the 90s.

as much as i'd like to point at this as an indictment of libertarianism, it's really a much stronger indictment of this one particular style of fire prevention. this fire department has responded to other homes, in the past, that have not been up to date with their subscription fee. it's not hard to see how this affected the mentality of other people who are supposed to pay this subscription fee. the man thought that he, like others, could just pitch in the 75 bucks after they showed up. his offer to "pay whatever" doesn't really factor in. it would still have been a national attention grabbing story if they'd put out his house and then charged him thousands of dollars afterward. if they'd let him just pay the 75 dollar fee, why would anyone else pay the subscription until their house caught on fire? 75 dollars a house may be enough to fund fire protection for that area, but 75 dollars per fire responded to probably isn't.

the system is not an example of a libertarian society. the homeowner clearly didn't think it was when he expected the service he did not subscribe to. this situation may be usable as an example of the benefits of government mandated fire coverage but it could just as easily be a usable example of why you should pay your annual fire protection subscription fee.

the attitude that "it's his own fault" may seem callous and uncharitable, but it's accurate. dox is right.

this kind of policy isn't applied in urban areas in my country. as dox pointed out, "Most places don't give you the choice to decline the taxes that pay for firefighters,..."