hans hoppe democracy the god that failed

Will it take more Medicare benefits, more unemployment insurance, more welfare? Then these you will see. If Social Security benefits must increase to sweep him into office, then they will increase. And our democratic aspirant will lose his election. But should he fail to gratify the crowd’s clamorings, he knows the other fellow will.

He may feel the tug of fiscal conscience. That is, he must get while the getting is there to be gotten.Ĭonsider the aspiring democratic official who seeks the franchise of a demanding public. His limited time horizon forces him toward immediate gratification. Otherwise the American Revolution was a vast swindle and the Fourth of July is a blackguard’s holiday.īut because a leader under democracy does not own the government apparatus, argues Hoppe, he has no incentive to maximize its value. The democratic politician is a placeholder.īut is that not our system’s cardinal virtue - that power is not permanently lodged in a single vessel? A rotating roster of rogues is far superior to one alone, you counter. The problem, says Hoppe, is that democratic leaders do not own the machinery of government. He wants it now - and the future can go scratching.ĭemocracy, in Hoppe’s regard, “wants it now.” It is a spendthrift a profligate a child at large in a candy store.Īs the wino cannot see beyond the next drink… democracy cannot see past the next election.

She is willing to have her cake later - after she’s seen to her business.īut a Jack with high time preference orients toward present consumption. Hoppe uses the economic concept of time preference to nail home his point.Ī Jill with low time preference delays her gratification until the future. Hoppe’s work amounts to a one-man war dance against that most holy of secular divinities. In 2001, academic Hans-Hermann Hoppe scribbled a book bearing the soaring title Democracy: The God That Failed. Today we trample sacred ground… trumpet a message of heresy… and offend the wrathful gods…

Hans hoppe democracy the god that failed