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The Libertarian Dream

Entry 1648, on 2014-04-25 at 12:29:37 (Rating 3, Politics)

Ayn woke at the usual time and started her preparation for the day. It was a cold morning but heating her cubicle wasn't an option with her income. But she wasn't resentful about this small inconvenience because the efficiency imposed by the market (all hail the fountainhead of all freedom) in these matters was irrefutable.

She daydreamed briefly about how lucky she was to live in a society which gave its participants such freedom to live such productive lives as hers, but quickly snapped out of her reverie when she realised there was a chance she might be late. She started work at exactly 07:15:30 and - as was perfectly fair under the circumstances - would be severely penalised if she was late.

If she missed her starting time by even a few seconds the efficiency of the whole system might be disturbed because her co-worker, whom she only knew by the name "Ron 07:15:45", would have his work interrupted by her untimely entrance.

Ayn seemed to be a model citizen and superficially enjoyed the freedom of the bold modern society of the 21st century. But she had a secret. Secretly she read the writings of earlier philosophers, politicians, and intellectuals from the years before the efficient era. It was hard to believe but in 90 BEE there was a president who actually espoused socialism. His name was Obama and luckily most of his destructive ideas were blocked by the courageous efforts of early efficiency campaigners like the "Tea Party".

When she first read of these corrupt ideas she was naturally appalled at them, and forced herself (although the pleasure of reading such inspiring thoughts hardly required force) to read a few hundred pages of her namesake's great treatise, Atlas Shrugged. John Galt's speech was her favourite. She could read that 100 pages of pure truth many times in succession. But despite that, the ideas of the opponents of the new order just wouldn't go away.

Outside a storm was raging but that was of no concern to her. After the climate became more extreme - for reasons no one could quite identify - storms were common, but living in the same building as you worked in meant that being exposed to the elements was unnecessary. It still amazed her that in the past people used to live and work in different places. It was all just so inefficient.

Her reading from the past contained the ridiculous notion that the new climate was the result of something they called "global warming" or "climate change" which was caused by excessive industrial use of fossil fuels. Incredibly, the writers didn't even consider the obvious fact that market forces (all hail the market, our saviour) would stop such an anomaly from happening because as soon as consumers realised corporations were harming the world they would switch to alternatives. It was so obvious she couldn't believe that they hadn't seen it.

It was time to get to work, and she had to take the stairs (she had run out of elevator tokens which had got too expensive after the world electricity supply had been cut so much) from level 4 (the second floor above the new sea level) to level 13. She knew that would take 5 minutes and 15 seconds and she couldn't rush because she had to maintain her energy for work.

As she walked past the elevator she remembered another news item from the past. Scientists (that had been an occupation dedicated to discovering things with little commercial value) had been working on a technology called "hydrogen fusion" which they claimed would have provided unlimited power. But when the old inefficient world had been finally eliminated the financial return on this work was insufficient for it to continue. Clearly these "scientists" must have been some sort of clever but ignorant pressure group because they always seemed to have been working on discoveries which were never quite ready to be used by the real commercial world. What possible use could they have been? Ayn was glad they no longer existed.

The market (all hail its glorious efficiency) handled all of those issues now. If electricity was in short supply the prices simply went up, but those who were truly deserving could still afford to use it. She felt a surge of pride when she thought of the elite in her society who could afford to use as much electricity as they wanted. What role models they were! She knew they deserved what they had because if they weren't deserving how else would they have got to where they were?

Again she thought of those old, deluded writings. In that time people were controlled by a criminal organisation called a "government". A government was an organisation dedicated to its own advancement which used violence, extortion, and theft to control the people. To justify this evil system there was an exercise called an "election" where the people could choose which criminal government they wanted. It was so much easier now that corporate leaders competed in the free market (all hail its beautiful fairness) to control society.

Ayn eventually arrived on the 13th floor and passed a co-worker leaving her 12 hour shift of work. She recognised the person whom she thought was called "Ayn 19:15:15" (Ayn was a popular name in this era) but she didn't speak to her while in her work space, of course.

As she sat at the production line Ayn thought about her part in the great enterprise she was part of. Other countries without such progressive economies might use machines for this work but there was almost full employment here because people were prepared to accept payment which was competitive in the global employment market (all hail its blessed productivity). Some might complain that it was difficult to live with such low rates of pay but how could anything ever improve unless productivity was increased? It was just common sense.

And the alternative was just too terrible to even think about. Ayn had heard of those who didn't enter into the job market (all hail the one true way) by negotiating a fair contract with an employer. They turned to crime and were usually quickly and efficiently corrected by the hugely effective private crime elimination corporation, CopCorp. No one quite knew what happened to the criminals but that wasn't surprising since the operations of CopCorp were protected by commercial sensitivity, as they should be.

It was 07:15:30 and Ayn eliminated all irrelevant thoughts from her mind as she started work. Those labels wouldn't get stuck to Coke bottles by themselves and the the new level determined by the consultants to be sufficient to meet new productivity targets had just been increased from 30 to 35 per minute. She was determined to do her part to make the corporation more efficient.

With the immortal words of Ayn Rand on her mind she began work: "your work is yours to choose, and the choice is as wide as your mind, that nothing more is possible to you and nothing less is human" and "There is no such thing as a lousy job - only lousy men who don't care to do it." Hallelujah!

Comment 1 (3914) by Sarah on 2014-04-27 at 10:49:27:

I won't tell you anything new, but it's just the same with everything in life. You would think history showes us anything, but that's so rare. Feel free to disagree but the world is changing, and we have no control whatsoever over it. For instance, imagine Barack had enough balls to put Russian bear to his place, but it seems like it's not happening, welcome world war. Awesome post, thanks! Sarah

Comment 2 (4380) by OJB on 2015-06-25 at 11:38:51:

Thanks for the positive comment. I think this post is one of my better ones... just so bitter and sarcastic! But I do thinks it makes a valid point about modern economic theory, and especially libertarian ideology.

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