Mondays with Murray: Rothbard on Feminism
As part of the ongoing debate regarding "thick" vs "thin" libertarians which I discussed in last week's edition of Mondays with Murray, there are some on the "thick" side who would like to lump their favorite social movements in with libertarianism. Former Lions of Liberty Podcast guest Jeffrey Tucker wrote in an article for FEE last October (emphasis mine):
I see within Students for Liberty the emergence of a new form of libertarianism—something more intellectually and strategically sophisticated than forms from the last century... here are some non-negotiables, and they aren’t only about the ban on the use of power. As an extension of the above point, this generation puts a premium on civilized thinking and behaving that includes absolute exclusion of bigotry in all its forms. Racist, sexist, and anti-gay attitudes are not only tacky, but embody the opposite of the tolerance that old liberalism identified as a main bulwark against State oppression. This necessarily means a special identity with groups that have been victims of State oppression and remain so in many parts if the world.So, for example, it is true that in our time many feminists look to the State for privilege, but it is also true that many racial minorities (and people of all races and classes) look to the State. But the fundamental history and drive of feminism and the anti-slavery movement, historically understood, are about empowering every member of the human family with the freedom that is his or her right.If we love capitalism, we must remember that it alone has done more to bring about that empowerment than any political change. For this reason, we should embrace the ideals of feminism in the same way we embrace the anti-slavery cause. It is our cause, our banner, our history, our movement. We should never give this up to the oppressor class.
Tucker believes this "new libertarianism" should include a "special identity" with groups that have been victims of state oppression, including "feminists." I don't see the particular need for this; after all, isn't just about every individual a victim of state oppression? We are all taxed, regulated, spied upon, etc. I see no need to "redefine" libertarianism to favor certain groups of individuals. Rather, the emphasis should remain on individual rights.Since this is Mondays with Murray, I'll turn it over to Murray Rothbard, and his thoughts on feminism from a 1970 article, "The Great Women's Liberation Issue: Setting It Straight":
The current Women's Movement is divisible into two parts. The older, slightly less irrational wing began in 1963 with the publication of Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique and her organization of NOW (the National Organization of Women). NOW concentrates on alleged economic discrimination against women. For example: the point that while the median annual wage for all jobs in 1968 was almost $7700 for men, it only totaled $4500 for women,58% of the male figure. The other major point is the quota argument: that if one casts one's eye about various professions, top management positions, etc., the quota of women is far lower than their supposedly deserved 51%, their share of the total population.
The quota argument may be disposed of rapidly; for it is a two-edged sword. If the low percentage of women in surgery, law, management, etc., is proof that the men should posthaste be replaced by females, then what are we to do with the Jews, for example, who shine far above their assigned quota in the professions, in medicine, in academia, etc.? Are they to be purged?
When we start picking and choosing which groups are represented "unequally" in society, inevitably that leads us to look at groups in other sectors, and examine the "inequality" there as well. This constant emphasis on groups only divides and distracts from the real state oppression faced by the individual on a daily basis.
The lower average income for women can be explained on several grounds, none of which involve irrational "sexist" discrimination. One is the fact that the overwhelming majority of women work a few years, and then take a large chunk of their productive years to raise children, after which they may or may not decide to return to the labor force. As a result, they tend to enter, or to find, jobs largely in those industries and in that type of work that does not require a long-term commitment to a career. Furthermore, they tend to find jobs in those occupations where the cost of training new people, or of losing old ones, is relatively low. These tend to be lower-paying occupations than those that require a long-term commitment or where costs of training or turnover are high. This general tendency to take out years forchild-raising also accounts for a good deal of the failure to promote women to higher-ranking, and therefore higher-paying jobs, and hence for the low female "quotas" in theseareas. It is easy to hire secretaries who do not intend to make the job their continuing life work; it is not so easy to promote people up the academic or the corporate ladder who do not do so. How does a dropout for motherhood get to be a corporate president or a full professor?
While these considerations account for a good chunk of lower pay and lower ranked jobs for women, they do not fully explain the problem. In the capitalist market economy, women have full freedom of opportunity; irrational discrimination in employment tends to be minimal in the free market, for the simple reason that the employer also suffers from such discriminatory practice. In the free market, every worker tends to earn the value of his product, his "marginal productivity." Similarly, everyone tends to fill the job he can best accomplish, to work at his most productive efforts. Employers who persist in paying below a person's marginal product will hurt themselves by losing their best workers and hence losing profits for themselves. If women have persistently lower pay and poorer jobs, even after correcting for the motherhood-dropout, then the simple reason must be that their marginal productivity tends to be lower than men.
The emphasis on "inequality" among certain groups, in this case men and women, tends to completely ignore many of the natural differences between these genders that will likely lead to disparity in many areas. For example, by merely driving around Los Angeles I can see that there are far more men performing physical labor in the construction business. Is this because the construction industry is inherently chauvinist? Or is it because the male gender is generally endowed with greater physical prowess and more likely to seek a physically demanding profession? The latter is a much more logical conclusion, and yet stating this out loud will be met with scorn from the "feminist" crowd.
Despite his opposition to the feminist movement, it appears Murray Rothbard may be in agreement with Tucker's overall point when pertaining to methods by which libertarians can strategically reach out to feminist groups:
It should be emphasized that, in contrast to the Women's Lib forces who tend to blame capitalism as well as male tyrants for centuries-old discrimination, it was precisely capitalism and the "capitalist revolution" of the 18th and 19th centuries that freed women from male oppression, and set each woman free to find her best level. It was the feudal and pre-capitalist, pre-market society that was marked by male oppression; it was that society where women were chattels of their fathers and husbands, where they could own no property of their own, etc. Capitalism set women free to find their own level, and the result is what we have today.
True economic freedom allows each individual the opportunity to achieve success in their most desired professions. But we should not be focused on the results of that freedom. It is not inherently bad if there are more male construction workers, or more female makeup artists. Individuals will naturally meander towards their preferred areas of interest, regardless of their gender.
Individual rights by nature encompass the right to form voluntary groups and to participate in those groups freely. Libertarians can effectively reach out to certain groups that feel they are oppressed by "society", but the emphasis must remain on individual rights, not gender rights, racial rights, or the rights of any other specific group.Catch up on past editions of Mondays with Murray by checking out the archive!Receive access to ALL of our EXCLUSIVE bonus audio content – including “Conspiracy Corner”, “Degenerate Gamblers” and the “League of Liberty Podcast” by joining the Lions of Liberty Pride and supporting us on Patreon!
