A Lesson From Iceland

"Hey, look at Iceland!

Stuck in the economic doldrums just a few years ago, Iceland today is enjoying an explosion of prosperity.

In fact, Iceland is now one of the world's richest nations, according to the World Bank. And it's arguably the wealthiest European country.

The economy is growing rapidly. The GDP (Gross Domestic Product) has grown about 50% since 1995. And the benefits are being felt throughout Icelandic society. Unemployment has almost disappeared -- dropping below 2 percent.

As a writer for the UK Spectator bluntly put it: "Today, Icelanders are absolutely rolling in it."

So what happened? Lots of lucky lottery ticket winners? Nope. Beginning around 1990, Icelandic leaders -- inspired by visits from libertarian free-market thinkers like Friedrich Hayek, Milton Friedman and James Buchanan -- instituted bold, fundamental free-market reforms.

Taxes were slashed, for both individuals and businesses. Personal income tax rates were cut from 33 percent in 1995 to 22.75 percent. The corporate tax rate was cut from 55 percent to 18 percent -- and a further cut to 10 percent is under consideration. A cumbersome income tax was replaced with a flat tax. Wealth and estate taxes were slashed. Major segments of the economy were deregulated. Numerous government services were privatized. Monetary policy was stabilized; inflation, which hit 100% in 1983, is down to 2-3% today. Government debt was hacked away. Private property rights were created for fisheries, a major Icelandic industry. And so forth.

Due to such market-oriented reforms, between 1990 and today Iceland rose from 26th to 9th in the Economic Freedom of the World rankings (a respected annual ranking of countries by the amount of economic freedom they permit).

The result: Iceland is enjoying the same remarkable progress that other countries around the world which have adopted similar policies have also seen.

Lesson, anyone?"

An excerpt from this issue of the liberator online:
http://www.theadvocates.org/liberator/vol-12-num-6.html#GBU
The liberator online is an e-newsletter provided by the Advocates for Self-Government.  You can sign up for it and have it delivered to your email box for free here: 
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>>19
I think you've gone way over the point here. Libertarianism is a set of simple principles and laws that have been revealed to be the basis of all tyranny. The number of Libertarian principles are no where near the same scale as the laws and expectations set out by religions or marxism. They can lie, stick it in each other's assholes, swear, worship satan, disagree with the government and smoke cannabis all they want, just so long as they do not harm anyone or interfere with their liberties.

>>20
Herbert Hoover came to power a few months beforfe the stock market crash. Herbert was a believer in the cooperation between the government and economy seemingly ignoring this policies similarities with fascist Italy's economic policies, calling this cooperation "volunteerism" instead of it's actual definition "socialism". You will find many of the causes of the great depression were based on the assumption that the US would remain laissez faire forever, when this turned out not to be the case investors panicced. You have to really look at what Herbert did in order to fully grasp the magnitude of the disaster of his policy of eradicating a succesful laissez faire economy caused.

I believe the stock market would have crashed whether the laissez faire economy as there was a bubble, however it would have just been a correction in the market and not a panic if it weren't for Herbert's clearly socialist agenda. Imagine you are a 21 year old student in 1928 and you decide to take out a few loans and make an investment as part of a nest egg in a rapidly growing economy. 1 year later and socialists hijack the republican party and get elected and rightly you want to know how this will effect your investment and after a dip in the market you see that Herbert is making a number of ridiculous laws that only serve to harm business. Now imagine that Herbert did not interfere with the economy and let businesses do what was necessary to stay afloat. There would have been no panic!