A simple critique of libertarianism.

So viewing friends of freinds’ profiles on facebook, I am reminded of the fact that there are quite a few Americans who consider themselves to be ‘libertarian.’  Many of the strongest proponents of this idea are people who have gone through a business school, and gotten a degree in any of the majors such as marketing, economics, advertising, finance, accounting, etc., that these schools offer.  In the netherlands, these are clearly understood to be vocational degrees, and so one finds no business schools at the universities.  In the US, business schools have gotten themselves attached to universities, and so business degrees have a corresponding prestige which perhaps they should not.  This is because, the average person in business school is not shown the whole range of possible approaches to their subject, (and, crucially, almost no history of their subject), but rather only those approaches which will make them a productive servant of a company.  A company’s main purpose is to sell as much product as possible, with the understanding that this will make as much profit as possible.  Thus, all vocational learning at business school is almost exclusively focused on this one end.  I should know, as my dad taught in one of the better business schools in the country for over 30 years, and I basically grew up there.

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