20A022 Bugs in a Free Society by Jim Davies, 6/2/2020

By far the biggest obstacle to human happiness and progress - government - will of course no longer be present; but there will still be a few factors to make life less than perfect. Despite the prerequisite re-education and despite an efficient justice system, there will alas be a handful of kriminals. There will inevitably be some natural disasters. Among those will be diseases; new viruses for example. How will a zero government society handle them?

First and foremost, there will be no government to make them worse! This year after the WuFlu surfaced, governments in Western Europe and North America, especially, seized the chance to increase their power by scaring "their" people and created enormous economic wreckage while doing so. None of that will take place, and that's a large gain.

News about the new bug will circulate at Internet speed, but instead of being spread mainly by a cartel of "Mainstream Media" it will be filtered by a whole variety of editors, each with his or her own perspective. The reading public will evaluate those and make informed decisions on what action to take, if any.

Once every few hundred years there is a genuine plague, so deadly as to kill large fractions of the human race. The more that medical science progresses the less danger will be that these will make our species extinct, and there is no better way to stimulate progress in that as in every other business, than a competitive market; therefore, while the possibility is finite, the danger will be minimized.

Suppose the errant bug is comparable to Covid-19. Shortly after it's first seen, it will be recognized as a new member of an existing virus family, and competing physicians and hospitals will race to find a cure. They will quickly find that it's unusual in that it spreads very fast, infects nearly everyone, but produces bad symptoms for only about 50 or 60 per million; and that of those, fewer than 10 actually die of it. Once that news circulates (in 3 or 4 weeks, tops) each person will evaluate the danger and see it as small. 10 deaths per million in a population is twelve times lower than the annual influenza causes. Sensational news reports claiming death rates 30 or 40 times larger will be treated roughly like the National Inquirer is today.

So my guess is that most folk will shrug it off; all life is a risk, and this will be one extra one, but not a big deal. The risk will be compared to that of catching a bad cold, smoking, driving cars, or staying home and tripping on the stair carpet. Any idea of remaining six feet away from other people, or to close restaurants or other business and crashing the economy, will not outlast a few seconds' scorn. Physicians will offer their advice, but there will be no such thing as "public policy."

Health care in the ZGS will be a free-entry, competitive business like any other so anyone will be able to call himself a "physician" and offer services for fees. Those who prove themselves competent and provide good value for money will prosper, while quacks and incompetents will move to a profession better suited to their skills. Nothing different from any other trade. Special licensing qualifications entered the scene only in the late 19th Century and were no more needed then than now or in the ZGS; it's just a racket whereby government gets increased control over people's closest secrets while physicians get protection from low-price competition. All being market participants, quality and price will be optimized - exactly as the market always does.

The coming zero government society will, then, not be perfect - but it will be optimal. That is, the best that human beings can devise, consistent with reality.