Peter and Aesop both ask the same question: Should the government ‘let’ people build a house in an area known to be prone to disasters like hurricanes? The reasons that they give:
- it costs local and state authorities huge amounts to maintain access to such areas to protect them, fire and rescue departments to aid those living there during disasters, etc.;
- Insurance companies typically won’t insure against hazards that are so easily foreseen, meaning that either they have to be compelled to do so through legislation, and/or subsidized to do so from taxpayers’ coffers, and/or have state-aided insurance plans such as flood insurance to cover the risks they will not.
- There’s all the infrastructure (roads, power, water, sewage processing and disposal, maintenance, etc.). That’s not just capital cost to provide them all, but ongoing running costs year in, year out.
- There’s the expense of subsidizing and/or providing insurance coverage.
- There’s the burden of restoring services to such areas when natural disasters disrupt them (which also means the resources devoted to doing that can’t be used in other areas where they may be needed, imposing additional delays and costs).
- There’s the additional bureaucracy and complexity of legislation and/or regulation accompanying all of the above.
These positions seem reasonable. They are also tyrannical and wrong. If we were to grant government the power to declare that you can’t live somewhere because it is too expensive to provide services there, then you open the door to government getting involved and ruling over your entire life.
Owning guns is too dangerous, and therefore illegal. So is smoking, drinking alcohol, eating salt, eating fatty foods, and not exercising 1 hour per day. SCUBA and sky diving, contact sports, owning a car that is capable of speeds more than 40 miles per hour, as well as roller skates, bicycles, and air conditioning (Climate Change!) are all dangerous.
Governments were created, among other things, to provide for the common defense. Services like fire, police, and rescue are properly part of that response. Don’t tell me how we should have for profit fire and rescue services- we tried that, and it plain doesn’t work. (Seriously- read the link before you comment)
Water, power, roads, and all of those other services are paid for by companies that have been granted a monopoly by the government. They aren’t paid for by taxes in many cases, but by fees passed on to consumers.
Back to the subject- when the government decides that it’s most cost effective to make everyone live in tenements in downtown Detroit, come back and explain to me how you didn’t see that coming. But hey, you can sign on to the Green New Deal if you prefer.
