Consider how it all started: the original industrialists had trouble getting folks to work once the folks had acquired as much as they were used to. After that, they valued leisure.

After all their idle sophistry, there is, thank God! no means of adding to the wealth of a nation but by adding to the facilities of living: so that wealth is liberty — liberty to seek recreation — liberty to enjoy life — liberty to improve the mind: it is disposable time, and nothing more.

The pamphlet was titled “The Source and Remedy of the National Difficulties as Deduced from Principles of Political Economy in a Letter to Lord John Russsell.” Although the pamphlet was published anonymously, the author is believed to be Charles Wentworth Dilke, a literary critic, edior, friend of John Keats and disciple of William Godwin and his Political Justice.

A link to a pdf file of the pamphlet is in my URL.

I am about as classically liberal as Friedman, but we HAVE to do something about health care costs. I’m not saying socialize, but some plan to remove artificial barriers for both health care providers and consumers.

If we can find a way to disengage health insurance from part-time work, the social and economic ramifications will be tremendous. Just imagine the breadth of choices that individuals would come up with if the labor market allowed this kind of flexibility. As a parent of two small kids whose wife is a school administrator/teacher, I know that if I could work part-time and keep health care coverage, it would be utterly fantastic from a domestic standpoint.

Chuck is right- linking health care to employment is a fundamentally illiberal flaw in the market that some intrepid libertarian think tanker ought to find us a way out of.

But I’m no economist, sociologist, or simple caveman lawyer. So what’s wrong with this story, if anything?

There’s nothing wrong with your story, as far as it goes, but I think that you’re neglecting the other side of the equation–and that leaves you susceptible to a crude caricature of your position such as the one that Chris Bertram posted on Crooked Timber. (viz., that work is good for its own sake)

Yes, there are distortions in the European system that make them work less than they otherwise would. But I believe that there are also massive distortions in the US system that make us use less leisure than we otherwise would (to our detriment!).

Let me give you the two examples that come to mind: Healthcare and higher education. We have a healthcare system that’s tied to private insurance which we get through a third-party (our employer). Why? Because that’s the way the tax code is set up (employers pay with pre-tax dollars). So if you lose your job, you lose your healthcare. The bottom line distortion is: Don’t become a free-lancer, don’t start your own business, just put your nose to the grindstone and keep working for corporate. That sucks.

Higher Education. We have a system that subsidizes consumers. It’s okay insofar as it has given us the best higher education system in the world. But it has also relieved universities of the pressure to control cost. So the federal government has been giving and subsidizing greater larger amounts of student aid. Today, student loan burdens are enormous. So you work, work, work at your job to get the hell out from under your Everest-size pile of debt. It’s like some weird indentured servitude.

Without distortions like these, more Americans would free-lance, work for themselves, or otherwise use increased leisure time.

And leisure time is good and important! It’s important for maintaining family bonds, cultivating one’s personality, and maintaining sanity.

So let’s not allow the illiberal socialists to equate markets with the destruction of leisure.

It is certain illiberal peculiarities of the American system that have deprived us of our leisure.

Bzzt. You’re wrong. As a British expat in the US, I don’t give a toss about the tax burden; I do give a toss about the fact that employers expect me not to take holidays. Even public holidays.

But I’m no economist, sociologist, or simple caveman lawyer.

Really? You could have fooled me.