The Impact Of Ownership Unbundling On Cost: Fill & Download for Free

Oh, I wasn’t expecting to answer this question today, but this is such a great example of how hard it is for people to imagine libertarianism.You see, what we intellectuals like to do is to keep everything else constant, and then ask, “How does this one small change affect the entire system?” And this is a very good approach to explore the impact of changes to one variable.But when we’re talking about a (voluntary) libertarian society versus the authoritarian society we have today, we are changing lots of variables all at the same time. It’s a systemic change, not an isolated change.So, if one imagines the same laws, the same poor, the same agencies, the same types of representation, the same types of crimes, the same causes of crime, or the same consequences, then you have ignored that we have changed the entire system to be a libertarian society!Imagine that we were stuck is a society in which we had been consumed by The Blob.It has entered our every orifice; it controls our every movement; it uses our life force for its energy.A libertarian comes to you and says, “We need to rid ourselves of this Blob.”But you have gotten used to being entirely controlled by the Blob. And so, you can think of many problems that might occur in isolation. For example, the Blob likes to roll really quickly, banging into buildings, or careening off roof tops to capture even more humans, and you, as a human already consumed inside, turn out to be protected from damage by the viscous consistency of the Blob.And so, as you imagine life without the Blob, you worry, “But what will happen to me if I rush at 30 mph into a building? Or jettisoned myself off of cliffs? The Blob protects me from injury. I don’t want to get hurt! No, it is safer staying inside the Blob.”And thus, the libertarian has to remind you that insulation from plopping 20 stories down onto a school bus would no longer be necessary for a functioning human minus the Blob.So, let’s take a quick tour at what an unBlobed criminal justice system might look like!What Poor?The biggest benefit (for me) of a libertarian society is the eradication of unchosen poverty. So, one cannot assume that in a libertarian society we have “the poor” who are similar to what we have today.Without the constant retardation of government, we will be multiple times wealthier than we are today:Industries won’t be artificially hamstrung.Innovation will occur much more quickly.Regulatory advantages to crony political contributors will disappear.Licensing will no longer stop regular folks from opening up their own businesses and becoming independent.Artificial constraints on hiring will no longer exist. You need something done? You hire someone to do it. No tax ID, no need for incorporation, no withholding taxes, no SS, no reporting.Think person-to-person transactions times billions.No longer will anyone wanting a job be able to say that there are no jobs.Our economic advancements will not be set back periodically by “the business cycle” where the economy tries to shrug off one round of a massive malinvestment forced on us by government’s fiscal and monetary interventions, only to be infected with yet another round of government-forced malinvestments (favoring their crony friends, of course).The constant suck suck suck of inflation? Nope!No longer will we be wasting intergenerational wealth blowing up bits of sand and people whom we have no business trying to rule over.Entrepreneurship will skyrocket.Industries will rise and fall within ten years, replaced by yet a new unanticipated, ever more impactful industries.And you, wealthy beyond your imagination today, will be looking for ways to help the Truly Needy.You will avoid charities that trap them into intergenerational dependency.You will favor charities that give them agency and dominion over their own lives.Charities will experience creative destruction as whole new concepts of how to assist various classes of poor are tried, many abandoned, and a few, truly effective ones, find success.Genetic problems that cause life-long debilitation are avoided, corrected, or simply not selected.Environmental conditions that insure continued and multigenerational dependency are eradicated, or isolated and not given the fuel to fester and grow.So, don’t imagine that in a libertarian society that we’d have the same poverty problems that we have today.What Crimes?The vast majority of “crimes” that beset the poor today would simply no longer be “crimes”. No longer would a quarter of black males be incarcerated, primarily for victimless crimes, or for secondary issues resulting from victimless crimes. [1] [2]Not only will the number of crimes decrease dramatically, but the causes of crime will be significantly curtailed.While I do not agree with the economic model of crime, in a libertarian society, the poor will have untold opportunity to work, to start up their own businesses, to trade however they like, to become important, reliable members of their communities, to increase their wealth with every win-win trade. No longer will they be whipsawed by government-induced poverty.But environmental and genetic causes of crime will also be targeted.Imagine charities that incent at-risk teens to semi-permanent birth control, until they either pay back part of the charity (indicating maturity, responsibility, and the ability and desire to care of a child), have been stably married, and/or have been gainfully employed for a significant period of time.And of the children born to poor families, we’d have more families led by fathers (who are no longer incarcerated for victimless crimes). Men in these communities would be able to make significant economic and increasingly moral contributions to their own families, and they would likely be judged and honored by society for how a good a steward they were to their children.Any charity that you can think of, that might attack a root cause of child abuse, of poor values, of victim mentality, of missing fathers, of teenage pregnancies, of absentee parenting, of …., would be possible.Certainly there would be charities that would still support large intergenerational dependency, but other charities would compete for your funding, some refusing to give additional funds to families that were abusing their children or setting them up for a life of crime and dependency. Some might require recipients to renounce their stewardship over their children before receiving any more charity.And poor families would exercise more responsibility and more agency. For example, they would choose the school for their child, and if they didn’t like what was going on at that school, they could pull their child out and take him to a different school. Just as though they were the parent in charge.So, don’t think that in a libertarian society, we’d have the crime problems we have today.What Rights?The rights of the poor are horribly violated today. Regularly:Their ownership of their own bodies is violated, as they are jailed for example, for ingesting things that their rulers don’t likeTheir ownership of their own labor is violated as they are jailed for buying and selling things that their rulers don’t like.Their ownership of their own property is violated — their homes and cars and cash and other property are subject to seizure and confiscation at every turn.In a libertarian society, these rights are paramount for every human. And there is no exception for a ruling class.Today, our rulers make their preferences into Laws, and then treat us like criminals when we have different preferences for our own bodies, labor, and property.In a libertarian society, “community preferences” will be handled by contractual agreements. Thus, for example, you may join a community and agree explicitly in writing to, say, not use opioids in the community and to an adjudication procedure. If found “guilty” of using opioids in the community, you are not incarcerated, you are simply no longer welcomed in that community.The only real “crimes” will be where you violate someone else’s human right — against her body, labor, or property. And it is these crimes that we need to focus on, not the 99.99% of current “crimes” that have more to do with the rulers’ personal preferences rather than with human rights.So, don’t think in a libertarian society, we’d have the confusion about “rights” that we have today.What Agencies?We won't have a monopolistic government provider forcing us to use them regardless of their level of service. Multiple agencies will arise because the people will want them and will be willing to pay for them.There will be protection services, insurance services, adjudication services, charity services, ... And there will be procedures to resolve differences across these services (as there are today with cell phones and car insurance).Certainly the more wealthy will be able to hire the better services (which is one of the reasons why people work so hard to create wealth). But the poor will have lower cost agencies, and charities to provide them with representation.(And keep in mind, there is far less “crime”, far less poverty, far greater wealth.)And much of the high costs today due to government licensing of lawyers and government monopoly of courts, will be gone. The agencies will desire streamlined, efficient, low cost adjudication. No longer will an accused criminal languish in jail for years — regardless of whether they are guilty or innocent — waiting for trial dates in a clogged, bureaucratic court system.In a libertarian society, there will be many more people who can represent you, and the cost will be far less, for far fewer instances of “crime”.So, don’t think in a libertarian society, we’ll have the same monopoly agency imposed on us today.What Consequences?I believe that a libertarian society will evolve to focus on restitution, not on punishment, and on ostracism, not on incarceration. (And I may be wrong ;)A system like today’s, that forces victims to pay for the incarceration of a criminal, with no compensation for the victim, is unlikely to be replicated in a libertarian society: few customers would voluntarily pay for such a backasswards, costly system. While I am not prescient, I would anticipate consequences moving in these directions:Make the victim whole. The victim’s insurance agency would pay the victim (or victim’s family), and would seek compensation from the perpetrator’s insurance agency, who would in turn seek compensation itself from the perpetrator.Reputation matters: Think of a small town where everyone knows each other. If Joe does something evil, the whole town knows it, and will make appropriate adjustments for their safety.This might be mirrored in a larger society by a database, similar to eBay’s rating system. If you are a solid citizen, your trustworthiness is trumpeted. If you are a scumbag, everyone will know that as well.In this way, your reputation will be your most important asset. It will have a major impact on your quality of life. Dishonoring yourself by violating another person’s human rights will have major long-term consequences.Identification and disassociation: If you have done something evil (crimes against body, labor, or property), the protection services in each community may target you for extra surveillance. Your crimes may be such that you are unwelcomed in some communities and some businesses.A particular insurance policy for a business may require refusal of entry to people at a certain risk level, simply because they do not want to accept the risk of those people without additional payment from the business owner.You may be notified if you are somewhere and someone is passing you buy with high risk profile. And you can know clearly the risk profiles in unfamiliar neighborhoods. In this way, the communities, businesses, and individuals can protect themselves from known risks.Insurance Company Assurances: Small violations may be forgiven. As you pay back your insurance company and prove to them that you can be trusted again, they will vouch/insure you to other protection and insurance services, allowing you increasingly greater access to a broader range of communities and businesses.Banishment: However, for some crimes, or for repeated scumbag behavior, your presence may not be welcomed by any community, insurance carrier, or protection service. You won’t be incarcerated and then the victims forced to care for you; you will just be banished from civil society.So don’t think in a libertarian society, we’ll be forced to replicate the same failed consequences our rulers abuse today.Compared to What?The proper comparison is not to some ideal, utopian judicial system, but to the broken, horrific one the poor suffer under today.Poor people’s human rights are continually violated by the very Law, which does not recognize their right to their own body, to their own labor, and to their own property.For this broken system, we all pay a high price — the retardation of wealth production, and the expansion of poverty. In a libertarian society, we reverse this.The same services that the government offers today are offered in a libertarian society, but they are offered by a variety of companies across which you may choose. And the companies compete and coordinate (because that is what the customers will demand).The focus of crime protection will be on real crime —- violations of the body, labor, and property of another. It will not recognize a special ruler class that may itself violate our body, labor, and property.Differences in personal preferences will not be crimes, but will simply be agreed-upon standards of voluntary communities.Rather than one (really bad) procedure to give the poor legal protection, a greater diversity of charities, with more entry, innovation, entrepreneurship, competition, efficiency, and effectiveness, will allow the poor at least as good representation as they have today.As opposed to incarceration, the consequences of real crime will focus on restitution, identification, prevention, and disassociation. The primary interactions will be with and between insurance companies.Can’t predict the FutureI’m sure you will be shocked to learn that unlike our politicians, I was not gifted with prescience, nor do I wish to limit the future to my finite imagination.So, I can’t predict the innovations and entrepreneurship and new approaches and alternative communities that will arise once we are free to associate and trade and interact however we voluntarily choose.But I can assure you thatit will be consonant with, and responsive to, your values,it will be bottom-up from your preference into community systems and then into societal systems,it will be allow you to choose what you prefer and are willing to pay for and what makes the most sense to you from both a consumer and a donor perspective.it will iteratively improve as new ideas are tested.So, don't get confused that you will be constrained everywhere else by the Blob, and yet will have to fix some single problem in isolation.The Blob will be out of your orifices and no longer contraining your movements and desires.You will be free to create your communities however you see fit.See related:Libertarianism and CrimeHow do human ethics differ from individual morals?What if we unbundled “government services”?How could a libertarian society provide “just punishment”?How could a libertarian society handle psychopaths?How could a libertarian society handle rape?How could a libertarian society deter criminals?How could libertarianism solve police brutality?How could libertarianism better protect us from both government and criminals?Does a libertarian society require all citizens to be innately good?Why is the US so much more dangerous than any other western country?Libertarianism and PovertyHow to differentiate different types of poor people?How could a libertarian society alleviate poverty?Should government incent birthing more children into poverty?How does the government trick innocent people into becoming criminals?Is it morally wrong to steal to feed your starving child?How does dishonesty lead to poverty?Libertarianism and CharityHow could a libertarian society replace the welfare state with voluntary charity?How could a libertarian society pay for necessary services without taxes?See more recent answers that reference this answer→ Essays on <The Difficulty of Understanding Libertarianism> by Dennis→ Return to the <Table of Contents> for Dennis’ Libertarian Essays[DiffUnder, GovFailure, Crime, Future, Poverty]Footnotes[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2015/06/16/the-stale-statistic-that-one-in-three-black-males-has-a-chance-of-ending-up-in-jail/?utm_term=.36fd5d8cf05e[2] The Top 10 Most Startling Facts About People of Color and Criminal Justice in the United States - Center for American Progress

To answer this well, we need a taxonomy of current government laws — from the perspective of libertarians!!And I’m feeling motivated, baby!! <Rolling up sleeves> :)[Distribution of Laws (number, cost, and intrusion), From a Libertarian’s Taxonomy]Threatening Innocents: Innocuous Personal PreferencesBy far the greatest number of laws are simply niggling personal preferences: Use this type of shower-head[1]; Put your sink at this height[2]; You can’t have a garden in front of your home [3]; You can’t sell this size coke[4]; Your window display must be of this size[5]; etc.And there’s literally hundreds of thousands of such picayune proclamations, each of which carries the threat of bodily violence and of theft.Some government bureaucrat, thinking long or more likely thinking short, came up with an idea, and of course he had a rationale. But, here’s the libertarian point:Reasonable people will disagree; there’s no need for violence!Ethical libertarians will object to this class of law saying that we are engaging in a category error — violence is being used to involuntarily impose something that is simply just a matter of opinion and of personal preference.Consequentialist libertarians will object to this class of law saying that using violence causes lots of unanticipated adverse consequences, and ignores the utility of diversity and of innovation.They both would argue that such rules should not be enforced by violence, but instead just be a suggestion, or perhaps part of a voluntary, private contract.Government — as solely an instrument of violence — is not the right locus for peaceful suggestions. Instead a private certification service could offer “Suggested Guidelines”, and free people could follow those suggestions voluntarily if they thought them wise, and private associations could contractually obligate their voluntary members to agree to various suggestions.No violence is necessary.How do human ethics differ from individual morals?Which government regulations on business do libertarians support?Threatening Innocents: StealingSo many government laws steal your wealth in so many different ways.Your money is stolen directly from you through income taxes, sales taxes, property taxes, investment taxes, etc. Money is also stolen indirectly from you through pass-through taxes and fees on companies that you use: licensing laws, inspection fees, tariffs, corporate taxes, inflation, debt (interest rates), etc.And then we have money taken through the hidden costs of regulations, hidden costs of reporting requirements, cartelization of industries towards bigger firms, etc.. The government reduces your choice of companies, your choices of products and services, the innovation of those products and services. In this way it further increases your prices and reduces your wealth.Additionally, you are involuntarily paying because government is also reducing the number and types of jobs that you can get in the economy, the salaries that you can earn, the speed with which you can advance, etc.The ethical libertarian notes that such stealing is unethical, regardless of what you call it or why you steal. Only when you consent and proactively purchase should you be charged. Anything else is theft and a form of enslavement.What is the argument that “Taxation is theft”?How is taxation slavery?How is all government spending effectively a tax?Threatening Innocents: Advantaging CroniesMany of the laws and theft benefit specific classes of providers (e.g., large corporations at the cost of small mom and pop providers). The larger the union or the corporation, the more influence they have over law formation. And sometimes, it’s simply a favor for a brother-in-law, a campaign contributor, or a favorite foreign dictator.The laws can give competitive advantages, all the way through to giving direct subsidies, monopolies, and contracts.Consequentialist libertarians will tell you of the enormous costs: the loss of innovation, the loss of employment, the loss of independence, the loss of mobility, and the drastic reduction of human wealth.Ethical libertarians will note how evil is it to use violence for personal profit.What is the difference between legal and ethical?Who is killing the mom and pop stores?Does capitalism ensure the least amount of corruption in any political system?Threatening Innocents: Destructive CharitiesOne justification of a ruling class assumes that the ruling class cares more for citizens-in-need and knows best how to help them.The consequentialist libertarian will note the enormous costs and poor results of government welfare programs, noting especially how such programs have had adverse consequences that may actually be far worse than the original problem. And they argue that rulers are no better than average citizens, and in many cases are more psychopathic, more narcissistic, more selfish, more sadistic, more megalomaniacal, etc.Ethical libertarians note that charity requires voluntary giving and thus cannot begin at the point of a gun. Violating people’s bodies to do something good is committing a great ethical sin for a minor moral benefit (which the consequentialists argue is not being accomplished anyway).Both would suggest that charity be privatized, creating a marketplace of innovating solutions, competing for donors, targeting various populations, differentiating on effectiveness, efficiency, trust, etc. And always always always being voluntary and consensual.Parable: How could voluntary charity replace the welfare state?Why don't conservatives vote to help the poor, like Christ and progressives demand?Threatening Innocents: PaternalismIn addition to innocuous rules, there are another category threatened on you because your rulers allegedly care so much about you. So, they try to reduce your risks — don’t climb on these rocks, don’t use these types of scissors, don’t ingest these substances.Now, the behaviors outlawed are really a matter of individual benefit/cost analysis. The consequentialist libertarian will argue that if we’re trying to maximize overall utility, how can we compare the unknowable disutilities of these vices for the participants relative to the disutility of not enjoying the vice plus the disutility of the government violence.The ethical libertarian says, “It’s your life; it’s your body; it’s your decision!”Both would argue that a private company offering safety guidelines as well as private contracts is a much more ethical and more utility-maximizing solution. For example, if a vice has a probabilistic health impact, then various insurance companies might well charge differing amounts for such behavior. You could shop around and make your decision voluntarily for your own life and your own budget. In addition, if you disapproved of some behavior, disassociation is ethical and nonviolent.Do you support dismantling the Food and Drug Administration?How would a libertarian deal with the opioid crisis?Threatening Innocents: Prior RestraintAnother category of law is imposed on otherwise innocent people because rulers note a correlation. Gun laws would be just one example of many. The idea is that because of a (low) correlation, if we reduce the item, we might eliminate some of the bad correlation.Consequentialist libertarians will note that this is faulty logic, and can produce opposite and unexpected adverse outcomes.Ethical libertarians will note that initiating violence against an otherwise peaceful person just because you fear a low probability criminal behavior from an entirely different person is itself an unethical act, and violates the ownership of the innocent’s bodies.Again, we would suggest people-ratings and voluntary associations to handle fears of correlation.Should the military go house to house to confiscate guns?Collude, Threaten, and Kill: ForeignersThere is set of laws that costs a lot of money — intervening in foreign countries. Oftentimes, this is part of a crony payoff. Rulers force you to pay to kill people half a world away, angering their relatives to come back over here to seek vengeance, which then causes your rulers to spy on you and to molest you, in a pretense of protecting you.Consequentialist libertarians will tell you about blow-back, unintended consequences, high costs, low return, etc.Ethical libertarians will look at you in amazement and wonder how you don’t see the ethical problem here.Both suggest a more individual approach to supporting specific dictators, corporations, and peoples: If you want to send your money and your body overseas to help one of these, go ahead. But don’t violently drag us into your oversea’s adventures.How would an anarcho-capitalist society deter a conventional warShould we intervene in countries that lack basic liberties?Do libertarian policies reduce our defense against terrorism?Widely Desired ServicesNow, we get to much smaller categories of law, which involve services that progressives, conservatives, and even libertarians would agree they want (e.g., roads, insurance, defense, police, contract mediation).Subsets of libertarians will continue to question whether government violence and a government monopoly is necessary or ethical, and will seek peaceful, voluntary, and consensual alternatives.Desired Services: Big ProjectsMany people see big projects (e.g., roads, tunnels, downtown business center, moon shots) as requiring violence against innocents: they believe that the overall benefit is worth threatening everyone, and while it may be unfortunate, it is necessary, that part of the costs of these big projects will be hurting a few innocent people.Consequentialist libertarians who disagree will talk about the costs, inefficiency, and disutility of relying on violence rather than on consent, and on monopoly and cronies, rather than on competition and choice.Ethical libertarians will often stop as soon as they hear nonconsensual. Initiating violence against innocent people to do something you think might be a long-term positive impact is trying to earn an arguable long-term profit at the cost of your soul.Both would suggest peaceful, consensual methods — which might take more time and involve more tradeoffs — but which may produce better outcomes more ethically with less waste, corruption, and distortion of civil society.How would a libertarian society have paid for the moon landings?Desired Services: Important ProjectsA category of law uses government violence to provide some services — which people know well could be provided nonviolently — but which nonlibertarians believe are just so important that they are willing to use violence against peaceful innocent people to assure those services are provided.Consequentialist libertarians who disagree will talk about unexpected adverse consequences, crony capitalism, corrupt officials, monopolistic solutions, diminishment of innovation, and loss of wealth.Ethical libertarians will again urge that we not proactively hurt people just because it is otherwise difficult to get one’s way or because you will personally benefit with a particular implementation of a service. They suggest that we instead find peaceful, innovative, win-win approaches.How would schooling work in a libertarian society?How would healthcare work in a libertarian society?Desired Services: Stopping CriminalsOne oft-cited category of law, which splits libertarians, is protecting people from the initiation of violence by common criminals.Consequentialist libertarians will talk about stifling innovation, government bureaucracy, lack of competition, high costs, poor results. They’ll note how government doesn’t stop crime as much as simply writes reports and removes bodies after the fact, and, should government catch criminals — which more often they do not — the victims must bear the costs of trial and incarceration, without themselves being compensated for the insult of the crime.Ethical libertarians will note the hypocrisy of threatening violence and initiating theft against innocent citizens for the purported purpose of preventing the initiation of violence and preventing theft (and generally not doing that.)While most libertarians will agree that some ruler violence on innocent people is necessary to prevent common criminal violence on innocent people, there are subsets of libertarians <Ahem!!> who believe that allowing competition, innovation and voluntary consent would be far much more effective — and more ethical.How could a libertarian society handle psychopaths?In a libertarian society, how would poor people defend their rights in a court of law?In a libertarian society, who protects private property?Desired Services: Enforcing ContractsWhile I could go on, let me conclude by noting another small category of law that divides even libertarians — enforcing contracts via civil courts.Consequentialist libertarians who disagree with this category of law will scratch their heads and wonder, “Have you ever actually tried to use the government to enforce contracts?” They’ll note that this is more the province of big guys beating up on each other or beating up on little guys. It is a small part of government, but done with government’s usual lack of effectiveness, efficiency, innovation, and customer service.Ethical libertarians will sadly note the hypocrisy of a noncontractual, coerced, unethical relationship with the government, allegedly for the purpose of enforcing ethical, voluntary contractual relationships.Again, many ‘small government’ libertarians will believe this is a provence of a highly limited government, but then there are those crazy anarcho-capitalists and voluntaryists who will suggest that we can have this function provided better via private mediation, insurance, reputation, and arbitration services, which would compete and innovate, and you would choose.What would you do were you in an anarcho-capitalist society?As we get more into the widely desired services, we do see more and more libertarians favoring some laws, but they would want to carefully restrict rulers from using their monopoly violent power to venture into more personal preference areas, and even if they thought that they could restrain rulers, these libertarians will still have consequentialist and ethical concerns about the violent, monopolistic provisioning of such services.The more anarchistic libertarians will be more consistent — seeking peaceful, consensual, competing alternatives to even these services.What if we unbundled all “government services”?See related:See later answers that reference this answer.→ Essays on <Government Failure and Expansion> by Dennis→ Return to the <Table of Contents> for Dennis’ Libertarian Essays< , GovViol, Preferences, NAPConsent, Conseq, DifUnd, Monop, GovFail, Regulation,>Footnotes[1] The Bureaucrat in Your Shower | Jeffrey A. Tucker[2] Good Intentions Gone Bad[3] Preserve the right to grow your own food![4] Mayor Bloomberg’s Soda Ban: Why It Won’t Work[5] Chicago to Businesses: Did Licensed Contractors Hang Those Window Signs?

No, I don’t think so.It’s a cool headline idea that grabs your attention, though.And it’s a respectable publication with a well respected and professional academic author, too. So it could be persuasive.But you have to look beyond face value and do some critique, no matter how compelling the material. At least look at the contextAnd consider other perspectives, like links between poor diet, decreased exercise and a lack of sleep, and mood, which could also be implicatedAs well as other opinions[1] by respected researchers[2] [3](it is a worry that Twenge claims correspondence with her own research yet cites papers that don’t demonstrate that at all, or only if you squint[4])And I have nothing but respect for the author, by the way. As stated down the bottom of the article, Jean M. Twenge[5] is a professor of psychology at San Diego State University and the author of Generation Me and iGen. She also debunked Strauss and Howe, at least a bit. [6]Nothing wrong with those credentials, of course (although you may want to dig deeper for more detail and critique, to reassure yourself[7][8][9][10]).But the article itself isn’t an academic paper, and it doesn’t go out of its way to quote sources and provide detailed references for the assertions made. (Although there are hints.[11][12][13][14][15][16])Which fills out a bit more of the context.But back to the question.And the article itself answers your question.Or as the author herself puts it…“Even when a seismic event—a war, a technological leap, a free concert in the mud—plays an outsize role in shaping a group of young people, no single factor ever defines a generation.”So why then would you blame the smartphone alone?And again the author admits that…“Depression and suicide have many causes; too much technology is clearly not the only one. And the teen suicide rate was even higher in the 1990s, long before smartphones existed.”And I can hear the chorus in my ears: Correlation is not causation. It’s a cliche, but it’s true.Assuming that you have read that article, and if not please do, if you draw some rough trend lines on the accompanying graphs, you can see that the trend often works against the ‘smartphone hypothesis’.I’ve drawn some lines (the red arrows) for you.Clearly this “less sleep” data (if the data is verifiable) suggests a long-term trend, and the significance of the iPhone (or any smartphone) is diminished, probably to zeroYou could ask instead, what suppressed the trend from 2003 until 2012? You could presume that hitting that 50% ownership mark in 2012 was the trigger, but why?Why does 50% ownership make all the difference, especially to such a young cohort?And in any event it’s still below the trend.Again the trend is mostly long term and sustained, until… it isn’t (initially showing what could be considered improvement in ‘feeling alone’). And yet the advent of the iPhone is not significant, if you can get over the spooky coincidence in 2007There weren't that many smartphones around in 2007, and they weren’t in the hands of babies, toddlers or school-age kidsSo what reversed the trend? Was it magically hitting 50% ownership in 2012, or some unidentified background issue?Now the iPhone (and other smartphones) was hardly instantly universal, and it was too expensive to be pervasive across age and demography… so I’d be wondering when it hit ‘critical mass’ - and at this stage dismissing the release date as insignificant.And then, why the seemingly exponential reversal of trend from about 2012? Does that parallel smartphone sales growth and age-range penetration? Or not?As for not rushing into driving, I think that is explained by many things.Opportunity cost, of the time and effort spent on driver training, and of purchasing a vehicle. You could something else, like a laptop or a smartphone, instead!Increasing fuel and other costsRoad congestionAnthropogenic climate change and a desire to ‘do better’The relentless effort to improve safety (simultaneously increasing the association between cars and risk) and fuel consumption (which undermined the ‘hero car’ concept and market segment)Increased simplification of operation (lowering perceived skill component) and an allied increase in complexity and complication within automobile designDilution of market differentiation (it’s just not clear cut what to buy anymore).In any case it’s the same sort of long-term trend, from 1976 onward. (The Oil Crisis of 1973[17] may have been a turning point.)So why would we pin the blame on smartphones?Again, what was the market penetration by demography of the smartphone… especially with regard to the ‘12th-graders’?Wouldn’t that be worth exploring?You could make some assumptions about it, and make a case for ‘accelerating’ the trend, but it wouldn’t necessarily be convincing.In the above example (and I won’t draw lines on all of the graphs just check ’em out again here or - more critically - here) you could draw another line showing oil prices (going upward, mostly) or highlight some other significant events, apart from just the advent of smartphones.It seems unlikely that the smartphone lies at the heart of these social changes, anyway.On the face of it, a portable device that is designed to connect you to other people wherever you are, and that allows not simply voice, image and text connection (and exchange) but also positional capabilities that help you to navigate to your social contacts is an enabler of social contact.Which sounds like it would help you get out and about, yes? So why would such a device make you stay at home instead?And wouldn’t most young school-age people be at school, with their friends, most of the day? They surely don’t use their smartphones all day. (OK, some clearly do.)If hiding in your room and interacting virtually is your thing, get a laptop. You can do your homework on that, too. And a lot more besidesOr is it the fault of the parents, using their smartphones obsessively, to the detriment of their child’s upbringing. In which case, why not explore what that may mean?[18]Yet smartphones[19] are just one distracting and involving thing among many. If you want to try to correlate social change with the evolution and use of mobile tools, think firstly of the advent of more basic underlying tech like cellphones[20]and texting (‘SMS’), rather than focusing on just their hyped-up and souped-up descendant, the smartphone.It has precursors. So why didn’t the effect show up earlier, even as a shadow?As an aside, the article seemingly perpetuates the myth that the Apple product was first to market, or that Apple ‘invented’ the smartphone. Again, there were precursors, and competitors[21]And sure, the smartphone is probably important here. It undoubtedly plays a part in providing mobility in communication, and ultimately uncoupled or unbundled the longstanding concept of a single communication connection or channel into the homeEveryone could have their own entertainment and communication channel, essentially - or potentially, as we have to choose to do this - breaking a long-standing ‘family-binding’ or communal experienceBut again, it was part of a trend, not the starting point or sole trigger.And what is it about 2012?The author herself asks that same question, pointing firstly to that year being ‘after the Great Recession’, which ‘had a starker effect on Millennials’.And the light bulb moment being that it was…“exactly the moment when the proportion of Americans who owned a smartphone surpassed 50 percent.”Or as ‘exact’ as one whole year can be. Before that was the statement…“around 2012, I noticed abrupt shifts in teen behaviors and emotional states. The gentle slopes of the line graphs became steep mountains and sheer cliffs, and many of the distinctive characteristics of the Millennial generation began to disappear. In all my analyses of generational data—some reaching back to the 1930s—I had never seen anything like it.”Which is all well and good, and intriguing, but why is 50% significant to this cohort?Why do these startling effects not gently grade on either side of 50%?Is it supposed that significant numbers of these smartphones were getting into the hands of, at best, 17 year olds?And how could reaching 50% overall ownership be having marked effects on people ‘born between 1995 and 2012′?If you think about it, 50% overall ownership would at best be 15% in that particular age range (if counted at all), and likely far fewer than that. Perhaps only 5%, if that.Whilst that would be a sizable percentage of the kids falling into that range, why do we assume that whatever that % ownership figure may be, is a significant driver of mental health issues?Indeed so significant that it affects the whole cohort, prompting the author to write that they had ‘never seen anything like it’?How or why would it represent a ‘switch’ or tipping point?Likely as not, it wasn’t smartphones.Maybe it was tablet ownership as well?Or tablets, smartphones and PCs?In which case, still, why blame just smartphones?Should we add laptops to that?Deloitte’s make the point that ownership doesn’t always equal use. They report that for fitness bands, younger people have high ownership but low use. [22]Anyway, just 5 years after that 50% market penetration marker comes a…“2017 survey of more than 5,000 American teens found that three out of four owned an iPhone.”Oh really? That sounds either imprecise, or a conflation to meI presume therefore that it should read “smartphone”, rather than “iPhone”, as Apple’s market share wasn’t that good. [23]So I checked.Statista[24] doesn’t quite agree with the author. (I can’t see the source - they want money, alas but assume manufacturer stats - perhaps - rather than a survey.)Statista puts the 50% mark for (adult-owned) smartphones at very late into 2012, almost 2013. Maybe that extra 11.5 months or so matters. Pew Research says the same, by the way[25]And whilst not showing teens in this breakdown, it puts overall smartphone (not just iPhone, which would have been around 20% of the market, give or take) uptake hitting 75% at about 2016It is highly unlikely that young teens owned the same % of smartphones as adults, even a year later, although it’s possible that a high % had access. [26]Deloitte’s has an interesting survey of 2,000 people with slightly higher market penetration (or ‘ready access’) overall, and marginally higher figures for 18–24 year olds in 2017. Nothing conclusive on those pesky younger people, though.Again Pew Research has also done interesting work in this area, with no marked divergence from the above.[27]And ownership isn’t use, anyway. Plenty of people own cars, not all of them drive a lot.We aren’t really told what features were used (although ‘social media’ starts low and heads up to maybe 70% adult usage by 2017), or how they affected or generated the aforementioned “abrupt shifts in teen behaviors and emotional states”.It’s certainly worth investigating, but it hardly demonstrates a compelling link between younger people, declining mental health and smartphones alone.A more acceptable hypothesis may be that it wasn’t the smartphone alone, but laptops or personal data communicators of any other sort, coupled of course with the advent of the Internet itselfAnd the World Wide Web, running on the Internet, tooBut it still doesn’t really explain the abruptness of it all.So maybe it was a synergy of all that with the added mobility of the cellphone network.A ‘perfect storm’, as we tend to say.But to analyse and critique all of that would involve looking at uptake rates for each tool, cellphone tower distributions, cellphone and data connectivity availability across generations, ADSL and cable access, and so onAnd app use, too, by age and so onMuch of today’s social media interaction can also be accomplished on a fixed line with a PC, so you should start looking for correlations with that, too.Point is, it’s quite hard to eliminate or control all the variables here, in order to confidently identify firstly the characteristics we are observing, and secondly the actual underlying cause.It’s rarely the first thing we think of, anyway.And to look across generations is even more difficult. ‘Generations’ are often - almost always - murky and ill-defined. Unless there are distinct events of a large enough scale, such as wars and economic depression, or a clear shift in birth rates, it’s hard to hang your hat on the data and own itOf course it doesn’t have to be hard. If we are only looking to make relatively trivial observations, such as ‘more smartphones are used at an earlier age by increasingly accomplished users’, that’s fineYou can quickly and easily say that smartphone sales and depth of use will be greater in a younger cohort, especially as they get into the workforce and get cashed up.You could also make predictions, including an increasing comfort with and utility of smartphones, including flow-ons like augmented reality and an increasingly cash-less society.Equally you could predict competition from cloud-based pervasive and embedded computing solutions that will shift the emphasis away from a clumsy block of metal, glass and plastic we carry with us, to something that effectively comes along with us, follows us, or is in us.In a complex environment with many influences in play, it’s even more difficult to pin any perceived, apparent and widespread social or cultural change on just one tool, no matter how pervasive or influential it becomes.I may make an exception here for the control and management of fire, the first stone axe, or perhaps the first truly symbolic language, but none of those truly revolutionary things were instantaneously widespreadAnd they too had precursors (like uncontrolled but usable fire, wooden tools, and proto-languages including gesturing).OK, these are extreme examples. But they are things that arguably ‘re-programmed’ our brains, our ‘wetware’, and may have influenced our genetic evolution as well.And yet such extremes help illustrate how difficult it is to be certain about other, lesser influences on our behaviourIf even the big changes or events had a certain measurable and limited impact, exactly how influential will be relatively minor changes?And over what time frame should we be looking?And are the effects universal, or restricted in some way (by age or geography, by demography or culture, by faith, by nation… you name it).Anyway. Back (again) to the question.Oh yeah, smartphones are ‘destroying’ a generation, or making a lot of them unwell (as in depressed, anxious or whatever). And whilst anecdotes are great, and they often resonate, they alone don’t make the case.As I said, it’s hard to unpick one generation from another. The same mix of genes get carried forward, and you get imprinted or programmed by your family customs, faith, and community, and by your friends and teachers. These things are fairly stableSurely whether you have mobile connectivity or not is down the list a bit, especially when most kids are not gifted a mobile device until their early teens (obviously some may get access earlier).It takes something big to change the force and weight of society and culture, to deviate to such an extent that it brings on sizable changes. And perhaps smartphones are a part of many other developments, and that combined they do have an influence on us.Technology is a big part of our lives, but surely no more powerful an influencer than culture, friends and family?So what about other changes in our lives, like anthropogenic climate change and mass consumption, and any inter-generational guilt we may feel about these things, or about our relative lack of action?What about increasing rates of caesarean section births?[28] How may that influence our microbiome, our mood, and our preferences?[29][30]Or our diet? Could increasing rates of obesity in childhood also be linked with an altered microbiome? How does this impact our mood and preferences?[31][32]Phew. Thanks for reading, if you got this far.Basically, tech like cellphones, smartphones and mobility are factors in social change, and yet it’s decidedly not just one thing.If it wasn’t the smartphone, it’d be laptops or personal data objects of some other sort. Or computer games. Much of the social media interaction can also be accomplished on a fixed line with a PC, so you should start looking for correlations with that, too.But does any of this correlation-hunting ‘prove’ anything?Nope.Further reading:There’s research that suggests ‘don’t panic’ and moderation about smartphone use, by the way. Caution, rather than outright, perhaps premature blameAnd I have written a lot more on this here.Footnotes[1] No, Smartphones Have Not Destroyed a Generation – Sarah Rose Cavanagh – Medium[2] Are smartphones really making our children sad?[3] https://www.theguardian.com/science/2018/jun/21/screen-time-harm-to-children-is-unproven-say-experts?utm_source=esp&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=Lab+notes+2016&utm_term=278893&subid=26037347&CMP=ema-3242[4] A Large-Scale Test of the Goldilocks Hypothesis.[5] About Jean[6] Strauss–Howe generational theory - Wikipedia[7] Move Over Millennials, Here Comes 'iGen' ... Or Maybe Not[8] a book review by Marilyn Gates: iGen: Why Today’s Super-Connected Kids Are Growing Up Less Rebellious, More Tolerant, Less Happy-and Completely Unprepared for Adulthood-and What That Means for the Rest of Us[9] Book review: Jean Twenge’s latest spotlights dangers of being a part of the smartphone generation [10] Jean Twenge - Wikipedia[11] Search Variables[12] Welcome to the MTF Website[13] Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS) - Statistics Solutions[14] Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance - United States, 2015.[15] Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System[16] Adolescent and School Health[17] 1973 oil crisis - Simple English Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[18] The Dangers of Distracted Parenting[19] Mobile phone - Wikipedia[20] Mobile phone - Wikipedia[21] Smartphone - Wikipedia[22] https://www2.deloitte.com/content/dam/Deloitte/us/Documents/technology-media-telecommunications/us-tmt-2017-global-mobile-consumer-survey-executive-summary.pdf[23] IDC: Smartphone Vendor Market Share[24] Smartphone ownership in the US by ethnicity 2011-2017 | Survey[25] Mobile Fact Sheet[26] Smartphone ownership in the US by age 2015-2018 | Survey[27] Record shares of Americans now own smartphones, have home broadband[28] The Increasing Trend in Caesarean Section Rates: Global, Regional and National Estimates: 1990-2014[29] The Impact of Caesarean Sections on the Microbiome of an Infant[30] Does Having a C-Section Alter Baby's First Microbiome?[31] The depression diet: Is our food influencing our mood?[32] Exciting insight into role gut bacteria play in obesity-related depression and anxiety