How Free Are We?

What is freedom?  Are we Americans really as free as we think we are?  Looking at this question I can tell it could get very philosophical but I want to avoid that.  I just want to talk about how free we really are as Americans in the grand scheme of things. 

In the United States, I would say that, yes, I am free.  I can live wherever I choose.  I can do whatever I want for work.  I say whatever I want about whoever I want.  I am free to accumulate as much money as is possible.  So the simple answer is yes I am free, however, it gets more complicated than that.  When I drive down the street, I must follow a law, the speed limit.  When I step outside to smoke, I must follow another law that says I must be 25 feet from the doors.  When I order a beer in a restaurant, another law dictates whether I can have a beer at that particular table.  If I want fireworks, no luck, against the law.  If I want to have a band play outside, I need to do it within the law, get a permit, get the required by law amount of port o potties.  If I want to sell a taco to someone on the street, I must get permission from the authorities and meet all the regulations.  If I want to camp in the desert in a park, I must pay the authorities and follow the rules.  If I want to drive my truck on the beach, I must get a permit from the authorities. 

My point is that we have reached a point as a society where there is a law dictating just about everything in the US.  It didn't start this way, it started with broad rules that didn't cover a lot of specifics.  Over time as people sued for this or that, and the lawyers argued this point or that point, precendents were set that narrowed the meaning of the orignal broader law.  As these interpretations continued, the laws came down to be extremely specific.  The result is what we have today.  We have the free speech, free movement, and free agency, but it all must be done within the law.  This is no accident, the laws were put in place to keep one person from wronging another.  The intentions are always good.  And, yes we are prosperous so they have been effective.  But is this freedom?

I have had the opporunity to live in a couple of places in South America.  South American coutnries for the most part are similar to our own philisophically.  They tend to have a market economy, and freedom of movement and agency.  (That hasn't always been the case with dictators etc...) Chile and Bolivia would be the main examples as they are where I have spent the most amount of time.  Bolivia especially because of the lack of institutional development is REALLY FREE.  You can do whatever you want.  You want to buy some dynamite and stick it in the side of the hill, go for it.  You can buy it at the market.  You want to drive your truck around on the salt flats, go for it.  You want to float down a river, but don't have a permit?  Go for it.  Nobody will say a thing to you.  You can do just about anything you want in Bolivia and as long as you don't bother or immediately endanger someone else, nobody would care a bit.  Chile is similar, however they are moving more towards our style of society driven by laws.  In Chile for the most part you can do pretty much whatever you want, but the broad laws are beginning to be interpreted downward and more specific.  This is good for business of course because you need a predictable system to allow business to thrive, but where are you most free in the truest sense of the word?  I would say in the least developed country.  You truly can do what you want. 

So the last question is, is the trade off of true freedom for stability and prosperity worth it?  I think that it is because the benefits of the true freedom cited above are really only available to those that have the means to enjoy them.  Bolivian mine workers technically are free, but not really.  If they don't slave away for the mine company until they die, they get fired and their family starves.  So freedom from want of basic needs is necessary before you can enjoy the other types of freedom available.  Part of what makes my ability to travel and enjoy other places is the freedom coming from a wealthy coutnry provides.  The trade off is worth it, and I continue to choose to make my life here in the US. 

What would I change?  I think that every 100 years the narrow laws and the specific laws and the precedents should all be dropped while the fundamental broader laws that truly define our society should be maintained.  Lawyers ought to like this idea since it would gaurantee work, but I also think that this idea would go a long ways to reinstating some of the lost freedoms that we don't think about anymore but are widely available in other places.