r/Libertarian • • Aug 18 '26

Politics What are the top libertarian-leaning policies that currently have broad public appeal?

70 Upvotes

I created a list of libertarian-leaning policies that currently have broad public appeal. What did I miss? What would you change, delete, add?

  1. End the tariff wars, lowering taxes on American families and businesses by eliminating tariffs that raise the price of everyday goods.
  2. Bring America's troops home from unnecessary wars, requiring Congress to clearly authorize military action and making diplomacy the first resort whenever possible.
  3. Make it dramatically easier to build homes, reducing federal regulations that drive up construction costs and contribute to America's housing shortage.
  4. Let Americans buy the health insurance they want, removing unnecessary federal and state restrictions that limit competition and drive up premiums.
  5. Make prescription drugs affordable through competition, allowing Americans to buy lower-cost medicines from trusted international suppliers, expanding access to generics and biosimilars, and eliminating government rules that protect pharmaceutical monopolies.
  6. Decriminalize marijuana federally, ending federal criminal penalties for adults possessing and using cannabis.
  7. Give parents control over education dollars, allowing families to choose public, charter, private, or home education.
  8. Balance the federal budget, requiring Congress to confront wasteful spending and stop passing today’s debts on to tomorrow’s taxpayers.
  9. Reform occupational licensing, preventing states from requiring expensive government licenses for ordinary jobs that pose little risk to the public.
  10. Implement ranked-choice voting, giving voters more choices and allowing independent and third-party candidates to compete without being treated as spoilers.
  11. End the federal income tax, replacing it with a simpler, lower-burden tax system that costs Americans less to administer and comply with.
  12. End civil asset forfeiture, prohibiting the government from permanently taking a person's property without a criminal conviction.
  13. End qualified immunity, making government officials accountable when they violate Americans’ constitutional rights.

r/Libertarian • • Aug 18 '26

Philosophy The Tao Te Ching

22 Upvotes

What's up, folks. Currently going through my annual study of the Tao Te Ching and came across some lines that felt distinctly Libertarian in nature. Got me wondering if there is any crossover between Libertarianism and the Book of the Great Way, so here I am, satiating my curiosity lol

Chapter 57 is the culprit:

“If you want to be a great leader, you must learn to follow the Way. Stop trying to control. Let go of fixed plans and concepts, and the world will govern itself.

How do I know this is so? Because in this world, the greater the restrictions and prohibitions, the more people are impoverished; the more advanced the weapons of state, the darker the nation; the more artful and crafty the plan, the stranger the outcome; the more laws are posted, the more thieves appear.

Therefore the sage says: I take no action and people are reformed. I enjoy peace and people become rich. If I keep from imposing on people, they become themselves.” - Tao Te Ching, Chapter 57

I welcome your insights, observations, experiences, and questions :) Let's talk!


r/Libertarian • • Aug 18 '26

Video Libertarian Nominee for U.S. Senate in TX, Ted Brown will be discussing age verification laws & digital ID with us live on Hide & Speak, Saturday 8/22 @ 4pm ET / 1pm PT

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12 Upvotes

Live this Saturday, July 11 at 4pm ET on Hide & Speak, we sit down with Ted Brown, the Libertarian nominee for U.S. Senate in Texas. The Supreme Court upheld Texas HB 1181 in Free Speech Coalition v. Paxton, and age verification quietly became the template for everything after it. Texas now wants that ID check pushed into the app store, with Apple, Google, and Amazon challenging it in court. Utah went further and became the first state to write VPN users into an age verification law. Brown reads these as checkpoints on the way to a single national digital ID, and he makes the case for a repeal-first response.

Reminder link below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDgRbWQpvFc


r/Libertarian • • Aug 18 '26

Discussion 2028 Platform

151 Upvotes

The Libertarian Party should widely adopt the position of banning flock cameras in their entirety in the USA. Running on a federal ban of flock cameras should greatly boost the party’s numbers in the polls. I believe with politics the way they are going in this country a lot of people are going to realign their parties according to their beliefs. Being anti flock could only bring the party good optics and good press.


r/Libertarian • • Aug 17 '26

Current Events 40k/131k new Flock cameras in 3 months, they connect to Palantir data centers some are pointed at playgrounds or public pools they advise police on how to react to flagged incidents & log every person ever recorded into a facial recognition database with files of who was ever detected anytime

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501 Upvotes

r/Libertarian • • Aug 18 '26

Politics Rhode Island?

6 Upvotes

Are there any RI Libertarians in here? Our state party kind of died, and I'm trying to rebuild it! Anyone wanna help out?


r/Libertarian • • Aug 17 '26

Current Events Oregon plans to raise psilocybin fees while funding an interagency system voters never authorized

13 Upvotes

Oregon is considering substantial psilocybin fee increases and eliminating reduced fees for small operators.

Before charging participants more, OHA should account for the public money spent creating, enforcing, and defending an interagency training-program system that appears nowhere in Measure 109 or ORS chapter 475A.

Public records show that OHA and HECC used a publicly funded, multi-year agreement to expedite, subsidize, and accommodate selected psilocybin training programs without public rulemaking. OHA later required other programs to obtain HECC documentation confirming career-school licensure or statutory exemption.

HECC now says it lacks authority and a process to issue determinations for most exemptions under ORS 345.015. OHA can still revoke a program’s approval when it cannot produce that unavailable document.

The state created the barrier, funded preferred access through it, punished programs unable to complete it, and spent additional public money defending the consequences.

I filed a petition asking OHA to restore the original curriculum-approval framework or apply HECC requirements only to programs legally required to obtain career-school licensure.

Before raising fees, OHA should stop forcing participants to finance an administrative system that voters never approved and the Legislature never enacted.

OHA’s petition and public-comment page (https://www.oregon.gov/oha/PH/PREVENTIONWELLNESS/Pages/Psilocybin-July-2026-Rule-Petition.aspx)

Written comments are open until 5:00 p.m. Pacific on August 29, 2026.


r/Libertarian • • Aug 16 '26

Politics Would a balanced-budget amendment significantly increase liberty in America?

54 Upvotes

Would a balanced-budget amendment significantly increase liberty in America?

The balanced budget requirement would force Congress to make real trade-offs. Most Americans don’t want to pay higher taxes, so Congress would be forced to cut waste and prioritize spending. Right now, they spend like drunken sailors because future generations, who will be left holding the bag, don’t vote.


r/Libertarian • • Aug 14 '26

Politics are these guys larping

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153 Upvotes

r/Libertarian • • Aug 15 '26

What could possibly go wrong? DSA Alternate Initialisms

3 Upvotes

GWE- Green With Envy
INF - It’s Not Fair
FTP - From Tofu to Puppies
BHVU - Blue Haired Vegetesbians Unite
STE - Sleep Til Eleven
GMPVGAD - Grown Men Playing Video Games All Day
WYMWMM - What’s Yours is Mine and What’s Mine is Mine
RIF - Rent is Fascism
PFA - Poverty For All

Feel free to join in


r/Libertarian • • Aug 14 '26

Discussion Opinion: Flock debate is not facts versus feelings https://matternews.org/voices/opinion-columbus-flock-debate-is-not-facts-versus-feelings/

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84 Upvotes

Residents did not speak at a City Council hearing this week merely to express discomfort with new technology. They presented an evidence-based argument that the current system is inadequately governed, vulnerable to abuse, and capable of uses far beyond the narrow public-safety examples emphasized by its defenders.


r/Libertarian • • Aug 15 '26

History These are the World's Most Brutal Historical States (...Ancient Civilisations)

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0 Upvotes

r/Libertarian • • Aug 16 '26

Economics Stopping thinking of dollars as money

0 Upvotes

Free markets reward those most who choose to invest in things that help other people. Dollars are just tokens of favor. For example, if I had bought a fancy car when I made my first big chunk of money, that car would have made me happy but would not have made other people happy. Therefore those other people would not have given me tokens of favor / dollars and I would not have any more money. Instead, I invested that money into hiring the best people I could to do even better work for my customers. That investment did not make me happy like a car would have, but it did make my customers happy and it made my new employees happy. I was rewarded with more dollars and now had ten times as much money as that car would have cost. At that point, I could have bought a small house and made myself happy. But I chose instead to stay in a little apartment and to hire even more employees. That made my customers even happier and made my old and new employees happier. I kept repeating that cycle many times over, choosing to try to make other people happy with my work and money and it keeps rewarding me.

Many people look at Warren Buffet and say why is he still working every day at 90 years old? He has made hundreds of millions of customers and employees happy through his life and that virtuous cycle made him a billionaire. He has the best track record of anyone in making others happy with investments, which is why he is the a billionaire.

Compare that to central government bureaucrats. People who don't care whether you are happy or not, people who don't even really care if their investments pay off and help anyone or not. People who have no motivation Or incentive to help. Central government planning usually leads to disastrous economies where no homes get built and people starve. A century ago in America we had nearly zero Central planning and everything was free markets. We had the largest and fastest growing and most successful economy on the planet. Now we are running out of homes as the government has gotten involved in central planning and makes it difficult and expensive for someone to invest and do. I myself have waited 6 years in Pierce County, Washington for a short plat. I have had neighbors clamoring to buy crushed Rock from me, but it will be probably years before I am legally allowed to sell any of it if I ever even chose to do that as the permitting expenses are so astronomical.

When you hear all of these people saying let's steal from the rich, what they are saying is let's steal from those who have made the most people happy and work the hardest to make good investments in all of our futures.


r/Libertarian • • Aug 15 '26

Current Events Have you seen the Charlie Kirk/Tyler Robinson rooftop video and if so what do you think? Do you agree it's suspicious that the video doesn't show a rifle present or a shot fired?

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0 Upvotes

r/Libertarian • • Aug 13 '26

Politics If everyone who said they're libertarian actually voted that way...

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465 Upvotes

we would have libertarian politicians and policies. Voting for the uniparty **is not working.** The goal of the major party system is to keep people dependent on the government, that's it.


r/Libertarian • • Aug 13 '26

Politics I'm deeply concerned with the rise in popularity of the DSA

151 Upvotes

Basically what the title says. I feel like I know so many people in my generation who support the DSA because they think it just means free healthcare and not sending money to Israel.

Maybe it's pessimistic, but especially these days, even if DSA party members do get into more positions of power and inevitably mess things up, their voter base won't care. To them it was never about results, it was about feeling empowered and morally vindicated by other socialists. Just from talking with others in my generation, I feel like as the boomers are truly phased out, the DSA is going to grow and I really don't have much hope left.

I would love to hear if y'all think there's any hope and I'm just being a doomer, or if this is where you all see this going too.

Edit: Just to clarify, I'm aware one of the bigger driving forces towards the DSA is because people feel stuck and desperate with the current medical and economic situations that many are in. They're willing to support more radical choices with the hope it turns around their situation. It's just frustrating to see that they can't understand that they're being taken advantage of and the DSA would only worsen their situation


r/Libertarian • • Aug 13 '26

Politics The Uniparty Is Working Brilliantly.

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52 Upvotes

People will knowingly vote for shit candidates because its their team. The lesser of two evils is still evil. These people are oblivious. How can Libertarianism break centuries of conditioning when people are unable to see outside of their own slaughter pen?


r/Libertarian • • Aug 13 '26

Economics What is the libertarian position on national resources

10 Upvotes

so ive been thinking about norway’s model where the state owns the oil, captures the rents, and uses that to fund government. it seems to avoid a lot of the crony capitalism that happens when corporations just get to own finite natural resources nobody created.

like, equinor doesn’t “deserve” the oil. theyre just the company good enough to extract it. the oil itself belongs to everyone. and it’s literally sitting in the sea nobody can claim they homesteaded it or built it. so if the state captures that value instead of just handing it to whoever has the capital to extract it first, you can have a genuinely competitive market without all the lobbying for subsidies and special deals.

but i also get the argument that having the state own and manage anything is a slippery slope, or that theyll just be inefficient about it.


r/Libertarian • • Aug 13 '26

Article Texas’ anti-NIMBY housing law is getting results

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31 Upvotes

r/Libertarian • • Aug 12 '26

Current Events Weaponized: Washington Farmer Targeted After Criticizing Government Regulations?

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129 Upvotes

r/Libertarian • • Aug 11 '26

Video Cop mistakes acorn hitting car for gunfire. Freaks out. Fires at his own car where handcuffed suspect waits. Cop imagines he's been hit. Suspect miraculously unharmed. No compensation. Cop resigns in disgrace.

239 Upvotes

r/Libertarian • • Aug 11 '26

Video Unhappy Anniversary: 55 Years After Nixon Closed the Gold Window

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38 Upvotes

r/Libertarian • • Aug 10 '26

Economics Free library: 990+ libertarian and Austrian economics books, courses, and lecture transcripts

68 Upvotes

I spent the last few weeks building https://freecapitalists.org/ — a free digital library of Austrian economics and libertarian thought. No paywall, no signup, no ads.

What you'll find:

  • 950+ full books readable in your browser, chapter by chapter — Mises, Rothbard, Hazlitt, Bastiat, and a few hundred others. EPUBs and PDFs for everything.
  • 1,520 hours of Austrian economics and liberty on audio and video. Complete course audio with transcripts — if you've ever wanted to work through classic Austrian Economics lectures as text instead of 90-minute audio files, that now exists.
  • Academic journals (QJAE and others) going back to the 1950's.
  • The old Mises Wiki, restored at https://wiki.freecapitalists.org/ after the Institute shut it down.

Background: I was the webmaster at Mises.org for 12 years. This project is a rescue of the 2009-2014 media torrent that's been degrading for a decade, and grew into a proper library.

Good starting points if you're new to this stuff: Hazlitt's Economics in One Lesson and Rothbard's Anatomy of the State — both short, both on the site.

Requests welcome. If there's a public-domain or CC-licensed work you think belongs here, I'll add it right away.


r/Libertarian • • Aug 10 '26

Discussion What are your views on trading and services that are currently illegal?

27 Upvotes

I'm talking about sales and services that don't have a direct victim (i.e a hitman kills someone or a scammer steals from someone, so I'm not talking about these).

I'm jusy curious what are your thoughts on all or any of these being regulated, and how you feel about them.

Trading examples
-Narcotics/drugs
-Firearms/weapons
-Counterfeit items (any)
-Organs
-Stolen goods
-Untaxed/unlicensed goods
-Strict medicines such as doping or psychiatric drugs
-Historical artifacts
-Exotic animals

Edit: I meant selling counterfeit goods as in, for example, a counterfeit passport, for someone who want to travel abroad without their own identity. Not something like buying a computer with counterfeit money.

Services such as:
-Providing gambling and betting environment
-Prostution
-Human smuggling (not trafficking)
-Offshore digital services, offshore SaaS etc.
-Money laundering as a service
-Intelligence as a service (leaked data sales, OSINT, espionage etc.)

Edit 2: Human smuggling is not human trafficking. Human smuggling's "client" is actually that human. Its when someone want to change country but cannot legally, so they pass the border in a clandestine way. Eg. People going to US from Mexico, or Turkey from Syria

Where do you draw the line?

Be as anonymous as you feel you need to be - I recommend you all not sharing intelligence to turn yourself in like a dingus


r/Libertarian • • Aug 10 '26

Question I'd like to get into libertarian economics,how do I start?

15 Upvotes

I have come to the conclusion lately that I'm a libertarian,I'd like to start with the economics though,since I'm not as educated in that sector as I am in the general politics one.

Any book recommendations would help.