“Ah,” you say, “but what of businesses? What makes government so wrong of a thing if you’re accepting of business organizations?”

That is the line that currently divides the left and right anarchisms as best I can tell. If anarchism is about not having magistrates to boss you around, then where do anarcho-capitalists get off at saying you can actually have a boss at work?

There’s a lot to the answer, but the solution is that you can choose your leaders and your bosses in the market but not necessarily government. Sure you might be able to vote, but the vote might not go your way, and if you’re not on the butt end of a transaction created by government action then someone else is.

Sure, we can get into a debate about what anarchism means and by defining anarchism as a certain thing we can say whether or not a business with a hierarchy can exist in a specific definition of anarchism or not, but that’s not what I’m interested in exploring. If you’re the kind of person who argues definitions to win arguments you’re probably not here reading my stuff. I want to sort of go over why it is okay that you can choose your boss in the market and not government.

Or maybe that needs rephrasing. The problem isn’t so much that you can’t choose your boss in government, it’s that you can. You can in fact get up and leave to go to another region or country, and the fact you can choose in both the market and the government means there’s some clearing up to be done. It seems like a clear contradiction. But anarcho-capitalists do not have cognitive dissonance. It’s that sometimes we forget to elaborate on some key things.

Specifically it is cost. What does it cost you to quit your job? Well, you’ll be out of a job, and you’ll be burning some savings while you look for a new job. Maybe you’ll invest in educating yourself to do something else. Maybe your new job will pay better or have less work, maybe it won’t, so maybe you’ll lose out on some future income as part of an income reduction.

What does it cost to quit your government? Not only will you be doing all of the above, you’ll be selling your home, investing in transportation to a new region, buying a new home, breaking off ties with people in your professional network, probably needing to choose a new industry to work in depending on where you move, and many other jarringly difficult things. In some countries you’ll have to deal with borders and policies designed to keep you in, and in many cases you’ll have to go through hundreds of man-hours of paperwork. The cost of choosing a new government to live under is tremendous, whether you move or try to force change through the system in some way. Many people would rather live in the government they have rather than try to pay all these costs with no guarantee of returns.

So when we say “you can quit your job but not your government,” it really means “you can quit your job [because the average Joe can easily do it] but not your government [because many people just can’t handle the level of investment that would take].”

“But what about the poor who are slaves to their jobs?” you scream hoarsely.

Well, nobody is a slave to their job in a free market. You typically sign a contract that has a way you can leave, so you aren’t enslaved. You’re probably wanting to say “Well what if you really need money and therefore can’t leave your job without starving?”

If you’re working in an industry that is in demand, there are probably people who are trying to buy you away from your low paying job in order to get you, a worker skilled in the industry, and slow down their competition by taking people away and reducing the competition’s functionality. If you’re in an industry that is doing fine and dandy as is and isn’t hiring people wantonly, you can still leave. You have skills you learned at your previous job and expertise in what your previous job was in the midst of doing. Its competition is probably willing to give you a job interview. If you’re laid off or something, go start your own business. I’m sure if you look around your area you’ll find people complaining about something. Look into fixing it. You’ll get paid. Barring that, offer to do odd jobs in your neighborhood in exchange for food or lodging. There’s always something that needs doing, and sometimes you’ll have to bend down to do it. If you would rather stay at your job than have to worry about finding a new one, you are not trapped. You are just voluntarily choosing to stay in your position rather than take the risk of doing something different.

“But people have to eat! A person could starve!”

Yeah, you and about 12 billion other life forms on the planet. Let’s just talk with the big man upstairs and see if we can get him to help us out in changing the laws of the universe. But in seriousness, your boss has to eat too. If enough people hate on your boss and then leave, how is your boss going to make money and eat? It goes both ways here. The market is about voluntary action and mutual benefit. If you don’t feel like you’re getting any benefit out of your job, leave and find another job. Your boss would be doing the same thing if he can’t make enough money to feed himself or his family if he has one.

“What if the law forbids either the business you want to start or working alone at something?”

That’s not a problem with anarchism now is it? Sure, anarcho-capitalism would have regions with insurance companies enticing all of its customers to do things through deductible reductions / payment reductions, and sure arbitrators would make judgements in the case of violations of the non-aggression principle, but were we in a free market nobody could stop you if you’re not violating the non-aggression principle. The worst anyone could do is shun you, but if you’re filling a market need then who’s going to do that?

“Alright. What if I can’t work?”

I’ll guess you’re of working age if you’re here and asking me that. Chances are you have a job currently, and so your question takes on the meaning “What if I get hurt and can’t work, or something to that effect?” You’ve probably heard of health insurance. When you get sick or hurt, they pay your fees or give you money to get through your difficulties. Granted, our health insurance market in the United States is the antithesis of a free market, we are assuming an anarchism and free market. In a free market, everyone would want to have insurance, and it would be general. You know how you can bundle your car insurance with your home insurance in some cases? Same here for everything. If you ever got hurt or your things were stolen or your were in need generally, your insurance company would help you out. Similarly and in the other direction, if you stole from somebody and you lost arbitration, or damaged the things of someone else by accident, your insurance company would pay that cost and then raise your rates or tell you to alter your behavior in exchange for your rate staying the same or not going up so much. This also answers the lingering question “what of children born with disabilities and can never work?” The parents’ insurance would cover partially or in full the cost of raising the child and helping it along to becoming as functional as he or she can be, as it was all part of the risk of covering those parents and what they do and / or produce. The rule of thumb even in life today is to buy insurance before you have children.

As a corollary to the insurance bit, you might try to argue that an insurance company would just become a government. This isn’t true. If enough people deem an insurance company unjust or anything and then move to a different company or just terminate contracts, said company has a drop in its income. It’s hard for a business to function without a consistent and supporting income. Even if this company tried to wage war to maintain income, other insurance companies would be out defending their own customers from this rogue “insurance” company. No self serving insurance company wants their clients killed. That means millions in pay outs per person. It is more cost effective for an insurance company to protect its beneficiaries than to pay out for claims.

“Well, okay. I guess it can’t be all that bad, but it just seems weird that you’re okay with free market bosses and not government bosses.”

Be your own boss. You can’t be your own government. Unless you managed to somehow be recognized by a number of nations, but that would be weird.