Belize is a stunningly beautiful nation of beaches, rainforests, and coral reefs at the southern end of the Yucatan Peninsula. A former British colony, it escaped the upheavals of Cold War politics in the Third World by being altogether too small (only about 300,000 citizens today), too remote, and too poor for anyone to notice their existence.

The country is a Libertarian paradise. The government is tiny and weak. Technically Belize imposes an income tax, but no one I encountered there seemed to know anything about it. Property taxes are laughably low. A couple I met from Dallas who own a beautiful $225,000 beachfront home in Belize pay an annual property tax of $40. Apart from entry and exit fees, those are the only taxes they pay to live there.

Property owners can more or less do as they please with their patch of land. Such rules as exist are loose and inconsistently enforced. The government lacks the resources to enforce any meaningful property restrictions even if they developed the will to impose them.

Why, then haven’t you heard of this country? If anything we have learned from Ted Cruz or Rand Paul is true, Belize must be an economic dynamo where the entrepreneurial energies of a free people are set loose from the stifling constraints of government.

The full post and discussion are at the GOPLifer blog.