You Can't Be Amish Alone

Thoughts on policy and communitarianism

This is one of those conceptual, all-purpose pieces, because it applies to a lot of things.

I’ve always sensed a kind of hidden ideology in individualist arguments for (or against) public policy: don’t demand more housing, just work hard; don’t complain about student debt; just get married; just put down the smartphone; if a product isn’t safe, just don’t use it. As if circumstances, conditions, and contexts don’t exist, and people practice work ethic or family life, or build character, in a vacuum.

I got some interesting comments on my piece about 5-over-1 apartment buildings the other day.