Based Economics

  One of the most infamous Great Houses of Westeros in the A Song of Ice and Fire series is that of House Frey of the Crossing. They are unfortunately sullied forever in the eyes of the readers because of Walder Frey’s actions during the Red Wedding, but at least the founding member of that house still appears to have been an entrepreneur who bettered countless lives in the process. Those of you familiar with the series will doubtless remember how House Frey’s holdfast, the Twins, is located at the strategic northern Green Fork of the Trident in the Riverlands. There is a good reason that the castle bears its name, as it is divided by the Trident River into two separate castles that look identical. It is here where the entrepreneurship of House Frey’s founding member can be seen. Six hundred years prior to A Game of Thrones, back when Westeros would not be united for another three hundred years under Aegon the Conqueror, the Riverlands were under the rule of House Durrandon of St...

 Famous YouTuber, Adam Something, decided about a year ago to diverge from his usual discussion topic of urban planning and public transportation to make a series of videos on what he thinks (or at least pretends to think to please his audience) that anarcho-capitalism would look like in practice. The absurdities presented thereon will not be addressed here, having been previously handled well by the YouTubers PraxBen and Mentis Wave. No, what will be discussed here is his various inane statements about medieval Iceland and how he thinks this shows anarcho-capitalism to ostensibly be doomed to fail. A simple look at the history without an ideological goal in mind will show the largely facile nature of these claims. Ironically, the most truthful claim he makes is to say that the Icelandic Commonwealth was only a “proto-Ancap” society. While doubtless not his intention, this was actually true, as the society was more of an anarchist one, but less of a capitalist one. That minor histo...