Frontierism

About

Frontierism is the political view that government -- if it exists at all -- should provide only minimal services to its citizens, only the fittest should survive, individuals should be self-reliant, competition between businesses will solve the problem of optimizing goods and services for the benefit of all, and income inequality is simply a reflection of the fact that some people are winners and some are losers.

context

Frontierism is one of two primary views currently in combat over the direction in which United States policy should go, especially in the areas of healthcare and social welfare, the other view being supportism.

expressions

Frontierism is often expressed with statements such as:

• government should be should be "small" and unobtrusive
• people should take more responsibility for themselves, and not go looking for handouts
• people become poor because they are economically unproductive
  • as opposed to "poor people are economically unproductive mostly because they're poor"
• hard work always leads to economic success, and failure indicates a lack of effort
• the system works; there are no innocent victims

political labels

Expressions of frontierism are often found among those who self-identify as libertarian, anarchist, market capitalist, and (fiscally) conservative.

arguments

Arguments used in support of frontierism include:

• other people's money
• voting for bread and circuses
• economic austerity

Etymology

This usage of the term was first detailed in a Google+ post on 2012-04-01, though there are earlier similar uses such as 2010-07-08 Daily Kos.