These days various journalists and pundits routinely misrepresent Ayn Rand’s ideas in order to smear her; see Daniel Wahl’s recent post for a number of examples. The latest smear comes from an article by Bijan Stephen in Time magazine about a coffee shop that uses a voluntary honor system for payments:

Any time the honor system is used successfully, I think of Ayn Rand—the founder of Objectivism, the academically bankrupt theory of overriding and extreme self-interest. According to her philosophy, the honor system should never work: According to her, rationally, it shouldn’t work because one should take what they want and pay nothing for it.

Of course, Stephen doesn’t quote anything by Rand to support his claims—because Rand never said or implied anything of the sort. In fact, she often said the exact opposite regarding payment. . . .

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