 If we ask exactly what rights the individual has, on the libertarian view, then a large part of the answer is that the individual is endowed with the rights of self-ownership. Someone enjoys self-ownership, in the relevant sense, when they have full private ownership of their own body and abilities (Cohen 1995: 68). A corollary of the idea of self-ownership is the idea that individuals do not have any non-contractual obligations to use their labor for the benefit of others. In exercising their rights of self-ownership, people may contract with others to offer them specified services and benefits. But if the state forces people to provide such services and benefits without the consent of the individuals concerned, it violates their rights of self-ownership. It would, so the argument runs, treat the individuals concerned as if they are state-owned assets, to be pressed into service for the good of others at the state’s discretion. Now, in order to enact a social minimum, it seems likely that the state will have to impose a non-contractual obligation on high earning citizens to transfer resources to the less fortunate who are otherwise at risk of falling below the level of the social minimum. But this apparently violates the self-ownership rights of the high earners (because it apparently forces them to share the ‘fruits of their labours’ with others without their consent). For this reason, libertarianism looks like an unpromising basis on which to defend enactment of a social minimum.