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On September 20 2011 19:09 Brotkrumen wrote:
Not a paycheck. Everyone has a right to life (which includes health, food and shelter), liberty (which includes the ability to make rational choices freely without being pressured by life, as defined above, threatening circumstances) and pursuit of happiness (free speech, religion, action and education).
RTFC.
The Declaration of Independence is more about what the government cannot do rather than what it is supposed to do. Read it again with that in mind.
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On September 20 2011 19:31 smokeyhoodoo wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 19:09 Brotkrumen wrote:
Not a paycheck. Everyone has a right to life (which includes health, food and shelter), liberty (which includes the ability to make rational choices freely without being pressured by life, as defined above, threatening circumstances) and pursuit of happiness (free speech, religion, action and education).
RTFC. The Declaration of Independence is more about what the government cannot do rather than what it is supposed to do. Read it again with that in mind.
The Declaration of Independence did not come up with these.
Rights always imply symmetric duties.
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This tread reminds me of a bunch of kids crying about having to share the pie they brought to school...
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On September 20 2011 19:34 Brotkrumen wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 19:31 smokeyhoodoo wrote:On September 20 2011 19:09 Brotkrumen wrote:
Not a paycheck. Everyone has a right to life (which includes health, food and shelter), liberty (which includes the ability to make rational choices freely without being pressured by life, as defined above, threatening circumstances) and pursuit of happiness (free speech, religion, action and education).
RTFC. The Declaration of Independence is more about what the government cannot do rather than what it is supposed to do. Read it again with that in mind. The Declaration of Independence did not come up with these. Rights always imply symmetric duties.
What do you mean by symmetric duties?
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i think one solution could be to answer the question, how much does a human need to live a reasonable, humanely legitimated life? everything above that rate should be taxed progressively so you always have something to strive after but maybe thats utopia
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Sanya12364 Posts
On September 20 2011 19:34 Brotkrumen wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 19:31 smokeyhoodoo wrote:On September 20 2011 19:09 Brotkrumen wrote:
Not a paycheck. Everyone has a right to life (which includes health, food and shelter), liberty (which includes the ability to make rational choices freely without being pressured by life, as defined above, threatening circumstances) and pursuit of happiness (free speech, religion, action and education).
RTFC. The Declaration of Independence is more about what the government cannot do rather than what it is supposed to do. Read it again with that in mind. The Declaration of Independence did not come up with these. Rights always imply symmetric duties.
No they didn't. Classical liberalism was freedom from tyranny and power, and rights carve out domains where the power of sovereigns cannot reach. Right to life is inability of the government to decree on such matters. It did not include an entitlement to sustenance. Right to liberty likewise is not a "freedom from basic wants." It's the inability of the government to interfere with individual choices. Pursuit of happiness was a novel idea of creative freedoms and self-directed ambitions.
Rights added the sense of symmetrical duties for some people in the early 20th century when liberalism stealthily incorporated the idea of freedom from basic wants. It only arose after the industrial revolution because before then it was inconceivable for people not to struggle with food, shelter, and health at some point in their lives. Many of the ideas were Marxist in origin, and those ideas have become mainstream in many places.
Edit: I have to be a bit more careful about my word choice.
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On September 20 2011 19:54 TanGeng wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 19:34 Brotkrumen wrote:On September 20 2011 19:31 smokeyhoodoo wrote:On September 20 2011 19:09 Brotkrumen wrote:
Not a paycheck. Everyone has a right to life (which includes health, food and shelter), liberty (which includes the ability to make rational choices freely without being pressured by life, as defined above, threatening circumstances) and pursuit of happiness (free speech, religion, action and education).
RTFC. The Declaration of Independence is more about what the government cannot do rather than what it is supposed to do. Read it again with that in mind. The Declaration of Independence did not come up with these. Rights always imply symmetric duties. No they didn't. Classical liberalism was freedom from tyranny and power, and rights carve out domains where the power of sovereigns cannot reach. Right to life is inability of the government to decree on such matters. It did not include the right to sustenance. Right to liberty likewise is not a "freedom from basic wants." It's the inability of the government to interfere with individual choices. Pursuit of happiness was a novel idea of creative freedoms and self-directed ambitions. Rights added the sense of symmetrical duties for some people in the early 20th century when liberalism stealthily incorporated the idea of freedom from basic wants. It only arose after the industrial revolution because before then it was inconceivable for people not to struggle with food, shelter, and health at some point in their lives. Many of the ideas were Marxist in origin, and those ideas have become mainstream in many places.
That settles it nicely.
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What I dont understand is that everybody seems to agree to the notion that if you increase taxes for the rich, people would suddenly have less an incentive to work hard to become rich, because it would be taken away from them anyway.
This strikes me as rather ridiculous. Obviously nobody who is serious argues for a system, where you can end up with less money than someone else, who earns less, because of taxes.
Nobody can convince me, that someone would say "oh no, with this tax system I can only make 50 million dollars instead of 500 million, so I wont even try. Instead I will sit on my back and enjoy my 1k/month welfare check" People will always aspire to become rich. Is there no reasonable middle ground? I mean, should people be able to become rich if they work hard/are smart/ are lucky? Yes, they should. Should they be able to accumulate so much wealth, that the richest 1% own such a large part of the country? No, they shouldn't.
This rather ridiculous accumulation of wealth in the hands of a few that is developing in western countries (which is a typical feature of third world countries) is a big step backwards. Historically, society as a whole has funtioned best, when the gap between rich and poor was the smallest.
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On September 20 2011 19:54 TanGeng wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On September 20 2011 19:34 Brotkrumen wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 19:31 smokeyhoodoo wrote:On September 20 2011 19:09 Brotkrumen wrote:
Not a paycheck. Everyone has a right to life (which includes health, food and shelter), liberty (which includes the ability to make rational choices freely without being pressured by life, as defined above, threatening circumstances) and pursuit of happiness (free speech, religion, action and education).
RTFC. The Declaration of Independence is more about what the government cannot do rather than what it is supposed to do. Read it again with that in mind. The Declaration of Independence did not come up with these. Rights always imply symmetric duties. No they didn't. Classical liberalism was freedom from tyranny and power, and rights carve out domains where the power of sovereigns cannot reach. Right to life is inability of the government to decree on such matters. It did not include an entitlement to sustenance. Right to liberty likewise is not a "freedom from basic wants." It's the inability of the government to interfere with individual choices. Pursuit of happiness was a novel idea of creative freedoms and self-directed ambitions. Rights added the sense of symmetrical duties for some people in the early 20th century when liberalism stealthily incorporated the idea of freedom from basic wants. It only arose after the industrial revolution because before then it was inconceivable for people not to struggle with food, shelter, and health at some point in their lives. Many of the ideas were Marxist in origin, and those ideas have become mainstream in many places. Edit: I have to be a bit more careful about my word choice .
Well that's a definite no.
Adam Smith in wealth of nations:
+ Show Spoiler +Masters are always and everywhere in a sort of tacit, but constant and uniform, combination, not to raise the wages of labor above their actual rate....We seldom, indeed, hear of this combination, because it is the usual and, one may say, the natural state of things which nobody every hears of. Masters, too, sometimes enter into particular combiantions to sink the wages of labor even below this rate....Such combinations, however, are frequently resisted by a contrary defensive combination of workmen....
But though in disputes with their workmen masters must generally have the advantage, there is however a certain rate below which it seems impossible to reduce, for any considerable time, the ordinary wages even of the lowest species of work.
A man must always live by his work, and his wages must at least be sufficient to maintain him. They must even upon most occasions be somewhat more, otherwise it would be impossible for him to bring up a family, and the race of such workmen could not last beyond the first generation. Mr. Cantillon seems, upon this account, to suppose that the lowest species of common laborers must everywhere earn at least double their own maintenance, in order that one with another they may be enabled to bring up two children; the labor of the wife, on account of her necessary attendance on the children, being supposed no more than sufficient to provide for herself. But one half the children born, it is computed, die before the age of manhood. The poorest laborers, therefore, according to this account, must, one with another, attempt to rear at least four children, in order that two may have an equal chance of living to that age. But the necessary maintenance of four children, it is supposed, may be nearly equal to that of one man. The labor of an able-bodied slave, the same author adds, is computed to be worth double his maintenance; and that of the meanest laborer, he thinks, cannot be worth less than that of an able-bodied slave. Thus far at least it seems certain that, in order to bring up a family, the labor of the husband and wife together must, even in the lowest species of common labor, be able to earn something more than what is precisely necessary for their own maintenance....
And don't get me started on his theory of moral sentiments.
Rousseau, who sometimes overshoots his goal said:
"no one citizen should be rich enough to buy another, and no one so poor as to be obliged to sell himself."
When I get back home from Uni, let me check my notes from stuart mill.
Any liberal thinker ever acknowledged that for an individual to be a free agent some base necessities had to be fulfilled.
Uh, here is a nice one from Stuart Mill in his Principles of Political Economy, reviewing and admiring Fourierism.
+ Show Spoiler +The most skilfully combined, and with the greatest foresight of objections, of all the forms of Socialism, is that commonly known as Fourierism. This system does not contemplate the abolition of private property, nor even of inheritance; on the contrary, it avowedly takes into consideration, as an element in the distribution of the produce, capital as well as labour. It proposes that the operations of industry should be carried on by associations of about two thousand members, combining their labour on a district of about a square league in extent, under the guidance of chiefs selected by themselves. In the distribution, a certain minimum is first assigned for the subsistence of every member of the community, whether capable or not of labour. The remainder of the produce is shared in certain proportions, to be determined beforehand, among the three elements, Labour, Capital, and Talent. The capital of the community may be owned in unequal shares by different members, who would in that case receive, as in any other joint-stock company, proportional dividends.
I'd advice to read the rest of the text too. Breaks down to a guaranteed base income though.
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On September 20 2011 20:34 Brotkrumen wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 19:54 TanGeng wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On September 20 2011 19:34 Brotkrumen wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 19:31 smokeyhoodoo wrote:On September 20 2011 19:09 Brotkrumen wrote:
Not a paycheck. Everyone has a right to life (which includes health, food and shelter), liberty (which includes the ability to make rational choices freely without being pressured by life, as defined above, threatening circumstances) and pursuit of happiness (free speech, religion, action and education).
RTFC. The Declaration of Independence is more about what the government cannot do rather than what it is supposed to do. Read it again with that in mind. The Declaration of Independence did not come up with these. Rights always imply symmetric duties. No they didn't. Classical liberalism was freedom from tyranny and power, and rights carve out domains where the power of sovereigns cannot reach. Right to life is inability of the government to decree on such matters. It did not include an entitlement to sustenance. Right to liberty likewise is not a "freedom from basic wants." It's the inability of the government to interfere with individual choices. Pursuit of happiness was a novel idea of creative freedoms and self-directed ambitions. Rights added the sense of symmetrical duties for some people in the early 20th century when liberalism stealthily incorporated the idea of freedom from basic wants. It only arose after the industrial revolution because before then it was inconceivable for people not to struggle with food, shelter, and health at some point in their lives. Many of the ideas were Marxist in origin, and those ideas have become mainstream in many places. Edit: I have to be a bit more careful about my word choice . Well that's a definite no. Adam Smith in wealth of nations: + Show Spoiler +Masters are always and everywhere in a sort of tacit, but constant and uniform, combination, not to raise the wages of labor above their actual rate....We seldom, indeed, hear of this combination, because it is the usual and, one may say, the natural state of things which nobody every hears of. Masters, too, sometimes enter into particular combiantions to sink the wages of labor even below this rate....Such combinations, however, are frequently resisted by a contrary defensive combination of workmen....
But though in disputes with their workmen masters must generally have the advantage, there is however a certain rate below which it seems impossible to reduce, for any considerable time, the ordinary wages even of the lowest species of work.
A man must always live by his work, and his wages must at least be sufficient to maintain him. They must even upon most occasions be somewhat more, otherwise it would be impossible for him to bring up a family, and the race of such workmen could not last beyond the first generation. Mr. Cantillon seems, upon this account, to suppose that the lowest species of common laborers must everywhere earn at least double their own maintenance, in order that one with another they may be enabled to bring up two children; the labor of the wife, on account of her necessary attendance on the children, being supposed no more than sufficient to provide for herself. But one half the children born, it is computed, die before the age of manhood. The poorest laborers, therefore, according to this account, must, one with another, attempt to rear at least four children, in order that two may have an equal chance of living to that age. But the necessary maintenance of four children, it is supposed, may be nearly equal to that of one man. The labor of an able-bodied slave, the same author adds, is computed to be worth double his maintenance; and that of the meanest laborer, he thinks, cannot be worth less than that of an able-bodied slave. Thus far at least it seems certain that, in order to bring up a family, the labor of the husband and wife together must, even in the lowest species of common labor, be able to earn something more than what is precisely necessary for their own maintenance.... And don't get me started on his theory of moral sentiments. Rousseau, who sometimes overshoots his goal said: "no one citizen should be rich enough to buy another, and no one so poor as to be obliged to sell himself." When I get back home from Uni, let me check my notes from stuart mill. Any liberal thinker ever acknowledged that for an individual to be a free agent some base necessities had to be fulfilled. Uh, here is a nice one from Stuart Mill in his Principles of Political Economy, reviewing and admiring Fourierism. + Show Spoiler +The most skilfully combined, and with the greatest foresight of objections, of all the forms of Socialism, is that commonly known as Fourierism. This system does not contemplate the abolition of private property, nor even of inheritance; on the contrary, it avowedly takes into consideration, as an element in the distribution of the produce, capital as well as labour. It proposes that the operations of industry should be carried on by associations of about two thousand members, combining their labour on a district of about a square league in extent, under the guidance of chiefs selected by themselves. In the distribution, a certain minimum is first assigned for the subsistence of every member of the community, whether capable or not of labour. The remainder of the produce is shared in certain proportions, to be determined beforehand, among the three elements, Labour, Capital, and Talent. The capital of the community may be owned in unequal shares by different members, who would in that case receive, as in any other joint-stock company, proportional dividends. I'd advice to read the rest of the text too. Breaks down to a guaranteed base income though.
That is true, although John Stuart Mill marks the tipping point between classical and 'the new' liberalism.
But it doesn't follow that someone like Adam Smith would agree with a social security Western world style - au contraire.
Fun fact: it was Adam Smith that put the poor man's burden on the agenda. How's that for anti-social classical liberalism.
One of the main conclusions one could draw for TMS is that you don't really need a social security government style, because people have a tendency to care for the opinions of others and will engage in more or less empathetic behavior.
Furthermore; although there are quotes in the classical liberal literature that put the issue of poverty in the foreground, it doesn't mean that it's an excuse for government welfare. They were mostly concerned - Hume, Smith, Ferguson, Bastiat, Say, Constant, Molinari - with limiting state oppression and analyzing society as an emergent, spontaneous order based on certain principles such as property, freedom of conscience and the like.
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On September 20 2011 19:57 smokeyhoodoo wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 19:54 TanGeng wrote:On September 20 2011 19:34 Brotkrumen wrote:On September 20 2011 19:31 smokeyhoodoo wrote:On September 20 2011 19:09 Brotkrumen wrote:
Not a paycheck. Everyone has a right to life (which includes health, food and shelter), liberty (which includes the ability to make rational choices freely without being pressured by life, as defined above, threatening circumstances) and pursuit of happiness (free speech, religion, action and education).
RTFC. The Declaration of Independence is more about what the government cannot do rather than what it is supposed to do. Read it again with that in mind. The Declaration of Independence did not come up with these. Rights always imply symmetric duties. No they didn't. Classical liberalism was freedom from tyranny and power, and rights carve out domains where the power of sovereigns cannot reach. Right to life is inability of the government to decree on such matters. It did not include the right to sustenance. Right to liberty likewise is not a "freedom from basic wants." It's the inability of the government to interfere with individual choices. Pursuit of happiness was a novel idea of creative freedoms and self-directed ambitions. Rights added the sense of symmetrical duties for some people in the early 20th century when liberalism stealthily incorporated the idea of freedom from basic wants. It only arose after the industrial revolution because before then it was inconceivable for people not to struggle with food, shelter, and health at some point in their lives. Many of the ideas were Marxist in origin, and those ideas have become mainstream in many places. That settles it nicely.
Do not believe everything you read. Check his and my claims.
Especially in Philosophy, all ideas are as old as the Greeks and Marx was hardly innovative.
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The problem with the tax increase is that it doesn't solve anything, fair and simple.
Taxing the rich is rarely a tax on consumption, but usually a tax on production, which means lower productivity and thus lower wages. This is not a solution to the systematic problems the USA is having.
Cut spending, tremendously. Stop the war, abolish the army, stop public schooling, stop providing pension plans, stop providing corporate welfare, stop the police state, etc.
(I think public schooling in general is in a best case scenario child neglect. In the worse scenario, child abuse. I have several pedagogical and anti-schooling reasons for that, most of which are easy to find on the internet if you are interested. But that's a different discussion.)
The amount of money you have left to actually provide descent care for the unable will be enormous. However; because they lack the political representation, this will never happen. The government does not exist to help the poor and unfortunate.
It also makes no sense to systematically engage in providing pensions: your pension is something which first and foremost is your own personal responsibility during your active life. Only handicapped people really have an argument to not be able to provide for their own pensions.
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On September 20 2011 20:46 AdrianHealey wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 20:34 Brotkrumen wrote:On September 20 2011 19:54 TanGeng wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On September 20 2011 19:34 Brotkrumen wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 19:31 smokeyhoodoo wrote:On September 20 2011 19:09 Brotkrumen wrote:
Not a paycheck. Everyone has a right to life (which includes health, food and shelter), liberty (which includes the ability to make rational choices freely without being pressured by life, as defined above, threatening circumstances) and pursuit of happiness (free speech, religion, action and education).
RTFC. The Declaration of Independence is more about what the government cannot do rather than what it is supposed to do. Read it again with that in mind. The Declaration of Independence did not come up with these. Rights always imply symmetric duties. No they didn't. Classical liberalism was freedom from tyranny and power, and rights carve out domains where the power of sovereigns cannot reach. Right to life is inability of the government to decree on such matters. It did not include an entitlement to sustenance. Right to liberty likewise is not a "freedom from basic wants." It's the inability of the government to interfere with individual choices. Pursuit of happiness was a novel idea of creative freedoms and self-directed ambitions. Rights added the sense of symmetrical duties for some people in the early 20th century when liberalism stealthily incorporated the idea of freedom from basic wants. It only arose after the industrial revolution because before then it was inconceivable for people not to struggle with food, shelter, and health at some point in their lives. Many of the ideas were Marxist in origin, and those ideas have become mainstream in many places. Edit: I have to be a bit more careful about my word choice . Well that's a definite no. Adam Smith in wealth of nations: + Show Spoiler +Masters are always and everywhere in a sort of tacit, but constant and uniform, combination, not to raise the wages of labor above their actual rate....We seldom, indeed, hear of this combination, because it is the usual and, one may say, the natural state of things which nobody every hears of. Masters, too, sometimes enter into particular combiantions to sink the wages of labor even below this rate....Such combinations, however, are frequently resisted by a contrary defensive combination of workmen....
But though in disputes with their workmen masters must generally have the advantage, there is however a certain rate below which it seems impossible to reduce, for any considerable time, the ordinary wages even of the lowest species of work.
A man must always live by his work, and his wages must at least be sufficient to maintain him. They must even upon most occasions be somewhat more, otherwise it would be impossible for him to bring up a family, and the race of such workmen could not last beyond the first generation. Mr. Cantillon seems, upon this account, to suppose that the lowest species of common laborers must everywhere earn at least double their own maintenance, in order that one with another they may be enabled to bring up two children; the labor of the wife, on account of her necessary attendance on the children, being supposed no more than sufficient to provide for herself. But one half the children born, it is computed, die before the age of manhood. The poorest laborers, therefore, according to this account, must, one with another, attempt to rear at least four children, in order that two may have an equal chance of living to that age. But the necessary maintenance of four children, it is supposed, may be nearly equal to that of one man. The labor of an able-bodied slave, the same author adds, is computed to be worth double his maintenance; and that of the meanest laborer, he thinks, cannot be worth less than that of an able-bodied slave. Thus far at least it seems certain that, in order to bring up a family, the labor of the husband and wife together must, even in the lowest species of common labor, be able to earn something more than what is precisely necessary for their own maintenance.... And don't get me started on his theory of moral sentiments. Rousseau, who sometimes overshoots his goal said: "no one citizen should be rich enough to buy another, and no one so poor as to be obliged to sell himself." When I get back home from Uni, let me check my notes from stuart mill. Any liberal thinker ever acknowledged that for an individual to be a free agent some base necessities had to be fulfilled. Uh, here is a nice one from Stuart Mill in his Principles of Political Economy, reviewing and admiring Fourierism. + Show Spoiler +The most skilfully combined, and with the greatest foresight of objections, of all the forms of Socialism, is that commonly known as Fourierism. This system does not contemplate the abolition of private property, nor even of inheritance; on the contrary, it avowedly takes into consideration, as an element in the distribution of the produce, capital as well as labour. It proposes that the operations of industry should be carried on by associations of about two thousand members, combining their labour on a district of about a square league in extent, under the guidance of chiefs selected by themselves. In the distribution, a certain minimum is first assigned for the subsistence of every member of the community, whether capable or not of labour. The remainder of the produce is shared in certain proportions, to be determined beforehand, among the three elements, Labour, Capital, and Talent. The capital of the community may be owned in unequal shares by different members, who would in that case receive, as in any other joint-stock company, proportional dividends. I'd advice to read the rest of the text too. Breaks down to a guaranteed base income though. That is true, although John Stuart Mill marks the tipping point between classical and 'the new' liberalism. But it doesn't follow that someone like Adam Smith would agree with a social security Western world style - au contraire. Fun fact: it was Adam Smith that put the poor man's burden on the agenda. How's that for anti-social classical liberalism.
Agreed.
Before Mill, Hume and contemporaries of Rousseau, the state was viewed as the big bully you have to keep around to scare off the other bullies. Rights theory was largely geared towards "liberty from to be able to acquire".
The underlying theory of what our humanity demands was already there though and that we had a right to get it. Still, the provision of some aspects of this were in there, like the provision of salt and iron in 600 AD in China, provision of safety and protection of property since the romans, etc. and those grew en lieu with the ability to coordinate and communicate. A technological problem basically.
What Adam Smith would say about our current economy and welfare I, and neither can you, can fathom. He would at first rework his economic theory completely as there are large parts that have been proven false.
Another Fun Fact: Hayek said:
"I have always said that I am in favor of a minimum income for every person in the country."
Usually free market types get their ideas about markets by avoiding the text they base their claims on.
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On September 20 2011 20:49 AdrianHealey wrote:
The problem with the tax increase is that it doesn't solve anything, fair and simple.
Taxing the rich is rarely a tax on consumption, but usually a tax on production, which means lower productivity and thus lower wages. This is not a solution to the systematic problems the USA is having.
the US problems are highly exaggerated.
Production is not erased by taxation. Private enterprise is more efficient in increasing wealth, but this effect is highly localized.
Government investment is is less efficient, but has other benefits, like redistribution, a society in which the private sector can thrive, etc.
On September 20 2011 20:49 AdrianHealey wrote:
Cut spending, tremendously. Stop the war, abolish the army, stop public schooling, stop providing pension plans, stop providing corporate welfare, stop the police state, etc.
(I think public schooling in general is in a best case scenario child neglect. In the worse scenario, child abuse. I have several pedagogical and anti-schooling reasons for that, most of which are easy to find on the internet if you are interested. But that's a different discussion.)
Abolishing the army completely will make you vulnerable to everyone who hasn't. Ever checked how many dictators with guns are still out there?
Public schooling is one of the greatest achievements for the average man and the economy as a whole. At first it emancipated the worker and peasant from the educated elite and made everyone more free and now, as innovation seems to be correlated to % of population educated is a boon to society and economy.
Leave education to the parents and you infringe on the childs right to an education. Or do you think that drunk parents will spend any effort on getting their child into school? What you will end up with is a more heavily stratified society at best and uneducated masses at worst.
On September 20 2011 20:49 AdrianHealey wrote:
The amount of money you have left to actually provide descent care for the unable will be enormous. However; because they lack the political representation, this will never happen. The government does not exist to help the poor and unfortunate.
It also makes no sense to systematically engage in providing pensions: your pension is something which first and foremost is your own personal responsibility during your active life. Only handicapped people really have an argument to not be able to provide for their own pensions.
Consumption preference. Humans prefer now to consuming more later. We are also risk takers. This might be helped by social engineering to change culture in a way that we don't anymore. Social engineering is scary though.
If we stopped pension programs, we would end up with masses of poor people that lived subsistence wages their whole working lives because the market would push wages to that level.
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On September 20 2011 21:02 Brotkrumen wrote:Agreed.
Before Mill, Hume and contemporaries of Rousseau, the state was viewed as the big bully you have to keep around to scare off the other bullies. Rights theory was largely geared towards "liberty from to be able to acquire".
The underlying theory of what our humanity demands was already there though and that we had a right to get it. Still, the provision of some aspects of this were in there, like the provision of salt and iron in 600 AD in China, provision of safety and protection of property since the romans, etc. and those grew en lieu with the ability to coordinate and communicate. A technological problem basically.
What Adam Smith would say about our current economy and welfare I, and neither can you, can fathom. He would at first rework his economic theory completely as there are large parts that have been proven false.
Another Fun Fact: Hayek said:
"I have always said that I am in favor of a minimum income for every person in the country."
Usually free market types get their ideas about markets by avoiding the text they base their claims on.
You keep mentioning Rousseau in the classical liberal discussion; you are aware that he's not considered a classical liberal, right?
And I'm not sure you can say that 'rights theory from to be able to acquire'. Take for instance Locke; he wasn't just providing an excuse for the rich - hence; the Lockean proviso. He was also saying that government needs to be justified into the consent of the governed.
Well; it was very unfortunate that Adam Smith had large parts wrong - subjective value theory, market process theory, and so on. Thank God he was right on mercantilism though; a theory we still see as an excuse today for a lot of European union and American federal government policies. So we can interfere a little bit from there to begin with.
Furthermore; given the way Adam Smith talks about rights and wealth, it seems not that unlikely to say that he would oppose the current welfare state as it exists, where people have definitive entitlements provided by government. It seems that would be in contrast to the way he rights about we should take care of the poor. He didn't, like Mill, advocated stuff like basic income or a seperation of distribution from production.
Hayek isn't the only free market type though. (Mises, Rothbard and David Friedman also exist in a more modern sense.) The problem with Hayek is precisely because his theoretical framework doesn't support some of his more practical conclusions such as his suggestions in the third part of CoL. Or, at least, he has been heavily criticized on it.
But even if one accepts a basic Hayekian point that there could be something as a minimal welfare state, it seems not that weird to say that what the Western world has today is pretty far off. If you look at the facts, the majority of the welfare state can not be defended in terms of 'well, we really need to take care of the deserving poor'.
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On September 20 2011 21:13 Brotkrumen wrote:the US problems are highly exaggerated. Production is not erased by taxation. Private enterprise is more efficient in increasing wealth, but this effect is highly localized. Government investment is is less efficient, but has other benefits, like redistribution, a society in which the private sector can thrive, etc. + Show Spoiler +On September 20 2011 20:49 AdrianHealey wrote:
Cut spending, tremendously. Stop the war, abolish the army, stop public schooling, stop providing pension plans, stop providing corporate welfare, stop the police state, etc.
(I think public schooling in general is in a best case scenario child neglect. In the worse scenario, child abuse. I have several pedagogical and anti-schooling reasons for that, most of which are easy to find on the internet if you are interested. But that's a different discussion.)
Abolishing the army completely will make you vulnerable to everyone who hasn't. Ever checked how many dictators with guns are still out there? Public schooling is one of the greatest achievements for the average man and the economy as a whole. At first it emancipated the worker and peasant from the educated elite and made everyone more free and now, as innovation seems to be correlated to % of population educated is a boon to society and economy. Leave education to the parents and you infringe on the childs right to an education. Or do you think that drunk parents will spend any effort on getting their child into school? What you will end up with is a more heavily stratified society at best and uneducated masses at worst. + Show Spoiler +On September 20 2011 20:49 AdrianHealey wrote:
The amount of money you have left to actually provide descent care for the unable will be enormous. However; because they lack the political representation, this will never happen. The government does not exist to help the poor and unfortunate.
It also makes no sense to systematically engage in providing pensions: your pension is something which first and foremost is your own personal responsibility during your active life. Only handicapped people really have an argument to not be able to provide for their own pensions.
Consumption preference. Humans prefer now to consuming more later. We are also risk takers. This might be helped by social engineering to change culture in a way that we don't anymore. Social engineering is scary though. If we stopped pension programs, we would end up with masses of poor people that lived subsistence wages their whole working lives because the market would push wages to that level.
Thanks for providing the status quo arguments. I was unaware of them!
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Sanya12364 Posts
On September 20 2011 20:34 Brotkrumen wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 19:54 TanGeng wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On September 20 2011 19:34 Brotkrumen wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 19:31 smokeyhoodoo wrote:On September 20 2011 19:09 Brotkrumen wrote:
Not a paycheck. Everyone has a right to life (which includes health, food and shelter), liberty (which includes the ability to make rational choices freely without being pressured by life, as defined above, threatening circumstances) and pursuit of happiness (free speech, religion, action and education).
RTFC. The Declaration of Independence is more about what the government cannot do rather than what it is supposed to do. Read it again with that in mind. The Declaration of Independence did not come up with these. Rights always imply symmetric duties. No they didn't. Classical liberalism was freedom from tyranny and power, and rights carve out domains where the power of sovereigns cannot reach. Right to life is inability of the government to decree on such matters. It did not include an entitlement to sustenance. Right to liberty likewise is not a "freedom from basic wants." It's the inability of the government to interfere with individual choices. Pursuit of happiness was a novel idea of creative freedoms and self-directed ambitions. Rights added the sense of symmetrical duties for some people in the early 20th century when liberalism stealthily incorporated the idea of freedom from basic wants. It only arose after the industrial revolution because before then it was inconceivable for people not to struggle with food, shelter, and health at some point in their lives. Many of the ideas were Marxist in origin, and those ideas have become mainstream in many places. Edit: I have to be a bit more careful about my word choice . Well that's a definite no. Adam Smith in wealth of nations: + Show Spoiler +Masters are always and everywhere in a sort of tacit, but constant and uniform, combination, not to raise the wages of labor above their actual rate....We seldom, indeed, hear of this combination, because it is the usual and, one may say, the natural state of things which nobody every hears of. Masters, too, sometimes enter into particular combiantions to sink the wages of labor even below this rate....Such combinations, however, are frequently resisted by a contrary defensive combination of workmen....
But though in disputes with their workmen masters must generally have the advantage, there is however a certain rate below which it seems impossible to reduce, for any considerable time, the ordinary wages even of the lowest species of work.
A man must always live by his work, and his wages must at least be sufficient to maintain him. They must even upon most occasions be somewhat more, otherwise it would be impossible for him to bring up a family, and the race of such workmen could not last beyond the first generation. Mr. Cantillon seems, upon this account, to suppose that the lowest species of common laborers must everywhere earn at least double their own maintenance, in order that one with another they may be enabled to bring up two children; the labor of the wife, on account of her necessary attendance on the children, being supposed no more than sufficient to provide for herself. But one half the children born, it is computed, die before the age of manhood. The poorest laborers, therefore, according to this account, must, one with another, attempt to rear at least four children, in order that two may have an equal chance of living to that age. But the necessary maintenance of four children, it is supposed, may be nearly equal to that of one man. The labor of an able-bodied slave, the same author adds, is computed to be worth double his maintenance; and that of the meanest laborer, he thinks, cannot be worth less than that of an able-bodied slave. Thus far at least it seems certain that, in order to bring up a family, the labor of the husband and wife together must, even in the lowest species of common labor, be able to earn something more than what is precisely necessary for their own maintenance.... And don't get me started on his theory of moral sentiments. Rousseau, who sometimes overshoots his goal said: "no one citizen should be rich enough to buy another, and no one so poor as to be obliged to sell himself." When I get back home from Uni, let me check my notes from stuart mill. Any liberal thinker ever acknowledged that for an individual to be a free agent some base necessities had to be fulfilled. Uh, here is a nice one from Stuart Mill in his Principles of Political Economy, reviewing and admiring Fourierism. + Show Spoiler +The most skilfully combined, and with the greatest foresight of objections, of all the forms of Socialism, is that commonly known as Fourierism. This system does not contemplate the abolition of private property, nor even of inheritance; on the contrary, it avowedly takes into consideration, as an element in the distribution of the produce, capital as well as labour. It proposes that the operations of industry should be carried on by associations of about two thousand members, combining their labour on a district of about a square league in extent, under the guidance of chiefs selected by themselves. In the distribution, a certain minimum is first assigned for the subsistence of every member of the community, whether capable or not of labour. The remainder of the produce is shared in certain proportions, to be determined beforehand, among the three elements, Labour, Capital, and Talent. The capital of the community may be owned in unequal shares by different members, who would in that case receive, as in any other joint-stock company, proportional dividends. I'd advice to read the rest of the text too. Breaks down to a guaranteed base income though.
So where in that Smith excerpt, does Smith say that society must guarantee such wage rates. It is by his analysis the bargaining principle of the worker. Their lowest acceptable wage is approximately twice sustenance below which they look for another job.
Stewart Mills, if I recall correctly, focused on the conflict between liberty and authority, in other words, individual rights and autocratic rule. Mills proposed that the individual is free to do as he wishes until he harms other. Given that statement, there is a symmetrical duty to do no harm, but nothing to suggest that everyone must provide for each other.
Fourierism is a decent idea for 2000 people, but even at 2000 people it will show signs of strain since social pressure won't be strong enough to enforce the social contract well. I don't care so much about his admiration for Fourierism. They're quite insubstantial compared to his Principles of Political Economy. For that I refer you to Book 2 Chapter 12, where he discusses Low Wages including the exclusionary effects of minimum wage laws.
BTW he's Mills' closer for the chapter:
+ Show Spoiler + No remedies for low wages have the smallest chance of being
efficacious, which do not operate on and through the minds and
habits of the people. While these are unaffected, any
contrivance, even if successful, for temporarily improving the
condition of the very poor, would but let slip the reins by which
population was previously curbed; and could only, therefore,
continue to produce its effect, if, by the whip and spur of
taxation, capital were compelled to follow at an equally
accelerated pace. But this process could not possibly continue
for long together, and whenever it stopped, it would leave the
country with an increased number of the poorest class, and a
diminished proportion of all except the poorest, or, if it
continued long enough, with none at all. For "to this complexion
must come at last" all social arrangements, which remove the
natural checks to population without substituting any others.
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Welcome to America where the wealth is unbalanced. But seriously, how much is the tax rate on, i didn't really read the whole post but is it different taxes for poor and rich people?
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Sanya12364 Posts
On September 20 2011 21:13 Brotkrumen wrote:Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 20:49 AdrianHealey wrote:
The problem with the tax increase is that it doesn't solve anything, fair and simple.
Taxing the rich is rarely a tax on consumption, but usually a tax on production, which means lower productivity and thus lower wages. This is not a solution to the systematic problems the USA is having.
the US problems are highly exaggerated. Production is not erased by taxation. Private enterprise is more efficient in increasing wealth, but this effect is highly localized. Government investment is is less efficient, but has other benefits, like redistribution, a society in which the private sector can thrive, etc. Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 20:49 AdrianHealey wrote:
Cut spending, tremendously. Stop the war, abolish the army, stop public schooling, stop providing pension plans, stop providing corporate welfare, stop the police state, etc.
(I think public schooling in general is in a best case scenario child neglect. In the worse scenario, child abuse. I have several pedagogical and anti-schooling reasons for that, most of which are easy to find on the internet if you are interested. But that's a different discussion.)
Abolishing the army completely will make you vulnerable to everyone who hasn't. Ever checked how many dictators with guns are still out there? Public schooling is one of the greatest achievements for the average man and the economy as a whole. At first it emancipated the worker and peasant from the educated elite and made everyone more free and now, as innovation seems to be correlated to % of population educated is a boon to society and economy. Leave education to the parents and you infringe on the childs right to an education. Or do you think that drunk parents will spend any effort on getting their child into school? What you will end up with is a more heavily stratified society at best and uneducated masses at worst. Show nested quote +On September 20 2011 20:49 AdrianHealey wrote:
The amount of money you have left to actually provide descent care for the unable will be enormous. However; because they lack the political representation, this will never happen. The government does not exist to help the poor and unfortunate.
It also makes no sense to systematically engage in providing pensions: your pension is something which first and foremost is your own personal responsibility during your active life. Only handicapped people really have an argument to not be able to provide for their own pensions.
Consumption preference. Humans prefer now to consuming more later. We are also risk takers. This might be helped by social engineering to change culture in a way that we don't anymore. Social engineering is scary though. If we stopped pension programs, we would end up with masses of poor people that lived subsistence wages their whole working lives because the market would push wages to that level.
I find this reply hilarious. First point, abolishing the army has happened in Costa Rica.
But the closer about being wary of social engineering is highly ironic since everything that is being defended is exactly that, social engineering. The only plausible difference I can think of is invasive social engineering through psychological conditioning and brainwashing verse minimally invasive social engineering through tweaked incentives. Yet, public schools are already a mild to moderate form of the former.
It misses contention that personal responsibility is both the least invasive and the most powerful form of "social engineering" in effect on human behavior.
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EPT
