Politics Discussion Thread (Heated Arguing Warning)

[Qgqqqqq]

Bacchus, I discussed how we approve of taxation because you were arguing that the state was imposed upon us. You can't have it both ways - either the state is illegitimate because people agree with it, or it is illegitimate despite the broad acceptance of the people. Who or what do you believe is imposing this upon us and then convincing us we wanted it the whole time? And, at least in my country, taxes were increased to provide better services and those proposals were overwhelming popular. Thus, it's not a redistribution of an already evil, the people collectively said we want this evil.

And it does not matter that people collectively do evil - because these things are not objective this is the only way for society to function practicably. Otherwise, who is to say whose morality should become the blueprint of the states?

And just paring the state away is not an answer - humanity did not fall because of the state, we are fallen people independently, and without its intervention there is no curb on our personal evils to one another.


Again, I don't understand your obsession with violence, or how you believe opt-out schemes would generate anywhere near sufficient funding. Humanity collectively is generous where humanity individually will want to pass on its burden.

Do you understand the concept of a public good?

[Gavagai]

Seven, I would also like to ask what is exactly your concern. If you are worried about practical consequences of libertarianism, then most surely there will be none: currently in US there are more parents who want to adopt then children waiting for adoption, I don't see why in our hypothetical the situation would be worse. If you are worried about logical consistency, then it is answered by the distinction between consequences of natural events and consequences of actions of other humans or by quasi-delictal theory of parental obligations.

[Gavagai]

Q, the problem is that the taxpayers and the voters are different logical sets. In most countries the minority of people pays the majority of taxes.

[Qgqqqqq]

So?

[Gavagai]

So?

It is trivially easy to approve high taxes when you are not the one who pays them, so you can't ascribe to this fact any moral significance.

[Qgqqqqq]

Principally, democracy is about people coming together and defining the rules by which their lives are governed. If 50%+1 want to eliminate ACC than a) I will fight that every step of the way, and b) I will accept that decision. At a certain point, the decision would become heinous enough to me that I would rebel.

This is what I am arguing for here.

Why should those who are taxed more get a greater say, just because their interests are negatively affected? By the same token, shouldn't murderers get greater say in whether harsher setences are appropriate?

[Bacchus]

Qqqqqqq,

I'm not sure which country you come from, but most states in existence were certainly first forced upon their subjects, and later democratized as subjects became citizens. No citizens, of any country that I know of had ever had a practicable choice presented to them of living without taxes. Instead, the citizens of most countries had to organize to, very slowly, claw back at least some of the state revenues at first (this happened in the 19th- early 20th centuries). Only later did citizens acquire enough power to use the state to increase taxation for popularly demanded services; this rise of the welfare state occurred only after the First, but mostly even after the Second World War. Taxing the rich certainly had popular appeal, I'm not arguing against that -- but the people never chose between taxing the rich, or not taxing at all, because no practicable taxless alternative was ever presented. The choice the people had has always been between "live in a state which extracts, but doesn't share its wealth with you, and is run by the elite" and "threaten the elite with disorder enough that the elite starts sharing at least some of the wealth it extracts with you". Of course people chose the latter, it's slightly less bad, but it's still only making the most out of a (relatively) bad situation.

I'm not saying that people are somehow confused or misunderstanding -- of the choices presented, they really do prefer and support the one we have; I'm saying that the choices themselves are too limited. Even more, I'm saying that we shouldn't gloss over the reality of state rule by perpetuating a myth of democracy, whereby "the people", whatever that is, "have come together", whatever that means, to establish a state that works for their own good. It's true that the states do a lot of good -- but make no mistake, they do so as a result of citizen's victories in battles against the state, frequently revolutionary, exceedingly bloody battles. These are concessions unwillingly extorted, not an intrinsic feature of the state.

we are fallen people independently, and without its intervention there is no curb on our personal evils to one another.

I think this statement just goes directly against the history of mankind. I think people are not only capable, but actually predisposed to many forms of productive association, whilst the state has been a major agent of sustaining warfare and other forms of mass murder, as well as of expropriation and impoverishment (it's more difficult than this, the very fact of state rule was pacifying, no-one likes internal violent riots, but this pacification was hardly done through any benevolence). That today's states are so oriented to preservation of peace and internal welfare is a testament to the goodness of the people and their strength of association, because even a hundred years back states were something much different.

But this really is the crux of the disagreement. Where you see a force for good, I see a beast put on a leash.

[Qgqqqqq]

So?

It is trivially easy to approve high taxes when you are not the one who pays them, so you can't ascribe to this fact any moral significance.

It is trivially easy to talk about children being ripped away from parents who are unable but not unwilling to support them without the assistance of the state.

This is a fun game. You next.

(Anyway, my point was irrleevent to whether I support high taxation, but about the concept of democracy. And those with more money have ways to amplify their say in the political process, anyway.)

[Gavagai]

So?

It is trivially easy to approve high taxes when you are not the one who pays them, so you can't ascribe to this fact any moral significance.

It is trivially easy to talk about children being ripped away from parents who are unable but not unwilling to support them without the assistance of the state.

I think I should stop posting here as it is obvious that my comments are misunderstood in the most bizzare way. I think it was wrong for me to participate in this discussion at all and I apologize for any bad blood left.

[Bacchus]

@Ichabod,

A very dry, but just as information-rich text is Grain Markets in Europe, 1500–1900: Integration and Deregulation, nothing that I would recommend more, even if reading it is a little like work. This issue deserves it, I think. This book is also helped by being very short. Provisioning Paris: Merchants and Millers in the Grain and Flour Trade is fun to read and rich in detail, but as you can see focuses on a very specific area. However, Ancien Regime France in many ways was the most developed form of absolutist state, so this gives a good picture of the "ideal type" of traditional regulations in grain. The same author, Kaplan, has a bunch of books on the subject, including a quite interesting The Famine Plot Persuasion in Eighteenth-century France -- all about the rumours and stories that circulated in society, and served to rationalize both government involvement in bread supply, and anti-government riots. He also has a much longer, older book, which is not bad: Bread, Politics and Political Economy in the Reign of Louis XV, this specifically addresses, in detail, how de-regulation happened in the eighteenth century France. Very interesting, but an overly historic account, for the general needs I would say. For a comparative assessment of state intervention into the food markets and the role of that intervention in governance have a look at a great article by Charles Tilly: Food supply and public order (1975).

But overall, you need to be familiar with just three things to appreciate how powerful deregulation was: the history of famines in Europe (can be gleaned from any general economic history, or even from Wikipedia), the history of deregulation (really anything on the physiocratic movement, Turgot, or the free market ideology of Britain, such as Polanyi's Great Transformation), the extent of the typical involvement of the state in grain trade (Tilly is as good of a introduction as any). Then you will see that a) famines in Europe were widespread and regular, b) that the state was terribly concerned with preventing them and using a whole array of methods to stop "profiteering", ensure "fairness", and so, c) that only after the state, with great difficulty, was persuaded to give up its "protective" ambitions, integrate and deregulate the markets that famines ceased to be a regular occurence. This change happened incredibly quickly and was not linked to any significant technological transformations -- whether the state was advanced or backward, once it deregulated, provisioning improved significantly.