6 ms·

Really sad to see all the libertarian viewpoints blanket down voted, mostly without any replies. It really seems like tech has been hit with a wave of pro-big

Really sad to see all the libertarian viewpoints blanket down voted, mostly without any replies. It really seems like tech has been hit with a wave of pro-big government thinking. My personal theory is that it's younger people who didn't have to deal with the threat of a draft and the baby boomers heavy handed social meddling. The threat of being forced into a war you don't agree with will make you think twice about funding the entity making that happen. Same with watching decades of ineffective social engineering from above.

wstrange 10y ago
I honestly don't get all the libertarian angst about paying taxes. As a Canadian, I pay a lot of tax. I grumble a bit during tax season - but I am incredibly grateful that I was lucky enough to be born in a prosperous country. A good part of my sucess (education, health care, etc) was paid for by other peoples taxes. So I am quite happy to return the favour. I also want to live in a society that is compassionate and takes care of those who can not take care of themselves. The libertarian viewpoint seems like "I got mine, so I'm OK".
- dchest 10y ago
  So I am quite happy to return the favour. It's great that you're happy, but you don't have a choice. You'll go to jail if you don't "return favour". I also want to live in a society that is compassionate and takes care of those who can not take care of themselves. Simple logic will tell you that if a society is compassionate, it doesn't need force taxation. From dictionary: compassion is a feeling of wanting to help someone who is sick, hungry, in trouble, etc. If you are forced to help, it's not compassion.
  - foxylad 10y ago
    S/he does have a choice - move to somewhere without taxes (Vanuatu was mentioned earlier as a possibility). The fact that non-taxing countries aren't over-run with libertarian immigrants (despite being a tropical paradise!) makes me doubt the practicality of the concept.
    - dchest 10y ago
      Seriously? How "we're going to take your money and if you don't like it, you can move somewhere else" is even remotely close to being a voluntary choice in your mind? You can try establishing some moral principles that will justify what government does (seriously, try this exercise), but let's not change meanings of words.
    - mchaver 10y ago
      It's often not a choice if you do not meet the countries requirements which are generally: be wealthy, have a higher degree and already have secured a job, or be married to a citizen/permanent resident. As another comment mentioned open borders would make it a choice. A good test case is looking at movement within European countries that allow freedom of movement for other European citizens. I'm sure some people have moved to Andorra, Gilbratar, Liechtenstein, etc. for lower taxes but probably at a lower rate than people moving to places for employment opportunities.
- rglullis 10y ago
  (I really shouldn't get into this discussion, as it seems that the HN crowd is down-voting everyone that slightly disagrees with the Big Government and is not into Populist Governments - whether Republican or Democrat. Alas, those are just Internet points and I do think the conversation can be productive.) You live in a developed country that is natural resource-rich, with an established middle class and a somewhat functional government. So on tax season you see lots of services being provided by Public Government and it seems that the price you are paying is reasonable. I really don't see it as someone "returning the favour", but there is no pointing in arguing there. What can be argued is how much more effective would this creation and redistribution of the wealth be if it weren't this centralized. For this, most reasonable Libertarians will argue that societies are the most prosperous when there is the minimal amount of interference from the Government. This is not to say that Governments and Democratic Institutions are not needed. They very much are. Without them, the natural resource-rich countries usually don't even manage to extract the value from the natural resources and transform it in long-lasting wealth. Just look at the Middle East, Venezuela or Brazil. So, my "Angst" is not about paying taxes, but more about "it keeps growing and growing, how much is enough?" and "are we really better off with all the meddling in general affairs?" --- I have a private health insurance company here in Germany. Terribly expensive, but so is the public one. The interesting difference is that the private one sent me a check last year because they got some savings and less expenses than expected, so they returning some of my money. Could you imagine anything like that happening with the budget of your country? "We actually managed to build those schools/highways/power plants/sewage treatment plant at a lower cost than expected, here is your share of the savings..." Was there ANY TIME you saw a career politician speaking anything that resembled "You know what, perhaps society can work out these issues without us having to take a bunch of their resources."? The only place where I see anything like that is Switzerland, which is precisely a country known for being prosperous and NOT natural resource-rich, and with low taxes compared with other countries in the OECD. You were already born into a rich country. The question is, how can we make existing poorer countries richer? Should a Canadian taxpayer really be funding Bombardier to keep its fat contracts and defend them from competition from Embraer [1]? > "The libertarian viewpoint seems like "I got mine, so I'm OK." That is so wrong is even offensive. The viewpoint is more like "I want to get mine, and I want to help the less fortunate with the product of MY work. I don't want to have slacktivists that think that "compassion" is sharing something on the Internet and thinking "someone else has to do something about it". Compassion can not be mandated or enforced by any Government. Worse, the more we remove individual agency, the worse we all become. We stop thinking about our own actions and start thinking that we are being effective by proxy. The viewpoint is also "Plenty of people don't get to get their share BECAUSE YOU KEEP THINKING THAT YOU KNOW WHAT IS BEST FOR THEM". In the USA, most of the Democrats that supported amnesty for undocumented immigrants were the ones benefiting from their low-wage jobs. The Dems always use amnesty as a way to get votes, but they NEVER introduce any serious immigration reform. [1]: http://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/lessons-from-a-nasty-trade-dispute http://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/lessons-from-a-nasty-trade-dispute
alkonaut 10y ago
There are plenty of interesting ideas in the libertarian school of thought - but all I have seen here is the repeated statement that taxation is theft, an idea that would be laughed at at the libertarian party convention. There simply isn't any good response to that viewpoint that hasn't already been posted in comments in this thread and many before it. Repeating the claim doesn't make it any less ridiculous. Being forced to fight a war etc is something else entirely, and I doubt a comment focused on that would be blanket down voted.

wstrange 10y ago

I honestly don't get all the libertarian angst about paying taxes. As a Canadian, I pay a lot of tax. I grumble a bit during tax season - but I am incredibly grateful that I was lucky enough to be born in a prosperous country. A good part of my sucess (education, health care, etc) was paid for by other peoples taxes. So I am quite happy to return the favour. I also want to live in a society that is compassionate and takes care of those who can not take care of themselves. The libertarian viewpoint seems like "I got mine, so I'm OK".

dchest 10y ago
So I am quite happy to return the favour. It's great that you're happy, but you don't have a choice. You'll go to jail if you don't "return favour". I also want to live in a society that is compassionate and takes care of those who can not take care of themselves. Simple logic will tell you that if a society is compassionate, it doesn't need force taxation. From dictionary: compassion is a feeling of wanting to help someone who is sick, hungry, in trouble, etc. If you are forced to help, it's not compassion.
- foxylad 10y ago
  S/he does have a choice - move to somewhere without taxes (Vanuatu was mentioned earlier as a possibility). The fact that non-taxing countries aren't over-run with libertarian immigrants (despite being a tropical paradise!) makes me doubt the practicality of the concept.
  - dchest 10y ago
    Seriously? How "we're going to take your money and if you don't like it, you can move somewhere else" is even remotely close to being a voluntary choice in your mind? You can try establishing some moral principles that will justify what government does (seriously, try this exercise), but let's not change meanings of words.
  - mchaver 10y ago
    It's often not a choice if you do not meet the countries requirements which are generally: be wealthy, have a higher degree and already have secured a job, or be married to a citizen/permanent resident. As another comment mentioned open borders would make it a choice. A good test case is looking at movement within European countries that allow freedom of movement for other European citizens. I'm sure some people have moved to Andorra, Gilbratar, Liechtenstein, etc. for lower taxes but probably at a lower rate than people moving to places for employment opportunities.
rglullis 10y ago
(I really shouldn't get into this discussion, as it seems that the HN crowd is down-voting everyone that slightly disagrees with the Big Government and is not into Populist Governments - whether Republican or Democrat. Alas, those are just Internet points and I do think the conversation can be productive.) You live in a developed country that is natural resource-rich, with an established middle class and a somewhat functional government. So on tax season you see lots of services being provided by Public Government and it seems that the price you are paying is reasonable. I really don't see it as someone "returning the favour", but there is no pointing in arguing there. What can be argued is how much more effective would this creation and redistribution of the wealth be if it weren't this centralized. For this, most reasonable Libertarians will argue that societies are the most prosperous when there is the minimal amount of interference from the Government. This is not to say that Governments and Democratic Institutions are not needed. They very much are. Without them, the natural resource-rich countries usually don't even manage to extract the value from the natural resources and transform it in long-lasting wealth. Just look at the Middle East, Venezuela or Brazil. So, my "Angst" is not about paying taxes, but more about "it keeps growing and growing, how much is enough?" and "are we really better off with all the meddling in general affairs?" --- I have a private health insurance company here in Germany. Terribly expensive, but so is the public one. The interesting difference is that the private one sent me a check last year because they got some savings and less expenses than expected, so they returning some of my money. Could you imagine anything like that happening with the budget of your country? "We actually managed to build those schools/highways/power plants/sewage treatment plant at a lower cost than expected, here is your share of the savings..." Was there ANY TIME you saw a career politician speaking anything that resembled "You know what, perhaps society can work out these issues without us having to take a bunch of their resources."? The only place where I see anything like that is Switzerland, which is precisely a country known for being prosperous and NOT natural resource-rich, and with low taxes compared with other countries in the OECD. You were already born into a rich country. The question is, how can we make existing poorer countries richer? Should a Canadian taxpayer really be funding Bombardier to keep its fat contracts and defend them from competition from Embraer [1]? > "The libertarian viewpoint seems like "I got mine, so I'm OK." That is so wrong is even offensive. The viewpoint is more like "I want to get mine, and I want to help the less fortunate with the product of MY work. I don't want to have slacktivists that think that "compassion" is sharing something on the Internet and thinking "someone else has to do something about it". Compassion can not be mandated or enforced by any Government. Worse, the more we remove individual agency, the worse we all become. We stop thinking about our own actions and start thinking that we are being effective by proxy. The viewpoint is also "Plenty of people don't get to get their share BECAUSE YOU KEEP THINKING THAT YOU KNOW WHAT IS BEST FOR THEM". In the USA, most of the Democrats that supported amnesty for undocumented immigrants were the ones benefiting from their low-wage jobs. The Dems always use amnesty as a way to get votes, but they NEVER introduce any serious immigration reform. [1]: http://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/lessons-from-a-nasty-trade-dispute http://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/lessons-from-a-nasty-trade-dispute

alkonaut 10y ago

There are plenty of interesting ideas in the libertarian school of thought - but all I have seen here is the repeated statement that taxation is theft, an idea that would be laughed at at the libertarian party convention. There simply isn't any good response to that viewpoint that hasn't already been posted in comments in this thread and many before it. Repeating the claim doesn't make it any less ridiculous. Being forced to fight a war etc is something else entirely, and I doubt a comment focused on that would be blanket down voted.