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Laws are finely-tuned reflections of morals - they are mostly about fairness and enabling society to function in an orderly way. How did laws evolve? Why do we

by blub 10y ago

Laws are finely-tuned reflections of morals - they are mostly about fairness and enabling society to function in an orderly way. How did laws evolve? Why do we punish theft anyway? What Apple (and Google, Microsoft, probably others) is doing is certainly immoral. It's likely also illegal.

jsmthrowaway 10y ago
No. The entire point of law is to completely eliminate fairness, morals, and other squishies as deciding factors involved in a judgment. We punish theft because it is against a clearly defined set of laws, and because at some point lawmakers determined that we should. We notably do not punish many immoral things, and punish many moral things; introducing morality is dangerous and undermines the whole thing. To use your theft example, think about a Robin Hood type situation; should we overlook sidestepping of the law when it fits with our morals and squishies? No. The law is the law. That edge cuts both ways. In some ways it supports your argument. In others it does not. Introducing morality makes your argument totally different (and, in this case, irrelevant until the United States and Ireland adopt socialism). I'm a bloody liberal and I'm saying that; we can't expect capitalist entities to operate in anything other than their own self interest or we actually don't want capitalism. Can't have it both ways. How do you define fair for a corporate person? I'm very intentionally avoiding commenting upon the specific situation aside from saying it's weird to come at this morally when discussing a paper entity with clearly defined goals within a particular system of government.
- pjc50 10y ago
  This argument completely contradicts the way law is enforced in practice, with all its "reasonableness" tests and mitigating factors. I think you'll find very few lawyers regarding it as a mechanical system. What is the law of equity but a different word for "fairness"? (Especially in a "common law" jurisdiction!)
- blub 10y ago
  (I didn't downvote you, but...) I think you're ignoring the fact that laws and morals can't be completely decoupled. Yes, morals should not play a role when --applying-- the law. But the reason the law exists is ultimately a moral one. When the punishment is flexible, the judge will normally apply moral arguments to support a more lenient or harsh sentence. Why did we determine at one point that we should punish theft? Maybe we were wrong and should repeal those laws. I think you will have a very hard time doing this and most counterarguments will be moral ones.
  - jsmthrowaway 10y ago
    We got into this with taxes which are pretty much the opposite of rooted in morality. You successfully strawmanned theft and judges and sentences, I stupidly rose to that challenge with perhaps an over literal interpretation of law to make a point, HN encourages downvoting for disagreement, and here we are, having a conversation where you have to be sympathetic to me for being downvoted before you can make your point. Ever ask yourself why? Anyway, it's corporate tax law. The assumption that a corporation is being unfair by using every legal remedy available to it disagrees with how capitalism is supposed to work, or so they tell me, and I really don't care. I literally ran out of steam on making this point while typing this comment because it's 3:30am and matters approximately zero, so I have to ripcord on this. Sorry.
    - blub 10y ago
      I said theft, because tax evasion is ultimately a form of theft. Theft from us, because we pay our taxes and the government uses that to build infrastructure which allows companies like Apple to function. And then they take that and give us 0.005% of their profits in return. Thank you for the generosity? No. This form of aggressive, "everyone for himself" capitalism works, for a definition of works equal to making certain people rich beyond their dreams. Why should the common man support that? For a phone? Good night :)
      - jsmthrowaway 10y ago
        Okay, but understand that your entire comment can be translated to "I don't actually want capitalism." Do you understand my point now? You can't have fair corporate expectations and capitalism. They are mutually exclusive and every case of corporate leadership trading value for moral causes can likely be successfully fought on fiduciary grounds. Capitalism is not aggressive. It just is. The incentives are created in a certain way. This is like saying you'd rather play chess if there was a third color; there's nothing wrong with wanting to play that game instead, but let's not call it chess any more. Dig it? I don't even disagree with you entirely (again: liberal! Look at me typing this conservative wet dream!), I'd just rather see you make the anticapitalist case as opposed to appealing to morals. If you ran a corporation in the United States and volunteered to pay more taxes on moral grounds you'd very likely be in breach of fiduciary duty if someone pressed the issue. That's what I'm saying. We have built a certain house and we can debate whether it's a good house, but we also can't be surprised and morally outraged when the incentives of the system are followed to their extremes.
Qantourisc 10y ago
"""Why do we punish theft anyway?""" This usually boils down to: do not do onto others, what you wish not done to you. In this case: what if Apple suddenly got a competitor who pays negative taxes ? (Since we can't go lower then 0% in this example) How would Apple feel ?
- blub 10y ago
  We punish it because it's damaging to individuals and the social fabric that binds them. The money that Apple is sitting on could have been used for many positive things for the citizens of Ireland. Their government and Apple robbed them of that money for 6000 jobs, the taxes they produce and probably some administrative income. Corporations are not above society. They exist thanks to individuals and infrastructure built with taxes. I think the idea is to have a level playing field, where everyone pays x%. There could be rebates for some categories of companies, but not for ONE company which is rich anyway.
  - icebraining 10y ago
    The money that Apple is sitting on could have been used for many positive things for the citizens of Ireland. Their government and Apple robbed them of that money for 6000 jobs, the taxes they produce and probably some administrative income. Nonsense. The reason Apple and those other companies are in Ireland in the first place is because of those deals. That's why the EU is trying to shut it down - the EU is the cartel charging high prices (taxes), and Ireland is the member undercutting them. I don't think there's anything wrong with what the EU is doing, assuming they have the authority under the treaties, but painting this as a government against its people is just wrong.
    - Infinitesimus 10y ago
      But Apple isn't paying the 12.5% Ireland tax rate; they paid 0.005% in the past year - thanks to an assumed deal between Apple and the government. The issue here isn't Ireland being at 12.5% which they are free to use - it is the special treatment Apple and I assume other large corporations are getting which is being viewed as unfair

by blub 10y ago

jsmthrowaway 10y ago

No. The entire point of law is to completely eliminate fairness, morals, and other squishies as deciding factors involved in a judgment. We punish theft because it is against a clearly defined set of laws, and because at some point lawmakers determined that we should. We notably do not punish many immoral things, and punish many moral things; introducing morality is dangerous and undermines the whole thing. To use your theft example, think about a Robin Hood type situation; should we overlook sidestepping of the law when it fits with our morals and squishies? No. The law is the law. That edge cuts both ways. In some ways it supports your argument. In others it does not. Introducing morality makes your argument totally different (and, in this case, irrelevant until the United States and Ireland adopt socialism). I'm a bloody liberal and I'm saying that; we can't expect capitalist entities to operate in anything other than their own self interest or we actually don't want capitalism. Can't have it both ways. How do you define fair for a corporate person? I'm very intentionally avoiding commenting upon the specific situation aside from saying it's weird to come at this morally when discussing a paper entity with clearly defined goals within a particular system of government.

pjc50 10y ago
This argument completely contradicts the way law is enforced in practice, with all its "reasonableness" tests and mitigating factors. I think you'll find very few lawyers regarding it as a mechanical system. What is the law of equity but a different word for "fairness"? (Especially in a "common law" jurisdiction!)
blub 10y ago
(I didn't downvote you, but...) I think you're ignoring the fact that laws and morals can't be completely decoupled. Yes, morals should not play a role when --applying-- the law. But the reason the law exists is ultimately a moral one. When the punishment is flexible, the judge will normally apply moral arguments to support a more lenient or harsh sentence. Why did we determine at one point that we should punish theft? Maybe we were wrong and should repeal those laws. I think you will have a very hard time doing this and most counterarguments will be moral ones.
- jsmthrowaway 10y ago
  We got into this with taxes which are pretty much the opposite of rooted in morality. You successfully strawmanned theft and judges and sentences, I stupidly rose to that challenge with perhaps an over literal interpretation of law to make a point, HN encourages downvoting for disagreement, and here we are, having a conversation where you have to be sympathetic to me for being downvoted before you can make your point. Ever ask yourself why? Anyway, it's corporate tax law. The assumption that a corporation is being unfair by using every legal remedy available to it disagrees with how capitalism is supposed to work, or so they tell me, and I really don't care. I literally ran out of steam on making this point while typing this comment because it's 3:30am and matters approximately zero, so I have to ripcord on this. Sorry.
  - blub 10y ago
    I said theft, because tax evasion is ultimately a form of theft. Theft from us, because we pay our taxes and the government uses that to build infrastructure which allows companies like Apple to function. And then they take that and give us 0.005% of their profits in return. Thank you for the generosity? No. This form of aggressive, "everyone for himself" capitalism works, for a definition of works equal to making certain people rich beyond their dreams. Why should the common man support that? For a phone? Good night :)
    - jsmthrowaway 10y ago
      Okay, but understand that your entire comment can be translated to "I don't actually want capitalism." Do you understand my point now? You can't have fair corporate expectations and capitalism. They are mutually exclusive and every case of corporate leadership trading value for moral causes can likely be successfully fought on fiduciary grounds. Capitalism is not aggressive. It just is. The incentives are created in a certain way. This is like saying you'd rather play chess if there was a third color; there's nothing wrong with wanting to play that game instead, but let's not call it chess any more. Dig it? I don't even disagree with you entirely (again: liberal! Look at me typing this conservative wet dream!), I'd just rather see you make the anticapitalist case as opposed to appealing to morals. If you ran a corporation in the United States and volunteered to pay more taxes on moral grounds you'd very likely be in breach of fiduciary duty if someone pressed the issue. That's what I'm saying. We have built a certain house and we can debate whether it's a good house, but we also can't be surprised and morally outraged when the incentives of the system are followed to their extremes.

Qantourisc 10y ago

"""Why do we punish theft anyway?""" This usually boils down to: do not do onto others, what you wish not done to you. In this case: what if Apple suddenly got a competitor who pays negative taxes ? (Since we can't go lower then 0% in this example) How would Apple feel ?

blub 10y ago
We punish it because it's damaging to individuals and the social fabric that binds them. The money that Apple is sitting on could have been used for many positive things for the citizens of Ireland. Their government and Apple robbed them of that money for 6000 jobs, the taxes they produce and probably some administrative income. Corporations are not above society. They exist thanks to individuals and infrastructure built with taxes. I think the idea is to have a level playing field, where everyone pays x%. There could be rebates for some categories of companies, but not for ONE company which is rich anyway.
- icebraining 10y ago
  The money that Apple is sitting on could have been used for many positive things for the citizens of Ireland. Their government and Apple robbed them of that money for 6000 jobs, the taxes they produce and probably some administrative income. Nonsense. The reason Apple and those other companies are in Ireland in the first place is because of those deals. That's why the EU is trying to shut it down - the EU is the cartel charging high prices (taxes), and Ireland is the member undercutting them. I don't think there's anything wrong with what the EU is doing, assuming they have the authority under the treaties, but painting this as a government against its people is just wrong.
  - Infinitesimus 10y ago
    But Apple isn't paying the 12.5% Ireland tax rate; they paid 0.005% in the past year - thanks to an assumed deal between Apple and the government. The issue here isn't Ireland being at 12.5% which they are free to use - it is the special treatment Apple and I assume other large corporations are getting which is being viewed as unfair