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The issue is that you can quite easily imagine a society where everyone is guaranteed shelter, food, and water by the social structure, and money might be used

The issue is that you can quite easily imagine a society where everyone is guaranteed shelter, food, and water by the social structure, and money might be used primarily for luxuries. Money-as-a-right wouldn't necessarily make sense in such a society. It exists in classical liberal societies because liberalism doesn't really have a consistent concept of positive duties, either on the individual or the societal whole. But there's definitely other forms of political thought, liberalism is just seductive because it claims to arise from the natural state of things.

tomcam 10y ago
I can't quite easily imagine such a society. No one can ever explain to how that gets paid for without the government taking even more money from me by force.
- vertex-four 10y ago
  Guaranteed by the social structure means that people have collectively agreed to guarantee this to others, and if you don't agree, you're prevented from access to the benefits of the social structure (including those guarantees for yourself). (Part of) left-libertarianism or left-anarchism, basically.
- aninhumer 10y ago
  Whether it's taken by force is irrelevant as to whether such a society is possible. A right to shelter does not require a right to property, so you can't use the former as an argument for the latter.
- xyzzy123 10y ago
  This functionally exists in nz, the uk, australia, where you can claim welfare benefits indefinitely as long as you demonstrate to the system that you're looking for work. (Probably a lot of other places but I don't have direct experience of those). You don't actually have to be really looking of course, you just need to satisfy the clerk at the dole office. The fundamentals of social structure are so close to the U.S that you have to squint a bit to see the differences. Yeah it gets abused and it's pretty hard to live on it, but the alternative (as far as a slim moral majority tends to vote) is worse. Yes, taxes are a bit higher. It's not the end of the world. Still got problems with homelessness, because that's a hard problem. You can live off benefits but you need to be basically functional to do it.
  - kagamine 10y ago
    Watch a few episodes of the UK Who Do You Think You Are tv show and what comes across in many of these people's ancestral stories is that some people had it all (and it didn't always work out for them), women had no right to own a damn thing, and that many, many people suffered and died because there was no welfare state in Europe pre WWII. The lives of ordinary people were often awful and governed by pure chance. The welfare state is one of the greatest achievements of human-kind.
- vidarh 10y ago
  And I can't imagine ever living in a society that values a slight reduction in taxes over providing basic protections for those in need. Most of Europe provides those kind of protections to (greatly) varying degrees, because the alternative seems too horrifying. (and yes, "US conditions" regularly gets pulled out in many European countries as a negative example of the consequences of cutting welfare systems)
AlgorithmicTime 10y ago
Only if you dream away all the important implementation details. You can easily imagine a being like superman. That doesn't mean a being like superman is possible.

tomcam 10y ago

I can't quite easily imagine such a society. No one can ever explain to how that gets paid for without the government taking even more money from me by force.

vertex-four 10y ago
Guaranteed by the social structure means that people have collectively agreed to guarantee this to others, and if you don't agree, you're prevented from access to the benefits of the social structure (including those guarantees for yourself). (Part of) left-libertarianism or left-anarchism, basically.
aninhumer 10y ago
Whether it's taken by force is irrelevant as to whether such a society is possible. A right to shelter does not require a right to property, so you can't use the former as an argument for the latter.
xyzzy123 10y ago
This functionally exists in nz, the uk, australia, where you can claim welfare benefits indefinitely as long as you demonstrate to the system that you're looking for work. (Probably a lot of other places but I don't have direct experience of those). You don't actually have to be really looking of course, you just need to satisfy the clerk at the dole office. The fundamentals of social structure are so close to the U.S that you have to squint a bit to see the differences. Yeah it gets abused and it's pretty hard to live on it, but the alternative (as far as a slim moral majority tends to vote) is worse. Yes, taxes are a bit higher. It's not the end of the world. Still got problems with homelessness, because that's a hard problem. You can live off benefits but you need to be basically functional to do it.
- kagamine 10y ago
  Watch a few episodes of the UK Who Do You Think You Are tv show and what comes across in many of these people's ancestral stories is that some people had it all (and it didn't always work out for them), women had no right to own a damn thing, and that many, many people suffered and died because there was no welfare state in Europe pre WWII. The lives of ordinary people were often awful and governed by pure chance. The welfare state is one of the greatest achievements of human-kind.
vidarh 10y ago
And I can't imagine ever living in a society that values a slight reduction in taxes over providing basic protections for those in need. Most of Europe provides those kind of protections to (greatly) varying degrees, because the alternative seems too horrifying. (and yes, "US conditions" regularly gets pulled out in many European countries as a negative example of the consequences of cutting welfare systems)

AlgorithmicTime 10y ago

Only if you dream away all the important implementation details. You can easily imagine a being like superman. That doesn't mean a being like superman is possible.