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As a relatively far leftist in my ideals and pragmatist in practice, fairness doesn't matter to me. Equal access to opportunity and relative structural efficie

As a relatively far leftist in my ideals and pragmatist in practice, fairness doesn't matter to me. Equal access to opportunity and relative structural efficiency matter to me. If we could cut spending on SNAP/Food Stamps while encouraging nutritious diets that will reduce health issues and improve child-hood outcomes, I'd be all for it. I look at the argument that 'taxes are theft' as dishonest because I don't agree that the revenues the wealthy enjoy are necessarily 'theirs' to begin with. When you consider Walmart, for example, they record significant profits each year. However, they pay and structure their labor such that many of their workers require public assistance. Walmart is not realizing actual profits, they're shifting costs onto the greater society. so the solution to this problem is to levy heavy taxes on the individuals banking those profits such that the cost to society from the public assistance to Walmart labor is offset.

aidenn0 9y ago
First of all, I did note that those were not the only bases for each side. Secondly, how is "Equal access to opportunity" not about fairness? Thirdly, the liberal argument for your walmart example would be that if the public-assistance programs didn't exist in the first place, then walmart would have to pay its employees more.
- grasshopperpurp 9y ago
  >Thirdly, the liberal argument for your walmart example would be that if the public-assistance programs didn't exist in the first place, then walmart would have to pay its employees more. This is getting off the main topic, but how do you square that with the large homeless population?
  - aidenn0 9y ago
    Personally, I find that to be a weakness in libertarianism. On the other hand, one argument for it is that we have a lot of regulations; those regulations cost money. Absent those regulations, some of that value would be captured by those who are poor (either directly because fewer regulations would allow more jobs, or indirectly because fewer regulations would reduce the cost of production). At least some regulations exist to prevent businesses from externalizing their costs; different libertarians disagree on the proper way to handle this (torts are one popular suggestion, something like cap-and-trade is another; a surprising number of libertarians are very comfortable with taxes on pollutants, provided the tax is tied to the approximate damages caused by the pollution). [edit] Another way of saying this is that without the various welfare and social justice systems, walmart's workers would either need to be paid more to keep them healthy, or they would have to deal with constant turnover and people showing up to work sick (and thus with reduced productivity). Both situations would impose costs upon walmart without any need of taxation. In addition, most schools of libertarianism are not opposed to workers unions as a contractual, free-market solution to workers rights. Special government protections (e.g. NLRA) or restrictions (e.g. right-to-work) of union tend to be treated with equal suspicion (though there are schools of libertarianism that are more pro- or anti- union).
skybrian 9y ago
You can certainly make that argument, but here's another one: Walmart is a low-margin business, so most of Walmart's revenue goes to expenses, not profits. So you could argue that government subsidies help keep Walmart's prices lower than they would be, which helps the poor people who shop there. When tracing where the money goes, there's more than one way to do it.
- wavefunction 9y ago
  Walmart chooses to be a low-margin business, it's not like they're doing it out of the goodness of their heart. There are countless stories of them driving the profits out of their supply chain through their scale. They've driven small businesses out of the rural areas they favor as their bread-and-butter. I would conclude in my assessment that their low prices do not really serve anyone other than the Waltons who reap the billions in profits each year. I don't look at Walmart as a net positive for society.
  - skybrian 9y ago
    They also save their customers billions of dollars. (That's the flip side of running their competitors out of business.)

aidenn0 9y ago

First of all, I did note that those were not the only bases for each side. Secondly, how is "Equal access to opportunity" not about fairness? Thirdly, the liberal argument for your walmart example would be that if the public-assistance programs didn't exist in the first place, then walmart would have to pay its employees more.

grasshopperpurp 9y ago
>Thirdly, the liberal argument for your walmart example would be that if the public-assistance programs didn't exist in the first place, then walmart would have to pay its employees more. This is getting off the main topic, but how do you square that with the large homeless population?
- aidenn0 9y ago
  Personally, I find that to be a weakness in libertarianism. On the other hand, one argument for it is that we have a lot of regulations; those regulations cost money. Absent those regulations, some of that value would be captured by those who are poor (either directly because fewer regulations would allow more jobs, or indirectly because fewer regulations would reduce the cost of production). At least some regulations exist to prevent businesses from externalizing their costs; different libertarians disagree on the proper way to handle this (torts are one popular suggestion, something like cap-and-trade is another; a surprising number of libertarians are very comfortable with taxes on pollutants, provided the tax is tied to the approximate damages caused by the pollution). [edit] Another way of saying this is that without the various welfare and social justice systems, walmart's workers would either need to be paid more to keep them healthy, or they would have to deal with constant turnover and people showing up to work sick (and thus with reduced productivity). Both situations would impose costs upon walmart without any need of taxation. In addition, most schools of libertarianism are not opposed to workers unions as a contractual, free-market solution to workers rights. Special government protections (e.g. NLRA) or restrictions (e.g. right-to-work) of union tend to be treated with equal suspicion (though there are schools of libertarianism that are more pro- or anti- union).

skybrian 9y ago

You can certainly make that argument, but here's another one: Walmart is a low-margin business, so most of Walmart's revenue goes to expenses, not profits. So you could argue that government subsidies help keep Walmart's prices lower than they would be, which helps the poor people who shop there. When tracing where the money goes, there's more than one way to do it.

wavefunction 9y ago
Walmart chooses to be a low-margin business, it's not like they're doing it out of the goodness of their heart. There are countless stories of them driving the profits out of their supply chain through their scale. They've driven small businesses out of the rural areas they favor as their bread-and-butter. I would conclude in my assessment that their low prices do not really serve anyone other than the Waltons who reap the billions in profits each year. I don't look at Walmart as a net positive for society.
- skybrian 9y ago
  They also save their customers billions of dollars. (That's the flip side of running their competitors out of business.)