4 ms·

Why, necessarily, must human value be remitted by a central authority and its inherent fickleness? Or, more importantly, why does belief in predetermined value,

Why, necessarily, must human value be remitted by a central authority and its inherent fickleness? Or, more importantly, why does belief in predetermined value, cause a belief that the State should suddenly take charge of measuring value and doling out its consequences? Mental and physical abilities seem useful insofar as they produce things of economic value. Different people, today, already, have different and diverse abilities to produce economic value; and as a result they come to possess diverse quantities of wealth. How does believing that people's potential wealth is predetermined, change things?

claudiawerner 8y ago
>Why, necessarily, must human value be remitted by a central authority and its inherent fickleness? If human worth (I use "worth" because I detest the economism of "value") depends on abilities, there must be some way to collapse the qualitative differences in abilities down to quantitative values, to say that one person is worth more than another means that there is something within them that we can compare, separate from their concrete abilities but abstracted away. In the same way that 20 yards of linen exchange for one coat, although they are qualitatively different, there is a mechanism which allows them to be exchanged. The translation function must be defined somewhere, but I will admit that it need not be defined by the State, assuming we're not also discussing the notion of rights and justice in relation to abilities. Perhaps I should have said "(subjective ones imposed by an authority, either the authority of the State or the authority of the market)". In my view, the authority of capital is just as pernicious (if not moreso in some circumstances) as the authority of the state. >why does belief in predetermined value, cause a belief that the State should suddenly take charge of measuring value and doling out its consequences? I said it "very easily leads to", I didn't mean to say it's a necessity. However law is based on principles, and if the times replace the principle of equality with the principle of pre-determined worth then the laws will surely reflect that. >How does believing that people's potential wealth is predetermined, change things? We weren't talking about wealth, we were talking about the worth of a person. I do not mean that in economic terms. Mental and physical abilities are useful for much more than producing things of economic value, and for the great majority of human history they haven't been directed to producing things of economic value. > different and diverse abilities to produce economic value; and as a result they come to possess diverse quantities of wealth The qualitative diversity of abilities is not logically linked to the quantitative amount of wealth.
- mmirate 8y ago
  > In the same way that 20 yards of linen exchange for one coat, although they are qualitatively different, there is a mechanism which allows them to be exchanged. Indeed. But because they are qualitatively different, the opportunity costs of producing one versus the other are probably different; and if they are, then even if Alice can produce both more efficiently than Bob, Bob has a comparative advantage in one. Similarly, one can say - and likely be correct - that an agricultural veterinarian is worth more than a stevedore. But if We, The Central Authority conclude that therefore We Shall Have ag-vets and not stevedores, then suddenly stevedores' value will increase, due to the decrease in supply as that policy is implemented. > >How does believing that people's potential wealth is predetermined, change things? > We weren't talking about wealth, we were talking about the worth of a person. I do not mean that in economic terms. Mental and physical abilities are useful for much more than producing things of economic value, and for the great majority of human history they haven't been directed to producing things of economic value. For the great majority of human history, humans have been without the invention called economics-as-we-know-it-today. And economics - even in the absence of a market - can, at least, analyze almost all of human action and reaction. (With a free market, it can also drive it, with all the resulting decentralized emergently efficient behavior.)

claudiawerner 8y ago

>Why, necessarily, must human value be remitted by a central authority and its inherent fickleness? If human worth (I use "worth" because I detest the economism of "value") depends on abilities, there must be some way to collapse the qualitative differences in abilities down to quantitative values, to say that one person is worth more than another means that there is something within them that we can compare, separate from their concrete abilities but abstracted away. In the same way that 20 yards of linen exchange for one coat, although they are qualitatively different, there is a mechanism which allows them to be exchanged. The translation function must be defined somewhere, but I will admit that it need not be defined by the State, assuming we're not also discussing the notion of rights and justice in relation to abilities. Perhaps I should have said "(subjective ones imposed by an authority, either the authority of the State or the authority of the market)". In my view, the authority of capital is just as pernicious (if not moreso in some circumstances) as the authority of the state. >why does belief in predetermined value, cause a belief that the State should suddenly take charge of measuring value and doling out its consequences? I said it "very easily leads to", I didn't mean to say it's a necessity. However law is based on principles, and if the times replace the principle of equality with the principle of pre-determined worth then the laws will surely reflect that. >How does believing that people's potential wealth is predetermined, change things? We weren't talking about wealth, we were talking about the worth of a person. I do not mean that in economic terms. Mental and physical abilities are useful for much more than producing things of economic value, and for the great majority of human history they haven't been directed to producing things of economic value. > different and diverse abilities to produce economic value; and as a result they come to possess diverse quantities of wealth The qualitative diversity of abilities is not logically linked to the quantitative amount of wealth.

mmirate 8y ago
> In the same way that 20 yards of linen exchange for one coat, although they are qualitatively different, there is a mechanism which allows them to be exchanged. Indeed. But because they are qualitatively different, the opportunity costs of producing one versus the other are probably different; and if they are, then even if Alice can produce both more efficiently than Bob, Bob has a comparative advantage in one. Similarly, one can say - and likely be correct - that an agricultural veterinarian is worth more than a stevedore. But if We, The Central Authority conclude that therefore We Shall Have ag-vets and not stevedores, then suddenly stevedores' value will increase, due to the decrease in supply as that policy is implemented. > >How does believing that people's potential wealth is predetermined, change things? > We weren't talking about wealth, we were talking about the worth of a person. I do not mean that in economic terms. Mental and physical abilities are useful for much more than producing things of economic value, and for the great majority of human history they haven't been directed to producing things of economic value. For the great majority of human history, humans have been without the invention called economics-as-we-know-it-today. And economics - even in the absence of a market - can, at least, analyze almost all of human action and reaction. (With a free market, it can also drive it, with all the resulting decentralized emergently efficient behavior.)