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I'm so tired of this boring old fairy tale where mythical "job creators" will the entirety of civilization into existence like gods raising the earth from the o

I'm so tired of this boring old fairy tale where mythical "job creators" will the entirety of civilization into existence like gods raising the earth from the ocean with a touch of their spear, or Athena leaping fully formed from the head of Zeus. Frankly, the mythologizing serves to justify a level of deference to the ultra-rich that they simply have not earned. In order for the "wealth creators" to work, they need a stable legal system and a currency just to start. Those things aren't free. And if they wanted to create, as a completely random example, a company that sells and delivers books, they might find it convenient for there to already be a well-developed trans-continental transportation infrastructure (and traffic laws, vehicle safety standards, air-traffic controllers, publicly-funded universities training students in logistics and supply-chain management), ports to receive goods from overseas (and trade agreements with other countries, and a navy to protect shipping lanes, and internationally standardized shipping crate sizes), a fire department to come rescue your investment when a warehouse full of books is burning, and perhaps a revolutionary global telecommunications system to let customers buy books with the click of a button (and a government research agency to invent it). "Wealth creators" exist as a part of the system - not apart from it. Their attempts to create new and better products should be encouraged and even celebrated. But we should never forget that those opportunities only arose because of a collective investment by all of America, funded by American tax dollars. No investment - no Amazon, which is why Jeff Bezos doesn't live in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. So when "wealth creators" refuse to contribute to that investment, they are stifling the innovation and creative potential of the next generation of dreamers and inventors. And as an aside, property rights are a social fiction. They exist only as long as it serves the collective interest of society. You "own" a particular piece of land because you happened to see it first, just as much as you "own" the front seat because you called shotgun. If you believe otherwise, you should immediately return your land to the native people it was stolen from.

ghostwriter 6y ago
> If you believe otherwise, you should immediately return your land to the native people it was stolen from. Define native people. Did any other peoples live on that land before them? Did any tribe fight with the other for the same piece of land? > And as an aside, property rights are a social fiction. I'm glad you said that. Next time robbers get into your house don't call the police, instead suggest your service to them. > In order for the "wealth creators" to work, they need a stable legal system and a currency just to start. Before you have any currency you need a valuable stuff to be created so that you can measure its value by your currency. Before you have a legal system you have to agree on the fundamental principles foundational to your way of living. Unalienable property right is one of these fundamental principles that made possible all the stuff around you and that you benefit greatly from. If you believe otherwise, try a lifestyle in Venezuela or Somaliland for a change. > they might find it convenient for there to already be a well-developed trans-continental transportation infrastructure Infrastructure is created by the same wealth creators https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Northern_Railway_(U.S.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Northern_Railway_(U.S.) Your government doesn't produce it out of nowhere, and before the government is able to contract any kind of infrastructure work, it has to extort money from those who created this currecny-measured value in the first place.
- vladTheInhaler 6y ago
  > Define native people. Did any other peoples live on that land before them? Okay, how about "the people who first settled a particular piece of land, thereby laying an inalienable claim of ownership to it." > Did any tribe fight with the other for the same piece of land? Oh wait, never mind. If somebody else didn't recognize their rights, I guess you don't have to either. Sounds to me like you're fishing for a reason not not respect their claim to the land. I can't help but question how committed you are to the vision of property that you presented. Inalienable doesn't mean "absolute, except when somebody else violated it first", or "except when the theft happened a long time ago", or "except when somebody else is living there and it would make them really sad to have to leave". It means always, forever, no exceptions. So if you don't believe that, why not just admit so? > Next time robbers get into your house don't call the police, instead suggest your service to them. I'm glad you said that. It's an incredibly hackneyed trope, but also perfectly illustrates my point about how enforcement of property rights serves the collective interests of society and isn't absolute. The police are not actually there to protect my property at all costs. They are there to enforce the social contract to the extent that we have collectively decided is economical. This is a balancing of various concerns (privacy, safety, financial) of the community, not a recognition of any supreme right. In fact, barring extraordinary circumstances, the police will do absolutely nothing to help me recover my property. They will probably snap a couple pictures and take down a police report, but making me whole is the responsibility of my insurance company. > Before you have any currency you need a valuable stuff to be created so that you can measure its value by your currency. Finally an interesting point that directly addresses the substance of what I wrote. It's true enough, but misses the point that a "wealth creator" who lives in a non-monetary society probably isn't accumulating sufficient excess profits for it to be socially useful to tax them, which I will remind you is the context of this discussion. > Before you have a legal system you have to agree on the fundamental principles foundational to your way of living. No, you don't - a legal system is exactly how you reach that agreement. A system of laws isn't like a mathematical structure, with immutable axioms at the foundation and theorems built on top. It's more like an empirical science, where the theories evolve and adapt to fit the realities of the physical world. That's why even the constitution can be amended. > try a lifestyle in Venezuela or Somaliland for a change. If those countries have anything in common, it is that ownership, as defined by ability to occupy protect the land with a gun or a pointy stick, has subsumed all other aspects of the social contract. So if you want to live somewhere that respects your right to kill others in defense of property, those would be excellent choices. As I pointed out in my comment, my friend Jeff Bezos and I would prefer to stay in a society that takes a more holistic view of social obligations, instead of recognizing only the rights of whomever happens to be exploiting a piece of property at this particular moment. > Infrastructure is created by the same wealth creators https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Northern_Railway_(U.S.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Northern_Railway_(U.S.) First of all, here is a quote from the very top of the article you cite: "The Great Northern was the only successfully built privately funded transcontinental railroad in U.S. history. No federal subsidies were used during its construction, unlike all other transcontinental railroads." I'm not sure this proves what you think it does. And even if it did, I offered an obnoxiously long list of other elements of the infrastructure that were provided, in part or in whole, by Uncle Sam. So unless you're going to claim that Amazon delivers exclusively via the only privately funded railroad, I'm not sure if I see the relevance of this point. But since you brought them up, I will also point out that the railroad industry was one of the most predatory monopolies that has ever existed, and is the root cause of much of current day anti-trust law, which was establish when society decided that their freedoms were being excessively harmed by allowing exclusive, unlimited control of such an important resource. Their operation is a perfect example of the consequences of unfettered accumulation of capital, and a great argument for a wealth tax. In fact, Andrew Carnegie is the only person in US history to ever have a tax bracket of his very own.

ghostwriter 6y ago

> If you believe otherwise, you should immediately return your land to the native people it was stolen from. Define native people. Did any other peoples live on that land before them? Did any tribe fight with the other for the same piece of land? > And as an aside, property rights are a social fiction. I'm glad you said that. Next time robbers get into your house don't call the police, instead suggest your service to them. > In order for the "wealth creators" to work, they need a stable legal system and a currency just to start. Before you have any currency you need a valuable stuff to be created so that you can measure its value by your currency. Before you have a legal system you have to agree on the fundamental principles foundational to your way of living. Unalienable property right is one of these fundamental principles that made possible all the stuff around you and that you benefit greatly from. If you believe otherwise, try a lifestyle in Venezuela or Somaliland for a change. > they might find it convenient for there to already be a well-developed trans-continental transportation infrastructure Infrastructure is created by the same wealth creators https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Northern_Railway_(U.S.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Northern_Railway_(U.S.) Your government doesn't produce it out of nowhere, and before the government is able to contract any kind of infrastructure work, it has to extort money from those who created this currecny-measured value in the first place.

vladTheInhaler 6y ago
> Define native people. Did any other peoples live on that land before them? Okay, how about "the people who first settled a particular piece of land, thereby laying an inalienable claim of ownership to it." > Did any tribe fight with the other for the same piece of land? Oh wait, never mind. If somebody else didn't recognize their rights, I guess you don't have to either. Sounds to me like you're fishing for a reason not not respect their claim to the land. I can't help but question how committed you are to the vision of property that you presented. Inalienable doesn't mean "absolute, except when somebody else violated it first", or "except when the theft happened a long time ago", or "except when somebody else is living there and it would make them really sad to have to leave". It means always, forever, no exceptions. So if you don't believe that, why not just admit so? > Next time robbers get into your house don't call the police, instead suggest your service to them. I'm glad you said that. It's an incredibly hackneyed trope, but also perfectly illustrates my point about how enforcement of property rights serves the collective interests of society and isn't absolute. The police are not actually there to protect my property at all costs. They are there to enforce the social contract to the extent that we have collectively decided is economical. This is a balancing of various concerns (privacy, safety, financial) of the community, not a recognition of any supreme right. In fact, barring extraordinary circumstances, the police will do absolutely nothing to help me recover my property. They will probably snap a couple pictures and take down a police report, but making me whole is the responsibility of my insurance company. > Before you have any currency you need a valuable stuff to be created so that you can measure its value by your currency. Finally an interesting point that directly addresses the substance of what I wrote. It's true enough, but misses the point that a "wealth creator" who lives in a non-monetary society probably isn't accumulating sufficient excess profits for it to be socially useful to tax them, which I will remind you is the context of this discussion. > Before you have a legal system you have to agree on the fundamental principles foundational to your way of living. No, you don't - a legal system is exactly how you reach that agreement. A system of laws isn't like a mathematical structure, with immutable axioms at the foundation and theorems built on top. It's more like an empirical science, where the theories evolve and adapt to fit the realities of the physical world. That's why even the constitution can be amended. > try a lifestyle in Venezuela or Somaliland for a change. If those countries have anything in common, it is that ownership, as defined by ability to occupy protect the land with a gun or a pointy stick, has subsumed all other aspects of the social contract. So if you want to live somewhere that respects your right to kill others in defense of property, those would be excellent choices. As I pointed out in my comment, my friend Jeff Bezos and I would prefer to stay in a society that takes a more holistic view of social obligations, instead of recognizing only the rights of whomever happens to be exploiting a piece of property at this particular moment. > Infrastructure is created by the same wealth creators https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Northern_Railway_(U.S.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Northern_Railway_(U.S.) First of all, here is a quote from the very top of the article you cite: "The Great Northern was the only successfully built privately funded transcontinental railroad in U.S. history. No federal subsidies were used during its construction, unlike all other transcontinental railroads." I'm not sure this proves what you think it does. And even if it did, I offered an obnoxiously long list of other elements of the infrastructure that were provided, in part or in whole, by Uncle Sam. So unless you're going to claim that Amazon delivers exclusively via the only privately funded railroad, I'm not sure if I see the relevance of this point. But since you brought them up, I will also point out that the railroad industry was one of the most predatory monopolies that has ever existed, and is the root cause of much of current day anti-trust law, which was establish when society decided that their freedoms were being excessively harmed by allowing exclusive, unlimited control of such an important resource. Their operation is a perfect example of the consequences of unfettered accumulation of capital, and a great argument for a wealth tax. In fact, Andrew Carnegie is the only person in US history to ever have a tax bracket of his very own.