4 ms·

Do you have an argument against redistribution that isn't "I disagree with what the public wants"?

by uoaei 5y ago

dismalpedigree 5y ago
The masses are asses. We shouldn’t just do things because the most people want it. Thats called tyranny by the majority.
- uoaei 5y ago
  I personally believe it'd be great if people like you could completely divest themselves from nation-states. You don't want to contribute to a commonwealth, that's fine, you can rough it over there and live a sad, cold, hungry existence. The vast majority of the comforts of modern life are afforded specifically and only because other people contribute to the common cause. You reject your responsibility to contribute to same but gleefully consume the benefits which are allocated to you. What an ass. Everyone wants to believe they'd be great survivalists. Very few appreciate the level of knowledge and skill needed to do it alone. Even fewer can ever gain all that knowledge and all those skills. There's a reason humans organize into packs: division of labor is nothing less than a paradigm shift in productivity for groups of people. Civilization today is that same basic concept scaled up to support your consumptive ass along with the rest of humanity.
  - dismalpedigree 5y ago
    I personally feel it’d be great if people like you could stop thinking that all property is inherently society’s property and that I should be thankful society allows me to reside on it. We are all in it together, but we will all be better off when others stop trying to appropriate everything from me and give it to others just because they want it. I work hard for what I have. I shouldn’t have to have it taken away if I don’t continue to work (add value) into perpetuity.
    - uoaei 5y ago
      - dismalpedigree 5y ago
        You are honestly arguing that the concept of private property is a mistake? Serious question. How do you envision things working when everything is communal? What motivates productivity and overcomes the tragedy of the commons?
        uoaei 5y ago
        Yes. Many have argued the same. If you wish to be informed, I recommend doing some reading. In particular, there is a difference between personal property and private property, and that difference is expounded in great detail in the literature. Are you saying selfishness motivates productivity today? I think you would be hard-pressed to justify that claim. Are you saying that we do not experience tragedy of the commons today? In today's economy, everyone having the same access to unregulated markets can be seen as a tragedy: this turns people into either suckers or grifters, and nothing in between. Sounds pretty fucked up to me. I see a tragedy of the commons in the ubiquity of the belief that "I own this" and "I don't own that". Everyone believes this to the point it is an ideological underpinning of contemporary society. But it is not true a priori, so I am not really seeing how you justify it in the first place, especially without empirical counterfactuals. And obviously it has some serious drawbacks, such as people dying needlessly. Those people could contribute to your wellbeing but they are dead and can no longer do that. A tragedy, indeed.
        tmnvix 5y ago
        Think about LVT as the occupier paying the community for the right to exclude them from a common resource. The price of that exclusion is set by the community. The occupier gets most of the benefits of private property rights without actually having private property. This concept can be extended to all natural resources (and in some cases already is to some extent). The radio spectrum, mineral resources, etc. I find this to be an attractive concept because I am philosophically opposed to the current situation where a new life is born into a world where all resources are already 'claimed'. That new life has just as much right to the world's resources as any other that already exists. This doesn't mean that someone can't make use of more resources than anybody else. They just have to do it in a justifiable way.
  - giantg2 5y ago
    "you can rough it over there" Over where? Organizations (gov, corp, etc) always grow and want more power. There is no place free of it or opt-in only. "Everyone wants to believe they'd be great survivalists." I think this is a gross misconception. I doubt most people want to be survivalist. It's possible they just want less government telling them what to do, especially in their private life. You could have a minarchist government where people want to contribute to their government/community. We see this to an extent in rural areas.
    - uoaei 5y ago
      "Less government" still has taxes, so I'm not sure how your comment is connected to the one from the previous commenter.
  - int_19h 5y ago
    Not OP, but speaking for myself: I want to contribute to a commonwealth, but any modern nation-state is a very perverse construct that doesn't really deserve that word. There's no commonwealth without a true democracy, and voting for people who supposedly represent you every few years isn't that.
- uoaei 5y ago
  > We shouldn’t just do things because the most people want it. I actually agree. "Should" is such a terrible word that I don't think we should use it at all. But we do do the things that most people want, because that is by construction the primary desire on a societal scale. You are part of a bigger machine, whether you like it or not. > Thats called tyranny by the majority. Really funny that American neo-con reactionaries have introduced such a concept. Anywhere else, it's just called "democracy".
  - CapricornNoble 5y ago
    >>> Thats called tyranny by the majority. >Really funny that American neo-con reactionaries have introduced such a concept. Anywhere else, it's just called "democracy". Your bias is showing... "Neo-con reactionaries" didn't introduce the concept. John Quincy Adams first did in 1788. It was popularized by John Stuart Mill in 1859. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyranny_of_the_majority https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyranny_of_the_majority
  - kmonsen 5y ago
    Most democracies have some mechanism in place to prevent majorities to change too much at one and prevent abuse of minorities. One example many share is a constitution that needs more than a majority to change.
fleddr 5y ago
Do you? Because depending on the country, the "public" are existing home owners and those wanting reform the minority.
- uoaei 5y ago
  I am having trouble finding statistics on the proportion of homeowners in any given country. The available statistics I can find are based on "owner-occupied homes" which is not comparable. What do homeowners want? Well, they don't want higher home prices if no one is around to support the local economy. So clearly they want some level of distribution of access.
  - giantg2 5y ago
    Looks like about 86M owner occupied homes out of 141M total housing units. So likely more than half depending on the distribution of household members. "What do homeowners want? Well, they don't want higher home prices if no one is around to support the local economy. So clearly they want some level of distribution of access." I'd imagine that only applies for a small area (SV, NYC). Outside of that area, it's not a real issue (people don't talk about that in the areas I have lived).
    - uoaei 5y ago
      I mean in a literal sense, hoarding all the goods means no one will be able to produce anything for your consumption. Unless you set up a serfdom, that is.
giantg2 5y ago
"Do you have an argument against redistribution that isn't "I disagree with what the public wants"?" I'm a part of the public, and I don't want it. I imagine there is a sizable number of others that don't want it too. We could just force people to do whatever we want because a majority wants it, but that's no different than mob rule. So far I haven't heard a compelling argument that this approach would solve more issues than it causes. The precise implementation would influence this greatly, but it isn't well defined. If we want to control housing prices in specific locations, I think a better approach is to cap the number of jobs in an area based on its carrying capacity. This would also provide more even distribution thorough out the state/country, reduce infrastructure concerns, and reduce property prices. But good luck convincing the politicians - they already like attracting jobs/companies by offering tax breaks, zoning variances, etc.
- uoaei 5y ago
  > We could just force people to do whatever we want because a majority wants it, but that's no different than mob rule. That's not mob rule, that's simple majority rule. We have access to other forms of consensus algorithms, but so far simple-majority seems to be the most anyone can stomach. That is very unfortunate. > would solve more issues than it causes. That's not the metric though, right? The metric is: are things better under that system vs this one? We want to measure whether B(enefits)2 - C(osts)2 >= B1 - C1, not whether B2 - C2 >= 0. I strongly agree with what I think you're implying, which is that we need more metropolitan areas, but I think we are not going to get very far with limits. You will get a lot more participation and a lot less tumult (not to mention orders of magnitude less bureaucratic overhead) if you offer carrots rather than sticks. People management is a real consideration: people are not identical particles subject to the continuum hypothesis.

Do you have an argument against redistribution that isn't "I disagree with what the public wants"?

by uoaei 5y ago

Do you have an argument against redistribution that isn't "I disagree with what the public wants"?

The masses are asses. We shouldn’t just do things because the most people want it. Thats called tyranny by the majority.

uoaei 5y ago
I personally believe it'd be great if people like you could completely divest themselves from nation-states. You don't want to contribute to a commonwealth, that's fine, you can rough it over there and live a sad, cold, hungry existence. The vast majority of the comforts of modern life are afforded specifically and only because other people contribute to the common cause. You reject your responsibility to contribute to same but gleefully consume the benefits which are allocated to you. What an ass. Everyone wants to believe they'd be great survivalists. Very few appreciate the level of knowledge and skill needed to do it alone. Even fewer can ever gain all that knowledge and all those skills. There's a reason humans organize into packs: division of labor is nothing less than a paradigm shift in productivity for groups of people. Civilization today is that same basic concept scaled up to support your consumptive ass along with the rest of humanity.
- dismalpedigree 5y ago
  I personally feel it’d be great if people like you could stop thinking that all property is inherently society’s property and that I should be thankful society allows me to reside on it. We are all in it together, but we will all be better off when others stop trying to appropriate everything from me and give it to others just because they want it. I work hard for what I have. I shouldn’t have to have it taken away if I don’t continue to work (add value) into perpetuity.
  - uoaei 5y ago
    - dismalpedigree 5y ago
      You are honestly arguing that the concept of private property is a mistake? Serious question. How do you envision things working when everything is communal? What motivates productivity and overcomes the tragedy of the commons?
      - uoaei 5y ago
        Yes. Many have argued the same. If you wish to be informed, I recommend doing some reading. In particular, there is a difference between personal property and private property, and that difference is expounded in great detail in the literature. Are you saying selfishness motivates productivity today? I think you would be hard-pressed to justify that claim. Are you saying that we do not experience tragedy of the commons today? In today's economy, everyone having the same access to unregulated markets can be seen as a tragedy: this turns people into either suckers or grifters, and nothing in between. Sounds pretty fucked up to me. I see a tragedy of the commons in the ubiquity of the belief that "I own this" and "I don't own that". Everyone believes this to the point it is an ideological underpinning of contemporary society. But it is not true a priori, so I am not really seeing how you justify it in the first place, especially without empirical counterfactuals. And obviously it has some serious drawbacks, such as people dying needlessly. Those people could contribute to your wellbeing but they are dead and can no longer do that. A tragedy, indeed.
      - tmnvix 5y ago
        Think about LVT as the occupier paying the community for the right to exclude them from a common resource. The price of that exclusion is set by the community. The occupier gets most of the benefits of private property rights without actually having private property. This concept can be extended to all natural resources (and in some cases already is to some extent). The radio spectrum, mineral resources, etc. I find this to be an attractive concept because I am philosophically opposed to the current situation where a new life is born into a world where all resources are already 'claimed'. That new life has just as much right to the world's resources as any other that already exists. This doesn't mean that someone can't make use of more resources than anybody else. They just have to do it in a justifiable way.
- giantg2 5y ago
  "you can rough it over there" Over where? Organizations (gov, corp, etc) always grow and want more power. There is no place free of it or opt-in only. "Everyone wants to believe they'd be great survivalists." I think this is a gross misconception. I doubt most people want to be survivalist. It's possible they just want less government telling them what to do, especially in their private life. You could have a minarchist government where people want to contribute to their government/community. We see this to an extent in rural areas.
  - uoaei 5y ago
    "Less government" still has taxes, so I'm not sure how your comment is connected to the one from the previous commenter.
- int_19h 5y ago
  Not OP, but speaking for myself: I want to contribute to a commonwealth, but any modern nation-state is a very perverse construct that doesn't really deserve that word. There's no commonwealth without a true democracy, and voting for people who supposedly represent you every few years isn't that.
uoaei 5y ago
> We shouldn’t just do things because the most people want it. I actually agree. "Should" is such a terrible word that I don't think we should use it at all. But we do do the things that most people want, because that is by construction the primary desire on a societal scale. You are part of a bigger machine, whether you like it or not. > Thats called tyranny by the majority. Really funny that American neo-con reactionaries have introduced such a concept. Anywhere else, it's just called "democracy".
- CapricornNoble 5y ago
  >>> Thats called tyranny by the majority. >Really funny that American neo-con reactionaries have introduced such a concept. Anywhere else, it's just called "democracy". Your bias is showing... "Neo-con reactionaries" didn't introduce the concept. John Quincy Adams first did in 1788. It was popularized by John Stuart Mill in 1859. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyranny_of_the_majority https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyranny_of_the_majority
- kmonsen 5y ago
  Most democracies have some mechanism in place to prevent majorities to change too much at one and prevent abuse of minorities. One example many share is a constitution that needs more than a majority to change.

fleddr 5y ago

Do you? Because depending on the country, the "public" are existing home owners and those wanting reform the minority.

uoaei 5y ago
I am having trouble finding statistics on the proportion of homeowners in any given country. The available statistics I can find are based on "owner-occupied homes" which is not comparable. What do homeowners want? Well, they don't want higher home prices if no one is around to support the local economy. So clearly they want some level of distribution of access.
- giantg2 5y ago
  Looks like about 86M owner occupied homes out of 141M total housing units. So likely more than half depending on the distribution of household members. "What do homeowners want? Well, they don't want higher home prices if no one is around to support the local economy. So clearly they want some level of distribution of access." I'd imagine that only applies for a small area (SV, NYC). Outside of that area, it's not a real issue (people don't talk about that in the areas I have lived).
  - uoaei 5y ago
    I mean in a literal sense, hoarding all the goods means no one will be able to produce anything for your consumption. Unless you set up a serfdom, that is.

giantg2 5y ago

"Do you have an argument against redistribution that isn't "I disagree with what the public wants"?" I'm a part of the public, and I don't want it. I imagine there is a sizable number of others that don't want it too. We could just force people to do whatever we want because a majority wants it, but that's no different than mob rule. So far I haven't heard a compelling argument that this approach would solve more issues than it causes. The precise implementation would influence this greatly, but it isn't well defined. If we want to control housing prices in specific locations, I think a better approach is to cap the number of jobs in an area based on its carrying capacity. This would also provide more even distribution thorough out the state/country, reduce infrastructure concerns, and reduce property prices. But good luck convincing the politicians - they already like attracting jobs/companies by offering tax breaks, zoning variances, etc.

uoaei 5y ago
> We could just force people to do whatever we want because a majority wants it, but that's no different than mob rule. That's not mob rule, that's simple majority rule. We have access to other forms of consensus algorithms, but so far simple-majority seems to be the most anyone can stomach. That is very unfortunate. > would solve more issues than it causes. That's not the metric though, right? The metric is: are things better under that system vs this one? We want to measure whether B(enefits)2 - C(osts)2 >= B1 - C1, not whether B2 - C2 >= 0. I strongly agree with what I think you're implying, which is that we need more metropolitan areas, but I think we are not going to get very far with limits. You will get a lot more participation and a lot less tumult (not to mention orders of magnitude less bureaucratic overhead) if you offer carrots rather than sticks. People management is a real consideration: people are not identical particles subject to the continuum hypothesis.