5 ms·

I'm not sure about how much more expensive it is, but if I lived in a hurricane-prone area I would probably investigate it and consider it a cost of living ther

I'm not sure about how much more expensive it is, but if I lived in a hurricane-prone area I would probably investigate it and consider it a cost of living there. Otherwise, if I can just get bailed out by the federal gov't when disaster strikes, those who choose to live in the safer areas of the country are essentially subsidizing the risks I assume by living there. Think of it as a negative externality (stretching my ECON101 limits a little here perhaps? :). I think the conclusion I'd rather draw is "the free market doesn't owe you anything."

toyg 15y ago
The free market doesn't owe you anything indeed, but society, which the government represents, is a very different thing. Sorry, I'm European and hardcore US "free-marketism" is so incredibly alien from here... I mean, the free market wouldn't ever give me 24 days of paid vacation every year, so why should I want more of it?
- cheez 15y ago
  I read this as follows: "I should force people, at the threat of violence, to give me 24 days of paid vacation." That's pretty much what you are saying. I agree with you: the free market doesn't provide everything but that is what charity is for. Government is not charity. What kind of charity is it when they will send you to jail or bankrupt you for not tithing on time or enough?
  - jiggy2011 15y ago
    The problems with charity as a model for providing what is provided currently by the government is that it is basically dictated by being able to make a plea to people with enough spare money to donate. So if a billionaire for example has a relative who suffers from a rare type of cancer for example they will be likely to donate a disproportionately massive amount of money to research and care for that particular type of cancer, or perhaps they find one particular endangered species particularly cute and will donate the money to the preservation of that particular species. They might also be opposed to environmentalists or hate gay people so will donate no money at all to environmental causes or treatment of aids victims. If their income is 1000x that of the average person they basically get 1000x the say in what is important (actually perhaps more since their cost of living will likely be lower as a % of income). This money might be used far more efficiently when some kind of justification is required in terms of providing the widest amount of help throughout society or the world as a whole. In addition allot of the "free market" type people that I know are quite opposed to the idea of charity anyway, although I think this may be somewhat different in the US.
    - sp332 15y ago
      The problems with charity as a model for providing what is provided currently by the government is that it is basically dictated by being able to make a plea to people with enough spare money to donate. But the government just gets money from the people. Also, they get mandates from the people. So getting the government to tax you to pay for someone else's problem is exactly the same as paying for the problem yourself. Except now you've got a bunch of politicians involved. I don't see how that's supposed to make things better. If people in a society want to pay for poor people's problems, they can just do that. On the other hand, if people don't want to pay for that, then of course they would never vote for a law to make them do that. I can't think of a case where people would rather be taxed by the government instead of giving money to charities.
      - jeltz 15y ago
        > If people in a society want to pay for poor people's problems, they can just do that. On the other hand, if people don't want to pay for that, then of course they would never vote for a law to make them do that. In most countries people do not vote for individual laws. Instead we trust the politicians to write laws we like. This means the government being a single huge entity can have a more holistic plan where less obvious groups get left out in the cold. I for one have no idea what groups really need help in our society and do not want to spend time to figure it out so am very happy that I have a government doing that job for me. Sure they do it quite poorly but I am positive I would do a worse job.
      - shibboleth 15y ago
        Political scientist here. The United States has tried relying on charities in the past. Here's (partially) why it didn't work out: people are selective to the charities they donate to and charities are often selective to the people they choose to help (some charities target war veterans, some children, some minorities, some certain neighborhoods). This leave a large, noticeable gap of many people left ignored. It's not a matter of whether people wanting to be taxed or wanting to give to charities; of course no one wants to be taxed. The government took the responsibility from the church and various charities because they weren't providing enough help across the board to citizens in need. I'm not saying don't donate to charity or volunteer, you should, but I am arguing that government, albeit in need of improvements, is one of the best mechanisms for helping the needy.
  - toyg 15y ago
    There is no threat of violence, workers' rights are a civil matter, penalties are financial. So yeah, society should force wealthy people, at the threat of financial ruin, to give their workers a decent lifestyle, to compensate for the unfair advantage they enjoyed (in terms of education and family networks as well as purely financial) and to basically let them call the shots on everything else. Obviously, as a social-democratic position, this moves from an implicit critical view of original capitalism, i.e. rich people exploiting the poor for financial gain, as observed through post-XVII-century history (more so in Europe than in the US, I guess, which might explain why it's not as widely accepted a concept over there). Times when Charity was widely praised and practice, but clearly was never enough. Obviously, if all economic disparity was eliminated overnight, things would be different. I look forward to the 1% renouncing their fortunes in order to establish a free-market utopia where such laws wouldn't be necessary.
    - losvedir 15y ago
      > There is no threat of violence, workers' rights are a civil matter, penalties are financial. And if you don't pay the financial penalties? You go to jail... Ultimately, the government derives all its power from having a monopoly on the legitimate use of violence.
      - toyg 15y ago
        If you don't pay the financial penalties your assets are seized and you go bankrupt... or not even that, in most cases, thanks to the concept of LLC. People don't go to jail for breaking workers' rights like holiday entitlements, let's not make it more dramatic than it is.
        cheez 15y ago
        Holiday entitlements, probably not. However, in each country where there are things like corporations, directors can go to jail for stuff like nonpayment.
        cheez 15y ago
        Actually, it slipped my first reading of this and probably yours too. The wording is so 'big government' that we don't even see it: If you don't pay the financial penalties your assets are seized and you go bankrupt. Seizure of assets is violence. You can be sure I would not like my assets to be seized because I have to follow some dumb, overreaching law. But I don't have the guns.
  - notahacker 15y ago
    Most Europeans also find the fringe libertarian argument that government collecting and distributing rent is morally wrong because of the use of "coercion" a little odd. There's no more or less coercion when the government (or private individuals) enforce particular rules essential to the function of the market system US property-rights libertarians hold so sacrosanct: namely property and contract enforcement. Both have a high degree of social acceptance generally ensuring people will comply, but both are ultimately preserved by implied violence, be that legislative or physical. So when it comes down to it, all property rights libertarians tacitly acknowledge the use of implied violence to collect rent is acceptable and sometimes necessary. If any corporation has a right to force me to pay to live on land they acquired through some historical sleight of business, and then dispose of the collected rent how they see fit, why exactly is it morally objectionable for the government to do the same thing? It's a more constructive debate when you start analysing on utilitarian terms whether there's any practical benefit to having 24 hour weeks, whether the market tends to underprovide them and whether regulation is the optimal solution.
    - cheez 15y ago
      There is a difference between using violence to protect my home and using violence to get myself a little more "me" time or literally more cash. Most libertarians don't advocate for no government, they advocate for as little as possible to maintain order and preserve freedom.
- steins 15y ago
  Maybe you should make yourself valuable enough to actually earn 24 days of vacation a year?
  - jiggy2011 15y ago
    If you are valuable enough your employer probably doesn't want you to take any vacation. Your only real bargaining chit is being able to get a job elsewhere which means that if your skills are specialised enough and your employer is the only game in town where you would be that valuable then you actually have little to no bargaining power. Also when you have a large number of staff who all doing essentially the same job they will usually get roughly the same vacation time or that would be regarded as unfair. Just because somebody works as say a programmer but doesn't happen to be numero uno rockstar-ninja coder doesn't mean they don't deserve some time off every year.
- sp332 15y ago
  What right do people have - even poor people - to demand that everyone else in society pay for damage to their homes? At least with insurance, the amount paid in is related to the probability * amount paid out. But if something is covered by the government, I'd pay a fixed amount in my taxes regardless of the risks I personally would be taking. So in that case, what would my incentive be to minimize risk? Anything bad that happens will be taken care of by other people.
DiabloD3 15y ago
One of the Representatives of the State of Louisiana at the time of Katrina lived in an area that was not directly hit by the hurricane. She had insurance that covered, flood, wind, and rain damage. The insurance company did not pay her a dime, even after she, and the rest of LA sued them. There is no free market when insurance companies can buy judges to get their way out of doing what they were paid to do.
- jiggy2011 15y ago
  Perhaps Ron Paul would do away with whatever mechanism allows the insurance companies to buy judges? (assuming what they are doing is legal).
  - nirvana 15y ago
    Insurance companies don't buy judges. This is really just nonsense. The thing is, judges work for the government, this means, no matter how illegal a law is, they will always take the government side of it. For example, the constitution doesn't give the government the power to regulate insurance at the federal level, but judges will rule based on the assumption it does because they are government employees and wouldn't be able to keep their jobs otherwise.
    - DiabloD3 15y ago
      Judges are elected in that area, and the insurance company paid for his re-election campaign. So, yes, judges CAN be bought, and it was legal too.
  - DiabloD3 15y ago
    At the time, he said he would support legislation to do this (I think he may have even put forth some, I can't find it though).
Anechoic 15y ago
> but if I lived in a hurricane-prone area I would probably investigate it and consider it a cost of living there [..] those who choose to live in the safer areas of the country are essentially subsidizing the risks I assume by living there The problem with this logic is that there are extremely few (if any) locations in the United States that aren't affected by severe natural events (blizzards, heat waves, wildfires, tornadoes, hurricanes, droughts, flooding, earthquakes, etc). I live in one of the more moderate locations in the USA (western MA) and in the past 11 months we've had an earthquake, tornado, hurricane, an ice storm that left much of the region without power for about a week,and 80 inches of snow in February alone. We all subsidize each other - maybe you had more moderate weather this year while we got whacked, but the situation could reverse itself next year.

toyg 15y ago

The free market doesn't owe you anything indeed, but society, which the government represents, is a very different thing. Sorry, I'm European and hardcore US "free-marketism" is so incredibly alien from here... I mean, the free market wouldn't ever give me 24 days of paid vacation every year, so why should I want more of it?

cheez 15y ago
I read this as follows: "I should force people, at the threat of violence, to give me 24 days of paid vacation." That's pretty much what you are saying. I agree with you: the free market doesn't provide everything but that is what charity is for. Government is not charity. What kind of charity is it when they will send you to jail or bankrupt you for not tithing on time or enough?
- jiggy2011 15y ago
  The problems with charity as a model for providing what is provided currently by the government is that it is basically dictated by being able to make a plea to people with enough spare money to donate. So if a billionaire for example has a relative who suffers from a rare type of cancer for example they will be likely to donate a disproportionately massive amount of money to research and care for that particular type of cancer, or perhaps they find one particular endangered species particularly cute and will donate the money to the preservation of that particular species. They might also be opposed to environmentalists or hate gay people so will donate no money at all to environmental causes or treatment of aids victims. If their income is 1000x that of the average person they basically get 1000x the say in what is important (actually perhaps more since their cost of living will likely be lower as a % of income). This money might be used far more efficiently when some kind of justification is required in terms of providing the widest amount of help throughout society or the world as a whole. In addition allot of the "free market" type people that I know are quite opposed to the idea of charity anyway, although I think this may be somewhat different in the US.
  - sp332 15y ago
    The problems with charity as a model for providing what is provided currently by the government is that it is basically dictated by being able to make a plea to people with enough spare money to donate. But the government just gets money from the people. Also, they get mandates from the people. So getting the government to tax you to pay for someone else's problem is exactly the same as paying for the problem yourself. Except now you've got a bunch of politicians involved. I don't see how that's supposed to make things better. If people in a society want to pay for poor people's problems, they can just do that. On the other hand, if people don't want to pay for that, then of course they would never vote for a law to make them do that. I can't think of a case where people would rather be taxed by the government instead of giving money to charities.
    - jeltz 15y ago
      > If people in a society want to pay for poor people's problems, they can just do that. On the other hand, if people don't want to pay for that, then of course they would never vote for a law to make them do that. In most countries people do not vote for individual laws. Instead we trust the politicians to write laws we like. This means the government being a single huge entity can have a more holistic plan where less obvious groups get left out in the cold. I for one have no idea what groups really need help in our society and do not want to spend time to figure it out so am very happy that I have a government doing that job for me. Sure they do it quite poorly but I am positive I would do a worse job.
    - shibboleth 15y ago
      Political scientist here. The United States has tried relying on charities in the past. Here's (partially) why it didn't work out: people are selective to the charities they donate to and charities are often selective to the people they choose to help (some charities target war veterans, some children, some minorities, some certain neighborhoods). This leave a large, noticeable gap of many people left ignored. It's not a matter of whether people wanting to be taxed or wanting to give to charities; of course no one wants to be taxed. The government took the responsibility from the church and various charities because they weren't providing enough help across the board to citizens in need. I'm not saying don't donate to charity or volunteer, you should, but I am arguing that government, albeit in need of improvements, is one of the best mechanisms for helping the needy.
- toyg 15y ago
  There is no threat of violence, workers' rights are a civil matter, penalties are financial. So yeah, society should force wealthy people, at the threat of financial ruin, to give their workers a decent lifestyle, to compensate for the unfair advantage they enjoyed (in terms of education and family networks as well as purely financial) and to basically let them call the shots on everything else. Obviously, as a social-democratic position, this moves from an implicit critical view of original capitalism, i.e. rich people exploiting the poor for financial gain, as observed through post-XVII-century history (more so in Europe than in the US, I guess, which might explain why it's not as widely accepted a concept over there). Times when Charity was widely praised and practice, but clearly was never enough. Obviously, if all economic disparity was eliminated overnight, things would be different. I look forward to the 1% renouncing their fortunes in order to establish a free-market utopia where such laws wouldn't be necessary.
  - losvedir 15y ago
    > There is no threat of violence, workers' rights are a civil matter, penalties are financial. And if you don't pay the financial penalties? You go to jail... Ultimately, the government derives all its power from having a monopoly on the legitimate use of violence.
    - toyg 15y ago
      If you don't pay the financial penalties your assets are seized and you go bankrupt... or not even that, in most cases, thanks to the concept of LLC. People don't go to jail for breaking workers' rights like holiday entitlements, let's not make it more dramatic than it is.
      - cheez 15y ago
        Holiday entitlements, probably not. However, in each country where there are things like corporations, directors can go to jail for stuff like nonpayment.
      - cheez 15y ago
        Actually, it slipped my first reading of this and probably yours too. The wording is so 'big government' that we don't even see it: If you don't pay the financial penalties your assets are seized and you go bankrupt. Seizure of assets is violence. You can be sure I would not like my assets to be seized because I have to follow some dumb, overreaching law. But I don't have the guns.
- notahacker 15y ago
  Most Europeans also find the fringe libertarian argument that government collecting and distributing rent is morally wrong because of the use of "coercion" a little odd. There's no more or less coercion when the government (or private individuals) enforce particular rules essential to the function of the market system US property-rights libertarians hold so sacrosanct: namely property and contract enforcement. Both have a high degree of social acceptance generally ensuring people will comply, but both are ultimately preserved by implied violence, be that legislative or physical. So when it comes down to it, all property rights libertarians tacitly acknowledge the use of implied violence to collect rent is acceptable and sometimes necessary. If any corporation has a right to force me to pay to live on land they acquired through some historical sleight of business, and then dispose of the collected rent how they see fit, why exactly is it morally objectionable for the government to do the same thing? It's a more constructive debate when you start analysing on utilitarian terms whether there's any practical benefit to having 24 hour weeks, whether the market tends to underprovide them and whether regulation is the optimal solution.
  - cheez 15y ago
    There is a difference between using violence to protect my home and using violence to get myself a little more "me" time or literally more cash. Most libertarians don't advocate for no government, they advocate for as little as possible to maintain order and preserve freedom.
steins 15y ago
Maybe you should make yourself valuable enough to actually earn 24 days of vacation a year?
- jiggy2011 15y ago
  If you are valuable enough your employer probably doesn't want you to take any vacation. Your only real bargaining chit is being able to get a job elsewhere which means that if your skills are specialised enough and your employer is the only game in town where you would be that valuable then you actually have little to no bargaining power. Also when you have a large number of staff who all doing essentially the same job they will usually get roughly the same vacation time or that would be regarded as unfair. Just because somebody works as say a programmer but doesn't happen to be numero uno rockstar-ninja coder doesn't mean they don't deserve some time off every year.
sp332 15y ago
What right do people have - even poor people - to demand that everyone else in society pay for damage to their homes? At least with insurance, the amount paid in is related to the probability * amount paid out. But if something is covered by the government, I'd pay a fixed amount in my taxes regardless of the risks I personally would be taking. So in that case, what would my incentive be to minimize risk? Anything bad that happens will be taken care of by other people.

DiabloD3 15y ago

One of the Representatives of the State of Louisiana at the time of Katrina lived in an area that was not directly hit by the hurricane. She had insurance that covered, flood, wind, and rain damage. The insurance company did not pay her a dime, even after she, and the rest of LA sued them. There is no free market when insurance companies can buy judges to get their way out of doing what they were paid to do.

jiggy2011 15y ago
Perhaps Ron Paul would do away with whatever mechanism allows the insurance companies to buy judges? (assuming what they are doing is legal).
- nirvana 15y ago
  Insurance companies don't buy judges. This is really just nonsense. The thing is, judges work for the government, this means, no matter how illegal a law is, they will always take the government side of it. For example, the constitution doesn't give the government the power to regulate insurance at the federal level, but judges will rule based on the assumption it does because they are government employees and wouldn't be able to keep their jobs otherwise.
  - DiabloD3 15y ago
    Judges are elected in that area, and the insurance company paid for his re-election campaign. So, yes, judges CAN be bought, and it was legal too.
- DiabloD3 15y ago
  At the time, he said he would support legislation to do this (I think he may have even put forth some, I can't find it though).

Anechoic 15y ago

> but if I lived in a hurricane-prone area I would probably investigate it and consider it a cost of living there [..] those who choose to live in the safer areas of the country are essentially subsidizing the risks I assume by living there The problem with this logic is that there are extremely few (if any) locations in the United States that aren't affected by severe natural events (blizzards, heat waves, wildfires, tornadoes, hurricanes, droughts, flooding, earthquakes, etc). I live in one of the more moderate locations in the USA (western MA) and in the past 11 months we've had an earthquake, tornado, hurricane, an ice storm that left much of the region without power for about a week,and 80 inches of snow in February alone. We all subsidize each other - maybe you had more moderate weather this year while we got whacked, but the situation could reverse itself next year.