6 ms·

indeed! HN has gone way to the authoritarian right. Not just socially but also a lot of HN readers favor economically authoritarian policies like tariffs!

cassianoleal 2y ago
Why do you call tariffs authoritarian? I would generally put them in the protectionist basket but I don't see how a country can be authoritarian towards another or either populations by simply imposing tariffs.
- mmooss 2y ago
  Tariffs are at least anti-libertarian.
  - brg 2y ago
    Absolutely agree. The libertarian view of tariffs is that they limit free trade, and are often used for inefficiently for market manipulation than as a funding source. One question this US election cycle has brought up is how to best fund a government. Every reasonable person understands that a government needs funding to operate. But every mechanism employed has trade offs. But I have not found enough information to develop an informed opinion on under what conditions a flat tariff on imports be better than a progressive income tax, a flat income tax be better than capital gains, etc. Tax policy is adhoc, driven by a multitude of factors. If you or anyone can provide an interesting survey on some principle approaches to tax policy I would be grateful.
    - mmooss 2y ago
      We can ignore the reasons they give; they're well-established liars. Here are some patterns the tariffs fit afaict: They like to shift the tax burden away from wealthy constituents and onto everyone else: Republican states tend to use sales tax, which taxes everyone at an equal rate, rather than progressive income tax. Most/much wealthy income comes from capital gains, etc., which are taxed at a relatively low rate. Most of everyone else's income comes from wages, which are taxed at higher rates ('income tax' should be called 'wage tax', to avoid confusion), including welfare taxes like Social Security, etc. They are populist nationalists and want to increase nationalism and disrupt international institutions and cooperation. Tariffs ideologically do the first and practically do the second. > The libertarian view of tariffs is that they limit free trade, and are often used for inefficiently for market manipulation than as a funding source. Also, tariffs are like sales tax: They tax everyone at the same rate. > If you or anyone can provide an interesting survey on some principle approaches to tax policy I would be grateful. Sorry, not off the top of my head ...
stonethrowaway 2y ago
If only you knew why my sweet summer child.
- fwip 2y ago
  I've been wondering a while, is your username a reference to the comic "stone toss?"
ajross 2y ago
My guess is the tariff thing is just a fad and no one actually wants a trade war. It's something Trump personally thinks is a good idea, and that sounds good in a stump speech. But all the folks advising him, including the ones from our own subculture (Musk, Ackman, Sacks) know better. I'm choosing this moment to try to be optimistic: if Trumps turns over the reins of government to a bunch of technocrats... it's not the worst possible thing that can happen. The real question is who's going to restrain him from turning the DoJ into a revenge organ. The rule of law is historically very hard to get back once its lost.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- jampekka 2y ago
  A major reason for the tariff thing is that free trade has a lot of losers, and those were left out to dry, and even ridiculed. Another reason is that being economically dependent on foreign countries can be quite risky. E.g. if China gets economically independent from the west but the west is still dependent on China, China will have immense power over the west.
  - ajross 2y ago
    Yeah, I get the arguments. They're just wrong. I'm not aware of a single time in history where a trade war worked to the advantage of the instigator. If you really want this, for the reasons you say, it's because we're already losing and cutting us off from the "enemy" just accelerates the loss. Trade makes everyone richer, and the cost is that some of the people you don't want to be rich get rich. But willfully choosing to be poor doesn't fix that.
- mmooss 2y ago
  > My guess is the tariff thing is just a fad and no one actually wants a trade war. It's something Trump personally thinks is a good idea, and that sounds good in a stump speech. But all the folks advising him, including the ones from our own subculture (Musk, Ackman, Sacks) know better. They aren't doing it for economic purposes but for political ones: They are nationalist authoritarians; tariffs are not only nationalistic policy, they undermine international institutions and cooperation. > if Trumps turns over the reins of government to a bunch of technocrats That seems like the opposite of Trump's behavior, campaign promises, and plans.
honkycat 2y ago
I realized HN was lost during a thread about having to provide identification to access adult websites. There we SO many voices in favor. I was shocked. Hackers historically cared a TON about their privacy, yet they were willing to throw it away for the sake of "the children." Ignoring that there is a huge suite of tools that would allow you to protect children WITHOUT having to register with the government and be tracked to visit a website.
- fwip 2y ago
  It turns out that "hackers" and "rich boy startups" have much less cultural overlap than the latter would have you believe.
- skhunted 2y ago
  I’m very liberal and very much opposed to authoritarianism. I don’t see the problem with forcing online content to be different than offline content. You gotta show ID or otherwise prove age to buy alcohol and pornography offline. Why not for online as well?
  - honkycat 2y ago
    Yes clearly ISPs, OSs, and everyone involved who is making money should provide easier and better tools for protecting kids from adult content. But a state mandated thing associated with my ID is... iffy. People have perfectly good reasons for wanting to protect their privacy.
    - skhunted 2y ago
      But they have done that and so a government mandated solution is warranted.
      - honkycat 2y ago
        Look into the Chinese identification systems associated with internet access to see where this leads. It isn't good.
skhunted 2y ago
From the perspective of wanting less waste and less pollution tariffs are a good thing.
- mmooss 2y ago
  Why do you say that? Without tariffs, the most efficient producer makes the good or service. With them, someone less efficient may make them. Efficiency includes, but isn't only, waste and pollution.
  - naveen99 2y ago
    You could say the same about progressive taxes. Without them, the most efficient do the work. With them, less efficient people below taxable income threshold will do more work.
    - mmooss 2y ago
      That's the first valuable, novel insight I've heard about taxation in a long time. While I support progressive taxes for other reasons (fairness), I'd be interested in the economic impact. (The research would have to use overall tax rate, not just 'income' tax (i.e., wage tax).)
      - naveen99 2y ago
        There was a time before income tax… and there maybe a future without income tax. Or you can think of income tax as profit sharing with everyone’s required partner big brother. Remember corporate tax and payroll taxes are flat. the progressive part of income tax is really more targeted at consumption. so it’s really more of a progressive consumption tax. It’s easy to arrange a delay in taxes if you don’t need to consume, and are willing to run a business.
        deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
  - 2y ago
Yizahi 2y ago
Well off people are pulling ladder behind them, a tale as old as mass migration become possible.

cassianoleal 2y ago

Why do you call tariffs authoritarian? I would generally put them in the protectionist basket but I don't see how a country can be authoritarian towards another or either populations by simply imposing tariffs.

mmooss 2y ago
Tariffs are at least anti-libertarian.
- brg 2y ago
  Absolutely agree. The libertarian view of tariffs is that they limit free trade, and are often used for inefficiently for market manipulation than as a funding source. One question this US election cycle has brought up is how to best fund a government. Every reasonable person understands that a government needs funding to operate. But every mechanism employed has trade offs. But I have not found enough information to develop an informed opinion on under what conditions a flat tariff on imports be better than a progressive income tax, a flat income tax be better than capital gains, etc. Tax policy is adhoc, driven by a multitude of factors. If you or anyone can provide an interesting survey on some principle approaches to tax policy I would be grateful.
  - mmooss 2y ago
    We can ignore the reasons they give; they're well-established liars. Here are some patterns the tariffs fit afaict: They like to shift the tax burden away from wealthy constituents and onto everyone else: Republican states tend to use sales tax, which taxes everyone at an equal rate, rather than progressive income tax. Most/much wealthy income comes from capital gains, etc., which are taxed at a relatively low rate. Most of everyone else's income comes from wages, which are taxed at higher rates ('income tax' should be called 'wage tax', to avoid confusion), including welfare taxes like Social Security, etc. They are populist nationalists and want to increase nationalism and disrupt international institutions and cooperation. Tariffs ideologically do the first and practically do the second. > The libertarian view of tariffs is that they limit free trade, and are often used for inefficiently for market manipulation than as a funding source. Also, tariffs are like sales tax: They tax everyone at the same rate. > If you or anyone can provide an interesting survey on some principle approaches to tax policy I would be grateful. Sorry, not off the top of my head ...

stonethrowaway 2y ago

If only you knew why my sweet summer child.

fwip 2y ago
I've been wondering a while, is your username a reference to the comic "stone toss?"

ajross 2y ago

My guess is the tariff thing is just a fad and no one actually wants a trade war. It's something Trump personally thinks is a good idea, and that sounds good in a stump speech. But all the folks advising him, including the ones from our own subculture (Musk, Ackman, Sacks) know better. I'm choosing this moment to try to be optimistic: if Trumps turns over the reins of government to a bunch of technocrats... it's not the worst possible thing that can happen. The real question is who's going to restrain him from turning the DoJ into a revenge organ. The rule of law is historically very hard to get back once its lost.

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
jampekka 2y ago
A major reason for the tariff thing is that free trade has a lot of losers, and those were left out to dry, and even ridiculed. Another reason is that being economically dependent on foreign countries can be quite risky. E.g. if China gets economically independent from the west but the west is still dependent on China, China will have immense power over the west.
- ajross 2y ago
  Yeah, I get the arguments. They're just wrong. I'm not aware of a single time in history where a trade war worked to the advantage of the instigator. If you really want this, for the reasons you say, it's because we're already losing and cutting us off from the "enemy" just accelerates the loss. Trade makes everyone richer, and the cost is that some of the people you don't want to be rich get rich. But willfully choosing to be poor doesn't fix that.
mmooss 2y ago
> My guess is the tariff thing is just a fad and no one actually wants a trade war. It's something Trump personally thinks is a good idea, and that sounds good in a stump speech. But all the folks advising him, including the ones from our own subculture (Musk, Ackman, Sacks) know better. They aren't doing it for economic purposes but for political ones: They are nationalist authoritarians; tariffs are not only nationalistic policy, they undermine international institutions and cooperation. > if Trumps turns over the reins of government to a bunch of technocrats That seems like the opposite of Trump's behavior, campaign promises, and plans.

honkycat 2y ago

I realized HN was lost during a thread about having to provide identification to access adult websites. There we SO many voices in favor. I was shocked. Hackers historically cared a TON about their privacy, yet they were willing to throw it away for the sake of "the children." Ignoring that there is a huge suite of tools that would allow you to protect children WITHOUT having to register with the government and be tracked to visit a website.

fwip 2y ago
It turns out that "hackers" and "rich boy startups" have much less cultural overlap than the latter would have you believe.
skhunted 2y ago
I’m very liberal and very much opposed to authoritarianism. I don’t see the problem with forcing online content to be different than offline content. You gotta show ID or otherwise prove age to buy alcohol and pornography offline. Why not for online as well?
- honkycat 2y ago
  Yes clearly ISPs, OSs, and everyone involved who is making money should provide easier and better tools for protecting kids from adult content. But a state mandated thing associated with my ID is... iffy. People have perfectly good reasons for wanting to protect their privacy.
  - skhunted 2y ago
    But they have done that and so a government mandated solution is warranted.
    - honkycat 2y ago
      Look into the Chinese identification systems associated with internet access to see where this leads. It isn't good.

skhunted 2y ago

From the perspective of wanting less waste and less pollution tariffs are a good thing.

mmooss 2y ago
Why do you say that? Without tariffs, the most efficient producer makes the good or service. With them, someone less efficient may make them. Efficiency includes, but isn't only, waste and pollution.
- naveen99 2y ago
  You could say the same about progressive taxes. Without them, the most efficient do the work. With them, less efficient people below taxable income threshold will do more work.
  - mmooss 2y ago
    That's the first valuable, novel insight I've heard about taxation in a long time. While I support progressive taxes for other reasons (fairness), I'd be interested in the economic impact. (The research would have to use overall tax rate, not just 'income' tax (i.e., wage tax).)
    - naveen99 2y ago
      There was a time before income tax… and there maybe a future without income tax. Or you can think of income tax as profit sharing with everyone’s required partner big brother. Remember corporate tax and payroll taxes are flat. the progressive part of income tax is really more targeted at consumption. so it’s really more of a progressive consumption tax. It’s easy to arrange a delay in taxes if you don’t need to consume, and are willing to run a business.
      - deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
- 2y ago

Yizahi 2y ago

Well off people are pulling ladder behind them, a tale as old as mass migration become possible.