5 ms·

Slightly tangential to the article itself, but quite relevant to the overall vibe of this comment section (and others like it): it seems like a large percentage

Slightly tangential to the article itself, but quite relevant to the overall vibe of this comment section (and others like it): it seems like a large percentage of the HN community genuinely thinks that we should always do whatever is best for ourselves personally when it comes to politics. "Voting against their own interests" has been a common refrain around here for the last months/years, usually in reference to Trump supporters and usually in reference to economic interests, as if your own personal economic benefit is the only thing that matters when in the voting booth. Maybe some people believe in more than just their own economic self-interest? In fact, Benjamin Franklin once said that "When the people find that they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic." And yet I feel like there are many commenters around here who are effectively encouraging everyone to do that, and/or gleefully experiencing schadenfreude when people don't do that. Now that I have articulated this though, I realize maybe a community built around a startup accelerator is exactly the place you'd find people that fixate on economic self-interest.

myhf 2y ago
Norwegian citizens found that they could vote themselves money and it worked out fine. It's almost always a better strategy than voting to give money to oligarchs.
- laughing_man 2y ago
  That's because there aren't many Norwegians and Norway has a lot of oil. It's one of the few countries where they can afford to do so. And nobody is voting to give money to oligarchs. We'd just rather not have our country spend itself into the third world.
  - stephen_g 2y ago
    Ironically the result of all the cuts will likely be a reduction in the size of the economy - which can actually lower the tax take too (a portion of the money flowing around the economy comes back in taxes) so the combination of that will likely be an increase in the US's debt to GDP ratio and reduced living standards for most people. That is not to say that Governments can spend to excess with no consequences of course, but that these indiscriminate cuts are likely going to have the opposite effect as intended.
  - throw0101a 2y ago
    > That's because there aren't many Norwegians and Norway has a lot of oil. It's one of the few countries where they can afford to do so. Sweden probably has as many social programs as Norway, and it has no oil money—though it does seem to have more billionaires per capita than the US: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_number_of_billionaires https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_number_of...
- fastball 2y ago
  I'd argue that rather than vote themselves money, they voted for sharing the exceedingly plentiful (relative to population) natural resources of their country. But yes, that does seem to be a version of "vote yourself money" that is far less problematic than other instantiations.
cratermoon 2y ago
Fact: There are people who will tell you with a straight face how they voted for Trump even though he promised to do things that would harm them because they didn't believe him, that it was campaign rhetoric. This isn't "I never thought the face-eating leopards would eat my face", this is "I didn't think the face-eating leopards would actually eat faces, I thought it was just a campaign slogan".
- fastball 2y ago
  Yes, those people are dumb, however it doesn't really affect the main my point of my comment (which was a bit meander-y I admit), which was merely that "voting against your own self-interest" isn't necessarily a bad thing.
3vidence 2y ago
Beyond economic self-interest, maybe particularly in the USA it is possible to vote for people who can actively undermine your vote in the future. Pretty long history in the US of gerrymandering, ID voter laws and reducing voting stations that pretty directly limit people's ability to vote. I think anger just blocks rational thought.
- fastball 2y ago
  I don't think those examples make any sense in the context of voting for self-interest. - gerrymandering: voting for someone that will gerrymander is once again voting for your own interests (this time at the expense of democratic values). If the prone-to-gerrymander candidate you are voting for does in fact gerrymander, it is likely to be in favor of that political party (which is the one you voted for). - Voter ID: I think everyone who wants stronger voter ID laws and is voting for them is not particularly worried about not having an ID when it comes time to vote in the next election. - Reducing voting stations is an interesting one, but again I think most of the people who would vote for a party that reduces voting stations are not worried about access to them (either because they can easily take time off to vote, they are quite mobile, or because they are happy with mail-in-ballots). So I think you are helping make my point, but in the opposite direction of how you meant – those are a bunch of examples of people voting selfishly in a way that could hurt democracy. I want people that would vote for such things to vote against their own self-interest, and instead vote for what is best for the health of our democratic republic.
  - 3vidence 2y ago
    In this case I mean the people adversely affected by the above policies can still find themselves voting for them. The voterID one for example, people who can vote one election that have otherwise out of date ID will find themselves unable to vote in the next election. VoterID can be especially tricky in the US due to not having a Nation ID or a federally run election see https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voter_suppression_in_the_United_States https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voter_suppression_in_the_Uni... for a good summary. I would imagine a pretty "rational" perspective would be to be in favor of policies that allow you to vote again in the future (just in general).

myhf 2y ago

Norwegian citizens found that they could vote themselves money and it worked out fine. It's almost always a better strategy than voting to give money to oligarchs.

laughing_man 2y ago
That's because there aren't many Norwegians and Norway has a lot of oil. It's one of the few countries where they can afford to do so. And nobody is voting to give money to oligarchs. We'd just rather not have our country spend itself into the third world.
- stephen_g 2y ago
  Ironically the result of all the cuts will likely be a reduction in the size of the economy - which can actually lower the tax take too (a portion of the money flowing around the economy comes back in taxes) so the combination of that will likely be an increase in the US's debt to GDP ratio and reduced living standards for most people. That is not to say that Governments can spend to excess with no consequences of course, but that these indiscriminate cuts are likely going to have the opposite effect as intended.
- throw0101a 2y ago
  > That's because there aren't many Norwegians and Norway has a lot of oil. It's one of the few countries where they can afford to do so. Sweden probably has as many social programs as Norway, and it has no oil money—though it does seem to have more billionaires per capita than the US: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_number_of_billionaires https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_number_of...
fastball 2y ago
I'd argue that rather than vote themselves money, they voted for sharing the exceedingly plentiful (relative to population) natural resources of their country. But yes, that does seem to be a version of "vote yourself money" that is far less problematic than other instantiations.

cratermoon 2y ago

Fact: There are people who will tell you with a straight face how they voted for Trump even though he promised to do things that would harm them because they didn't believe him, that it was campaign rhetoric. This isn't "I never thought the face-eating leopards would eat my face", this is "I didn't think the face-eating leopards would actually eat faces, I thought it was just a campaign slogan".

fastball 2y ago
Yes, those people are dumb, however it doesn't really affect the main my point of my comment (which was a bit meander-y I admit), which was merely that "voting against your own self-interest" isn't necessarily a bad thing.

3vidence 2y ago

Beyond economic self-interest, maybe particularly in the USA it is possible to vote for people who can actively undermine your vote in the future. Pretty long history in the US of gerrymandering, ID voter laws and reducing voting stations that pretty directly limit people's ability to vote. I think anger just blocks rational thought.

fastball 2y ago
I don't think those examples make any sense in the context of voting for self-interest. - gerrymandering: voting for someone that will gerrymander is once again voting for your own interests (this time at the expense of democratic values). If the prone-to-gerrymander candidate you are voting for does in fact gerrymander, it is likely to be in favor of that political party (which is the one you voted for). - Voter ID: I think everyone who wants stronger voter ID laws and is voting for them is not particularly worried about not having an ID when it comes time to vote in the next election. - Reducing voting stations is an interesting one, but again I think most of the people who would vote for a party that reduces voting stations are not worried about access to them (either because they can easily take time off to vote, they are quite mobile, or because they are happy with mail-in-ballots). So I think you are helping make my point, but in the opposite direction of how you meant – those are a bunch of examples of people voting selfishly in a way that could hurt democracy. I want people that would vote for such things to vote against their own self-interest, and instead vote for what is best for the health of our democratic republic.
- 3vidence 2y ago
  In this case I mean the people adversely affected by the above policies can still find themselves voting for them. The voterID one for example, people who can vote one election that have otherwise out of date ID will find themselves unable to vote in the next election. VoterID can be especially tricky in the US due to not having a Nation ID or a federally run election see https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voter_suppression_in_the_United_States https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voter_suppression_in_the_Uni... for a good summary. I would imagine a pretty "rational" perspective would be to be in favor of policies that allow you to vote again in the future (just in general).