4 ms·

Well first of all people shouldn't have to pay an extra tax to go online, no matter how small, because that $1 won't be $1 for more than a year even if it was l

Well first of all people shouldn't have to pay an extra tax to go online, no matter how small, because that $1 won't be $1 for more than a year even if it was legislated to start that way. Also if such identification cards are that easy to get, it is inevitable that the majority of kids are going to get access to them. I or somebody else could go across town to different stores, get 30 different ID cards, and then sell them for $15 a piece. And that is of course assuming foreign states and people don't break or circumvent the situation and sell ID codes online.

fc417fc802 9mo ago
I wouldn't be too concerned about the price. Left to private business it should remain cost competitive. Monopolized by the government legislation dictating the price be set at a small percentage plus costs should be sufficient. Sure, you could enter the black market. Presumably that would carry similar penalties as selling alcohol to minors. People certainly do that but at least my personal experience growing up in the US was that it was substantially easier to come by narcotics in highschool than it was alcohol. Why would a foreign state bother to interfere with such a system? Violations are even less harmful than underage alcohol consumption. (Which is itself typically fairly benign. I will never understand why people in the US make such a big deal out of it.) If you worry about every possible thing that can go wrong you will inevitably arrive at a surveillance state. Thus these eventualities need to balance the downsides imposed by any solution with the downsides of circumvention or other abuse. In this case all that's required is a very minor but legally enforced speedbump to force the hand of website operators and nudge cultural norms towards a healthier place.
- AngryData 9mo ago
  Why would foreign bodies interfere? Because it is easy money. Unless you limit the number of, and therefore access to, ID verification proofs it will inevitably be sold on the open market to any and all people. And when the problem comes up, will the state admit failure and cancel the program? Unlikely. They will more likely spend far more effort on personally identifying each person online "for the children" which just puts us back at the same problem again, except minus the cost of this whole ID verification scheme that shouldn't exist to start with.

fc417fc802 9mo ago

I wouldn't be too concerned about the price. Left to private business it should remain cost competitive. Monopolized by the government legislation dictating the price be set at a small percentage plus costs should be sufficient. Sure, you could enter the black market. Presumably that would carry similar penalties as selling alcohol to minors. People certainly do that but at least my personal experience growing up in the US was that it was substantially easier to come by narcotics in highschool than it was alcohol. Why would a foreign state bother to interfere with such a system? Violations are even less harmful than underage alcohol consumption. (Which is itself typically fairly benign. I will never understand why people in the US make such a big deal out of it.) If you worry about every possible thing that can go wrong you will inevitably arrive at a surveillance state. Thus these eventualities need to balance the downsides imposed by any solution with the downsides of circumvention or other abuse. In this case all that's required is a very minor but legally enforced speedbump to force the hand of website operators and nudge cultural norms towards a healthier place.

AngryData 9mo ago
Why would foreign bodies interfere? Because it is easy money. Unless you limit the number of, and therefore access to, ID verification proofs it will inevitably be sold on the open market to any and all people. And when the problem comes up, will the state admit failure and cancel the program? Unlikely. They will more likely spend far more effort on personally identifying each person online "for the children" which just puts us back at the same problem again, except minus the cost of this whole ID verification scheme that shouldn't exist to start with.