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I don't see this 'larger implication'. Where is this objective moral scale I can look at? The one that'll tell me that I'm more moral than you, or you're more m

by Weltan 13y ago

I don't see this 'larger implication'. Where is this objective moral scale I can look at? The one that'll tell me that I'm more moral than you, or you're more moral than me? I don't claim I'm more moral than you, I do claim we have differing morality. My morals tell me that it is okay to 'initiate force' in certain circumstances, the fact that your morals tell you the opposite has no bearings on me nor on any objective scale of morals you could point to. You've taken a principle and put it on some sort of pedestal which allows you to point to it and say: if you violate that, you're immoral. I can do the same with any given principle and neither of us comes out on top morally, nor will we ever. The unfortunate thing about your principle is that it is weak from a force perspective: in order for you to stay true to your morals, you cannot initiate force, in order for me to stay true to my morals, I can do so and I can enable the government to do so as well.

snitko 13y ago
Very good. But you cannot claim the majority of people actually share your morals, because you also initiate force against them. If people weren't afraid of your force, my guess is most of them wouldn't be willing to pay taxes. It's like if you were a crusader occupying a muslim village and converting everyone living in it to christians by force. Does it make them christian? Technically yes. In reality, unlikely.
- Weltan 13y ago
  On a legal conception (my field), people don't pay taxes because they are forced to do so by force, people pay taxes for a wide variety of reasons: fear of consequences, habit, actual willingness to pay taxes, social cohesion, internalization of process. Paying taxes makes sense for businesses, and various other organisations on an economic level. Paying taxes in Australia (where I am), for example, gets you a wide variety of benefits that most people appreciate, and most of them don't feel forced to do so. Maybe at some baseline level they are 'forced' to do so, but it is done voluntarily. Just as you would say that a person taking a job because otherwise they will starve is a voluntary act, so can paying taxes be voluntary despite the background threat of prison. Same with religion, maybe those initial people will not be Christians, but maybe their grandchildren will be if the occupation continues. The Ottomans, for example, converted people to Islam through tax incentives and education. A test case for you: In Canada (and Australia), for example, 89% of the land is in direct ownership by the Crown, the other 11% is rented by the Crown to individuals in the form of land tenure. Legally, the Queen is not allowed to permanently sell any land, as they are subject to the old rules of English family law, where descendants are to be entitled to inherit the land. The Queen, through the Government of Canada which represents her, is the owner of the entire country. Does she not have the right to charge whatever rent rates (taxes) she would like? And are not people paying these taxes voluntarily as long as they live on this rented land?
  - snitko 13y ago
    > people don't pay taxes because they are forced to do so by force, people pay taxes for a wide variety of reasons Easy to test. Ask people if they would keep paying taxes if they weren't afraid of IRS (or equivalent). My experience: the answer is NO with most. > A test case for you The question is where this legitimacy of owning a land by the Queen comes from. The royal family simply declared certain territories their own, then used government forces (sponsored by taxation) to enforce this. So I'd argue it's the people who paid taxes who own the land, not the Queen. What you have, though, is a perverted situation in which people pay taxes to have their land taken away from them and then leased back. That's insane.
    - Weltan 13y ago
      Is that the correct test, though? Ask the guy if he would take the job if he wasn't starving: He'll say 'No'. So in a system where he has no recourse to some safety net, he's not acting voluntarily in any case where the alternative is a type of negative consequence which he'd like to mitigate. I'd rather not be doing law, for example, I'd rather be reading on the beach, but the alternative could be living on social assistance (which is a definitely a thing to fear for me), still I wouldn't say that I'm involuntarily doing my job. Maybe you should ask, instead: "Why do you pay taxes?" And allow the respondents to give you a wider set of reasons. Maybe some will say it is out of fear of the IRS, but some people might not say that, or say something different. It's still a 'test' of the matter, but it's a less leading test and it's the sort of test that follows from what I've said. Sorry, the Queen test case was just for fun. Wanted to see what you'd say. Yeah, the Queen cannot legitimately own anything by that conception, since it is all ultimately tainted by a long historical process of beating out competitors on the British Isles.
      - snitko 13y ago
        No, I disagree that we should be asking "Why do you pay taxes?" because this is an open ended question which leaves a lot of room for speculation and asks for an opinion, not an action. Action is what matters. People might convince themselves it's actually a good idea to pay taxes if it's inevitable anyway. But if you ask them "Would you pay it?" then it's a question about an action - yes I would, or no I wouldn't. I don't see why would a person lie.

by Weltan 13y ago

snitko 13y ago

Very good. But you cannot claim the majority of people actually share your morals, because you also initiate force against them. If people weren't afraid of your force, my guess is most of them wouldn't be willing to pay taxes. It's like if you were a crusader occupying a muslim village and converting everyone living in it to christians by force. Does it make them christian? Technically yes. In reality, unlikely.

Weltan 13y ago
On a legal conception (my field), people don't pay taxes because they are forced to do so by force, people pay taxes for a wide variety of reasons: fear of consequences, habit, actual willingness to pay taxes, social cohesion, internalization of process. Paying taxes makes sense for businesses, and various other organisations on an economic level. Paying taxes in Australia (where I am), for example, gets you a wide variety of benefits that most people appreciate, and most of them don't feel forced to do so. Maybe at some baseline level they are 'forced' to do so, but it is done voluntarily. Just as you would say that a person taking a job because otherwise they will starve is a voluntary act, so can paying taxes be voluntary despite the background threat of prison. Same with religion, maybe those initial people will not be Christians, but maybe their grandchildren will be if the occupation continues. The Ottomans, for example, converted people to Islam through tax incentives and education. A test case for you: In Canada (and Australia), for example, 89% of the land is in direct ownership by the Crown, the other 11% is rented by the Crown to individuals in the form of land tenure. Legally, the Queen is not allowed to permanently sell any land, as they are subject to the old rules of English family law, where descendants are to be entitled to inherit the land. The Queen, through the Government of Canada which represents her, is the owner of the entire country. Does she not have the right to charge whatever rent rates (taxes) she would like? And are not people paying these taxes voluntarily as long as they live on this rented land?
- snitko 13y ago
  > people don't pay taxes because they are forced to do so by force, people pay taxes for a wide variety of reasons Easy to test. Ask people if they would keep paying taxes if they weren't afraid of IRS (or equivalent). My experience: the answer is NO with most. > A test case for you The question is where this legitimacy of owning a land by the Queen comes from. The royal family simply declared certain territories their own, then used government forces (sponsored by taxation) to enforce this. So I'd argue it's the people who paid taxes who own the land, not the Queen. What you have, though, is a perverted situation in which people pay taxes to have their land taken away from them and then leased back. That's insane.
  - Weltan 13y ago
    Is that the correct test, though? Ask the guy if he would take the job if he wasn't starving: He'll say 'No'. So in a system where he has no recourse to some safety net, he's not acting voluntarily in any case where the alternative is a type of negative consequence which he'd like to mitigate. I'd rather not be doing law, for example, I'd rather be reading on the beach, but the alternative could be living on social assistance (which is a definitely a thing to fear for me), still I wouldn't say that I'm involuntarily doing my job. Maybe you should ask, instead: "Why do you pay taxes?" And allow the respondents to give you a wider set of reasons. Maybe some will say it is out of fear of the IRS, but some people might not say that, or say something different. It's still a 'test' of the matter, but it's a less leading test and it's the sort of test that follows from what I've said. Sorry, the Queen test case was just for fun. Wanted to see what you'd say. Yeah, the Queen cannot legitimately own anything by that conception, since it is all ultimately tainted by a long historical process of beating out competitors on the British Isles.
    - snitko 13y ago
      No, I disagree that we should be asking "Why do you pay taxes?" because this is an open ended question which leaves a lot of room for speculation and asks for an opinion, not an action. Action is what matters. People might convince themselves it's actually a good idea to pay taxes if it's inevitable anyway. But if you ask them "Would you pay it?" then it's a question about an action - yes I would, or no I wouldn't. I don't see why would a person lie.