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We require people with children to pay less taxes or subsidize them and provide those children with education because the value educated people provide to socie

by pmr_ 13y ago

We require people with children to pay less taxes or subsidize them and provide those children with education because the value educated people provide to society is far higher than the actual cost of educating them. I would wager the same goes for long-lived, but healthy individuals, but this seems very hard to measure and I cannot find any numbers. So I would understand if you don't see this as a convincing argument. Especially since "value" should mean more than just money here. How do you keep people "maintaining the responsibility oneself" if you just let them continue to hurt themselves and then provide therapy funded by the general public?

netcan 13y ago
>>"value" should mean more than just money here. This is the central point, to me. I don't think of public education as a way for a government to increase taxes from future generations. That's horrible. I really hate listening to politicians and bureaucrats talk like that. Amoral creeps. Luckily, it's impractical for reasons like the one you mention. Governments (societies) educate children for the same reason parents do: because it will help those children, it will help the family/society & (importantly) for its own sake. Basically we do it for them, the children. We also take care of the sick, to help the sick. Public welfare, education, health care (not health) are goods, even if they are not frivolous goods. We buy them when we can afford them. They are not investments or money saving exercises. I really do think this political culture that has become established in Europe (also the US, I think) where politicians are constantly claiming how some policy is really an investment or pays for itself is nasty rhetoric. It's usually an ignorant statement or outright lie, for one thing. Even it these statements where in fact accurate statements about something measurable it would still be a nasty, amoral & totalitarian way of looking at the world. There is not way, for example to justify elderly care under this view. They've already paid taxes, now they just cost us money. >>if you just let them continue to hurt themselves and then provide therapy funded by the general public I really do see this view as incompatible with democracy and I'm surprised more people aren't as creeped out by it as I am. Like I said, I don't think you are facing a real problem here that needs to be solved. People already have a strong interest in their own health and well being. There is no conflict of interest. People are of course imperfect and weak, the human condition and all that. Their decisions are sometimes bad. Human institutions are also imperfect. When they are perverted by their own weaknesses and make bad decisions on your behalf it can be horribly oppressive. You are basically (I'm deducing, apologies if I'm misrepresenting) advocating increased supervision and pointing to the bill as your source of authority, or (even worse) the lost taxes society might have received had the person remained healthy. What kind of morals is this?

by pmr_ 13y ago

netcan 13y ago

>>"value" should mean more than just money here. This is the central point, to me. I don't think of public education as a way for a government to increase taxes from future generations. That's horrible. I really hate listening to politicians and bureaucrats talk like that. Amoral creeps. Luckily, it's impractical for reasons like the one you mention. Governments (societies) educate children for the same reason parents do: because it will help those children, it will help the family/society & (importantly) for its own sake. Basically we do it for them, the children. We also take care of the sick, to help the sick. Public welfare, education, health care (not health) are goods, even if they are not frivolous goods. We buy them when we can afford them. They are not investments or money saving exercises. I really do think this political culture that has become established in Europe (also the US, I think) where politicians are constantly claiming how some policy is really an investment or pays for itself is nasty rhetoric. It's usually an ignorant statement or outright lie, for one thing. Even it these statements where in fact accurate statements about something measurable it would still be a nasty, amoral & totalitarian way of looking at the world. There is not way, for example to justify elderly care under this view. They've already paid taxes, now they just cost us money. >>if you just let them continue to hurt themselves and then provide therapy funded by the general public I really do see this view as incompatible with democracy and I'm surprised more people aren't as creeped out by it as I am. Like I said, I don't think you are facing a real problem here that needs to be solved. People already have a strong interest in their own health and well being. There is no conflict of interest. People are of course imperfect and weak, the human condition and all that. Their decisions are sometimes bad. Human institutions are also imperfect. When they are perverted by their own weaknesses and make bad decisions on your behalf it can be horribly oppressive. You are basically (I'm deducing, apologies if I'm misrepresenting) advocating increased supervision and pointing to the bill as your source of authority, or (even worse) the lost taxes society might have received had the person remained healthy. What kind of morals is this?