8 ms·

You appear to be getting downvoted, but you've struck at the heart of the issue: If we want to do away with meaningless jobs, people will still need resources

by chasing 12y ago

You appear to be getting downvoted, but you've struck at the heart of the issue: If we want to do away with meaningless jobs, people will still need resources to survive. And that "one-in-ten-thousand" (or whatever) will need to be taxed very heavily so the wealth can be spread. We can't have all of our financial resources siloed into an increasingly small number of people's wallets. A great benefit to this system will be that people can do important work that might not necessarily reward them financially. The downside is that, well, those who do financially well will have to share their earnings. And we'll have to detach the notion of financial success with the notion of power, which will be difficult. And all of this runs anathema to the usual sort of libertarian financial-might-makes-right of the tech world, unfortunately. [Edit, since I can't reply to zo1, yet, below: No, I wasn't trying to tie libertarianism to "financial-might-makes-right." I meant that the tech world seems to slant libertarian, and people in this world seem to aggrandize money as the supreme metric of success.]

zo1 12y ago
"And all of this runs anathema to the usual sort of libertarian financial-might-makes-right of the tech world, unfortunately."? Woah, hold on there. Did you really just imply that "financial-might-makes-right" is a Libertarian thing/concept? That is absolutely not true, and I challenge you to prove otherwise. I'm honestly curious why you would even think that. If you do, then you've been drinking some seriously nasty statist koolaid, and we're here for you if you need some help getting over that addiction. With reasoned arguments, no less!
- 21echoes 12y ago
  Libertarianism is the belief that the only valid rights are 1) private property, and 2) no initiated direct physical violence. The only time either of these rules can be violated is: the second one may be violated to punish those who violated rule 1 or 2 (notice: rule 1 can never be violated). a pretty direct, if over-simplified, outcome: someone with a lot of financial might (say, an apple orchard), can deny another person with less financial might (say, nothing) access to food, leading to their death. as the second person was looking to violate rule number 1, and the first person didn't violate rule number 2, Libertarianism is totally fine with this chain of events. Libertarianism, phrased a different way, says "the only time you can hurt someone is when they take your stuff. if you hurt someone by having stuff while they have nothing, that's totally fine." In other words, financial might makes right.
  - vidarh 12y ago
    > Libertarianism is the belief that the only valid rights are 1) private property, and 2) no initiated direct physical violence. That's simply not true. Libertarianism is a group of related ideologies that includes libertarian socialism - often called "left communism" (and derided as such in Lenin's "Left-Wing Communism - An infantile disorder"). What libertarian ideologies share, is liberty as a prime goal. But many libertarian ideologies see private property as antithetical to liberty, as it intrinsically restricts access to limited natural resources, even when sharing access to the same would cause minimal reduction in liberty for someone who might otherwise have exclusive access to said property.
paulhauggis 12y ago
I made a good point..and I wasn't even snarky or mean about it. I was down voted because I differed with someone's opinion. Silencing trolls is one thing..but silencing the opposition reminds me why need freedom of speech.
- 21echoes 12y ago
  I'm sorry, but you really did not make good points. > Why would I ever want to start a million dollar business if I knew the majority of my earnings would be taken from me by the government to support people that didn't need to do anything?? To help people. Maybe you don't feel like helping others, but most people do. To question even the existence of that motive is... pretty scary > You don't have to get a crappy job and work for someone you hate for the rest of your life. I started a business 2 years ago and I don't plan on getting a job anytime soon. Starting a business requires capital, talent, and a lot of luck. Obviously, not everyone has access to these things, nor should we expect them to. > You have the freedom to do this..or work for someone..or you could even live in the woods on berries. No, living in the woods on berries is really not realistic.
- ScottBurson 12y ago
  One thing I've learned around HN is that sometimes you have to wear your downvotes with pride.
Artistry121 12y ago
Libertarians would actually be against many policies designed to keep people in jobs - pushed by many of both major parties today. In fact full employment is a goal mostly supported by policies and politicians decidedly anti-free-market. Voluntary giving and charity and voluntary communal groups could easily grow. The notion that taxes are the only way to spread wealth is flawed. The nuclear family is already one example almost everyone can relate to where one or two people support a whole - in some cases old and young alike. It will take social change to make a less work based society work - forcing people into that route is silly and a long step on the road to totalitarianism. Libertarianism is the opposite of might-makes-right. Libertarianism is the view that coercive power should be incredibly limited in scope and that an individual's decisions and contracts are what makes right.
- chasing 12y ago
  > Voluntary giving and charity and voluntary communal groups could easily grow. The notion that taxes are the only way to spread wealth is flawed. Except now you've created a situation where only the wealthy get to choose society's direction. We need taxes so that even those without financial resources can have a say in what our collective money funds. This is made even more extreme if only a small part of the population is doing work with immediate financial reward.
  - Artistry121 12y ago
    You've actually created a situation where only those who provide value to others get to choose society's direction - and only in non-coercive ways. Thought leaders, religious leaders and other individuals can all have power as well - although non-violent power. In a heavy tax-scenario those who get to choose society's direction can do so with military level force and attain power through politics and favor trading unrestricted by limits of the law (i.e. they can rewrite the laws). Also, those with influence can influence the law and write favorable, coercive, policies for themselves (as evidenced by the banking crisis and bailouts and current low interest rate environment). Here is a list of current expenditures by the financial industry on lawmakers: http://www.opensecrets.org/industries/recips.php?ind=F&cycle=2014&recipdetail=A&sortorder=U http://www.opensecrets.org/industries/recips.php?ind=F&cycle... Either way someone accumulates wealth - in one case its through forced redistribution (which will benefit a specific class, and which is unlikely to be the class that doesn't have the funds to contribute to politicians) and in once case is through voluntary redistribution. Dr. Dre gets to be a billionaire because people want to give him money in exchange for his music and social cred and Steve Jobs gets to be a billionaire because people want to give him money for his company's technology. Taxes and regulations are needed in some cases - but the more power they get the more people will attempt to use them for anticompetitive purposes. 1000s of banks shut down during the financial crisis - but the worst offenders got cheap loans to make record profits in the succeeding years. It would be nice to think a central authority can have our best interests in minds. That central authority has killed more civilians than combatants in current wars: https://www.iraqbodycount.org/ https://www.iraqbodycount.org/ And the first lady and President openly pronounce disgust with Boko Haram while ordering airstrikes and military actions that have directly caused the deaths of far more children and left more than half of Iraqi children orphans. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Iraq_War http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Iraq_War http://www.cnn.com/2013/12/12/world/meast/yemen-u-s-drone-wedding/ http://www.cnn.com/2013/12/12/world/meast/yemen-u-s-drone-we... (Notice US Officials declined to comment on actions they could have prevented - but are more than willing to comment on crimes in other countries far beyond their jurisdiction) On the "home front" non-violent and non-lying offenders in prison account for nearly 60% of incarcerated because violence has been used to punish these crimes of choice rather than social stigmas and education.
vishnugupta 12y ago
> And that "one-in-ten-thousand" (or whatever) will need to be taxed very heavily so the wealth can be spread I think this is always going to be problematic because once wealth gets concentrated it's going to be very hard to redistribute it, short of some revolution or coup. And I sense that this is going to be especially hard in democratic countries where there's a very close nexus between elected representatives and wealth holders; US, India being prime examples that I could think of. An alternative is to have systems and institutions such that wealth concentration doesn't even happen in the first place. Also I believe wealth gets concentrated by systemic and institutionalized transfer of wealth from middle and poor class to a selected few rich and not because those who are wealthy are geniuses or are contributing proportionately to society. I can think of a few examples of systemic, institutionalized wealth transfers that are happening right now. 1. Riding on others hard work: A labor working in inhuman conditions with peanuts for wage producing textiles which are sold with profit margin of a few thousand percentages. 2. Privatizing essential services: Poor/middle class persons having to pay out regular health premium and still live in fear of getting their claim rejected and end up paying through their nose for smallest of diseases, medicines. 3. Rent seeking: Natural resources (oil, spectrum etc.,), licenses, monopoly, forced software contracts, patents and such. 4. Crony Capitalism: Govt bail outs for failed private institutions that have caused massive financial crisis which in itself was a wealth transfer from poor to rich of a scale that was perhaps unheard of. 5. Crony Capitalism: Tax payer's money getting transferred to weapon's manufacturers and private military contractors who in turn are going to protect the interest of private oil corporations. 6. Riding on others hard work: Illegal or institutionalized collusion among private corporations to suppress the wage by not allowing free labor market. 7. Resource transfer: Government snatching massive tracts of farming land from the poor farmers and giving them away to private corporations for pittance. 9. Erect massive blockade to democratic institutions so that the common citizen, for whom they were meant for in the first place, will have no choice but to resort to middle men and shell out huge sums. Courts (lawyers, out of court settlements etc.,), parliaments (lobbyists) etc., If I look at the list of wealthiest people, rent seeking behavior and riding on cheap labor jumps out! Sure, they probably deserve to be wealthier than above average, but does the wealth they have accumulated is proportional to their social contribution? The intersection between those who have contributed to advancement of our civilization in whatever small way and the rich people is almost an empty set. That's a clear enough indicator that those who are very wealthy really don't deserve it and in fact snatched the wealth from others to start with!
vidarh 12y ago
> A great benefit to this system will be that people can do important work that might not necessarily reward them financially. The downside is that, well, those who do financially well will have to share their earnings. And we'll have to detach the notion of financial success with the notion of power, which will be difficult. You've basically restated Marx' view on what communism should be. His most famous quote on the subject is probably this from German Ideology: "in communist society, where nobody has one exclusive sphere of activity but each can become accomplished in any branch he wished, society regulates the general production and thus makes it possible for me to do one thing today and another tomorrow, to hunt in the morning, fish in the afternoon, rear cattle in the evening, criticize after dinner, just as I have a mind, without ever becoming hunter, fisherman, shepherd, or critic." A large part of Marx' point is that for socialism to become possible - and necessary - capitalism must first drive technological advances and production to a point where nothing near the full production capacity of humanity is needed for redistribution to be possible while eliminating poverty entirely, and in the process freeing society up to be extremely flexible about how people contributes.
ramblerman 12y ago
"And all of this runs anathema to the usual sort of libertarian financial-might-makes-right of the tech world, unfortunately." Is that the right usage of that word? It means to vehemently dislike or a papal curse. I think something along the lines of, 'but this is anathema to the libertarian ...' would be correct.

by chasing 12y ago

zo1 12y ago

"And all of this runs anathema to the usual sort of libertarian financial-might-makes-right of the tech world, unfortunately."? Woah, hold on there. Did you really just imply that "financial-might-makes-right" is a Libertarian thing/concept? That is absolutely not true, and I challenge you to prove otherwise. I'm honestly curious why you would even think that. If you do, then you've been drinking some seriously nasty statist koolaid, and we're here for you if you need some help getting over that addiction. With reasoned arguments, no less!

21echoes 12y ago
Libertarianism is the belief that the only valid rights are 1) private property, and 2) no initiated direct physical violence. The only time either of these rules can be violated is: the second one may be violated to punish those who violated rule 1 or 2 (notice: rule 1 can never be violated). a pretty direct, if over-simplified, outcome: someone with a lot of financial might (say, an apple orchard), can deny another person with less financial might (say, nothing) access to food, leading to their death. as the second person was looking to violate rule number 1, and the first person didn't violate rule number 2, Libertarianism is totally fine with this chain of events. Libertarianism, phrased a different way, says "the only time you can hurt someone is when they take your stuff. if you hurt someone by having stuff while they have nothing, that's totally fine." In other words, financial might makes right.
- vidarh 12y ago
  > Libertarianism is the belief that the only valid rights are 1) private property, and 2) no initiated direct physical violence. That's simply not true. Libertarianism is a group of related ideologies that includes libertarian socialism - often called "left communism" (and derided as such in Lenin's "Left-Wing Communism - An infantile disorder"). What libertarian ideologies share, is liberty as a prime goal. But many libertarian ideologies see private property as antithetical to liberty, as it intrinsically restricts access to limited natural resources, even when sharing access to the same would cause minimal reduction in liberty for someone who might otherwise have exclusive access to said property.

paulhauggis 12y ago

I made a good point..and I wasn't even snarky or mean about it. I was down voted because I differed with someone's opinion. Silencing trolls is one thing..but silencing the opposition reminds me why need freedom of speech.

21echoes 12y ago
I'm sorry, but you really did not make good points. > Why would I ever want to start a million dollar business if I knew the majority of my earnings would be taken from me by the government to support people that didn't need to do anything?? To help people. Maybe you don't feel like helping others, but most people do. To question even the existence of that motive is... pretty scary > You don't have to get a crappy job and work for someone you hate for the rest of your life. I started a business 2 years ago and I don't plan on getting a job anytime soon. Starting a business requires capital, talent, and a lot of luck. Obviously, not everyone has access to these things, nor should we expect them to. > You have the freedom to do this..or work for someone..or you could even live in the woods on berries. No, living in the woods on berries is really not realistic.
ScottBurson 12y ago
One thing I've learned around HN is that sometimes you have to wear your downvotes with pride.

Artistry121 12y ago

Libertarians would actually be against many policies designed to keep people in jobs - pushed by many of both major parties today. In fact full employment is a goal mostly supported by policies and politicians decidedly anti-free-market. Voluntary giving and charity and voluntary communal groups could easily grow. The notion that taxes are the only way to spread wealth is flawed. The nuclear family is already one example almost everyone can relate to where one or two people support a whole - in some cases old and young alike. It will take social change to make a less work based society work - forcing people into that route is silly and a long step on the road to totalitarianism. Libertarianism is the opposite of might-makes-right. Libertarianism is the view that coercive power should be incredibly limited in scope and that an individual's decisions and contracts are what makes right.

chasing 12y ago
> Voluntary giving and charity and voluntary communal groups could easily grow. The notion that taxes are the only way to spread wealth is flawed. Except now you've created a situation where only the wealthy get to choose society's direction. We need taxes so that even those without financial resources can have a say in what our collective money funds. This is made even more extreme if only a small part of the population is doing work with immediate financial reward.
- Artistry121 12y ago
  You've actually created a situation where only those who provide value to others get to choose society's direction - and only in non-coercive ways. Thought leaders, religious leaders and other individuals can all have power as well - although non-violent power. In a heavy tax-scenario those who get to choose society's direction can do so with military level force and attain power through politics and favor trading unrestricted by limits of the law (i.e. they can rewrite the laws). Also, those with influence can influence the law and write favorable, coercive, policies for themselves (as evidenced by the banking crisis and bailouts and current low interest rate environment). Here is a list of current expenditures by the financial industry on lawmakers: http://www.opensecrets.org/industries/recips.php?ind=F&cycle=2014&recipdetail=A&sortorder=U http://www.opensecrets.org/industries/recips.php?ind=F&cycle... Either way someone accumulates wealth - in one case its through forced redistribution (which will benefit a specific class, and which is unlikely to be the class that doesn't have the funds to contribute to politicians) and in once case is through voluntary redistribution. Dr. Dre gets to be a billionaire because people want to give him money in exchange for his music and social cred and Steve Jobs gets to be a billionaire because people want to give him money for his company's technology. Taxes and regulations are needed in some cases - but the more power they get the more people will attempt to use them for anticompetitive purposes. 1000s of banks shut down during the financial crisis - but the worst offenders got cheap loans to make record profits in the succeeding years. It would be nice to think a central authority can have our best interests in minds. That central authority has killed more civilians than combatants in current wars: https://www.iraqbodycount.org/ https://www.iraqbodycount.org/ And the first lady and President openly pronounce disgust with Boko Haram while ordering airstrikes and military actions that have directly caused the deaths of far more children and left more than half of Iraqi children orphans. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Iraq_War http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Iraq_War http://www.cnn.com/2013/12/12/world/meast/yemen-u-s-drone-wedding/ http://www.cnn.com/2013/12/12/world/meast/yemen-u-s-drone-we... (Notice US Officials declined to comment on actions they could have prevented - but are more than willing to comment on crimes in other countries far beyond their jurisdiction) On the "home front" non-violent and non-lying offenders in prison account for nearly 60% of incarcerated because violence has been used to punish these crimes of choice rather than social stigmas and education.

vishnugupta 12y ago

> And that "one-in-ten-thousand" (or whatever) will need to be taxed very heavily so the wealth can be spread I think this is always going to be problematic because once wealth gets concentrated it's going to be very hard to redistribute it, short of some revolution or coup. And I sense that this is going to be especially hard in democratic countries where there's a very close nexus between elected representatives and wealth holders; US, India being prime examples that I could think of. An alternative is to have systems and institutions such that wealth concentration doesn't even happen in the first place. Also I believe wealth gets concentrated by systemic and institutionalized transfer of wealth from middle and poor class to a selected few rich and not because those who are wealthy are geniuses or are contributing proportionately to society. I can think of a few examples of systemic, institutionalized wealth transfers that are happening right now. 1. Riding on others hard work: A labor working in inhuman conditions with peanuts for wage producing textiles which are sold with profit margin of a few thousand percentages. 2. Privatizing essential services: Poor/middle class persons having to pay out regular health premium and still live in fear of getting their claim rejected and end up paying through their nose for smallest of diseases, medicines. 3. Rent seeking: Natural resources (oil, spectrum etc.,), licenses, monopoly, forced software contracts, patents and such. 4. Crony Capitalism: Govt bail outs for failed private institutions that have caused massive financial crisis which in itself was a wealth transfer from poor to rich of a scale that was perhaps unheard of. 5. Crony Capitalism: Tax payer's money getting transferred to weapon's manufacturers and private military contractors who in turn are going to protect the interest of private oil corporations. 6. Riding on others hard work: Illegal or institutionalized collusion among private corporations to suppress the wage by not allowing free labor market. 7. Resource transfer: Government snatching massive tracts of farming land from the poor farmers and giving them away to private corporations for pittance. 9. Erect massive blockade to democratic institutions so that the common citizen, for whom they were meant for in the first place, will have no choice but to resort to middle men and shell out huge sums. Courts (lawyers, out of court settlements etc.,), parliaments (lobbyists) etc., If I look at the list of wealthiest people, rent seeking behavior and riding on cheap labor jumps out! Sure, they probably deserve to be wealthier than above average, but does the wealth they have accumulated is proportional to their social contribution? The intersection between those who have contributed to advancement of our civilization in whatever small way and the rich people is almost an empty set. That's a clear enough indicator that those who are very wealthy really don't deserve it and in fact snatched the wealth from others to start with!

vidarh 12y ago

> A great benefit to this system will be that people can do important work that might not necessarily reward them financially. The downside is that, well, those who do financially well will have to share their earnings. And we'll have to detach the notion of financial success with the notion of power, which will be difficult. You've basically restated Marx' view on what communism should be. His most famous quote on the subject is probably this from German Ideology: "in communist society, where nobody has one exclusive sphere of activity but each can become accomplished in any branch he wished, society regulates the general production and thus makes it possible for me to do one thing today and another tomorrow, to hunt in the morning, fish in the afternoon, rear cattle in the evening, criticize after dinner, just as I have a mind, without ever becoming hunter, fisherman, shepherd, or critic." A large part of Marx' point is that for socialism to become possible - and necessary - capitalism must first drive technological advances and production to a point where nothing near the full production capacity of humanity is needed for redistribution to be possible while eliminating poverty entirely, and in the process freeing society up to be extremely flexible about how people contributes.

ramblerman 12y ago

"And all of this runs anathema to the usual sort of libertarian financial-might-makes-right of the tech world, unfortunately." Is that the right usage of that word? It means to vehemently dislike or a papal curse. I think something along the lines of, 'but this is anathema to the libertarian ...' would be correct.