[Donau]

Well, Inland Revenue Service (or the IRS in the US) collects a large fraction of my income before I even see it. I have zero control over how that part of my income is spent.

You probable believe that your income comes from the sky or something When you make money ,whehter you are employer or worker, you are using some infrastructure ( and I am not talking about roads ) that is not yours or somebody else ... is ours . Only the fact that you have enough relative healty and educated people to hire means somebody wasted time with them or the fact that you cant have your business safe means somebody does something for you . You can have your pizza shop in England because somebody keeps England safe , and people eat pizza in England because they know you will not use poison to cook it because there are some nasty bureaucrats from FDA and some cops that will punish you if you poison people , without this basic things there would be no market . There is no economy outside the community , there is no income in a absolute sense , what you have is relative to others.

[Genghis Khan]

Well, Inland Revenue Service (or the IRS in the US) collects a large fraction of my income before I even see it.

That's the problem. You think it's all yours. Who told you that? What in the world would make you think you're entitled to a 100% of it?

If I lived in New York, the mayor would tell me not to buy a soda which is too large for his (the mayor's) taste.

That is indeed stupid. I'm not a supporter of that. Still, you're allowed to buy soda.

Anywhere in the US, FDA bureaucrats prohibit me from buying raw mik.

Not true. Around half of the states allow it. The reason it's prohibited in other places is because unregulated consumption causes disease, and there were cases where treating a lot of people for that cost a lot of money and caused of a lot of mayhem. In some places, there were societal decisions to not let that happen. Again - You live in a society.

The Equal Opportunity bureaucracy will start questioning my hiring standards if my workforce's distribution of gender/race is not to their liking.

You cannot be required to hire a woman for a specific job, unless it's a job that involves female body parts.

And, of course, I cannot employ anybody without filling mountains of paperwork, and otherwise waste time as the government's arrend boy filling forms and collecting taxes on its behalf.

But you are allowed to employ them. I don't see how your freedom is being infringed upon.

[Rothbardian]

You probable believe that your income comes from the sky or something When you make money ,whehter you are employer or worker, you are using some infrastructure ( and I am not talking about roads ) that is not yours or somebody else ... is ours . Only the fact that you have enough relative healty and educated people to hire means somebody wasted time with them or the fact that you cant have your business safe means somebody does something for you . You can have your pizza shop in England because somebody keeps England safe , and people eat pizza in England because they know you will not use poison to cook it because there are some nasty bureaucrats from FDA and some cops that will punish you if you poison people , without this basic things there would be no market . There is no economy outside the community , there is no income in a absolute sense , what you have is relative to others.

A few hundred years ago, the only reason people had roads was because slaves were building them. Does that justify slavery, or mean that if you use roads you have to advocate slavery?

Your argument is literally exactly the same argument abolitionists faced constantly. And guess what, it turns out slavery was inefficient and wasteful anyway.

[Donau]

Abolitionists were not against roads they had a problem with the way the roads were made but here Eran not just sees them unnecessary , he denies their existence .

[Eran]

You probable believe that your income comes from the sky or something

I know exactly where my income comes from. It comes from my employer which, in turn, gets it from our customers who willingly pay us for the services we provide.

When you make money ,whehter you are employer or worker, you are using some infrastructure ( and I am not talking about roads ) that is not yours or somebody else ... is ours

Since you are not talking about roads, it would help if you explained yourself. And what makes it yours. It is true that I enjoy the benefits of living within a law-abiding society in which my person and property are tolerably safe. Without tolerable safety in one's property, there is indeed no market.

Some aspects of this environment - the effective deterrence of property crime for example - is clearly not free and is worth paying for. Much like roads, I'd be delighted to pay for the crime deterrence I enjoy.

But just because I benefit from some aspects of living within a community doesn't automatically mean that the community is owed an arbitrary fraction of my income. Certainly not when that fraction is charged irrespective of one's use of the community's facilities.



For the purpose of this discussion, I am going to assume that we need and want government to protect our property rights. (If you want to discuss why it isn't really necessary, we can start a separate thread in the Anarchy forum).

But assuming government does provide adequate protection of property rights, all the other useful services that government clearly provides (food quality assurance, roads and many others) can be provided more efficiently by the free market.

You think it's all yours. Who told you that? What in the world would make you think you're entitled to a 100% of it?

My employer would like to give it all to me. The government forces my employer to take some away. Before I was paid, the money belonged 100% to my employer, since he received it from happy customers in exchange for services rendered.

If I am not 100% entitled to the money I earned, somebody ought to be able to present a better claim for it.

Not true. Around half of the states allow it.

The FDA (i.e. the Federal Government) prohibits it, whether a particular state allows it or not.

To be clear, there are always rationalisations for government prohibitions, though in some cases exceptionally weak ones. It is easy to rationalise. But freedom rationalised away is still freedom lost.

You cannot be required to hire a woman for a specific job, unless it's a job that involves female body parts.

As a small employer, I am not. But as a large employer, I have to be very careful about my hiring patterns, or risk an expensive regulatory process.

But you are allowed to employ them. I don't see how your freedom is being infringed upon.

If I told you that you are allowed to read certain books, provided only that you provide the government with three authorisations by the local police chief, head of the local library and your priest, all certifying that the required reading won't be harmful to you, would you consider that to be a state of freedom?

Having to jump through bureaucratic hoops reduces freedom.

Abolitionists were not against roads they had a problem with the way the roads were made but here Eran not just sees them unnecessary , he denies their existence .

Of course I don't. I deny the necessity of having them built by government. That's completely different, don't you agree?

[Donau]

For the purpose of this discussion, I am going to assume that we need and want government to protect our property rights. (If you want to discuss why it isn't really necessary, we can start a separate thread in the Anarchy forum).

But assuming government does provide adequate protection of property rights, all the other useful services that government clearly provides (food quality assurance, roads and many others) can be provided more efficiently by the free market.

What if near your pizza shop I build a small factory wich makes a lot of noise and is smelly , how big your income would be now ? I don't threaten your life or your property ...

[Eran]

Sure you do. Noise and smells are both forms of nuisance that has long been recognised as a form of aggression (i.e. initiation of force against another person's property). It is firmly established in common law tradition.

So by both libertarian and common law principles, you are describing a violation of my property rights, which government would be obliged to stop. Not because it violates some municipal ordinance or zoning regulation, but because it actually effects other people's (my) property rights.

Please try again - show me a situation in which, beyond preserving people's property rights, government provides a service that cannot be provided by the private sector.

[Donau]

Sure you do. Noise and smells are both forms of nuisance that has long been recognised as a form of aggression (i.e. initiation of force against another person's property). It is firmly established in common law tradition.

If you had a small factory like me that wouldn't be considered a form of aggression and it's a tradition because the basic ideea is "we are a community " nor " we are a market".

[Genghis Khan]

My employer would like to give it all to me.

How would you know? Your employer sets a certain amount of money for you. He doesn't care how much of it goes to government and how much goes to your pocket directly. It's none of his concern. His obligation towards you has ended the second he allocated the initial amount.

Before I was paid, the money belonged 100% to my employer

No it didn't. Your employer got taxed too, because like you, he too didn't earn all that money on his own, or even with just the help of his employees.

since he received it from happy customers in exchange for services rendered.

And how do you think they got to the point where buying this product was even feasible for them?

But as a large employer, I have to be very careful about my hiring patterns, or risk an expensive regulatory process.

The government doesn't care about the gender of every employee hired by Bank of America. If you're referring to affirmative action, I'm opposed to that.

If I told you that you are allowed to read certain books

Let me stop you right there. Reading books is not, in anyway shape or form, the same as hiring someone. For one, you don't have to pay the books a salary.

[Donau]

Please try again - show me a situation in which, beyond preserving people's property rights, government provides a service that cannot be provided by the private sector.

Ok .So we have city A and city B and 3 roads between them : 1 that has 100 km and 2 that have 150 km . If we don't have a government only the 100 km road will have asphalt because a investor will seize the opportunity to make money from a tax , the other 2 roads are bad ( no asphalt ) and because of that all the trucks will choose the 100 km road .
Also because so many trucks pass the houses near the 100 km road will start to have serious problems .

How can you fix this without a government?

[Eran]

If you had a small factory like me that wouldn't be considered a form of aggression and it's a tradition because the basic ideea is "we are a community " nor " we are a market".

It doesn't matter. Both a market and a community require that people are secure in their property rights. Once they are, people can freely choose whether they wish to share with their friends, relatives and neighbours ("community"), exchange their property for monetary consideration ("market") or some combination of the two.

Ok .So we have city A and city B and 3 roads between them : 1 that has 100 km and 2 that have 150 km . If we don't have a government only the 100 km road will have asphalt because a investor will seize the opportunity to make money from a tax , the other 2 roads are bad ( no asphalt ) and because of that all the trucks will choose the 100 km road .

Sounds plausible, except, of course, that it wouldn't be "tax", but "toll".

Also because so many trucks pass the houses near the 100 km road will start to have serious problems .

Who was there first, the road or the houses? IT is a critical question.

How can you fix this without a government?

What is the problem you believe ought to be fixed? If it is those other roads, the main question is why? If the main road is ample, and provides enough capacity at a reasonable cost, what's the problem? If the main road owner charges too much, or the road doesn't have enough capacity, entrepreneurs can build new roads (many pairs of cities have more than one road connecting them).

If the issue is the trucks passing by the house, and the houses predate the road, the road owner would have to either restrict the nuisance coming from the road, or reach an agreement with you to allow the noise/pollution for a consideration (e.g. free use of the road).

If the road predates the houses, the house owners are stuck. They can try to pay the road-owner to reduce the nuisance of traffic, but have no right to force him.

How would you know? Your employer sets a certain amount of money for you. He doesn't care how much of it goes to government and how much goes to your pocket directly. It's none of his concern. His obligation towards you has ended the second he allocated the initial amount.

Fair enough. Leave it to employer discretion then.

No it didn't. Your employer got taxed too, because like you, he too didn't earn all that money on his own, or even with just the help of his employees.

Whether my employer is taxed or not is completely irrelevant. The employer could have paid me from their after-tax income. Or else, you'd have to show why the proceeds from our customers (most of which, btw, live outside the UK) don't belong to my employer. Those customers paid money to my employer for a service provided. Not to the British government or British people. Just to my employer. In fact, my employer would probably earn exactly the same amount if we shifted our offices to another country.

And how do you think they got to the point where buying this product was even feasible for them?

For the non-British ones (the majority), however they got to that point, they did so without the assistance of the British government or people. Those people owe the British people exactly nothing.

The government doesn't care about the gender of every employee hired by Bank of America. If you're referring to affirmative action, I'm opposed to that.

Government offices do care about the gender distribution. They don't call it "affirmative action", but "anti-discrimination", though it often ends up being the same.

Let me stop you right there. Reading books is not, in anyway shape or form, the same as hiring someone. For one, you don't have to pay the books a salary.

True, but irrelevant to my point, which is that enough bureaucratic hurdles remove freedom. And why is the payment of salary a relevant factor? If Mr. A and Mr. B agree that Mr. A will do a certain job, and Mr. B will pay Mr. A out of Mr. B's property, how is this more the business of government than is my reading a specific book?

[Donau]

Who was there first, the road or the houses? IT is a critical question.

The houses were there when the asphalt road was built by a private company .

What is the problem you believe ought to be fixed?

Homes of those people, their property , are destroyed due to traffic .

If it is those other roads, the main question is why? If the main road is ample, and provides enough capacity at a reasonable cost, what's the problem?

The road is fine that's why all the trucks choose it , the toll is ok .

If the main road owner charges too much, or the road doesn't have enough capacity, entrepreneurs can build new roads (many pairs of cities have more than one road connecting them).

Nobody builds other roads because is not profitable , eveybody chooses the 100 km road .

If the issue is the trucks passing by the house, and the houses predate the road, the road owner would have to either restrict the nuisance coming from the road, or reach an agreement with you to allow the noise/pollution for a consideration (e.g. free use of the road).

Would have to ? He doesn't want that , it's legal , and all he wants is the profit .

The government would tax your income and would build the other two roads . With 0 toll for them the government would help the owner of the road and the owners of the houses to enjoy their properties in the same time .

[Rothbardian]

Abolitionists were not against roads they had a problem with the way the roads were made .

Just like how an anarchist is not against the services provided by government, just with the way they are provided/made.

Interestingly, abolitionists faced a lot of the same arguments we faced. Who will pick the cotton without slaves? Who will build the roads? We can't get rid of slavery, we should just find ways to improve it!

[JRS1]

It panders to greed and ego.

[Genghis Khan]

you'd have to show why the proceeds from our customers (most of which, btw, live outside the UK) don't belong to my employer.

It belongs mostly to your employer, not entirely, and that's true for the same reason that not all of your income belongs to you.

For the non-British ones (the majority), however they got to that point, they did so without the assistance of the British government or people.

Not with the British government. With their own. They too got taxed for the same reason you are.

True, but irrelevant to my point, which is that enough bureaucratic hurdles remove freedom.

To do what?

If Mr. A and Mr. B agree that Mr. A will do a certain job, and Mr. B will pay Mr. A out of Mr. B's property, how is this more the business of government than is my reading a specific book?

Because it generates income. If it's a small amount the government doesn't care, but if it's a big amount, it will be taxed to finance the collective concerns of society, which are mostly things that society takes completely for granted.

[Eran]

Would have to ? He doesn't want that , it's legal , and all he wants is the profit .

He may want the profit, but we are assuming a society in which property rights are protected. The road violates the property rights of road-side home owners. Consequently, they are likely to sue the road owner, either preventing the operation of the road, or reaching a mutually-acceptable solution.

The government would tax your income and would build the other two roads . With 0 toll for them the government would help the owner of the road and the owners of the houses to enjoy their properties in the same time .

This raises several questions.
1. Without charging people for the roads, how can government officials determine how many roads are required? How can a government decision-maker decide how much a new road (or an expansion of an existing road) is worth?

2. What would motivate government officials to care about the road-owner and/or the home-owners? Assuming both represent a small minority of the electorate, aren't government officials more likely to lean in favour of whichever group is better organised for lobbying?

3. Whenever a product (such as the road) is offered at below-cost price (e.g. zero cost), over-consumption automatically ensues. If people don't have to pay for using the road, more of them will use the road than would be economically-efficient. To be precise, some people will use the road even though the cost of allowing them to use the road is less than the benefit they make from using the road.

[ralfy]

Because it is simply one side of the same coin of global capitalism. The other side is conservatives.

[Adagio]

>"i think its just because every new group thats come to power has adopted the term liberal, its just evolved with the times more than being one ideology that hasn't changed. "<

I think that Mike has voiced something with few words that resonates well. Liberalism rejects fixed ideololgy. The very essence of it is "change". It evolves. It never stays in one place, and it's never a finished. There are those that choose to differentiate it with Classical Liberalism, but what does that really mean? It means the liberalism that existed at a given time under certain conditions that were peculiar to that time. But it never stays in one place. It evolves. It challenges existing institutions and the status quo. It doesn't always know where it's going, but it knows that it doesn't want to stand still.

In contrast; Situationally, conservatism is defined as the ideology arising out of a distinct but recurring type of historical situation in which a fundamental challenge is directed at established institutions and in which the supporters of those institutions employ the conservative ideology in their defense. Thus, conservatism is that system of ideas employed to justify any established social order, no matter where or when it exists, against any fundamental challenge to its nature or being, no matter from what quarter. Conservatism in this sense is possible in the United States today only if there is a basic challenge to existing American institutions which impels their defenders to articulate conservative values.

Take the Civil Rights Movement for example. A liberal idea. The Civil Rights movement was a direct challenge to the existing institutions of the time, and conservatism as an ideology is thus a reaction to a system under challenge, a defense of the status – quo in a period of intense ideological and social conflict. Liberalism rejects ideological thinking. Ideologies can never demonstrate why they are true...and truth matters to a liberal. That's why they're so interested in Fact rather than baseless opinion.

[Eran]

Liberalism rejects ideological thinking. Ideologies can never demonstrate why they are true...and truth matters to a liberal. That's why they're so interested in Fact rather than baseless opinion.

Liberalism is itself an ideology. It doesn't reject ideological thinking - it engages in its own. Aspects of liberal ideology include broad-based democracy, active government intervention to cure society's perceived ills, going hand-in-hand with great faith in the ability of intellectual elites to fix society.

And liberals are certainly no more interested in facts than any other group. Note, for example, complete absence of factual basis behind any of the popular liberal policies from the New Deal to War on Poverty.

[Joe Liberty]

Interestingly, abolitionists faced a lot of the same arguments we faced. Who will pick the cotton without slaves? Who will build the roads? We can't get rid of slavery, we should just find ways to improve it!

An astute comparison, I'm going to appropriate that, thanks! I find it very difficult to have patience with people who believe that governments somehow build roads without people, or that without government no individual would ever see the need for them. That kind of thinking is essentially religious faith.