Large profits attract competition
The gov. makes huge sums through taxation
Therefore the gov. encourages theives
But that which encourages crime is evil
So the gov. is evil QED
Corollary:
Businessmen are good.
Has this argument ever been used or is it even a valid one in the context of economic/ethical theory?
I did something similar a few years ago:
A lot of people think that the root of government is freedom. But if this is true (which it is not), many people have forgotten their high-school math, because the complete answer would be:
√G = +/- Freedom
From the law of identity, we know that A is A. It cannot be both A and –A at the same time. Therefore, √G cannot be equal to both Freedom, and the Opposite of Freedom. This would be problematic because of the +/- operator alone; we cannot definitively show that √G = either Freedom, or –Freedom. Furthermore:
If we substitute either F or -F into our original equation, and do a little algebra; we are left with:
Freedom = FreedomFreedom or -Freedom = FreedomFreedom
So the “root of government is freedom” hypothesis is exploded, once and for all, because neither of these make any sense. But then what is the root of government?
Start from step 4 above and you’ll be pleasantly surprised. Given: √G = √-(Freedom)
We know that the root of a negative number is imaginary. From whence it follows that whatever root we may suppose Government to have, it is purely imaginary, and useful only in making pretty fractals on supercomputers.
QED
I find this a fairly simplified argument but the problem is that in order to be a statist these days you almost certianly have to say “oh democracy is infallible. Every time somone else one the election the voters were just misguided” or whatever, so the idea is that the voting process would root out most of the thieves. Therefore they could then simply turn the argument around on you and say that existing firms have little to no safe guards against theives who would like to steer the company into the ground and take all of its money. If they don’t support democracy however then this is a good argument because there is no good rooting out process of negative influences… But then again any argument for statism that doesn’t reflect democracy automatically self destructs because it implys that humans are stupid and can’t pick their government and yet there must be a government to protect the people but if the people are that stupid, weak, greedy, needy, and useless what is the point of a state?
that stuff cracked me up! and the comments were priceless.
You need to take it one step further: Taxation is theft, therefore government is evil.
However from that you can’t derive the statement that all businessmen are good.
What used to happen is if executives were looting the company, the stock value would go down. A financial firm would buy up the company’s stock, fire the executives doing this, then the stock value would go back up and they would make a profit.
Buying stocks isn’t just about turning a profit, its about ownership. The owners necessarily have incentives to make their companies competitive.
Missing assertion: taxation = theft. Many outside of the libertarian tradition would not agree with this implicit premise.
Should read, “ASSUMING that which encourages crime is evil, government is evil.” You can’t make unqualified ethical statements with logic.
Full logical expansion for this:
Again assumptions comes up. Even if someone were to agree with them, though, this is a case of denying the antecedent. Assuming that business “does not encourage crime” does not mean that it abstains from all other things that may be considered “evil.”
In short, I like the idea. But it can’t ever really be logically sound, and it’s not a form of argumentation that will convert anyone to libertarianism.
Oh I know, there are a million safeguards a smart firm can use to prevent this I was merely trying to show a very possible counter argument. Even if the above were impossible to preventit would be preferable 2 a single one who might infiltrare the political system (lololol!!! Thats soooooooo never happened b4!!!)… At any rate there are a million far more effective and important argunents to be made
Of course, that’s the key premise. But people who deny that taxation is theft should explain why they think taxation is not theft…given that taxation is a forced transfer of property - i.e. theft.
Of course, of course, statists believe that there’s no such thing as ‘natural’ property and there’s no such thing as ‘natural law’…and so do some ‘libertarians’, go figure…
well I didn’t really check the logic of the argument and the QED was placed there to make it look more intellectual than it really was for my own amusement…sorry.
The force of the argument doesn’t come from the assumption that taxes=theft but from the supply/demand logic that when the profits from something are large, competitors try to enter the market. In this case the gov. reaps rewards from taxes and this creates competitors. But who are these latter? They are theives and other governments. So in fact this argument doesn’t need one to assume taxes=theft.
Also any attempt to reform the gov. (campaign finance or something) only makes things worse since it just ups the possible rewards of gov. power.
But in order to assert that a government’s competitors are thieves, you have to assert that a government commits theft. I agree with this assertion, but it’s an assumption that has to be explicitly stated in a logical proof.
yeah…
initiating coercive transfer of property is theft
government is initiating coercive transfer of property
government is theft;
A necessarily is B
C necessarily is A
C necessarily is B
a prior, in other words, simple necessary deduction
This is where a non-libertarian might disagree. They may argue that they willingly and voluntarily give up their earnings to government in the name of democracy, welfare, war, or whatever other such nonsense. In that case, it cannot be called “theft.”
In this case, it cannot be called governmet; this is simply a voluntary organization of individuals no different from a club or business.
No. It would still be a form of state although admittedly a better one. This organisation would still have a monopoly on force and the ability to make laws, declare war, ECT.
However the end of taxation would be a huuuuuuuuuugggggggggeeeeeeeee step in the right direction. However its stupid to say that a specific group can still issue laws of any type, but can’t force people to pay taxes.
But at any rate governments need taxes to assert their authority, and fund their BS. Just try not paying your taxes somtimes, I hope you like cops confiscating your property.
so they think they don’t have to pay taxes. they dare to keep the potential of choice on the negotiation table. why should i care if they think this? i heard of people that don’t pay taxes and have used guns to stop the government from coming to collect on them. when choice is coerced into this kind of relational conflict it’s not merely bad manners by those that initiate the violence. now if they are not caught, but it’s a risk. i heard of this agency called the IRS. that could be a song.
I heard of an agency called the IRS
wonder what they do
I heard of an agency called the IRS
wonder what they do
ladadee… bum, dah, dee…
[and then for some reason i hear Louis Armstrong playin’ his trumpet and hearin’ that laughin’ beat of his]