I think you’re not quite getting my point - the point is that you are saying “governments persist but theft does not” but I’m saying that theft does in fact persist… via governments. That governments are doing the thieving makes it no less thievery. We need attach no moral dimension to it, either, since we can readily identify a natural, culturally universal human conception of property that applies in all realms of human action and note that government acts of expropriation are formally identical (unilateral reassignment of property boundaries) to private acts of expropriation. We can differentiate between private theft and government theft (actually, robbery) but the defining difference is social currency or legitimacy. Understanding why government thieves have legitimacy but private thieves do not is the most important problem, in my opinion, and the solution* points the way to understanding why governments persist and are “efficient” given human nature.
Clayton -
*I think the solution resides in human nature and our tendency to accept dual ethical/legal standards under specific circumstances
If rational individuals continue to give government “legitimacy,” why is that necessarily incorrect?
If we make an appeal to “propaganda,” “brainwashing,” “indoctrination” or other psychic manipulation, then we must just as quickly criticize corporate advertising for manufacturing consumer preferences (bear in mind, I do not agree with the former or the latter).
Not to me. I am absolutely fascinated by scholars using economic logic in non-market scenarios (so-called “economic imperialism”). Principally, cost-benefit calculation is central to all decision-making.
Okay. What would you oppose that with? I mean, what other definitions for “ideology” do you think are used?
I’m not sure what you mean by “ideologies should then be seen for what they are”. Can you explain further?
Maybe, for some people, philosophic arguments are personal interests?
Otherwise, I think you’re absolutely right. In my experience, a lot of people (maybe most) don’t see “the point” of one philosophy over another if they don’t see any difference in how they apply to them personally. When I discuss libertarianism with people, I always try to tie in their personal circumstances. It doesn’t make any more logical sense, but making analogies between philosophical concepts and real-life experiences definitely helps get the point across.
A translation, if I may: don’t expect to convince a bureaucrat that he should quit his job immediately. I’d certainly agree with this, if it’s an accurate assessment. Still, Rome wasn’t built in a day!
I think I got your point and I agree with your argument which is why I mentioned semantics and definitions. “Theft” appears to be in the eye of the (subjective) human actor. If governments persist and private theft doesn’t, then either (1) taxation is not defined as theft, or (2) some types of theft are not viewed as problematic (“inefficient”) as others by end-seeking human actors.
Your explanation of why such reality persists may be a very good one, but is not necessary for establishing that it does.
Quoting David Friedman once again, “The efficient level of crime, taking account of enforcement costs, may leave some inefficient crimes undeterred–because it is not worth the cost of deterring them.”
If we presume government is a “gang of thieves writ large” (à la Rothbard), then what are we to make of Friedman’s statement that rational individuals will naturally converge toward an efficient level of crime?
Understanding aggression (coercion, etc.) as a natural feature of the world, is it not being allocated by the interaction of rational individuals (who are acting to minimize costs, etc.)? If the State persists, much like crime, then how is that not an efficient outcome? If an alternative social arrangement were cost-justified, it would already exist (i.e., unexploited opportunities do not remain indefinitely).
But that is exactly his (and, curiously, my own) point. Not all theft is created equal; one instance or kind of theft need not be identical to another. We might classify taxation as theft, but there is an obvious difference between swiping clothes from a store and taxing the store. The former is less efficient than the latter, as the former is less sustainable than the latter. Similarly, working as a police officer is a more efficient way to rough people up than being a street thug. The government, then, offers a more efficient/sustainable way to steal, harass, rent-seek, etc.
StrangeLoop: Quoting David Friedman, “Economists generally assume that individuals are rational, that they take the actions which best serve their objectives. That suggests that if we simply let each person do what he wants, the outcome should be attractive for everyone, a suggestion that can be converted into a formal proof, an efficiency theorem showing that, under some set of simplifying assumptions, the outcome of individual choice in a market system cannot be improved even by a wise and benevolent central planner.”
Strangeloop, you do know that David Friedman is an anarcho-capitalist libertarian, and not just as a secret, but he publicly advocates it and write books about why it would be better than monopoly government and how it could work?
First off, I didn’t think the point of libertarian legal theory was so much about deterring crime (if at all) as about 1) what constitutes crime, and 2) how crime (however constituted) should be handled when it occurs.
Second, one criticism I didn’t mention yet concerns the Stiglerian notion of “efficiency” vs. the standard libertarian notion of “efficiency”. I don’t think both of these are the same thing. Stiglerian efficiency seems to make no distinction between the political and the economic means (a la Franz Oppenheimer) while libertarian efficiency does. Furthermore, libertarian efficiency seems to concern only the economic means. Hence when libertarians talk about market processes being more efficient than political processes, they aren’t talking in terms of Stiglerian efficiency, but in terms of libertarian efficiency. Arguments using Stiglerian efficiency and arguments using libertarian efficiency will thus necessarily sail past one another.
Third and finally, do you have an answer to either of the two questions I posed earlier? Here they are again:
Autolykos, the distinction between “economic means” and “political means” is moral; nothing else.
I have a question for you: outside of strictly economic exchanges, do you believe people tend to make economizing decisions? That is, do persons tend to maximize their benefits and to minimize their costs?
No. I would ascribe “personal responsibility” to the actor in the latter case; contrariwise, I would consider the former case to be “bad luck.”
Are you sure? “Aggression” cannot be defined in an amoral way?
Yes, based on whatever they happen to see as benefits and costs.
However, I’d wager that I define “(strictly) economic exchanges” differently from how you do. This is why I brought up Franz Oppenheimer’s distinction between “economic means” and “political means”.
Okay. Maybe “causal distinction” was the wrong phrase to use. What I mean is this: which of the two events would you consider to have a lower than maximum efficiency (in the Stiglerian sense)? If your answer is both, do you make any distinction between the interferences in the actors’ efficiency-maximizing behavior?
Therefore the mugging interfered with his efficiency-maximizing behavior, through no choice of his own. More generally, this means that certain things can happen which interfere with people’s efficiency-maximizing behavior, again through no choices of their own. So the question is, which things cause such interference?
No. It can. I said that too strongly. I would, as I’ve been insisting, claim that aggression is a feature of the natural world and we allocate it efficiently (e.g., much like we take measures to limit the imposed costs of mosquito bites, we also respond rationally to State interference).
I would consider a mugging, a dip in the stock market, or other sources of loss to be classified as risk generally. There are people who have taken measures to limit such risk, even in the case of muggings (e.g., learning martial arts, carrying pepper spray, etc.).
This sounds like an accurate characterization of the argument to me as well.
Overall, StrangeLoop wishes to demonstrate the soundness of the following:
(1) resources are scarce
(2) individuals are rational
(3) therefore, individuals act to achieve ends—and do so in a way which maximizes (or at the very least, aims to maximize) efficiency
(4) social institutions are the result of individuals’ actions
(5) therefore, social institutions serve the ends of individuals—and do so in a way which maximizes (or at the very least, aims to maximize) efficiency
And, as a corollary—the argument Z explicates above:
(5a) persistence of a particular social institution proves the fact of its efficiency (persistence = efficiency)
The first argument (1-5) is the nail, and the second (5a) is the proverbial hammer which supposedly drives it home.
In regard to individual action what, exactly, constitutes efficiency? We know that efficiency takes its form in relation to the empirical fact of resource scarcity. That is, efficiency is to be judged vis-a’-vis resource scarcity. Clearly, then, efficiency with respect to the individual means that an individual maximizes output (i.e. “psychic profit”) for a given measure of material inputs.
If StrangeLoop’s analysis is to hold, the same conception of efficiency must also hold regarding social institutions. That is, social institutions must maximize “psychic profit” for a given measure of material inputs. But, maximize the psychic profit of whom, precisely, and in relation to whose inputs?
Presumably, we are speaking of those individuals who comprise the membership a given institution. StrangeLoop’s thesis is that a given social institution exists and persists for the benefit of its members. As well, it is the members or users of the institution who also bear the costs (i.e. provide the material inputs.) Again, the standard of efficiency is maximal psychic profit for a given measure of material inputs.
How difficult is it, however, to imagine a social institution which (1) uses the material inputs of a given individual member, yet (2) fails to provide maximum psychic benefit to that member, for every given action taken by the institution? Quite easy. So, in StrangeLoop’s analysis, the measure of efficiency for a social institution clearly isn’t that it must maximize the psychic output of each and every individual member, for each and every action the institution takes.
Instead, the measure of efficiency for a given social institution must therefore be taken to mean that it maximizes the average psychic profit of its members considered as a group, given the average material input into the group: favoring some individuals one time, other individuals another so that, in the long run, all individuals are satisfied with their share of psychic benefit relative to their share of material contribution.
Or so it is presumed in StrangeLoop’s analysis. However, regarding social institutions, it is possible for average psychic profit to be maximized, yet simultaneously have this be a zero-sum situation nevertheless. Simply because average psychic profit is maximized relative to the group, it does not follow that each member receives a long-term benefit which is in proportion to his/her material contribution to the group.
Thus, again, according to StrangeLoop’s analysis, a social institution can be characterized as “efficient” when it maximizes the average psychic profit of the group. Proof of this maximization occurs in the simple fact of the institution’s persistence (so it is claimed, at least—a dubious claim imo, to be sure, though one which can be granted in order to move the discussion forward.)
Nevertheless, simply because a social institution can be characterized as being “efficient” with regard to the group, it does not follow that the social institution necessarily serves the long-term interests of each of its members—i.e. necessarily is “efficient” in the long-run with regard to each member.
Since you concede that “aggression” can be defined amorally, then you also implicitly concede that the distinction between “economic means” and “political means” is not necessarily moral. For example, I can (and do) define them such that “economic means” embodies all non-aggressive means and “political means” embodies all aggressive means. These are entirely amoral definitions. This then means that libertarian efficiency is (or at least can be) just as amoral and non-normative as Stiglerian efficiency.
Yes, and I agree. However, there’s an important (praxeological?) difference between a mugging and a dip in the stock market. A mugging is intentional on the part of the mugger, while a dip in the stock market (presumably) is not intentional on anyone’s part. Hence there are some things, like muggings, which intentionally interfere with people’s efficiency-maximizing behavior. I think this distinction is a useful one. What do you think?
At this point, I feel like our discussion is akin to one about monism vs. dualism. You’re arguing the position of the monist. While it may seem like I’m arguing the position of the dualist, I’m actually arguing the position of both*.* That is, both monism and dualism are useful ways to look at the world. My point here isn’t to belittle our discussion – it’s just to note something I find interesting.
I think it makes more sense to use the word efficient when you compare it to other means of action. The state is efficient, compared to what? That, plus specifying the goal of the means. Efficient, compared to what, and at what?
If I could draw a table… oh wait, I can.
Who
efficient at
compared to
A state
existing
other institutions that existed less (for less time)
murderer
killing
other people who killed less.
x seller
selling x
other people who sell x less
society
developing
other groups of people who developed less (whatever development may mean)
statist society
not overthrowing government
other groups who overthrew their rulers less (or sooner)
statist society
everything
wat
The problem of asserting that the state is efficient period, is that you’re conflating every possible goal that people may have, and saying that the state has been the most efficient at maximizing everyone’s goals. But that’s just impossible to know, if not complete BS.
There’s far too many interest groups wanting so many things, from nuking the whole rest of the world back into the stone age, to forcing a stone age upon the US itself. That it’s even possible to conciliate the extremes and moderates in any fashion is very implausible, let alone even knowing whether you’re making a better job than what-could-have-been other societal organizations. It’s impossible to know unless you had parallel universes, a time machine, or omniscience of all people’s consciousnesses and unconsciousnesses.
And the question of alternatives is extremely relevant, because people who are coerced against necessarily have fewer options to choose from. A man with a gun to your head narrows your choices to giving him what he wants, or trying some leet karate moves if you know any; while a voluntary relation is always more flexible as it does not forces you into taking a course of action. Austrian theory would have you thinking that the non-coercive relation is far more efficiency maximizing than the coercive one, but I guess you’ve been ignoring that on purpose after your methodological individualism approach failed.
So… I ask that you at least be more specific in what you mean by ‘efficient’; I think it would have reduced this thread in size significantly.
I’ve been hanging with this thread for awhile now—and have had precisely the same complaint—namely, that StrangeLoop won’t provide a definition of “efficient”. However, take a look at my post immediately above. I do believe it contains an accurate and fair conception of StrangeLoop’s argument, as well as an accurate and fair conception of his defintion of “efficient”.
In fairness to StrangeLoop, I believe he’s repeatedly provided a definition of “efficiency”, namely that used by George Stigler. This is why I contrast “Stiglerian efficiency” to “libertarian efficiency” in my later posts.
I hear what you are saying, but wtf is Stigler’s defintion of efficiency? All I’ve seen is StrangeLoop cutting-and-pasting quotes of Stigler talking about efficiency, and repeatedly asserting its existence, however, never defining what he means by it.
Sorry, I’ve not read your posts. I’ll go back and see what definitions you’ve come up.
Edit: I’ve not read ALL of your posts. I did catch this memorable one:
“If a person is mugged on the way to seeing a movie, does that mean to you that the most efficient way for him to see that movie necessarily involved the mugging, per Stigler’s definition of “maximum efficiency”?”
Lol. I know you were asking a serious question here, but lol.
