"Sorry, were you referring to me? "
No I was replying to the hypothetical that Porco had about taking stuff from people using force.
“Looks like you didn’t answer my question.”
Not sure what you’re getting at. Recommended caloric intake?
It seems like by your line of questioning you don’t think there’s enough to go around.
He’s asking you to quantify how much it would take to make sure everyone has “enough”, and that the wealth in society currently exists to meet those conditions.
Keep in mind that your claim that there is “enough” has important implications beyond just mere stocks of grain. Merely claiming that there is “enough” sitting around says nothing about distribution, which, I believe, is what you’re getting at. But distribution is much more complex than just sending a boat over to the areas where there isn’t “enough”.
The question was, How do you know there’s enough to go around?
“No I was replying to the hypothetical that Porco had about taking stuff from people using force.”
Well, exactly. Socialism would only be that.
As LogisticEarth and Porco Rosso stated, I’m trying to figure out how much you’ve actually thought about the statement “there’s enough to go around for everyone”. To me, that statement doesn’t suggest only food - it refers to everything. How do you know there’s “enough” stuff for everyone? Before you can answer that question, first you must explain just what you mean by “enough”.
“Keep in mind that your claim that there is “enough” has important implications beyond just mere stocks of grain. Merely claiming that there is “enough” sitting around says nothing about distribution, which, I believe, is what you’re getting at. But distribution is much more complex than just sending a boat over to the areas where there isn’t “enough”.”
Yes, it’s complex.
As far as quantifying what’s enough, that seems like a trick to trip me up. I don’t think I could come up with an answer to satisfy him. But isn’t that kind of common sense anyway? Enough is enough. Basic necessities are food and shelter. Maybe the more important question is when is it too much. Should people be able to accumulate wealth to no end?
“Should people be able to accumulate wealth to no end?”
Who has the right to stop them? And, no, it’s an important question. What is enough? Who has the right to determine it? What kind of force can they employ to attain their standard of enough?
If you can’t even explain what you mean by “enough”, how can you make the claim that there is “enough”?
“As LogisticEarth and Porco Rosso stated, I’m trying to figure out how much you’ve actually thought about the statement “there’s enough to go around for everyone”.”
I’ve thought about it plenty, thank you very much! I’ve also experienced it. I’ve grown up in the US, where there’s abundance and excess, but still people starving and living on the streets. I’ve seen the same thing in other countries, though those conditions are perhaps more widespread there.
“To me, that statement doesn’t suggest only food - it refers to everything. How do you know there’s “enough” stuff for everyone? Before you can answer that question, first you must explain just what you mean by “enough””
It seems like if we’re truly libertarians (me anarcho-communist, you Misean) then we believe in peoples’ ability to decide for themselves when enough is enough. Of everything. The line is when having ‘enough’ means taking from someone else who will then be left without enough.
You assume, then, that people with more took it from someone else. Can you prove that? The problem with left anarchists is that they would impoverish everyone and they believe in a zero-sum world.
So what precise conclusions have you reached from your thinking?
Because you’re breathing right now, I feel like I’m left without enough air. Please stop breathing.
occupy-
To many people in the world it might seem as though you are living an opulent lifestyle. So, simply because they feel that way does that mean they are entitled to your things or that you are morally obligated to give away some of your things to them?
“To many people in the world it might seem as though you are living an opulent lifestyle. So, simply because they feel that way does that mean they are entitled to your things or that you are morally obligated to give away some of your things to them?”
Well I don’t really have much to take. My bike? My debts? They’re already taking my house.
Squabbling about “amounts of money” with a central bank makes no sense. If the serfs (that’s us, folks) make too much money, they can just print more, cause a credit bubble, call in their loans, cause a credit crisis, and collect material possessions in exchange for the promise to deliver silly pieces of paper. It’s called “fleecing the flock”.
Well, I think it’s fair of me to assume you consume enough food to survive. Many don’t have even that. Therefore, I propose you give up half your supply of food. You might as well cut your living space in half as well. Or how about your cellphone, dryer, refrigerator, etc.? You keep half of those type of amenities, and the rest we’ll ship off. I just can’t stand to see some people living as you are while others are starving across the globe.
Can you suggest an appropriate maximum? Would you care to speculate as to what the ramifications of setting that maximum would be?
Should people be able to accumulate wealth to no end?
Alright, so after a specific point people lose their right to make things and keep them or exchange their own things for things of others.
And how do you calculate this point? Surely you mean to say that 1 million dollars is more than 1 million grains of sand, and hence someone with 1 million dollars may be stopped, while the person with 1 million in sand may keep accumulating. But how do you determine the relative value of things? How do you convert from one into another? Perhaps you would like to use the “fair market price?” But how do you determine the supply and demand when you have people who have actively been prevented from entering the market (because they are already too wealthy)? Coordination requires supply and demand, which would not be allowed to manifest themselves, because people at the wealth limit would not be able to participate in the system.
Wealth limits are inherently unfeasible. It all comes down to “he has more than me, thus I think I can take things from him.”
From an ethical standpoint you lose the universality of the system when you impose limits on how much of your right you may exercise.
From a utilitarian standpoint you lose efficiency when people lose the incentive to work at what appears to be a trade they’re good at.
What grounds are left for the argument? Selfish, dictatorial grounds.
And surely, since value is subjective, then someone at the wealth limit cannot under any circumstance trade anything for anything else, as that would increase his utility and prove that the thing he receives in exchange is worth more than the thing he traded away, hence going over the wealth limit, and becoming illegal.
Reductio ad absurdum.
“Alright, so after a specific point people lose their right to make things and keep them or exchange their own things for things of others.”
My point is actually that the system we have in place now functions as a vampire, living off the work that others do, thereby creating ‘wealth’.
I realize we have different worldviews, but it sometimes seems like Miseans are not living on the same planet as the rest of us. Why defend capitalists when you probably aren’t one of them and may never be one? Nevermind that, because the point isn’t to attack individuals, it’s to organize within and against the social systems that create concrete lived realities.