False. Landlords factor in their property taxes when they charge rent. That property tax is paid by the tenants, something that many poor people are.
Big deal. Not all the poor people live in Florida. Or don’t you care about the rest of the country? Oh, and if Florida is anything like NH, what they don’t charge in sales tax, they make up for it in property tax.
Mhm. So I guess the poor people don’t pay the SS tax when they are still working? Also, unless they are self-employed (unlikely since they are poor, but you never know, and even then they get fucking nailed to the cross on SS tax), the employer pays the other half of SS tax. That half could have been wages, but instead it just goes into the Ponzi scheme.
I need some empirical evidence from you on the stone age, please. In regards to Somalia, I will direct you here, here and here (I will provide the links in an edit because I don’t want to have to wait for moderation for linking to too many things.) And of course, the wild west was far less wild than the idiot box would lead you to believe.
I’m not going to continue arguing whether or not private security is cheaper than a 5% sales tax. But I don’t think Somalia, as much improvement as it’s made, is a model for the rest of the world. Celtic Ireland and “ancap” Iceland were politically unstable third world basket cases like the rest of the world at the time.
Straw man, as neither was I. I was talking about all taxescombined. Why don’t you try being intellectually honest.
The thing about Somalia is that it disproves your point. Without a state, it made improvements. Bam! And I’ve used empirical evidence to support my argument. But what do you do? “Oh, well, it doesn’t matter if there is evidence to the contrary, I’m gonna put my fingers between my ears and shout ‘Nyanyanyanya!’”
This nonsense was addressed earlier in the thread. Somalia is improving today. If the West stops trying to interfere over there, it should continue to improve. After all, there is not only a theory as to why it’s improving, but there is a trend that it is - which is to say, EMPIRICAL EVIDENCE.
Markets are not good at guaranteeing anything. They don’t guarantee food either, lack of which would be even more detrimental to your life. Or do they?
Are you implying that governments are good at guaranteeing protection, especially to the poor?
Do you value your entitlements to health and safety over your fellow humans’ obligation to provide them for you? There are no space-aliens (yet). It’s just us. Every person’s entitlement (“right”) to X implies someone else’s enslaving obligation to provide it to him. Where do you think health and safety come from, and what exactly promotes them to their status of cosmic necessity in your (subjective) value system? Why not food?
To the extent that health and safety are cosmically imortant to you, what makes you think that a coercive monopoly would be the best provider for them – i.e. able to provide you with best health and safety at the most affordable price possible?
Markets never fail. Values (i.e. judgments about failure or success) are subjective. Market outcomes (i.e. products of voluntary exchanges of property and labor between free agents) that don’t reflect your subjective valuations (entitlements, rights, etc.) or visions of a proper universe are not failures.
A coercive and aggressive group of people (government, mafia) can only “correct” market “failures” to the extent that the coerced outcome satisfies their own personal ends. Not yours. Not mine. Not “ours”.
Believe me, I am perfectly qualified to say this: You have no idea what you’re talking about. To the mathematically literate, economists analyzing data are like little children playing with really dangerous weapons, oblivious to the damage they can do to themselves or to the people around them.
Health and safety come from free markets, especially if they’re not quite free enough to deny universal healthcare and protection. I can’t explain why human health and safety are important. But to me, I don’t see these values as requiring justification.
I’m not a fan of getting rid of food stamps, either.
The subjective opinion of many people who use private healthcare disagrees.
Sometimes, those personal ends aren’t that bad. I still admire your writing.
I’m quoting that.
The interstate highway system is used by an enormous amount of drivers for a brief period of time. In the absence of public funding, individuals who use it may not have bothered to calculate every minutiae of this investment’s costs and benefits. This driver would have instead preferred to mispell big words.
They are important to me and probably most other normal people too. Then how about you invest or donate your property towards the provision of whatever you think mankind must have? Lacking your own property (means, funds), how about you convince like minded fellow humans with means to join you in your investment or contribution toward that end? Why is the pointed gun necessary when trying to collect the means for your noble vision? What are you afraid of exactly? That not enough people would subjectively value what you subjectively deem important?
But you can’t eat food stamps. Who makes sure that enough food gets made and that no one is denied access to it?
What “private” healthcare? The one regulated, licenced, and coerced into extinction?
They are very bad for anyone who’s not them, most of the time. The coercive power den of politics attracts the most parasitic amongst us. You actually believe that a government person has your best interest as their end?
Let me suggest that Facebook is used by even more enormous amount of people for brief (and not so brief) periods of time. So are movie theaters and restaurants. Customers need not be the investors, you see. That’s why we have markets.
What exactly is you obsession with funding projects at the point of a gun (taxation)? Again, is your fear that things subjectively valued by you would not get enough voluntary funding by like-minded others? Do you think of yourself as being more humane than humanity itself, so you feel the necessity to extract funding from it at the point of a gun – for its own good? Who do you think you are?
Exactly. I would point a gun in someone’s face if they did fail to support human rights.
The government?
Yes. The one that is much worse than public health care.
Usually, if they want my vote.
Sometimes those markets work. There are theoretical instances when they may not.
A normal person. Subsidizing abortion and child healthcare may sound repulsive to you. But I would defintely force someone to pay for a woman’s right to choose and a children’s right to healthcare.
Thanks for your honesty. Please ponder over what you just said some more.
You don’t need a Kindle. The Kindle app for PC, Mac, iPhone, iPad, Android, etc. is free to download from Amazon. Then it’s just $0.99 (free for Prime members) to get the book and read it on whatever device you have.
z1235, there is a forum I want you to register on and discuss what you have just presented. I foressee that you would create severe shitfits in this limousine liberal hive.
I don’t agree with you, but I do think you could create some really amusing threads on a board that I failed.
Can I link you to it?
Trust me. It’s not a trap. I just think you could really unsettle them.
I’m not into unsettling people. The paths through which each of us seeks what they end up finding are quite mysterious. It’s a waste of everyone’s time trying to shove a seed into an unprepared soil.
Some poor people may recieve more money back than they pay. But they make very low amounts and are very low in number. Nothing that private charity or mutual aid societies would not be able to handle.
The lower class would be far better off if there were no taxes and private charity and mutual aid were allowed to flourish.
Yes, it’s quite amusing seeing you run from empirical evidence.
Really? Which welfare states are you talking about? The US can afford to do it because of the massive amount of capital accumulation due to the free market. During that time, poverty was being reduced. See the Milton Friedman tv miniseries Free to Choose. The earlier one is better. So no, these welfare states don’t reduce poverty any more than when the market was freer.
You know you’re inconsistent when you say empirical evidence is the end all and be all of debates and then promptly ditch it when it doesn’t suit your point.
If you want empirical evidence about the rise of the standard of living in countries when the market is liberalized, please watch the Milton Friedman miniseries Free to Choose linked above.
The point isn’t that Somalia is successful by African standards. The point is that despite not having a state, the standard of living is rising. Really, it’s because of it and not in spite of it. This flies in the face of your position, that people would be poorer without the government. Well, they are actually richer without one. Like I said, you are inconsistent. You pick and choose when it suits you.