States as farms

Miscellaneous General
21

You may possess things, but there is no legal regime that supports you owning anything, including yourself.

The difference between ownership and possession is nonsense; property is the ability to exercise control over things. I can, in fact, exercise control over a lot of things, and exclude other people from doing say, therefor I own it. In this same sense the government does own capital goods and land, though I would argue that the way in which it acquires control is a particularly heinous system.

The legal regime does, in fact, support me owning things; even if it does so in extremely ineffective and inconsistent ways. Moreover, the de facto legal regime by which people ordinarily recognize one anothers’ property and agree not to fight over it is more pervasive and important than the de jure of statute law; though statute law - due to the legitimacy granted to the state by popular consensus - often overrides customary law.

22

I think you are a bit confused. First off, using your definition a burglar would be the owner of said stolen good. You could see why this would probably cause problems of agreement amongst many, not just libertarians.

In the same way the cow thinks he exercises control over the hay in his pen. But the owner is the farmer.

I’m not saying I agree with Stefan. I’m saying that you’ve yet to disprove anything.

In so far as it makes you productive so that they can further extract rent from you.

This comes back to my question, why do you and others give up your property to the state? Why are you paying rent to the state? Why are they extracting our productive output from you, rather then you benefiting from your own productive output?

This statement is confusing. You first said you don’t pay direct taxes, your second statement is that they withdraw taxes from your earnings anyways. Which is it, are you paying taxes or not? Second off, even if you were not, why is 95%(guessing) of the population paying rents to the state?

Well then I guess you answered your own debate. Your “customary law”(what is that?) is now obsolete, and statute law overrides it. IE you don’t really own your property.

23

I think you are a bit confused. First off, using your definition a burglar would be the owner of said stolen good.

He is, at least in the near term, but he does not have social recognition for this. He will be, at least in theory, relieved of his ill-gotten gains. But it would be strange to say that he did not have property in them while he controlled their deployment.

In the same way the cow thinks he exercises control over the hay in his pen. But the owner is the farmer.

The farmer literally gives hay to the cow. I don’t know about you, but very little of my income is derived from the State, and very few of my dealings directly involve it.

In so far as it makes you productive so that they can further extract rent from you.

That may be part of it, though I think that’s a bit of a cartoon villain view of politics. I would say it is more because some sort of market economy and liberal society is compatible and necessary for their social engineering projects.

This comes back to my question, why do you and others give up your property to the state? Why are you paying rent to the state? Why are they extracting our productive output from you, rather then you benefiting from your own productive output?

Because they can get away with it and we’re not very capable of stopping them. I’m not saying that some coercion isn’t implicit in their activities, it obviously is, but coercion is implicit in any human situation where not everyone agrees on what to do with everything they have control over. Coercion isn’t the problem, it’s the bizarre religion which erects an imaginary being to a position of monopolistic control over deciding exceptions to rules.

You first said you don’t pay direct taxes, your second statement is that they withdraw taxes from your earnings anyways.

Paying taxes would involve me doing something, when they excise it I flatly never had control over it to begin with. It is not my property, and never was, so I was never in a position to pay it. Perhaps it should have been my property, but that’s another issue.

Well then I guess you answered your own debate. Your “customary law”(what is that?) is now obsolete, and statute law overrides it. IE you don’t really own your property.

No, customary law is dominant in most areas of our lives. It just so happens that the state has the power to intervene in it (just as a warlord or cult leader could) and that people will put up with it when it does so. That does not somehow magically turn everyone into peons of the Federal Government.

24

sigh

25

So…, whatever is “Socially recognized” is justified, IE Might makes right or majority rules? If only it was clear what “Socially recognized” meant.

As slave owners got away with owning slaves.

So your saying 40% of the income that you make, isn’t actually you making it? That it never existed?

I pay my auto-bill automatically every month debited out of my checking account. Shall I pretend that money never existed?

Sounds like it does. What you just said is, Customary law is dominant, except when government intervene’s. Doesn’t look to be that dominant now does it?

Also what is customary law, and how is it derived?

26

IMO, you’re mostly correct. A statute is a policy statement, not law.

27

As slave owners got away with owning slaves.

Repeating irrelevancies does nothing to strengthen your case. It is obvious we do not have, de jure or de facto, either chattel or directive slavery in this country, nor in most countries around the world. We do have a combination of system and random violence and threats used to bolster the interventionist measures the State deploys in pursuit of its odd little plans. The very fact, however, that we have any kind of organization and coherence in production proves that we are not, in fact, slaves as we obviously are at liberty to act on the market. If we were literal slaves the country would implode in ways that would make War Communism look positively benign. Slavery = socialism, we are obviously not socialist, therefor we are obviously not slaves.

So your saying 40% of the income that you make, isn’t actually you making it? That it never existed?

If you mean that the money is diverted from returns to the marginal product of my labor, sure. But I never actually had possession or control of that money. It is income that I would have had, but never actually did. Some people do pay taxes - by filling out little forms and sending a check to the IRS or state revenue departments. But, just as a matter of fact, I do not.

I pay my auto-bill automatically every month.

The very fact that you could not pay it demonstrates that you have effective control over the money. There is no feasible way for most people to not pay the excises from their checks.

Shall I pretend that money never existed?

No one ever said anything about it ‘not existing’, the question was of de facto ownership.

What you just said is, Customary law is dominant, except when government intervene’s. Doesn’t look to be that dominant now does it?

Um, yes it does; in the same way that customary law is dominant except when gang bangers invade your town and rob people. Under most circumstances we decide things with very little reference to or interaction with the state. The fact that it can focus both force and legitimacy into particular acts of intervention does not somehow retroactively change all the circumstances in which it did not, in fact, intervene.

Also what is customary law, and how is it derived?

The normal system of boundries and torts that people generally accept and recognize. It is derived from the fact that people agree not to fight about it. As opposed to statute law, where something is a law because of an authority which in itself is not subject to customary regulation. For example, customary law can change so that geometric plots instead of rivers and hedges are used for land simply by the people involved agreeing to it. However, you can not change the tax code by just deciding between your employer and yourself that you owe 0% taxes.

28

What exactly is my case Mr. Carlyle? I don’t recall making one.

The object presented was an analogy, nothing stated here interferes with the analogy presented.

The deduction is in error, since Socialism and Slavery are two entirely different terms. Socialism is an economic term.

So you don’t take issue with someone else extracting a percentage of your wages before you even get hands on it? And in this way you don’t think your paying taxes? It is not your concern that 30-40% of your income goes away from you?

And what of others who DO pay taxes manually?

I could not pay taxes. Unless your 1099, when you are employed in the states you fill out a W4. In that form you decide how much money the government will extract. Since the government is garnishing your wages, I have to assume you’ve filled this out granting them permission to do so.

Now we’re getting somewhere. If you don’t own it, how can you say your being robbed?

It’s amazing how far off topic we’ve become. Nothing of what you’ve stated directly refutes the analogy provided in the OP. In fact you’ve not really directly addressed it at all. The circularity in your understanding of property isn’t helping.

Keep in mind we’re referring to an analogy. I, unlike you, am forced against my will to pay taxes. I must pay rent to the state on my land and labor. I am effectively a surf, AKA a slave with many liberties. Ironically I live in the same country as you, but you’ve confused yourself enough not to understand a very simple reality.

Since your points really don’t address anything, and aren’t going anywhere I am going to move on.

29

Back OT.

I disagree with one point Stefan makes. He acts as if there is a collective group of evil individuals planning this widescale human cultivatioon activity. I typically have a hard time giving statists that much credit of intelligence. Ayn Rand referred to a similar type of evil where the masses and the collective simply perpetuated the evil by some unknown force. Perhaps out of ignorance. Thoughts?

30

What exactly is my case Mr. Carlyle? I don’t recall making one.

This we can agree on, but I was referring to the proposition that slavery is a literal or analogical parallel to state intervention into society.

The object presented was an analogy, nothing stated here interferes with the analogy presented.

As an analogy, it is bad, for two reasons: 1) because it is nothing but an emotional appeal to a loaded concept; 2) Slavery shouldn’t be illegal, it should be contractual; 3) there are much better analogies to state behavior, which are extortion and brainwashing.

I could not pay taxes. Unless your 1099, when you are employed in the states you fill out a W4. In that form you decide how much money the government will extract. Since the government is garnishing your wages, I have to assume you’ve filled this out granting them permission to do so.

I said feasible. Some people can work under the table, and some people will run the risk of no witholding. However, even in this case, it’s not really feasible not to pay excise duties or sales taxes.

If you don’t own it, how can you say your being robbed?

You’re conflating two things here, as many libertarian moralizers do: de facto ownership and property claims. The first is the ability to control, the second is the socially sanctioned/recognized authority to control. In practice the second offers some force in itself so that the first (de facto control) remains; though it does not do so automatically or by some derived ‘principle’, but rather by the actual fact that people actually do oppose violation of these claims. Robbery is a violation of the second by the robber taking possession and gaining de facto ownership. If the robber never gained de facto ownership, he obviously never could have violated de jure ownership, or property claims.

Since your points really don’t address anything, and aren’t going anywhere I am going to move on.

Your ‘points’ don’t even exist, so that’s fine with me.

31

I am not the one conflating possession with property.

I’m not saying I agree or disagree with anything you’ve said. I guess what I am saying is your comments are confusing me. Its funny how you tried to correct me on the differences of possession and ownership, when I was about to do the same thing to do several posts up…

Indentured servitude is not the same as slavery. If you enter into the contract voluntarily it’s not slavery. Slavery implies the use of coercion.

There is a very serious distinction between general objects of possession, and humans as possessions. Assuming humans can be owned, as a lamp is camped, ignores key behavioral differences of humans as property. Primarily the problem where each owner can only request compliance from his property, even if coerced. As such, humans as property is non-satisfactory. as property cannot just willingly get up and walk away. A hammer does not just getup, and walk away.

In all human interactions we must make communicative requests of other individuals. A farmer does not politely, or even rudely, ask his cow to bare milk. A homeowner does not ask permission of his lamp to grant light. These are objects of property and/or possession. Physical intervention is required to gain anything from them.

On the other hand, you could argue that you own a human being, but as soon as you make any sort of communicative request, you concede the actual ownership and admit that the true owner of said body is the person itself(IE your acknowledging that this is a human being, not property). Even if coerced, (Till my soil slave!), you recognize that you don’t actually own them, and must forever request permission from them to comply. Man must make a type of communicative request, where the other man must choose to comply. His decision may be influenced via coercion, but as soon as you open your mouth and make a verbal request, your admitting that this man is no lamp, or cow. Man acknowledges that the other human must comply for anything to happen. This view point supports the position that people are self owners.

Yes and I could just turn around and say that a slave owner is still just an extortion racket, extorting the fruits of the labor of slaves. The two analogy’s are compatible. One does not refute the other, they are analogy’s. Extortion rackets and slavery share the same fundamental principles. They both fundamentally revolve around violence and coercion.

32

how you tried to correct me on the differences of possession and ownership

I have not conflated them, and you obviously missed the point of my correction to your statements. I said that possession and property are control of a thing, which is not the same as a recognized claim to a thing. The latter may form part of the reason for the former, but property always was, is and will be the ability to exercise control over a given scarce resource; not some abstract ‘right’ thereof.

Indentured servitude is not the same as slavery. If you enter into the contract voluntarily it’s not slavery. Slavery implies the use of coercion.

All society implies the use of coercion, contract-and-property models no less than naked despotisms or welfare-states. If you want to define it so that indentured servitude is not called slavery, then you are free to do so, but my point remains: the difference is in how you get there, not the relationship itself.

Yes and I could just turn around and say that a slave owner is still just an extortion racket, extorting the fruits of the labor of slaves

Except that slavery implies ownership of persons, and extortion does not.

They both fundamentally revolve around violence and coercion.

All social order does.

33

You are correct that the term property does not originate from rights(Claims to action) but from other things. I’ll address a more formal definition of property in another post. For now this is going in circles, and I am not sure if you even have a clear argument here. For I still have yet to understand what you’ve been arguing all this time. Essentially what I’ve been trying to avoid saying is your Customary vs statutory law is a complete red herring and non-relevant.

Where does coercion come into play in voluntary exchange?

You cannot own a person, for reasons I described above. You must have missed that. Human’s are not lamps. Human’s must accept compliance, even if coerced, lamps do not.

In what way does all social order revolve around coercion? I am not saying that coercion can be eliminated. I am just making a distinction, unlike you, regarding institutions who’s principles are founded on violence, and institutions where that is not the case, like voluntary exchange(Markets).

Amazon Boobs, Ancient Gods and the End of Evil
34

I don’t necessarily believe in evil “forces” of a supernatural or biological origin, but I do think we have allowed society to be structured in such a manner that the hyper intelligent have organized humanity into these systems because frankly, we’re easier to control this way, and less likely to compete with them for a different and potentially more anarchic vision.

35

Where does coercion come into play in voluntary exchange?

Behind any delineation of property claims, torts and contract obligations stands force or the threat of force. The fact that I am exchanging with you, rather than just taking what I want, might simply be because of this implicit threat of coercion. There is no such thing as a ‘voluntary’ society, unless everyone is a practicing Jainist; in which case the utter inability to enforce and practice production and contracts would pretty well implode society.

You cannot own a person, for reasons I described above.

  1. You obviously can have a property claim on a person; 2) Most animals are also conscious, intentional beings who have to cooperate in some way if we want to use them for anything aside from food. Yet to say that we do not ‘own’ animals would be ridiculous, we obviously do exert a great deal of control over them, in addition to having a generally recognized claim over them.

In what way does all social order revolve around coercion?

Because if coercion didn’t exist there would be absolutely no strictures on potential actions and uses for various scarce factors. The willingness to use violence according to some particular plan (such as propertarianism) and to have this socially accepted is the only thing that makes your so-called ‘voluntary’ exchanges possible.

Voluntarism, like anti-authoritarianism and ‘equal rights’ is just a bunch of phoney-baloney BS that makes no logical sense and isn’t even consistent with liberal-propertarian social orders. Just accept that, yes, we want to impose our rules on other people and if they don’t like it they can leave or get shot. Stop pussy-footing around the brunt facts and trying to make yourself seem elevated to some special categorical realm.

Robinson Crusoe had property T/F (Property is a social institution? No)
36

Assertion. Just accept it. Assert facts. Ad hominem.

Great argumentation Edmund. Each incarnation gets more interesting.

37

It’s still non-sequitur to assume that all exchange revolves around compulsion. In the case of a contract violation, it is the violator who is aggressing. Making a collection on the contract can be see as defensive, furthermore it does not conclude that all exchange revolves around compulsion. It just proves that there are bad people in the world, and that there is an economic need for protection.

If I go to LS to trade my grain for his eggs, no compulsion was necessary. We came to terms voluntarily and agreed to them. If is fraudulent against me I may choose not to do business with him in the future.

It’s not clear that business’s need the threat of compulsion to stay honest. Consumer sovereignty in most cases is more then sufficient. Fear of loss, and desire for profits, generally serves well enough. If a businessman frequently is dishonest we don’t need a security firm to go give him a spanking. His business will dwindle on his own, and customers will use their coin elsewhere. The social medium will deal with him free of compulsion.

Another issue is that you make no distinction between entering a contract voluntarily, being aware of it’s conditions ahead of time, and being placed in a contract that you never gave consent to in the first place. In some cases a contract you may not even be aware of.

And as such you are stuck with the dillemma of comparing a human being to a lamp. And forever begging the question of physical ownership when you verbally request your property to till the soil.

I do not make a verbal request to my cow to bear milk, nor of my hen to bear eggs. On the other hand a slave master must in some communicative fashion make requests of his slaves. Providing evidence that the true owner of the slave and his body is the slave itself(Otherwise why the verbal request?). The slave is simply voluntarily complying.

Whats more ridiculous is making verbal requests to your property, hoping it will comply. Thereby providing evidence that it was never your property to begin with. Do you make the same verbal requests to your lamp at home?

I never said “Coercion wouldn’t exist”. In fact I even specifically stated that this was not my position. I stated:

I asked you to explain how social order revolves around coercion. I am not taking a position that social order would not employ coercion and more accurately defense in most cases*.* I am asking how it revolves around coercion, coercion being the corner stone of social order. Please explain that.

The statement is logically fallacious. Your statement implies the existence of social norms before exchange could even occur. Such an argument at it’s face does not follow. If an exchange occured voluntarily, it doesn’t follow that any external social norms were required or even involved. The two parties agreed to the terms on their own. The exchange is possible without these social frameworks you keep speaking of. Did these these social norms exist prior to voluntary exchange or vise versa? Do you see the circularity? Such an assertion is patently false.

Well then you must be confused as to what “liberal” is. Certainly not libertarianism at any hand. I can honestly say that I don’t want to impose my rules on anyone. I just don’t want them to impose their rules on me. If you think that defense is logically the same as offense, then I would argue that you are mentally confused. And I mean no offense to that statement, it’s just that the two are different. Not the same.

You use awfully crude language, and your tone seems someone what condescending. So I must request, what facts are you referring to? Please no vagueties and non-specifics. You’ve provided much in the way rhetorical arguments involving objects of discussion which are non relevant, and your terms are non-specific which can mistakingly apply to a broad scope of things. I know it may not be the case but I have hard time discerning being vague with simply being evasive. I prefer a naked and honest conversation. If someone is being nakedly honest with their discussion, they can be blunt enough about it. There is no need to hide behind unnecessary complexities.

38

Do you think these hyper intelligent few think they are working in our best interest? Or do you think they are overtly aware that they are taking advantage of us?

39

In the case of a contract violation, it is the violator who is aggressing.

Because you arbitrarily define it that way. So what?

And as such you are stuck with the dillemma of comparing a human being to a lamp. And forever begging the question of physical ownership when you verbally request your property to till the soil.

The notion that sentience interferes with control (possession) is questionable, at best it might sometimes and other times not. It is a question of whether you can, in fact, control people. Threats which cause them to comply with your will is nonetheless control. Furthermore, in a sense of recognized claims, it is obviously possible to own human beings.

I do not make a verbal request to my cow to bear milk, nor of my hen to bear eggs.

You don’t talk at all to mutes or deaf people, so what? And, obviously, cows don’t understand English. It is, further, obvious that you have to use communication and alignment of incentives to get dogs to do things you want. This is basically irrelevant, like everything you write.

Whats more ridiculous is making verbal requests to your property, hoping it will comply.

Again, stupid nonsense. Some objects in the world are conscious, others are not. Naturally there will be differences between them. It’s stupid to try to carry a gallon of water in your bare hands, just as it is stupid to try to command a lamp to do anything. For objects which are conscious and understand language, the use of speech and incentives is quite a coherent method of dealing with them.

I am asking how it revolves around coercion, coercion being the corner stone of social order.

Because if you got rid of it you would never be able to decide property claims. As Hans Hoppe has pointed out, a person who does not resist even in principle has no property whatsoever. Coercion is not endemic, but it is absolutely requisite and implicit in all property exchanges and contracts.

If an exchange occured voluntarily, it doesn’t follow that any external social norms were required or even involved.

You’re totally missing the point, that it is only ‘voluntary’ insofar as we ignore the fact that I am too weak or afraid to just take what you have.

You use awfully crude language,

No, I didn’t, but now I will because you’re a God damn idiot. Pussy footing means moving stealthily and creeping about, like, you know, a cat.

Where do you get these people, Mises?

I prefer a naked and honest conversation.

No, you prefer people to accept your BS definitions and play into your semantic games, which I refuse to you. However, as you are worthless, I will not continue this discussion.

40

No because there is a generally accepted understanding between the initiation of force, and just simply force.

Then why the verbal request for compliance? In all cases you have ignored my argument.

But I can communicate with deaf and mutes. A poor response.

Why are you asking permission of your property, to comply? If it is indeed your property?

So you think that it’s human nature to pillage and thieve between one another, but that it is by some benevolent over-arching hegemonic firm which ensures we don’t do that? That if LS and I approached each other on an island alone, rather then trading with each other we’d be at each others throats trying to kill one another? If I tried his corn, for my wheat. There wouldn’t be an understanding there?

How did voluntary exchange exist before a state then?

Is this one of those assertions your trying to coin as fact?

To the contrary your missing my point, completely. I recognie the fact that there are weak people, and predators who will take advantage of them. I also recognize however that most people are able to socially cooperate without trying threatening one another. You seem to disagree.

I have repeatedly asked you to explain how the whole of society completely revolves around hostility, and violence. All you can provide is the occasional requirement of personal defense. You ignore social ostracization and other more historically less combative technique’s. And you ignore that it’s the general nature of man to cooperate, not threaten.

You treat business and exchange as some kind of hostile game, where each party is desperately trying to take advantage of the next.

Wow ok. I laughed.

This made me lulz also. What is the purpose of continuing a discussion if you cannot come to terms on key definitions? Would you prefer that we continue the discussion, each of us having our own definitions kept to ourselves, talking past one another? Much like what your trying to do to me?

And by what criteria or metric do I become classified as an idiot? Can you explain that in further detail? Am I an idiot because I want to reconcile key definitions and terms before I continue? You don’t see the value in that?