The Question of Choice...HELP!

Economics Political Theory
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I keep getting in debates with my philosophy teacher who comes from a sympathic background to Marx, Beavoir, and Hegel.

The main question she has for me is that of ‘choice’. I argue that poor people have the choice between a terrible job in a sweat shop, prostitution, and poverty, since they are in the sweat shop (given there is no coercion preventing them from quitting) it demonstrates that they prefer that choice to the others.

But she objects that there is coercion outside of the idea of physical force. I don’t know how to articulate the Austro-libertarian position very well.

Help would be awesome.

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Maybe this will help:

https://smilingdavesblog.wordpress.com/2013/01/09/so-called-wage-slavery/

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On wage slavery: A complete rebuttal

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Coercion doesn’t make sense out of some socially defined minimal standard that qualifies as “coercion”. I don’t see anything else the occurs within the capitalist society as “coercion”. Even if you’re a fool and you define depriving the laborer the full enjoyment of his produce as “coercion”, I don’t see how this is worse than threatening to kill someone if you don’t give them your money.

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Why in sam hell is a Philo prof debating her students? That’s insane. ANd why in Sam Hell is shee even allowing the premise of this argument to take place: you are obviously closer to talking about what the nature of coercsion, it’s scope, and context is. If she allows this “debate” to occur it will obviously be nonsense. that’s insane. It may even be a form of propaganda. Maybe it’s Marxian “praxis-logic” techniques. Whoever says Marx and Marxism is dead is liar.

Anyway throw Her Mises Socialism, tell her to get over it, it’s been uncontroversially over for 80 yrs for anyone outside of the humanities - academics department. And if she likes Hegel-Marx throw her a copy of The Ego and It’s Own and call yourself a “Petite Bourgoise” (which was essentially Marx’s,umm… “argument”, of the book), walk out, and see if you can get your money back for taking a worthless class, because you’ve been duped.

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Wow vive la, tell us what you rally think, stop holding back.

Kaasproav,

You did not say what the question about “choice” or “coercion” was exactly, but in my experience Marxists believe employment is exploitation by definition. That is why they think coercion is involved. They do not believe that in a free market a voluntary exchange benefits both parties equally.

Once she acknowledges that, the other arguments of choice may make sense. If she does not acknowledge that, nothing else you say will make sense to her.

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I’d just like to throw out there that the outrage and the charge of coercion does make sense from a Marxist standpoint. I’ve often considered this (although I don’t at all agree with it) that one could theoretically take Rothbardianism to the letter, redefine property to fit the LTV, and you end up at some form of socialism. If you’re a Marxist then you believe that it is only labor that creates value, and therefore all ownership is caused by production itself. Because it is the laborers who really produce the produce, then, it is their property, not the property of the greedy capitalists who only attain the produced goods through aggressive cultural norms that would brand the rightful owners of the property as thieves if they tried to retrieve their property.

This is the points that Marxists should really be stressing, in combination with their notion of wage slavery, if they hope to attract any libertarian converts. Still, it’s always struck me how absurdly leftist, that is to say emotional and wishful, the concept of “wage slavery” really is. This is also one of the few cases where I go full Randian my outrage surrounding an issue.

Vive,

“Whoever says Marx and Marxism is dead is liar.”

What do you mean by this? I feel like sociology and some political science still borrow from Marx, but by and large and especially in economics Marx is long dead. Marxism hasn’t contributed a single iota of substance to mainstream economics. With that said, I have seen a disturbing rise in directly Marxist rhetoric with things like OWS, but this is far outweighed by the rise in libertarianism with Ron Paul and the like which is currently sweeping our generation. I’ve rarely ever met a real Marxist, only those who speak of Marxism and use the philosopher’s terms. He’s far too incoherent an economist, both in his writing style and in the things that he wrote, to ever develop a real mass following. The strength and superficial simplicity of his vision however… That has yet to be seen.

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that is to say emotional and wishful, the concept of “wage slavery” really is

I usually don’t see it as emotional, but as a sly power play by and for certain people who have power- I have 0 sympathy for people who use that term, and it is usually one of those times where I want to do what Mencken said: rub my hands together, hoist the black flag, and start slitting throats.

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So let me get this straight. If we assume enough false premises to be true, we could eventually justify a political theory? What a big win for Marxists…

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I actually do not think its “aggression” in a strict libertarian sense if the only people harmed or killed are/were communists.

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“What a big win for Marxists…”

Pretty much

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we could eventually justify a political theory

This is a major aspect of Marxism (and a lot of other forms of socialism)- the “theory is the praxis”. One may even go so far as to say Marxism is almost nothing but some foundational political theory to seize power and let loose people’s socialistic urges.

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“Marxism is almost nothing but some foundational political theory to seize power and let loose people’s socialistic urges.”

yup

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I just meant as an institution - and you see fairly “mainstream” people on news and politics (mostly not in the US obviously) advocating for Maxist economic policy by name - that’s all I meant.

Though, was actual Marxism ever mainstream in Academic economic circles? It seems to me when Marxism was big, there were simply widely accepted “Economic schools” floating around with varying degrees of influence, and even there I’m not so sure where Marxism would ran among actual academia.

The damn thing will not die, no matter how one refutes it, or how obviously stupid it’s outcomes are

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people who advocate marxism arent interested in truth, they just want to convince other people to change so that they (the marxists) can steal things and get away with it.

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This debate is generally between two groups of naive middle class first world white kids talking out of their asses of realities so complex and so far removed from their day to day lives they can barely fathom.

The “libertarians” who think sweatshop operators do not have mob enforcers threatening their families, loan sharks, drug dealers and other shady businesses effectively coercing their third world employees to work for them, and the “socialists” who think more government or NGO intervention can help about that.

When the reality is that in underdeveloped societies, raw violence is one the cheapest and most effective ways available to mobilize a productive workforce. Violence is one of that basic common denominators everybody from every miserably backwards culture understands. The others are food and sex.

That’s the reality at the ground level in many places in Africa, Latin America, Eastern Europe and Asia, as well as in some gethos and inner cities in North America and Western Europe, but that’s not politically correct to assume among civilized peoples.

Coercion is organized and commoditized violence.

And coercion will exist in either “capitalism” or in “socialism”, as long as it is a comparatively effective way of getting things done.

Slavery can be run or be subsidised by a government-size operation or by small private slavedrivers. It’s only a matter of economies of scale.

You can fool yourselves into thinking that as long as there is coercion, there’s no capitalism or free market or whatever is your ideal.

But then it only shows how unpractical and unrealistic are your basic notions about the world.

In the end, it’s less a matter of political beliefs and ideologies, and more a matter of practical costs. And sometimes, it’s cheaper to strike good deals by breaking a few legs or getting some serious ball busters whacked than by talking and being all civilized and offering options and alternatives.

Anybody with business/political interests in third world troubled regions knows that. But of course, naive middle class first world overfed white kids cannot even come close to understand it.

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Coercion outside of the idea of physical force. Sure: the threat of force. I don’t think many people have had cops bust into their homes and physically force money from them, right? Are we any less coerced, though? Is a victim any less coerced in any of these situations?: 1) Someone calls and threatens to kill Jim unless Jim gives him $5.00 or 2) Someone approaches Jim pointing a gun at him and threatens to kill him unless Jim hands over $5.00. Even in the case of gunpoint, nobody is physically forcing money from Jim, but the coercion exists nonetheless in the form of the fear of physical violence.

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You have it all wrong, Toxic.

And your atitude. Oh my!

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Kaasproav

interesting topic

you are right that staying in the sweat shop demonstrates that they prefer the sweat shop to their other alternatives, but i’m not sure what moral weight that carries. if you put a gun to my head and tell me to either poop or die, i will eat poop (yah i said poop). i have demonstrated that i prefer eating poop to dying, but does that tell us anything about whether you holding a gun to my head was “right” or “wrong”?

that isn’t to say that this example is directly analogous to what you’re talking about, i’m just saying i understand why your professor would want you to start connecting the dots to get from “this is (or is not) coercion” to “this is (or is not) wrong”.

it looks like other people are weighing in on the steps you could follow to connect those dots. i don’t have any answers to the quesiton personally, but i would recommend checking out the entry on coercion in the standford philosophy encylopedia on the subject. there are references to tons of good readings there.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/coercion/

personally, i think the more you read about the topic, the more frustrated you will get it. at least that was my experience with the topic when i wrestled with it. i could never really figure out how to sort out which acts were coercive let alone which acts were coercive and wrong. so i didn’t find it a useful concept. but that’s just me. Maybe you’ll have better luck.

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that isn’t to say that this example is directly analogous to what you’re talking about, i’m just saying i understand why your professor would want you to start connecting the dots to get from “this is (or is not) coercion” to “this is (or is not) wrong”.

Student,

The way the OP has set this up it seems like a complete “armchair” discussion - where one is a Philo prof who has opposing political views to her 101 philo student and is debating him (which is insane) in a contextless void. If that is the case, the teacher is wrong and the OP is wasting his time.

If I’m right, I think it may be best how to give the OP tips on how to cut his losses and minimalize damage on bad undergrad classes.