Then please explain why you shouldn’t be considered an idiot for using a term like “anarcho-capitalist-primativist”.
Non sequitur. Nonsense.
RD, I wouldn’t expect much to come out of this. Keep in mind this user has a very clearly defined MO.
Would I be allowed to stay in “civ” in your AnCapPrim or coercively relocated into the wilderness?
Thanks for the heads up James. =)
Would I be allowed to stay in “civ” in your AnCapPrim or coercively relocated into the wilderness?
Yes you can stay but I don’t see why you’d want to after civ collapses.
I am anarcho-capitlalist-propertarian-leftist-mutual-primitivist! Checkmate!
No, I did not say any of that. I believe the state leads us to live with a dependence upon technology that would not otherwise be affordable without the state. You may not agree with my predction but that disagreement is irrelevent. We can at least agree that space exploration would disappear, right? It might resurface at later date but initially, we can agree that such technolgy is currenty ONLY affordable by the state.
I never said anything about one state of affairs being better than an other. However, since you brought that up, yes, I believe a more primitivist society is better if it means more freedom.
I answered that. Why are you asking questions that were clearly pre-empted inside my original post?
I clearly offered the modern transportation industry as an example. Everybody – anarchist or otherwise – can see quite clearly that the state subsidizes the transportation industry and it does so with preferential treatement – i.e., some sectors get sbsidies while other sectors are crowded out. That would be gone without the state as it should.
All I am saying is that our economic behavior would be different without the state and it is my belief that we would have a lot less gadgets. Certainly all of the cheap junk I get from Asia would be gone and that would probably account for 99% of the products I consume on a daly basis. Like I said, it sucks but that is the price of freedom. I think it is a good price.
How in the world is “we are dependent on technology that would not be affordable without the state” different from “the state provides more benefit than the costs it imposes on everyone”?
…Unless you want to argue that more advanced, productive, efficient technology is not a benefit. But in that case we wouldn’t exactly be “dependent” on it, would we.
Right. I don’t care about your prediction because it’s built upon a faulty premise. Since your premise is wrong, obviously your prediction would likely be wrong.
We’re dependent on space exploration?
You said it “would be technologically regressed” and that that “sucks”. Call me crazy, but that sounds like you’re saying one thing is better than another.
So I was right…you’re an anarchist not just on moral grounds alone, but also in spite of a personal belief that in a utilitarian sense it makes you worse off.
That makes absolutely no sense. I’m still just baffled at the idea of someone actually being acquainted with Austrian theory and still being under the assumption that an industry people are “dependent” on would not exist unless people were forced to contribute money to it.
How you can come to the conclusion that the world would be less weathly when faced with less intervention and coercion constantly interfering with the market process is again just baffling.
The problem arises when someone or some group feels the need to control society.
– because I believe we – by that I mean, the people in the affluent West – are beneficiaries of slave labor from the third world.
No, it is not. Slave labor gives us cheap oil and gadgets.
I just threw one obvious example upon which I bet we can agree. That example combines state-cronyism and advanced technology.
Now that we are in agreement that there will be technology that will disappear, I will leave it to you to connect the dots with other aspects of the economy.
You are not crazy. Rather, you fail to look outside of the box.
It would suck for me because I would no longer be the recipient of a free-lunch of cheap oil and cheap gadgets. There goes my car! I will be walking to and from work for now on. Yeah, it would suck… for me. However, it would not suck for all of the slaves who would be liberated in third world countries. They will win. I will lose. Too bad. That is the price of freedom.
By the way, Ben Bernanke’s secretary would be out of a job. She would no longer get a free iPhone from work. That would suck… for her, right???
No, it will make me better off because it will restore my faith in humanity and I will be confident that my children or grand-children will live in a much more honorable world than I did.
— because I live in a city filled with silly civil servants who spend money frivolously.
More than half of my clients are civil servants. All of the shops downtown depend on civil servants.
The computer I am using right now is only two years old. Guess where I got it? The civil servants voted to get new computers. They got their new computers. They auctioned off all of their other computers for dirt cheap prices. I am the beneficiary of the state whether I like it or not.
Whithout the state, the vast majority of computer purchases in my city would disappear – as they should.
The entire history of technological research of the modern world was subsidized by tax-payers AND RE-DIRECTED from other uses by the state.
Unlike you, I do not look at the possession of a gadget and automatically assume that inherently leads to an increase in welfare. I look at how that gadget came to the market.
Please define “slave labor” and explain how without it oil would not be cheap and gadgets would not exist.
That does absolutely nothing to prove what you are asserting. You said we are dependent on things that would not exist without a state. And the only example you gave is something we are in no way dependent upon. Please try again.
So this is your example? Automobiles would not exist, (and apparently walking would be the only mode of transport) if not for the state. This is your contention?
Working for Ben Bernanke is not the only way to have an iPhone provided free of charge by your employer. Trust me.
So I was right…you’re an anarchist not just on moral grounds alone and a personal belief in honor, but also in spite of a personal belief that in a utilitarian sense it makes you worse off.
What does any of that have to do with what is being discussed? We’re talking about the notion that an industry people are “dependent” on would not exist unless people were forced to contribute money to it, and all you can say is “look, if it weren’t for the state, these civil servants wouldn’t have income to spend frivolously at these shops, which would put them out of business.”
a) If it’s frivoulous spending, how is anyone dependent on it?
b) you’re seriously contending that if these civil servants didn’t have the state to employ them, they wouldn’t have any income? Seriously?
What does that have to do with your assumption that if you remove intervention and coercion in the market constantly interfering with the market process, the world will actually be less productive? Please explain that.
This is how we get it now.
In a free market, I bet prices of oil would be higher since the cost of labor would have to go up. I can not imagine people willfully submitting to slave labor as it is practiced now.
If we can not agree on the above, I see no reason to carry on the discussion further.
So just to be clear,
-
that article describes what you mean when you say “slave labor”
-
you believe that “slave labor” makes the world more productive and efficient
-
without intervention and coercion in the market constantly interfering with the market process, the world will actually be less innovative and productive
Is this accurate?
-
correct
-
incorrect. I expect the cost of oil to go up if all of the slave labor that produces oil is eliminated. Cheap oil is used in virtually all of the global economy at the very least, it is used to transport stuff to and from third world countries. Hence, the price of commerce will go up. Everything will go up.
-
poorly phrased but close enough. I think people will tend to rely less on transportation – from this, derives my prediction that there will be less access to technology. At the very least, I am convinced that all of the nonsense research that is subsidized by governments (directly in government agencies and in public schools) will stop.
So, we can agree that at the very least, research in space exploration will stop. I think that will not be the only thing that disappears.
I’m still waiting on specifics. You have yet to name one thing we are “dependent” on that will not exist without a state forcing it into existence.
I believe the state leads us to live with a dependence upon technology that would not otherwise be affordable without the state
I don’t think the problem may be this large, but I am currently thinking that government may have at least initially created an over-investment in railroad infrastructure which has been the mother of the entitlement mentality - a company begins to do something useful, the government subsidizes it so that “everyone can have it,” and now everyone expects it as a birthright. I am not sure that this bubble in transportation exists anymore, though.
Everybody – anarchist or otherwise – can see quite clearly that the state subsidizes the transportation industry and it does so with preferential treatement – i.e., some sectors get sbsidies while other sectors are crowded out. That would be gone without the state as it should.
As would old-age pension, police force, army, consumer protection, education, firefighters, and all other things the government provides. Right? Wrong. Simply because the government is currently providing them, it doesn’t mean that the free market won’t be. I personally find roads quite nice, so I would surely support them even without government.
Certainly all of the cheap junk I get from Asia would be gone
You mean that you would actually have more of it because there would be no tariffs and you would keep more of your income?
We can at least agree that space exploration would disappear, right?
the people in the affluent West – are beneficiaries of slave labor from the third world
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I had the impression that food and cotton prices didn’t skyrocket when slavery in the US was abolished. Right? Or is that because we now rely on foreign slaves?
Whithout the state, the vast majority of computer purchases in my city would disappear – as they should.
Imagine what you could do without all of that wasted city money.
prices of oil would be higher
Don’t forget about the 23% embedded tax in goods these days (the hidden payroll, income, and corporate taxes). And that excludes expensive regulation. Furthermore, with all of this antitrust regulation, we operate well below efficient levels.
Cheap oil is used in virtually all of the global economy at the very least, it is used to transport stuff to and from third world countries. Hence, the price of commerce will go up. Everything will go up.
Perfect time for new energy sources. Plus, I think that we currently have embargoes against oil exporting nations, right?
There’s so much wrong here I don’t know where to start.
To the guy who’s a real life version of Dale Gribble, you should probably read about actual tribes and “hunter-gatherers” and not from an elementary school text book. Civilization is collectivist? Probably, and if that’s the case so is culture and religion, and a sense of national identity, but does that mean it’s negative? No. Without civilization or a heirarchical structure you probably wouldn’t be sitting at a computer right now.
As far as I know about the Germanic tribes of NW Europe from around 100 B.C. to 1,000 C.E., they were tribes, yes, and they had social structures and forms of law and government with chieftains and kings. Maybe you should read this.
To Charles Anthony, let’s say the state and it’s corruption is removed from countries, such as 3rd world countries, and all land ownership handed over to it’s native people with complete control and no coercion from 1st world countries, what would happen? When you look at something like US businesses going into Africa trying to get minerals to be used in electronics while there’s child warfare going on there’s a lot of risk investment. What do we know about prices and scarcity of resources? If or when prices go up those resources will be allocated to their most beneficial sector of industry by demand of consumers. Would prices go up? Maybe, but that’s subjective and we can’t determine that.
If you take government completely out the equation you take out the taxes as well as the regulations and coercion and the unseen acts of various corporations using labor from 3rd world countries who are held in place with laws and bribes.
You’re defining capitalism very broadly or at least using a very muddy definition. Explicitly, capitalism implies private ownership of the means of production and the production of goods and services for profit. These ideas by themselves do not require all actions to be voluntary.
The idea that tribalist societies were “Capitalist” is curious. During that period capital and infrastructure were minimal, so ownership of such things were likely rare. I don’t know much about pre-civilization history, but it seems unlikely there would have been any measurable capital goods market and even more unlikely that there would have been a labor market. Calling this type of economy “Capitalist” is pretty strange.
I laughed out loud.
Isn’t all ownership inherently private (i.e. restricted in some sense)? Or are you using the word “private” here to mean the same thing as “individual”?
The capital of tribal societies mainly consisted of land, buildings, crops, livestock, and tools.
Apparently even the Sumerians were acquainted with wage labor.