poli-sci@ucbvax.ARPA (07/30/85)
From: JoSH <JoSH@RUTGERS.ARPA>
Poli-Sci Digest Tue 30 July 85 Volume 5 Number 31
[Greetings, I am back from vacation...]
Contents: What is money?
Taxes
Crime and Technology
New mailing list
Computers- Mfg's responsibilities
Welfare
Multicolored flame
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Date: 10 Jul 1985 5:46-PDT
From: knapp%usc-cseb%usc-cse.csnet@csnet-relay.arpa
Subject: what is money?
[This is either crazy, or money-worship. Unless you are Scrooge McDuck,
money isn't desireable for its own sake alone, to lounge in a pile of;
it is only of use to spend. The idea that someone saving his money
is avoiding a sales tax assumes that the saver somehow gets value for
his money without spending it. But that's loopy--whether you put
your money in a bank, or stuff it in a mattress, it is of no use to you--
in real terms, as if you didn't get it at all-- *until you spend it
on a good or service*. At which point you pay the tax. So I claim
that a sales tax is perfectly flat. If you are of a mind to help the
poor, merely exempt food, clothing, and shelter from the tax. --JoSH]
What? My name is by no means McDuck, but I certainly would like to spend
less of my life working for the Govt. than I do. See, if I had a great pile
of money to lounge upon, I would invest it. At that point, my income
would not cost me any time to earn; hence any tax I paid the Govt would
cost me no time. On the other hand a poor man paying the same tax
on his living expenses (I live cheap) would have to work for the money
he paid the Govt; i.e. the Govt is claiming (what, about 10%?) of
his *life*, where I am paying nil because of my capital. Moreover,
any money I work for is diluted by return on investment. Isn't that
regressive?
David
[No, because *exactly* the same argument may be made with respect to
our current "progressive" income tax -- the working stiff is still
paying out of his labor and you are paying from income that costs
you no time to earn. --JoSH]
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Date: Tue, 9 Jul 85 11:16:01 edt
From: <ihnp4!watmath!looking!brad@Berkeley>
Subject: The proper forms of tax are property tax and inflation
The (free-enterprise) view of the proper form of government states
that governments should only provide police, courts and military.
I pretty much concur.
It seems to me you should pay for what you get with taxation. If the
government does only the above, the service it provides is protection, and
the amount of service you receive will be proportional to your property.
In many way it's like a security service. Any security service charges
more to protect more valuable property.
Of course, there is the problem of having to reveal how much you own.
I suggest you be allowed to claim any amount. If you claim low, however,
just like insurance, your propertly will no longer be protected, and when
you attempt to claim redress in the courts you must permit an assesment
of your property. If you are low, you lose, perhaps proportionally to
how low you were.
Mind you, I am not sure how this works.
For liquid assets, there's an easier way to tax that is 100% accurate
and doesn't require any revalation of your assets. This is (gasp) inflation.
Inflation costs something in paperwork, of course, but this is going to
be fixed by an EFT based economy. On the side, inflation as a tax
(as long as it is kept within bounds) stimulats the economy by punishing
people who take money out of circulation. You must invest to keep your
money away from the tax man. And the tax man doesn't mind if you keep it
away, because later there will be more and they will get their part.
A sales tax discourages commerce, so I don't like it. It's just like an
import duty.
There is one interesting selling tactic for the above, which is not to
say I think it is a justification. It does tax the rich more than the poor,
so the socialists will be more willing to accept it.
Brad Templeton, Looking Glass Software Ltd. - Waterloo, Ontario 519/884-7473
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Date: Thu, 11 Jul 1985 11:24 EDT
From: Dean Sutherland <Sutherland@TL-20A.ARPA>
Subject: Lowry on taxes in Japan...
Remember, however, that the long term capital gains tax in Japan is ZERO%!!!!!
They (quite sensibly) don't tax capital gains AT ALL!
Dean F. Sutherland <sutherland@tartan>
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Date: Mon, 15 Jul 85 00:57:33 cdt
From: Laurence Leff <leff%smu.csnet@csnet-relay.arpa>
Crime and Technology
The two major problems in our criminal justice system are the patrol
function and what do with criminals once arrested or convicted. A major
source of crime is the fact that any given time most of the streets are not
in sight of a police officer. Thus in most cases a crime is not followed by
an arrest. A cost-effective solution is putting a movable camera on every
corner and pipe the input into the police station. Once a criminal is
arrested or convicted, the question is what to do with him/her. Currently,
it costs $6,000 to $20,000/year to keep a prisoner in jail and construction
costs for new jail cells now reach $100,000 per prisoner. Using "electronic
"handcuffs", we can reduce these costs markedly. There have been no
technological innovations in either patrol of streets (with the exception of
the walky-talky and patrol car) nor in jails for centuries. If we are to
solve the crime problem as opposed to reducing it by a few per cent, we need
to use some modern technology.
If we could put somehow put a cop on every corner, street crime would go way
down if not disappear. This has been tried on an experimental basis in one
neighborhood. In addition, during the transit strike in New York City where
police officers were put on many corners to direct traffic, crime dropped
substantially. Unfortunately, the cost of such a solution is over 24,000
dollars per corner per year even assuming that police officers make minimum
wage and never take time off to go to meals, etc. However, a camera can be
put up and connected via a cable television system in reverse for about
$6,000 per corner (on a one time cost). This camera would have remote
controlled rotation and could see a block each way up and down the two
streets meeting at the corner. One person at the police station can observe
30 TV screens simultaneously looking for crime. If the input from the
cameras is preprocessed to eliminate those streets where there is no motion
(i. e. where there are no people or cars moving) then a person can observe
even more TV screens. I have calculated the cost of putting a camera on
every corner would be comparable to one years expenditures for police
protection in a city. The cost to monitor the camera would be about
$500/year per corner. Considering that there are at least 50 families on a
given block of a street, we are talking a per family cost of $10.00 year for
almost total protection against any street crime.
The camera systems can be used to track a fleeing criminal (in a car
or by foot) through the streets until a patrol car can catch up with them.
They also can be used to observe whether there are people parked at
fire hydrants/etc. to make traffic law enforcement easier and to look
for fires or other emergency situations.
One technique that can be used to incarcerate criminals are so called
"electronic handcuffs." These have already been used to put non-violent
criminals under house-arrest in New Mexico. In these cases, a criminal
had a device with a transmitter strapped to his leg. A receiver was
put in his apartment which was connected to the phone system. If the
criminal left the area, the sheriffs office would be notified and
the person picked up and put in a real jail.
For those criminals who are violent, a slightly different technique can be
used. A transmitter can be placed in the center of a 200 foot radius
circle. A receiver would be put around the criminals neck. If the receiver
got further than 100 feet from the transmitter, it would start buzzing to
alert the criminal that he was getting too far. By 200 feet, the device
would activate an explosive charge killing the criminal. Food, clothing,
etc. could be dropped in by helicopter on a regular basis. Sufficient land
to handle a large population can be easily found in the badlands of South
Dakota or the Arizona desert. (Note under Texas law an escaping convict can
be shot even if there are other ways to stop him. The system being proposed
is an automatic way of doing the same thing.)
Technology has eliminated such dangers as tuberculosis and polio to the
point where they are no longer even talked about by the general populus. In
the 1920's, parents were worried about their kids contracting tuberculosis
and in the 1950's polio was the big fear. In the 1980's, parents worry
about their children getting mugged, raped or murdered on the streets.
Technology can eliminate this fear as well!
Quarantine for Criminals
Our current legal system is designed to punish those individuals who
can be proved guilty of a specific crime. Unfortunately, there are many
cases where someone is judged likely to have committed a crime and
will also probably commit additional crimes if not somehow controlled.
For example, a women may identify a person as a rapist but did not
have the necessary medical tests done afterwards or a person
may have been apprehended in the vicinity of a robbery more than once
but for some reason the victim can't or won't identify the person.
Clearly the probable perpetrator can't be punished since it is not possible
to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that they have committed any crime.
However, it is extremely dangerous to allow them to roam the streets where
they will probably continue to terrorize, rape, injure or murder.
What I propose is a form of quarantine. The probable perpetrator should be
required to remain in a defined place (of their own choosing). This can be
their place of employment (with the aid of a mobile home), their home,
or special areas set up for such purposes by public and private agencies.
This can be enforced by mounting a transmitter on their persons with
a receiver in the center of their chosen location. This form of
"electronic handcuffs" has already been used to punish people by
putting them under house arrest in New Mexico.
Of course, many would view this as "unconstitutional" and a violation
of a possibly innocent person's rights. I thus appeal to the
precedent of the old quarantine and isolation laws used when communicable
diseases and epidemics were a problem. When a contagious disease
was found on a ship, the ship would be required to remain in dock for
fourty days and all people would be confined to the ship. Note that the
people involved are being confined against their will, there was no
hearing and even those who did not have the disease (but may be
carriers) were "punished." Isolation refers to laws where a person
suffering from a communicable disease and those who had close personal
contact would be required to remain in their homes until the disease
(or incubation period) had passed. Note that some people would be
confined to their homes even if there was no evidence that they actually had
the disease in question.
In some cases, other methods could be used to prevent reoccurences. A
transmitter could be set attached to the criminal with his location being
tracked at all times. If a crime was to occur in the vicinity of where the
criminal was, further restrictive actions or criminal prosecution could
occur. For many criminals, simply knowing that the police always knew
exactly where they were would serve as a sufficient deterrent. If nothing
else, at least the person would not be able to commit hundreds of
additional crimes before something was done as is currently the case.
Some specific crimes could be treated with various physiologic methods.
Possible heroin addicts could be required to have naloxone implanted in their
bodies (which would neutralize the effects of any heroin they might take) or
have daily urine tests. Drunk drivers might have a biosensor for alcohol
implanted that would prevent them from consuming alcohol. Depo-provera
(a chemical that eliminates sex drive) could be used for possible rapists.
In these cases, the potential criminal would have an opportunity to choose
the previous methods. These techniques would be opportunities for a person
who knows he has trouble controlling himself a chance to get help in doing so
so as to avoid later criminal prosecution because of these problems.
In order to prevent the government from using these laws as tools to repress
political dissidents, etc., a jury similar to a grand jury should be
required to determine
a) that there was probable reason to believe that the person involved has
committed a crime in the past (with the same standard of proof necessary
to indict a person for the crime)
b) the danger to society of having the person commit further crimes
outweighs the loss of the persons' freedoms
c) the action suggested is the minimum necessary to reduce the probability
of further crimes to a reasonable level.
We have an epidemic of crime which is causing as much fear as communicable
diseases did in the 1800s. Methods analagous to quarantine and isolation
are clearly appropriate for dealing with it.
------------------------------
Date: 17 Jul 85 03:36:49 EDT
From: *Hobbit* <AWalker@RUTGERS.ARPA>
Subject: New Mailing List
After some footwork, the Security mailing list has been created. Its incoming
address is Security@Rutgers, and is moderated by me. The incoming stuff is
not digestified, but it is filtered to keep things of questionable legality/
content from escaping out to the network. This list supports the standard
Arpanet -request address convention as well.
Knowledge of locks and things generally runs fairly high among hackers, as I'm
sure most of us know. Part of the security business is that there must be
some people knowledgeable enough to defeat and subsequently repair security
devices in the event of problems. Unfortunately there are also those who
posess this knowledge and use it to commit crimes. And there is a third
category, the hackers. These are the people who often tread a thin edge
between crime and knowledge. Because of this, the discussion of security
is often a ticklish issue.
Unfortunately the word ''hacker'' has been misused by the media and now is
shrouded in a criminal context in minds everywhere. There are quite often
hackers who started out as ''crackers'' in high school, perhaps, or fell in
with a bunch of destructive types but eventually learned that Hacking is a
lot more fun than Cracking, involves the same sort of cleverness, and is
legal to boot. It is this kind of hacking that this list deals with, in the
field of security in general, be it electronic, physical, or computer-related.
Therefore, this list is designed to provide a forum for discussion of any and
all security topics. Since the original idea was to name this list
Locksmiths@Rutgers, discussions about physical security and hardware are
welcomed, but to broaden out into computer security and electronic access
control and such is also valid. In other words, any subject matter relating
to the *improvement* and *implementation* of security systems is okay, while
how to *defeat* them is not.
A good example is the already well-established list called Telecom, which is
devoted to the discussion of telephone networks, hardware, and company
happenings. It is not a phreak bboard where everyone calls in and leaves MCI
access numbers and such. There are many other things that one can discuss
about the telephone network that has no relation to toll fraud at all, like
ESS internals, what LATAs are, and new products on the market. The same idea
applies to the security business. Articles containing information like ''How
to trivially open Kwikset locksets'' could be used for criminal purposes and
would not be forwarded to the list, but info about how to take them apart and
fix them is legitimately useful and would not really be questioned. It is
hoped that the list will collect some legal wizards who can help the rest
of us determine just where those fine lines lie, so that we can host some
deeply technical discussions without violating the law or common sense.
At any rate, it's off and rolling. Please forward questions and such
about the list itself [additions, bugs, etc] to SECURITY-REQUEST@RUTGERS.
_H*
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 15 Jul 85 15:14:47 pdt
From: sonia@aids-unix (Sonia Schwartzberg)
Subject: Computers and Better Business
I don't know if this is the proper place to put this sort of query, but
I believe there are social indications here as well, so...
What sort of recourse does a private citizen have when a computer
company takes a computer in for "cosmetic" repairs (changing a
face-plate) and then -- as a by-product of trying to fix something else
that they inadvertantly broke -- erases the citizen's data?
I have gone to the Better Business Bureau and their response was that
since the data was lost, there was nothing that could be "fixed" or
refunded. I wrote the company a letter, asking for compensation for the
time lost restoring the data, and they ignored me. Since all I had was
the salesman's word that no harm would come to the data, it appears to
be my word against his. If I tell too many friends that this company
acted irresponsibly, I may have a case brought against me for slander,
even if I tell the truth, since I have no written evidence of what
happened.
What does this imply about the consumer society? Must I get in writing,
prior to any kind of service, a guarentee that the company will act
responsibly or provide compensation? Is data simply not considered of
value, so that when it is accidentily lost it's just too bad? Should I
have recorded the conversations I had with the salesman?
What can I do, or -- if nothing -- what should I have done? Anyone?
S.Schwartzberg arpa: sonia@aids-unix
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Date: Saturday, 27 July 1985 00:30:53 EDT
From: Hank.Walker@cmu-cs-unh.arpa
Subject: where welfare goes
A while back, someone claimed that $10,000 to $15,000 was spent for each
person on welfare, with much of this money going to bureaucracy. The
following shows that spending per FAMILY might be this much, but there's no
way that spending per person could be this much.
The 7/26 New York Times had an article on making two-parent welfare
mandatory. The article also stated that the next year spending estimates
for welfare are $8.7B federal and $7.6B state for 10.7M people in 3.7M
families. That comes to $1523/person, $4405/family. The federal money is
basically Aid to Families with Dependent Children. Medicaid, Food Stamps,
and housing subsidies are not included.
Over the past 6 years, I have averaged about $1200/year in medical costs
($5000 of that in one operation last year). Given that my insurance premium
is $300, and I spend another $100 on dentists and doctors, I'll assume that
the real long-term average is $400/year. People don't eat much more than
$1000/year of food. Housing subsidies almost surely do not exceed
$5000/family. Given that, I don't see how the total welfare spending can
exceed $13,500/family.
Note also that I am not considering the considerable funds spent on welfare
programs for people just above the poverty line.
------------------------------
Date: 28 Jul 1985 05:05:59 PDT
Subject: Flame
From: Roger Lewis <RLEWIS@USC-ISIB.ARPA>
I was rather surprised to see no reply to your hostage questions.
We should not give in to terrorists, and we should not allow hostage
situations to drag out into lengthy media spectacles. If the "authorities"
in an area refused to acknowledge the rights of hostages and handled hostage
situations as if the hostages weren't even present, we would doubtless see
few hostage situations in that area. This strategy is better suited to non-
terrorist acts, such as bank robbers taking hostages to thwart the attempts
of the authorities to capture them.
Obviously, this will never become policy due to the threat of lawsuits by
surviving hostages and non-surviving hostages' families (and bad press).
What if the hostage(s) had filled out a form before the incident absolving
the government of any blame if they should be harmed in an armed rescue
attempt? How many people would be willing to fill one out (keeping in mind
that the more people that do, the less likely any government would have to
take them up on it)?
{That should get some flaming}
On another more sane note-
It looks like the divestment movement was too late for South Africa. Someone
asked a while ago why it would not be better to stay invested in Politically
Incorrect stocks and use proxy power to effect change. Here at U.S.C. we had
Fluor (of the Fluor Corporation) on the Board of Trustees. The Fluor Corp.
has extensive mining interests in South Africa and many students, staff and
faculty mistrust the University to do the right thing given its incredibly
right-wing leanings. If a union or other pension fund trusted their
leadership to do the right (or left-wing) thing with the proxies it is not
too bad of an idea. Our University suggested that idea and the liberals
instantly knee-jerked against the idea in our infinite mistrust of the
University.
Years ago I read of a study that showed an exceptionally high number of auto
collisions (I don't call them accidents...it makes them sound so harmless)
involved drivers that smoke cigarettes. The article speculated that these
drivers probably got distracted while searching for or lighting their
cigarettes. If there is any causality, I would be more likely to think that
anyone who would take up an unhealthy habit like smoking might just be
reckless in other pursuits (like driving) also.-Roger
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End of POLI-SCI Digest
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