nrh@inmet.UUCP (08/09/85)
>/* Written 8:51 pm Aug 6, 1985 by psuvax1!berman in inmet:net.politics.t */ >/* ---------- "Re: Newsflash! [Subsidized Educatio" ---------- */ > > I find here very appealing vision: unemployed starve or hire themselves >for pennys, criminals are shot, children of uneducated poor cannot >afford education, criminals are shot (or banished), if somebody invents >penicilyn, then for eternity he can charge whatever market can bear, etc. Do you suppose that THIS time it will be enough to show that Mr. Berman lacks imagination? Oh well... The unemployed do not starve in a libertarian society unless there are two conditions: 1) Lack of sufficient charity 2) lack of a sufficient labor market. You have, so far as I can tell, no support for either of these conditions. In particular, our government, supposedly responsive to public needs, has relatively little trouble raising lots of money for the poor, and private agencies exist in plenty. As for the labor market, yes, the price of certain sorts of labor would drop under a libertarian scheme -- for example, I'll bet the median of doctor's salaries would be lower. On the other hand, people who would be willing to work as (say) a plumber or a hairdresser, or a taxi driver for a low price would be ABLE to (no licensure in Libertaria), so many avenues up from poverty that are closed now (unless you've the right connections) would become open. Criminals are shot? How terrible! Of course, it happens now..... Children of uneducated poor cannot afford education? How odd. Even though MY family couldn't afford it, I went to a private high school. Why? There's this institution called "scholarships", sometimes, but not always supported by the state. Of course, in OUR society, we give the uneducated poor the right to go to ghetto schools. What a great break! Criminals are shot (again) or banished. How terrible. Not often relevant to libertarian ideas, but since you brought it up.... Penicillin. Mr. Berman. If I discover penicillin, I don't "invent" it, so I can't "patent" it. I may patent the process, or keep it secret, but I can't patent a thing I discover (as opposed to invent) and hence have a lot of trouble monopolizing it if someone comes up with another process to extract the stuff. In the case of "designer drugs" where I DO invent the drug, there are similar problems for me in store because of substitute drugs. > First problem: who enforces the law? Private agency? How about the >competition? How assure that a private law enforcement agency uses fair >practices to establish its fee structure (imagine Lebanese militias in >this role? Perhaps hire another agency to shoot out the first one. > This is periodically discussed in the net. Suggest you read The Machinery of Freedom" by David Friedman. >Now, assume that law enforcement is public. That means that it belongs >to the state, and is supported by taxes. But we have no democracy. >Also, we (owners of education or property) must defend ourself agains >voluntary organisations of poor and uneducated (they could turn, God >forbid, democratic). Who, in absence of democracy should decide? >Possibly, taxpayers, proportionally to the taxes paid. I don't mind if the poor turn democratic so long as they don't start seizing my property or person. Let's not start setting up straw-men: If law-enforcement is to be public, and is controlled by taxation, you have some government mechanism for dealing with the people or you have a gang. In the first case, your piteous moans about how the people are underrepresented are irrelevant, in the second they are spurious. > >Conclusion: Libertaria is a police state governed by the rich. Advocating >democracy there is in effect a conspiracy to deprive people of their full >property rights; as such it is a crime. Uneducated poor cannot afford >the market value of education, thus they remain (hereditiary) uneducated >poor. Tsk! Unwarranted, inflammatory, and underinformed rhetoric of this sort is hardly worth even responding to, but... What makes you think the poor cannot afford the "market value of education"? They did so in old Jewish ghettoes, they do so in new Chicago ghettoes. They've even done so with subsidies from the Church. Advocacy of democracy is not a crime in Libertaria. Conspiracy to deprive someone of property is not a crime. DEPRIVING people of property by force or fraud IS a crime, but this has little to do with advocating democracy. > > It occurred to me that this is exactly what our net free-marketeers >(and/or libertarians) have in mind. Of course, this is a logically >coherent system. Do we really like it? I don't. Nothing like knocking down the ol' straw man, eh? > Net.libertarians, please illuminate me where is the error here (if any). > >Piotr Berman >/* End of text from inmet:net.politics.t */ >
nrh@inmet.UUCP (08/14/85)
>/* Written 4:23 pm Aug 7, 1985 by ubvax!tonyw in inmet:net.politics.t */ >/* ---------- "Re: Newsflash! [Subsidized Educatio" ---------- */ >In article <1110@umcp-cs.UUCP> version B 2.10.3 alpha 4/15/85; site ubvax.UUCP version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site umcp-cs.UUCP ubvax!cae780!amdcad!decwrl!decvax!genrad!panda!talcott!harvard!seismo!umcp-cs!flink flink@umcp-cs.UUCP (Paul V. Torek) writes: >Education does one massive thing that its lack or its privatization >could not: it sets up people with credentials before they get their >first job. Hence it permits a match between many different levels >of jobs and many different levels of credentials. Huh? The GOVERNMENT runs the ETS folks who put out the National Merit Scholarships? The SAT's? The Achievement tests? Oho! That's news to me! And what about private colleges? Does the government run them also? My understanding was that the government CERTIFIED certain things, but not, for example, the tests put out by ETS. >Hence it makes >filling a job a manageable task for most jobs, by helping to ensure >that the number of "qualified" applicants for a job match the number >of jobs more or less. >It also makes filling a job a less risky >procedure, since applicants have accumulated a record which can >be compared with other records even before the first job. A peculiar stance, given that the colleges and private high schools depend on private achievement tests..... >Of course, the value of a credentialing system depends on the level >of publicity, the level of enforcement, and the level of agreement >on the value of particular credentials. Hence, since the best >guarantor of publicity, enforcement, and agreement between credentials >is a public regulatory authority, Support please. >and because people outside the >educational system disturb the system of credentials, Support for the implication that the impact that outsiders have is "distortion" and not "adjustment to reality", please. >the place >for education is in the public sphere, and education should be >subsidized and regulated by a public authority. Given a false premise, it's possible to prove anything. Please back yours up. > >Even in Libertaria. > Ha! >Tony Wuersch >{amd,amdcad}!cae780!ubvax!tonyw > >"And if you don't believe all the words I say, > I'm certified prime by the USDA!" Prime? Well, RIPE maybe..... >/* End of text from inmet:net.politics.t */
nrh@inmet.UUCP (08/14/85)
>/* Written 1:38 pm Aug 9, 1985 by ubvax!tonyw in inmet:net.politics.t */ >/* ---------- "Re: Newsflash! [Subsidized Educatio" ---------- */ >In article <3168@topaz.RUTGERS.EDU> josh@topaz.UUCP (J Storrs Hall) writes: >>In article <1680@psuvax1.UUCP> berman@psuvax1.UUCP (Piotr Berman) writes: >>> I find here very appealing vision: unemployed starve or hire themselves >>>for pennys, ... [litany of Dickensian horrors] >> >>Why do you think that the centralized organization of illegitimate >>coercion, which is all that we're advocating the removal of, is the >>motive force behind social concern and compassion? I don't believe it. >> >>I believe that the amount of compassion is relatively orthogonal to >>these political questions, but that the wealth of a society determines >>the amount of activity and physical aid this compassion enables them >>actually to give. Thus a rich society is a better place to live, >>even if you are poor. > >It's nice to know what you believe, Josh. But is it true that the poor >and down-and-out do better from private charity than from the modern >welfare state? Why should the abolition of "coercion" make people >any more generous? Why should the absence of any health standards, >for instance, which poor people should fulfill (food in the right >quantities, minimum shelter, etc.) aid the poor in meeting these >standards? > >These aren't questions of belief; the burden's on libertarians to prove >these things (chuckle), not on the rest of us to take them for granted. > If you want a lot of evidence for this, I suggest you read Charles Murray's "Losing Ground". In brief, the welfare state has harmed those it wished to help, and so far (a social-worker friend tells me) the best that any liberal publication has been able to do is grumble that maybe things would have been even worse if the welfare state hadn't been around. A pretty weak argument from those who have stolen billions of dollars ostensibly to help. More evidence? How about "The State Against Blacks" by Walter Williams. The abolition of coercion need not make people more generous -- to spend $1 on a poor person, the Federal government must take in $5. A private agency need take in only about $1.10. Remember, we're talking about a society in which anybody could take people on taxi rides, cut their hair, or do social work without certification from the state or fear that the state might shut them down without certification from a union, so some proportion of the poor who don't have jobs now would have jobs in libertaria. Of course, if you REALLY think that people a libertarian society would be less generous, you should bear in mind that you are saying that people tend to give less than a fifth voluntarily than they do under coercion, and that the poor have not been denied reasonable jobs by such things as minimum wage laws and licensure. Not a tenable position. You're also assuming that a large number of people will need charity -- remember Daniel Mck.'s very well-defended discussion of unemployment in libertaria. The reason that the absence of health standards would help the poor to meet those the real standards of health is that the existence of a standard in law merely imposes a penalty for not meeting the standard ("we arrest you because these houses you built are too small, or because the food you provide is too meager") but doesn't accomplish any increase in the amount of housing or food provided. In other words, making it illegal to serve inferior food doesn't make it a requirement to serve good food. An example? Why sure! Just take a look at the abandonment rate of buildings under rent control in New York city. If you'd rather not look it up, just take a cab through Harlem sometime. Those buildings with the metal sheets blocking the windows are examples. Another example? Certainly. Kidney machines are rationed and subsidized by the government. There has been relatively little research on improving these machines because the whole thing is pretty closely regulated, there have also been pretty severe limits placed on access to those machines. For details, see Reason Magazine, August 1984. >>> First problem: who enforces the law? Private agency? How about the >>>competition? >> >>The competition keeps the prices low, the laws fair, and the cops on the >>job. Unlike the present situation. >> >>>... Perhaps hire another agency to shoot out the first one. >> >>War is extremely expensive; it is almost never practiced except by >>those organizations who obtain their incomes by theft, such as >>governments and criminal gangs. > >Not in Mad Max's world. Isn't libertaria more like that? Nobody >regulating the gangs? In Mad Max's world, everybody knows how to use >a gun ('cept for those helpless good folk...). Excuse me, but in Mad Max's world, what we have are very small governments running around harassing people. In the latest film ("Beyond Thunderdome") we see the beginning of private law-enforcement and trade (essentially a town that forms from a trading post). Sure it's anarchic and brutal, but I'd swap it for the large countries that presumably conducted the nuclear war, wouldn't you? >Poor women who can't afford an agency had better watch out. Or, perhaps apply to the Red Cross, their church, the Guardian Angels (who do not, as I recall, solicit donations) for the money to support themselves. As I recall, the per capita cost of our current municipal law-enforcement system is pretty low anyhow (on the order of $300/year, in NYC if I remember right) (Note -- this is the COST, not how much had to be raised in taxes to enable the NYPD to spend that much). Most likely the poor woman who can't afford an agency would pay the agency as part of her rent. By the way, in libertaria, she could own a handgun for self-defense. Certain statist types believe that she shouldn't have that right. >And even >then, they'd probably could only afford a crime deductable (i.e. the >agency pledges to protect only after the first ten crimes ...). They >would learn to adjust their expectations and live with this. > Such nonsense! Let me see -- you're arguing that in a society with a much easier path to economic self-sufficiency, a society in which no public institutionalization of poverty or broken homes is going on, the crime rate would be the same or worse than what we have now? G'wan! >... >> >>>Conclusion: Libertaria is a police state governed by the rich. [etc] >> >>If I have two dollars and you have one dollar, I get two lollipops and >>you get one. If I have two votes and you have one, I get everything, >>and you get nothing. Sorry! >> > >Show me a democracy like this, and I might believe you, Josh. At least >I'd stop and think. Stop and think: how long did it take to get out of Vietnam? Why? Among other reasons, the people who were forced to go there accounted for a fairly small proportion of the vote. How long have New England blue laws prohibited people from working on Sunday? Until (do you suppose) a large enough political coalition was formed to weaken them? In the Reason Magazine article quoted above, it is pointed out that Hemophiliacs do not receive special government aid for their treatments, even though those are at least as expensive as kidney machine treatment. Why? Because the polital push was on for renal-failure victims. They, in short, had the votes. >I agree with Piotr. I'd rather believe in people than believe in >libertaria anytime. > That's quite a statment for someone who seems to be advocating the welfare state..... Do you believe in people, or do you believe in people with the right chains on them?
tonyw@ubvax.UUCP (Tony Wuersch) (08/18/85)
In article <28200048@inmet.UUCP> nrh@inmet.UUCP writes > >>(Tony Wuersch) >>Education does one massive thing that its lack or its privatization >>could not: it sets up people with credentials before they get their >>first job. Hence it permits a match between many different levels >>of jobs and many different levels of credentials. > > [... some comments about ETS which have nothing to do with jobs. ] > >>Hence it makes >>filling a job a manageable task for most jobs, by helping to ensure >>that the number of "qualified" applicants for a job match the number >>of jobs more or less. >>It also makes filling a job a less risky >>procedure, since applicants have accumulated a record which can >>be compared with other records even before the first job. > >A peculiar stance, given that the colleges and private high >schools depend on private achievement tests..... > Again here, private achievement tests have nothing to do with jobs. They react to the failure of high school or elementary schools to generate decent credentials -- a failure of the American system of local rule over high school and elementary education which systems following national educational standards don't share. The solution here is stricter national standards, not looser ones. And personnel departments don't look at ETS results, anyway. > >>Of course, the value of a credentialing system depends on the level >>of publicity, the level of enforcement, and the level of agreement >>on the value of particular credentials. Hence, since the best >>guarantor of publicity, enforcement, and agreement between credentials >>is a public regulatory authority, > >Support please. > I assume you agree with the first sentence. As far as the second goes, I think of a credentialing scheme like a security setup. The most secure setups are where an outside, central agency takes charge of security and makes sure that all sub-central security arrangements are consistent, so that the system as a whole is secure against hostile entry. And where everyone knows the rules. The same rules which maintain secure environments are the rules which maintain consistent credentialing systems. The only central agency in a state which has coercive powers over people within the state is the state. So it has a role if a social goal is that educational credentials should be secure and consistent. >>and because people outside the >>educational system disturb the system of credentials, > >Support for the implication that the impact that outsiders have >is "distortion" and not "adjustment to reality", please. > The debate over affirmative action. Anyone who gets benefited by affirmative action is assumed to be distorting the system because they didn't obtain the necessary credentials, or their credentials were watered down and inflated compared to similar credentials held by others. These people are outsiders because they break the rules relating credentials to jobs. Now, if you believe that affirmative action is adjustment to reality, then I have no argument with you. >>the place >>for education is in the public sphere, and education should be >>subsidized and regulated by a public authority. > >Given a false premise, it's possible to prove anything. Please back >yours up. I'm guessing here as to what you think is the false premise. Maybe you could tell me in some reply or future article. Tony Wuersch {amd,amdcad}!cae780!ubvax!tonyw
bob@pedsgd.UUCP (Robert A. Weiler) (08/19/85)
Organization : Perkin-Elmer DSG, Tinton Falls NJ Keywords: In article <28200051@inmet.UUCP> nrh@inmet.UUCP writes: > > >If you want a lot of evidence for this, I suggest you read Charles >Murray's "Losing Ground". In brief, the welfare state has harmed those I must get a copy of this book I guess. As refutation, Teddy White in "The Making of the President 1972" claims that the average income for blacks rose dramtically under the Great Society. I can ferret out the exact numbers if you want. Apparently they came from the 1970 census, but its hard to tell. On the down side, the number of broken homes also rose dramatically. >The abolition of coercion need not make people more generous -- to >spend $1 on a poor person, the Federal government must take in >$5. A private agency need take in only about $1.10. Remember, we're Just curious, but what is the source for this? >Stop and think: how long did it take to get out of Vietnam? Why? I was going to argue against this and point out that in fact it was popular opinion and elections which did get us out, but on reflection, it does seem to me that it would never have happend if there was no draft and the American people where sent a bill every month from the Defense Company. So score 1 for the Libertarians. Bob Weiler. ps could we not meander so much in the future?