mwm@ucbtopaz.CC.Berkeley.ARPA (02/03/85)
["Why should a blockhead get one in ten?"] In article <462@whuxl.UUCP> orb@whuxl.UUCP (SEVENER) writes: >my continued life. Once again we can point out the restrictions on >freedom implied by private property in the most extreme case: i.e. where >one person or group owns all property or all means of production at least. Sorry, but your extreme case can't happen in a libertarian society. You see, in a libertarian society, *you always own your own body.* This is a means of production. Your extreme case can only happen in statist societies, most probably in the leftist ones where the production of a person is subjugated to "the good of the state." >JoSH suggested the person buying bread had a choice: raise his own >vegetable garden. But what if the person owns no land? (Many people in >this country are in exactly that position) This choice is taken from him. >Moreover, what if the person has no money? Then he can't get bread >anywhere. No? Never hear of bartering work for goods? Or maybe you think it's beneath someones dignity to have to do labor to earn their bread. >By the very same reasoning, suppose I have X amount of freedom before >voting to approve a municipal bond and consequent increase in taxation. >Now I join a majority of other citizens in approving a municipal bond >which will go to provide an education to all children in the community. >After joining this majority I will find myself with less money to spend: >BUT I still have the same freedom I had before approving this referendum >to work for its repeal, AND to vote for its repeal. >How has my freedom been diminished? The *only* way in which my freedom >has been diminished is economic. Exactly the way in which buying bread >has done nothing to diminish my freedom to exchange but *HAS* diminished >how much money I have available to exchange. Yup, your freedom hasn't been diminished. Up to a point, everything you are doing is fine with libertarians. The point we part company is when the majority gets out their hired guns, and goes to collect the tax from the minority who don't want to spend their money that way. *Their* freedom has been reduced - they no longer have that money to spend. BTW, Tim, how big does your majority have to be before it stops being "theft" and starts being "taxation"? Everybody will agree that a majority of two taking money from a single person on a street is theft. The statists seem to think that two million taking money from one million in an organized manner isn't theft. Where's the line of decision? >A further point: at the very least most Libertarians will concede that >there must be *some* role for government. [list of services deleted] >How is this to be paid for? How about letting the government compete for funds in the free market, just like everyone else, with the profits going for the services the government must provide. Note that this is competition, not a monopoly, so the government can't afford the waste normally associated with government actions. Also note that asking for contributions from individuals (begging, if you will) is a perfectly valid way to get funds. >What is wrong with a tax levied upon >citizens to provide the means with which they can live and the conditions >under which even "free markets" can exist? Because pointing a gun at someone and forcing them to give you money is theft. Organizing this activity just lets it reach more people, and institutionalizing it just makes it hard to get rid of. >I would go so far as to call it a precondition of democracy itself: for without >it there would be absolutely no check upon the powerful taking whatever they >want. So why hasn't our democracy prevented this from happening? Or maybe you forgot your ravings about the ever-increasing power of the american business community? >no agency will exist to protect anyone's rights to life, liberty, >happiness, or your precious and so-sacred right to property. (notice >the latter was *never* mentioned in the Declaration of Independence??) Tell you what: let's admit that no rights exist that weren't in the Declaration of Independence, the original Constitution, or the Bill of Rights. Let's also turn off all government agencies that are providing a "right" that isn't in that set. We didn't get rid of the DoD, and we didn't get rid of the Post Offal. The *entire* welfare system is gone - seems that they forgot to mention "eating, breathing, and a roof over your head" as "rights." Your oh-so-precious public education system is gone, the banking monopoly held by the US government is gone. Hmm, I'm not sure, but all that seems to be left is the DoD (in a much stripped form), the PO, State, the DoI, the OMB, part of the Fed, the FCC, and of course the Judicial and Executive branches. >> (By the way, I won't trade my TV for the grocery store's bread, but I >> would trade it for the contents of the cash register at the end of the >> day. Am I diminishing their freedom by excluding them from my TV >> unless they empty their cash register?) > MY REPLY: YES Tim - I don't own a TV set, as I've never thought one was worth the expense. If you own one, would you please cease diminishing my freedom by mailing it to me? Come to think of it, I don't own a car, either, so if you have one of those, why don't you put your tv in it, and hire a driver to deliver them to me in Oakland. I promise I'll send them back in a year, unless you've bought another in that time. <mike