Subject:
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Re: Rights to free goods? (was Re: What happened?
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Thu, 1 Jul 1999 01:49:10 GMT
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Viewed:
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1048 times
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Larry Pieniazek wrote in message <37796883.7A114758@voyager.net>...
> Whoops... first time round was just mailed to Frank, meant to post this
> instead, so here it is.
And of course I replied in kind... Here's my reply:
> Frank Filz wrote:
> >
> > Larry,
> >
> > I would like to understand the Libertarian principle better, but am
> > finding it hard to understand from your responses in the various debates
> > that have occurred.
>
> Right. that's because I'm Libertarian Macho Flashing(tm). I do it all
> the time. I'm not this over the top out in public, trust me.
Thanks for the response. I suppose I am close to being a closet Libertarian.
I think most of my discomfort has been with the "Macho Flashing", though
your presentation has been mostly clear to me that what your ultimate goal
is is something palatable to me, and you aren't preaching (extreme)
revolution to get there.
> For a somewhat more level headed approach to getting the info, you might
> surf to the LP site http://www.lp.org and scope out the
> philosophy/positions section.
I will have to check it out when I'm not ready to collapse from
exhaustion...
> > Do we have a police force? If so, how
> > is it chosen, regulated, and funded?
>
> Funding is the biggie. Get that right and the rest follows. Most
> libertarians (Small l) are minimalist government rather than say,
> anarcho-capitalist. That is, they recognize the need for a government,
> and recognize that in order to carry out proper functions, it needs
> funding. But how do you fund a government "voluntarily"? Taxing everyone
> is effective (and some taxes are better than others (1)) but defeats the
> principle of getting people to pay for services rendered.
Of course some of the services the police provide could also be provided by
private security forces (which of course would introduce competition to the
market - a good thing).
> I don't want to go too far down this road but do want to point out that
> there are mechanisms for funding government that are user fee based.
> That's why I'm against capital punishment, I want criminals to work to
> compensate their victims and the police and courts that delivered
> justice to them. Voluntary contract insurance (in which you forfeit your
> right to sue in civil court unless you paid in advance, but certainly
> still can work out private arrangements or binding arbitration) is
> another mechanism for funding.
Another mechanism would be fees for filing a suit, which of course can
become part of the damages you recover if you prevail. I certainly wouldn't
cry if a portion of what right now goes to the lawyers in the high profile
cases went to the courts instead (of course lawyers do need to be properly
compensated, and may even deserve a percentage of the settlement, but
probably in cases where the lawyers get 30% or more of a multi-million
dollar settlement, they are getting grossly overpaid).
> > What is the Libertarian view on protecting the environment? Does it
> > agree at all that the environment should be protected? If the
> > environment is to be protected, how do we "pay" for that?
>
> This is thorny. I tend to take the view that private property rights,
> enforced correctly, go along way to preventing pollution. That is, if I
> build a dump and it leaches into your ground water, I am liable for
> trespass, assault, criminal negligence, you name it. And no hiding
> behind shell corporations to avoid responsibility. Corporate officers
> are liable for the actions of their companies, including jail for murder
> if flagrant enough.
One of the things I definitely fear is the trend towards severely curtailing
lawsuits. There clearly are some inappropriate lawsuits, and something needs
to be done to curtail those, but we need to not eliminate them. One example
(and I know this isn't perfect), that many would like to eliminate, that I
see as not as outrageous as people want it to be was the McDonalds coffee
spill lawsuit. The lawsuit did bring out that people had complained about
how hot the coffee was, and McDonalds chose to ignore those complaints for
whatever reason (partly of course to satisfy those customers who do want it
hot). The woman did need serious medical care. To me, this is a real toss up
situation, and one that needs to be left to the courts to decide, not to the
legislators.
> > How do we
> > punnish
>
> (2)
>
> > someone for polluting a river, or is the fact that he lives
> > upstream of me mean that he has a higher claim to the water, and if I
> > want cleaner water, I have be willing to live farther upstream? I guess
> > given a perfect market, what would end up happening is that the value of
> > the clean water is sufficient that enough rivers will be left
> > unpolluted, but how do we get there?
>
> your last assertion is where we want to get to. It's hard to get from
> here to there, which is why there never will be a libertopia. There is
> no perfect society. But there are better ones than this one and that's
> the direction we want to go in...)
>
> > The perfect society would also have plenty of
> > artists and museums, and plenty would be just as open as the current
> > government run museums.
>
> By definition, my taste is better than the government's. The best
> museums, even today, are private. So is the best art. Government grants
> are bad money and bad money drives out good.
>
>
> > I think the hardest thing is how do we move from a governmental society
> > to a Libertarian society? There are a lot of strings to unwind.
>
> Yup. But the way to start is to unwind the easy ones, get some quick
> wins, and spark debate on unwinding the harder ones. Lots of easy stuff
> has already been privatised and the sky didn't fall. In fact we've got
> ourselves a nice little boom going for a number of reasons that directly
> relate to free markets and free minds.
>
> Who would have thought 10 years ago that privatising social security
> would even be mentioned as a serious option? So I'm hopeful.
>
> > -----------------------------
> > Work: mailto:ffilz@us.ibm.com
> > Home: mailto:ffilz@mindspring.com
>
> 1 - Although I don't like any tax, I'd rank them this way, best to
> worst:
> - flat tax in which everyone pays exactly the same fee per year. No
> exemptions, if you can't pay, you work it off in January or find
> charity/loans to cover it for you.
> - fixed percentage sales tax that applies to all goods and services. No
> exemptions.
> - fixed percentage property tax that applies to all property. No
> exemptions. (sensing a theme here yet?)
> - fixed percentage of income, same percentage for everyone, first
> dollar to last, no exemptions.
> - other kinds of sales taxes which have varying amounts of fiddling,
> the less the better
I'm uncomfortable with the first, but in a more ideal libertarian society, I
guess it would work, because anyone who was willing to work 40 (or whatever)
hours per week at a productive job, would easily be able to pay it (without
the government having to set a minimum wage, which then gets a bunch of
exceptions such that working at McDonalds is not a viable (only) job).
Anyone unable to work because of disability (physical, mental, or social)
would have charity if they were deserving, and the scum would find
themselves in a work camp.
I can see the point of no exemptions for sales, property, and income taxes,
though in some ways I would like to see some, but its one of those slippery
slopes (sure, exemption on sales tax for life necessities might be
reasonable, but then you start stretching the definitions, and then, and
then, and before you know it, we have the mostly unfair tax situation of
today).
Again, I guess in liberatopia, the issue is moot, because the perfect market
generates fair prices for everything, and as a result, almost everyone has
the money to pay for the services they need. Maybe the need for charity
actually goes away, I could see that the possible contribution to society of
a severely disabled individual actually generates enough value to pay for
the services they need. After all, charity exists today because those who
contribute put a hard dollar value on some nebulous things and the problem
is probably more of people (who are members of a charitable organization)
not actually paying their fair share (a specific example I'm thinking of is
our church, many people, who have the ability, do not contribute their fair
share of the costs).
I guess another thing that would occur in liberatopia is there is actually a
variety of ways to pay for most things, thus sparking the competition which
would tend to drive things towards efficiency and balanced costs, and
especially paying for things up front, and solving problems before they
become problems.
> 2 - was that punnish deliberate?
No, unless it was something subconscious... No spell checker at work...
Again, thanks for the opportunity to learn more about Libertarianism. One
thing I am learning is that while I am not that much of a radical, we need
the radical viewpoints to make sure that all the alternatives are being
explored. The problem with most current popular debate is that we end up
mostly only hearing the radical positions, and then only sound bites from
them which distort the viewpoint.
Frank
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