Confusion about Property Rights...

[rgraham666]

So what you're saying lickin is, "I wish to live here, to enjoy all the services offered by my society. The armed forces that defend me. The police that protect me. The central bank that guarantees the money I use. The good roads. The school system. The regulatory agencies that keep my air and water clean. The economic watchdogs that prevent the dishonest from ripping me off. The diplomatic services that help my nation work with others and protect my interests overseas. All this and more, I want to enjoy.

But I'm not willing to pay for any of it."

Have I got the right of that?

 

[Pure]

Reply to Shanglan,

Pure said to Roxanne: //Get off the fence: either 1) trust the market for healthcare AND everything else, OR 2) DON'T TRUST the market and take over or regulate all the supplies and suppliers of basic necessities, socialist style, at least in respect of their dealings with the non well to do. //

Shanglan replied: While I generally want explanations of why circumstances are different in such cases, I accept that there often are explanations. I think you're wrong, Pure, to imply that there is some inherent good in ideological purity and ultimatism. Most systems show their worst failures when people attempt to elevate one single principle and apply it to everything, so why chide Roxanne for being flexible?

The free market works very well for some things; I am glad, for instance, that we have some free market working in our health care system on the bottom end (least severe ailments), because as El Sol once observed, if someone has a cold and it costs $125 to cut it short by two days, many people will make a very different decision if they are paying the $125. There, I think that the free market works well in asking people to consider what expenditure of resources is really a reasonable answer to a cold.

I would prefer if we had less at the upper (most severe ailments) end of our health care services because I hate to think of anyone lacking medical attention for a condition radically altering their long-term quality of life. There, I agree with Roxanne - I'd like to see the free market take less of role.

My reasoning - and I can't speak for Roxanne, but possibly she might agree with me - is that while the free market can do a good job of pricing things according to their cost, labor investment, and/or scarcity, there are some goods that for humanitarian reasons we want people to have whatever the cost.

----
Shanglan,
I think you misread me, and noting that, i expect Ms. Roxanne will also. Possibly I was less than clear and detailed.

First of all, i do not like the general stance (ploy) of "I'm flexible, but you're an inflexible ideologue." Were RA to say this to me, it would be patently untrue.

I don't think, for example, Ms R is so 'flexible' as to call for socialized medicine (even excluding minor issues from coverage). But i'm willing to be corrected. Roxanne?

You, Shanglan, may well be 'flexible' in that area, based on your posting. It's unclear to me if you're more 'flexible' than I, overall, but that seems like a silly issue even to discuss.

If you will recall, more than one of my postings have held up such countries as Holland, Norway, Sweden, and Finland as exemplary.
None are 'pure socialist' states. All have degrees of mixing; including in the area of health care. Indeed, i believe it's almost in the definition of 'social democrat' that there be some mixing. We are empirical--and the 'mix' is decided by circumstance, not Das Kapital.

----
Now, consider the sentence I bolded. I said 'take over or control the supplies and suppliers of basic necessities, at least in respect of their dealings with the non well-to-do.' To me that does not sound like ideological inflexibility. I don't see a call to eliminate private capital, for instance. I do not object to some 'user fees,' although experience has shown that small user fees for medication make the poorest people NOT fill their presriptions.

Second, i did not call for 'ideological purity.' I called for consistency.
Commentators more knowledgeable than I have noted the weird inconsistencies of Murray's Plan, e.g., Gordon, if you read his piece at the Von Mises website.


Consider your sentence there are some goods that for humanitarian reasons we want people to have whatever the cost.. Does it not resemble in meaning my sentence about 'basic necessities.'?

As far as RA goes, I have yet to hear from her about this, but my speculation [subject to correction] is that she is far from holding this position, and does not do so just because she's at the 'left' of the 'libertarian' movement is allowing that some taxes are not theft.

Now lets get to specifics. You will recall that i suggested that the rents at 'flophouses' would go up. I was referring to the lower scale rooming houses, such as in our city, which house many of those discharged from mental hospitals or chronically unemployable. Some are far from cheap. One common method of owners is to take a house with 4 bedrooms that might rent for 1500/month, and chop it up into 'bachelorettes,' i.e. tiny one room apts with sink and hot plate (and bathroom--toilet and shower stall, all in 15 sq ft). Four of those, rentable at 600/month yield much higher profits, since the income is 2400/month. In some cases, the welfare people have standing agreements that all cheques are signed over to the owner (even payable to him!). The point is that abundant cheap housing did not materialize here, despite demand; crap units were created and rented at inflated prices, units which violated housing standards and in some cases were shut down. That is the market here, in this 'good.'

In any case, RA assured me the market in housing would NOT be limited under The Plan, and she compared housing to Fritos in that more can be made, and so the supply will rise to meet the demand (instead of prices rising). Housing, she said, is not 'beachfront' property. Of course it's not, but it's not like Fritos, either, as the above example illustrates. In our city, in the era of rent controls, the housing supply dwindled a lot. I think you will agree that builders and developers are quite capable of exerting substantial, if not decisive influence on the market, in order to limit supply.

Roxanne agrees, apparently, with Murray about healthcare. And Murray admits he may have to have the govt 1) insist on group coverage [don't turf the unhealthy], and 2) keep the premium to a set fee, somewhat arbirtrarily set at $3000.

In my posting with which you take issue, I suggest that the reasons for this set up are obvious. Murray does NOT trust the insurers NOT to dump the hard cases, adn NOT to push through a serious of premium increases. After all the profit goes up, if, on a mass scale, the premium simply rises 5%, if other costs are held in control. Why doesn't Roxanne trust the market to generate new entrants who will hold the price down, according to the capitalist 'invisible hand'? I think the answer is obvious; because of experience with health insurers.

So I charge Roxanne [insofar as she endorses Murray with no stated specific reservations] --and Murray-- with a fundamental inconsistency evidenced in her 'socialized' treatment of medical services, and her 'free market' faith regarding housing for the poor and less well off. That is what makes his Plan a bastard entity, a farrago, rather than a smooth pragmatic mixing of capitialism and social democracy.

I hope this clarifies matters,

Robespierre, (aka The Flexible).

 

[Roxanne Appleby]

So what you're saying lickin is, "I wish to live here, to enjoy all the services offered by my society. The armed forces that defend me. The police that protect me. The central bank that guarantees the money I use. The good roads. The school system. The regulatory agencies that keep my air and water clean. The economic watchdogs that prevent the dishonest from ripping me off. The diplomatic services that help my nation work with others and protect my interests overseas. All this and more, I want to enjoy.

But I'm not willing to pay for any of it."

Have I got the right of that?

Minor point of information: I can't speak for lickin, but noting the fact that tax levies are backed up with the state's monopoly on legal force does not necessarily mean that one rejects the social contract that grants this monopoly to the state, and the authority to levy taxes. Just sayin'.


This is a drive-by: I have not forgotten and am not ignoring the big posts from others. Just don't have time right now. Thanks, R.A.

 

[imalickin]

So what you're saying lickin is, "I wish to live here, to enjoy all the services offered by my society. The armed forces that defend me. The police that protect me. The central bank that guarantees the money I use. The good roads. The school system. The regulatory agencies that keep my air and water clean. The economic watchdogs that prevent the dishonest from ripping me off. The diplomatic services that help my nation work with others and protect my interests overseas. All this and more, I want to enjoy.

But I'm not willing to pay for any of it."

Have I got the right of that?

Not at all. What I'm saying is that the tax system should be voluntary and government should be sized accordingly. If I (the people) what the government to do more for me(us) then I will have to contribute more to the running of the government.

How do we do this you ask? There are several ways without being confiscatory.

One that I know of is a consumption tax. An all inclusive consumption tax...say on new retail items only. No exceptions. Everyone pays the tax at the retail level, individual, corporations, government. And before you go off on how this would effect the poor...lets just give every household a rebate of the consumption tax that they would pay up to the proverty level or in other the words you pay no tax on neccesities. That way those families that are below the poverty level would wined up paying no tax at all, the same as they don't now.

No before you start on me about all the wherefore and whereas's there has already been a study funded to the tune of eleven million dollars and you can find all the answers to your questions here.

With a consumption tax you the tax payor decide whether you want to contribute by make or not making a purchase. Your choice.

 

[Pure]

to ima,

how about a 'voluntary' tax on going to bed-- if i don't like it, i can lean against the wall. how about one for entering a drs. office or medical facility? for taking a crap (like a pay toilet, iow).

you play with words.

you read a lot of Atlas Shrugged, i take it...

 

[imalickin]

how about a 'voluntary' tax on going to bed-- if i don't like it, i can lean against the wall. how about one for entering a drs. office or medical facility? for taking a crap (like a pay toilet, iow).

you play with words.

you read a lot of Atlas Shrugged, i take it...

Nope, never even opened the book, nor looked it up in the library. And it's not playing with words. A consumption tax is voluntary. If you buy an item you pay the tax, if you don't buy the item you owe no tax.

Tell me how that is playing with words? Up to the poverty level the tax is pre-bated to you by check, credit to a debit card, whatever so the neccesities are coverd without you having to pay a tax. Then after that it is up to you to buy or not to buy.

And then there is the problem of the govenment not paying taxes...this way the government pays the tax just as the individual does.

And then there are the criminal element, which pay no income tax now, they will now be paying taxes on everything they buy. All those fancy cars, gold chains,etc.

And then there are the tourists who will now contribute to the tax base of the US.

So I have just named three new sources of income to the US, how is that playing with words?

 

[Pure]

ok, ok, you're just a fine, red-blooded, American tax and government hater.

 

[imalickin]

ok, ok, you're just a fine, red-blooded, American tax and government hater.

I don't hate the govenment, just how big and wastful it is. There is a need for govenment, as Rob put it, to provide security of our borders, a national infrastructure, everything a government is good at.

A government shouldn't try to tell me how to live my life as long as I don't infringe on other peoples rights to life, liberty and property. They also should forcibly put their hands in my pockets and take my hard earned dollars.

I am not opposed to a national consumption tax at the retail level as long as everyone is treated exactly the same. No special interest groups, no exceptions to the rule. Everyone pays the same rate on what they spend.

 

[Roxanne Appleby]

I don't hate the govenment, just how big and wastful it is. There is a need for govenment, as Rob put it, to provide security of our borders, a national infrastructure, everything a government is good at.

A government shouldn't try to tell me how to live my life as long as I don't infringe on other peoples rights to life, liberty and property. They also should forcibly put their hands in my pockets and take my hard earned dollars.

I am not opposed to a national consumption tax at the retail level as long as everyone is treated exactly the same. No special interest groups, no exceptions to the rule. Everyone pays the same rate on what they spend.

I find your hair-splitting on "voluntary" in the characterization of a consumption tax unsatisfying, but let me ask a different, hypothetical question:

What if everyone "chose" to not pay this tax by returning the farm, growing their own food and making their own clothes and utensils, never purchasing anything subject to the tax. The government revenue would be zero. You say that you don't oppose limited government, just non-voluntary taxes. What new "voluntary" revenue source would you propose?

Here's my point: I think one has to choose, either embrace anarcho-capitalism (or other forms of anarchy), in which case you can make a logically consistent against taxation (which is at its root non-voluntary), or accept limited government (or unlimited government), and the taxation-backed-by-coercion that is an implicit element of it.

The latter does not prohibit you from reviling the current monstrosity of a tax system, and preferring a more economically efficient and rational consumption tax. But absent that return-to-the-land "choice," I think you have to admit that it is not voluntary.

 

[imalickin]

I find your hair-splitting on "voluntary" in the characterization of a consumption tax unsatisfying, but let me ask a different, hypothetical question:

What if everyone "chose" to not pay this tax by returning the farm, growing their own food and making their own clothes and utensils, never purchasing anything subject to the tax. The government revenue would be zero. You say that you don't oppose limited government, just non-voluntary taxes. What new "voluntary" revenue source would you propose?

Here's my point: I think one has to choose, either embrace anarcho-capitalism (or other forms of anarchy), in which case you can make a logically consistent against taxation (which is at its root non-voluntary), or accept limited government (or unlimited government), and the taxation-backed-by-coercion that is an implicit element of it.

The latter does not prohibit you from reviling the current monstrosity of a tax system, and preferring a more economically efficient and rational consumption tax. But absent that return-to-the-land "choice," I think you have to admit that it is not voluntary.

Those that want to return to the farm, make there own thing and grow their own food are free to do that. Will everyone do that and turn this country into an agraian nation, I doubt it. And even those that do will eventually either purchase or sell goods, thus either paying or collecting the tax.

Will I continue to consume as many goods as I do now, you betcha, I like my life just the way it is. I also want the government to protect me against invaders so I may enjoy my life, liberty and property. I also assume the great majority of the nation will feel the same way.

I have no objection to the government collecting tax to run and provide all the necessary thing the populace will need, I am willing and have paid my fair share. It's just that there is a better way which would save the taxpayer 460 billion dollars annally in compliance costs.

 

[Pure]

hi ima,

ima A government shouldn't try to tell me how to live my life as long as I don't infringe on other peoples rights to life, liberty and property.

you, like some others on the right, must be SO sad this wasn't written into the Constitution-- or even the Declaration of Independence, which says "life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness."

since the declarers, like the founders, were familiar with the 'life, liberty, and property' formula of Locke, the inference is that they rejected 'property' as at the topmost level of 'inalienable rights'.

They also should [not]
forcibly put their hands in my pockets and take my hard earned dollars.

I'd say a right to tax is explicit, in these early documents.

"Congress shall have the right to lay and collect taxes....to provide for the common defense and the general welfare." seems pretty clear to me. It doesn't say 'but the 'general welfare' does not include education and healthcare.'


FURTHER, as to the topic of this thread, the government, since the beginning, has a right to 'take' property for public use and purpose.

So the Constitution (in its Bill of Rights), far from giving you a sacred right to hold your property against all comers, saying that *when the government takes it for public use* they shall compensate you.

I guess you're pretty unhappy with the form the US government has taken since, say, 1850. That democratic process (the means by which it changed, e.g. in the income tax amendment) can be a real bitch for you with a fixed idea of limited government.

Don't ya wish there had been supreme courts all along that slapped down all these initiatives from Congress and the states? Some wise, pro-property people like yourself who would limit government, the people's wishes be damned.

 

[imalickin]

Pure...

I'm really sorry you feel the way you do and I hope it won't come as too much of a shock to you when the beloved government comes and tells you to move you belonging out of your house because they have this big developer who is going to build this shopping mall and increase the tax base of the city, county and state government and they need you propety for a parking lot.

 

[Roxanne Appleby]

I do wish people would express their views without resorting to bitter sarcasm and nastiness. It's so unnecessary. Surely there is already enough unpleasantness and stress in the world, why add more? How about a little golden rule in AH?

 

[rgraham666]

I do wish people would express their views without resorting to bitter sarcasm and nastiness. It's so unnecessary. Surely there is already enough unpleasantness and stress in the world, why add more? How about a little golden rule in AH?

I quite agree, Roxanne.

And my post earlier to ima was made in honest curiousity.

I don't think our governments are that bad, despite what many people say. I just want them to do better. It has nothing to do with my stance on the 'left'.

Actually, my stance is more theta. I am a heretic after all.

 

[BlackShanglan]

Ah, but you have the choice not to buy that ice. No one is forcing you to buy the ice at fifteen dollars a bag. I know the arguement will be, but I need the ice to keep my food cool so it won't spoil.

So, if you don't buy the ice the only thing that happens is your food spoils and you and the family may be hungry the next day. If you don't pay your taxes the men with big IRS letters on their jacket come to your house and take it away from you to pay those taxes.

So which is actually confiscatory?

They appear equally confiscatory to me if the ultimate result of each is, pay an unreasonable sum or lack basic necessities.

 

[Pure]

ima--

ima I'm really sorry you feel the way you do and I hope it won't come as too much of a shock to you when the beloved government comes and tells you to move your belongings out of your house because they have this big developer who is going to build this shopping mall and increase the tax base of the city, county and state government and they need you propety for a parking lot.


i don't love 'government' for its own sake, it's merely a tool in the hands of the people (when it's working). nor do i favor arbitrary measures or totalitarianism. or corrupt bureacracies.

it's simple a false alternative, a debating ploy, to say, "minmum government' or tyranny/slavery; to oppose the first is the endorse the second."

i gather you have a problem with Kelo, which is a main topic of this thread? have you read it? what do you NOT accept about its argument. does your problem with the SC pre-date Kelo? i don't want to re-tread old ground. do you generally disapprove of SC judgments of, say the last 50 years?

here's one key point that should be of interest to libertarians (though it's not, apparently): should the courts generally show deference and respect to the findings and decisions of elected bodies (city councils, legislatures). that to me sounds democratic, what do you think?

 

[BlackShanglan]

Pure said to Roxanne: //Get off the fence: either 1) trust the market for healthcare AND everything else, OR 2) DON'T TRUST the market and take over or regulate all the supplies and suppliers of basic necessities, socialist style, at least in respect of their dealings with the non well to do. //

I do beg your pardon, Pure. However, I think that a reasonable person, looking at the beginning of this statement - a demand to "get off the fence," which is widely interpreted as a demand to leave the middle ground - and at your expression of the latter half, with the free market either covering healthcare "AND everything else" (one extreme) or the government deciding to "take over" or regulat "all the supplies" and suppliers of basic necessities "socialist style" (a different extreme), might reasonably conclude that you're trying to split this into two extremes. It's what you're describing, and addition of the single word "basic" doesn't really do much to clear that up.

I am, of course, happy to learn that I am incorrect in this interpretation. However, I feel that your sally against Roxanne's housing theories makes some unfair comparisons. If Roxanne's position is that we should supply things people can't live without, it's perfectly consistent that we supply medical care but not housing support exept to the physically incapable. That no one likes living in a cramped bedsit is true, but that few people die of it is also true. Whether I would prefer to see a higher minimum standard of housing or not, I can at least see that her position is consistent if her standard is "sufficient support that one may continue to live." Indeed, I actually lean toward her approach for person not possessed of a disability; that is, I would like the minimum standard to be minimum rather than comfortable for anyone capable of working, as I wish them to consider work the proper course of action. I think that becomes more complex when there is high unemployment for other reasons, but at the basic level it's quite consistent.

Shanglan

 

[Pure]

one question you ignore, Shang, is whether the 'free market' in housing, apparently endorsed by Roxanne, and, so far as we know, a feature of Murray's "PLan", is going to take adequate care of the basic needs of the "underclass", as M calls them.

you say,
BS: If Roxanne's position is that we should supply things people can't live without,

BS quoting somebody [RA?] "sufficient support that one may continue to live."

i don't know that that's her position, except in the area of food, and hypothetically, in the area of healthcare under "The Plan." i await her clarification.

it's hard to address your points on behalf of what you take to be her position and your own personal views.

i reject 'can't live without' or 'continued life' as an adequate criterion of basic needs, so called 'human rights.' indeed this doesn't even delimit an area of healthcare as generally understood, e.g. repairing a congenital shortening of one leg. immediate or imminent death is not my criterion.

it seems to me that a person needs shelter ("housing") to live a decent life, and it's a bit elitist, if you're suggesting a cardboard box would allow continued life. or if she's suggesting that. lacking certain medical services, while not fatal soon, is much like living in a cardboard box-- it's a crappy existence, even 'subhuman.'

i agree that working is valuable for a human, and hence all who can work should do so, first applying those wages toward the basic necessities. HOWEVER, if you're read the "Nickled" piece i posted, it's clear that present minimum wage does not support adequate housing. Hence I favor the government taking such measures as would make up the slack for the working poor, and take entire responsibility for the disabled.

in any case, you've avoided the key point, which wasnt't that housing people is exactly like giving them medical care, or even which is a more basic right, if it is. it was that there is no good reason to assume that the housing market in M's Plan would take care of itself (provide enough). and the arguments that it would NOT are precisely built around the issues that RA and Murray try to cope with in socializing medicine.

again, RA has not given any reasons for thinking that the problems of profiteering and inadequate offerings, indeed no offering for some, are a *special and unique feature* of the healthcare industry (e.g. private insurers, private hospitals, etc.)

in that she is inconsistent. putting it another way, that (failure to provide for basic needs) is one of the 'fatal flaws' of M's Plan.