NationStates Jolt Archive

I would've thought this would have inspired a thread.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Lewis_Brown

The two are an elderly couple who refused to pay taxes, believing there was no valid law compelling them to do so (silly, I know, but that's not my point). Since they didn't pay for years, they ended up owing $625,000.

They moved to some ranch out in nowhere, and when they had electricity, phones, mail and so on cut off, they just used gas cookers, canned food and so on. They also started stacking weapons in case the state would try to come and get them.

Because they were friendly to their supporters (http://makethestand.com/), gave press conferences and so on, they ended up letting undercover police into their house and were overpowered. They're now being sent to jail, which their supporters call "kidnapping".

Now, I realise that the legal basis for their claim is ridiculous (like the state is going to make a mistake when it comes to taking the money it needs to grow), and that it's full of conspiracy theories. I think that they're most likely nuts, to be honest. I'm sure Ed is.

But this real-world thing makes me wonder about a theoretical question.

Why do we have to pay taxes?

There is one reason, which is that we take advantage of government services. Hence, if we didn't pay for them, we'd be stealing. On the other hand, it implies that if we didn't use government services to such an extent that the government wouldn't have to pay a single cent extra for our usage, we wouldn't be compelled to pay, correct? And even if this was somehow not possible, it would imply that the only correct tax burden to be paid by a person is the equivalent of the services used by that person and not a cent more or less.

There is another, altogether more "soft" reason, which is that taxes have something to do not with the government, but with society. So the money we hand over is some sort of "giving back" to a society without which we allegedly would be nothing. Of course, how precisely that works is seldomly explained, it's often just sort of assumed to be a last word on the issue.

So I wonder whether anyone can explain their thoughts on why it is we pay taxes and if and why it would be wrong if we didn't.

no, not the way the current reasoning runs.

Supposedly in the U.S Constitution, there is a statement that says federal income tax is voluntary.. something like that. Maybe?

The ordeal was very interesting to me, but I think even the hard-core libertarians knew there was no way that this was going to go in the couple's favor. THe government had nothing if not the time and funds to keep it up.

I kind of want their house. It looks frikkin' awsome.

Now, I realise that the legal basis for their claim is ridiculous (like the state is going to make a mistake when it comes to taking the money it needs to grow), and that it's full of conspiracy theories. I think that they're most likely nuts, to be honest. I'm sure Ed is.

Actually, the the very technical sense, their claims are true, but its been established long enough that the courts wont support it. Also they didnt resist taxes, just the federal income tax. They paid their state taxes, sales taxes, etc.

Curses, only should have voted for 4&5, not 3.

Once upon a time we payed taxes for usage.

Now we pay taxes so the government can use us.

We pay for wars we don't want.
We pay welfare for people who have never participated in funding it.
We pay the salaries of government officials who don't do anything for us.
We pay for corporate welfare for services we don't use.
We pay for social security we will likely never see.
We pay for mercenaries who murder civilians.
We pay for corporations to outsource our jobs overseas.
We pay for immigration to deport people who perform services for us.

We give money to an organization which already OWES the American tax payers TRILLIONS of dollars...

I say we call this debt, and foreclose on every peice of government property to cover their debt to us.... Our first order of business, I'm putting the Whitehouse for sale on ebay...

There is already a thread on the subject here:
http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=540028


At any rate, it is good that these scumbags are in prison now, where they belong, and that no policemen or dogs were shot.

We pay taxes for the same reason we pay rent.

Supposedly in the U.S Constitution, there is a statement that says federal income tax is voluntary.. something like that. Maybe?

Which part of the constitution? It isn't a long document - modern computers have a text-search feature, why settle for "supposedly" and "maybe" ?

Moreover, do you understand what "voluntary" means when it refers to a tax?

Blueblood;13118526']
Actually, the the very technical sense, their claims are true, but its been established long enough that the courts wont support it. Also they didnt resist taxes, just the federal income tax. They paid their state taxes, sales taxes, etc.

Which claims?

None of their claims about the income tax are true in any sense or form, least so "very technically."

You have a severe problem understanding the laws of the US if you believe something this astoundingly absurd.

Which part of the constitution? It isn't a long document - modern computers have a text-search feature, why settle for "supposedly" and "maybe" ?

Moreover, do you understand what "voluntary" means when it refers to a tax?

Whoa.. I just heard this somewhere, I have no idea if it is true myself.
Hence the 'supposedly' and 'maybe'.

Actually I don't know what voluntary means in reference to a tax.

Which part of the constitution? It isn't a long document - modern computers have a text-search feature, why settle for "supposedly" and "maybe" ?

Moreover, do you understand what "voluntary" means when it refers to a tax?

Voluntary in US tax law means that one voluntarily gets to surrender their 5th amendment rights to the US government, and if they don't then various measures will be taken by the IRS and what passes for a judicial proceeding in this absurd thing called "Tax Court" to be compelled to surrender those rights in accordance with tax law by force, all without the benefit of legal representation, constitutional rights, or judicial review... In addition the IRS is allowed to seize any property to cover any debts which they determine you owe, without the need of a judges order, by compelling through coersion the local authorities to do their job for them. In addition you will be met by armed IRS personnel, who arm themselves by applying specific powers only granted by law to BATF to their own personnel to carry weapons to coerce your surrender.

IOW, "voluntary" in Tax code means anything but voluntary actions on your part.... I might as well claim someone can voluntarily give me their money, or I will shoot them.

Because it cost money for the government to do its shit. No such thing as a free meal et all.

16th Amendment to the US Constitution:

"The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration."

Before that, taxes were indirect and uniform, and were not based on income. As an Amendment is equal to any other writing in the Constitution, this amendment is part of the law of the land, and it is not negotiable and may only be revoked by another amendment. There is no reason these people should keep pushing this idea, though there is no reason people should be pushing the ideas of aliens visiting the Earth or Creationism or Dragons in the Garage. But they do.

Plus, as the main holder of force throughout the country, the government will hurt you if you don't. Not always physically, but economically, socially, and by locking you up.

Blueblood;13118526']Actually, the the very technical sense, their claims are true,

No, they are not.

Voluntary in US tax law means that one voluntarily gets to surrender their 5th amendment rights to the US government, and if they don't then various measures will be taken by the IRS and what passes for a judicial proceeding in this absurd thing called "Tax Court" to be compelled to surrender those rights in accordance with tax law by force, all without the benefit of legal representation, constitutional rights, or judicial review... In addition the IRS is allowed to seize any property to cover any debts which they determine you owe, without the need of a judges order, by compelling through coersion the local authorities to do their job for them. In addition you will be met by armed IRS personnel, who arm themselves by applying specific powers only granted by law to BATF to their own personnel to carry weapons to coerce your surrender.


Wow, I can't see you any more over that mound of bullshit you've constructed.

Voluntary in US tax law means that one voluntarily gets to surrender their 5th amendment rights to the US government, and if they don't then various measures will be taken by the IRS and what passes for a judicial proceeding in this absurd thing called "Tax Court" to be compelled to surrender those rights in accordance with tax law by force, all without the benefit of legal representation, constitutional rights, or judicial review... In addition the IRS is allowed to seize any property to cover any debts which they determine you owe, without the need of a judges order, by compelling through coersion the local authorities to do their job for them. In addition you will be met by armed IRS personnel, who arm themselves by applying specific powers only granted by law to BATF to their own personnel to carry weapons to coerce your surrender.

IOW, "voluntary" in Tax code means anything but voluntary actions on your part.... I might as well claim someone can voluntarily give me their money, or I will shoot them.

Nope, that is not what 'voluntary' means in reference to tax.

It means that you are at liberty to file and assess your own taxes. The income tax is not computed and collected automatically by the government.

The income tax is voluntary, a sales tax is not.

Nope, that is not what 'voluntary' means in reference to tax.

It means that you are at liberty to file and assess your own taxes. The income tax is not computed and collected automatically by the government.

The income tax is voluntary, a sales tax is not.

I'm at liberty to file and assess my own taxes? So, how come I can have proceedings brought against me for NOT FILING? How can something be "voluntary" if I'm penalized if I DO NOT DO IT?

EDIT: I guess speed limits are voluntary as well. As is registration for the draft.

Well, the reasons you list are the reasons why we pay taxes. Unless these two grow all their food using tools they make from resources they gather using implements they make to gather them, make their own clothes from materials they produce, and grow or build everything else they use without any external input, they are relying on the services provided by taxpayers at some point along the line.

They're thieves and nothing more.

I don't know about anybody else on NSG, but the only reason I pay taxes is to keep from getting my property taken from me and my head blown off. I don't do it out of any sense of "obligation to society", or because I unquestioningly and mindlessly support everything the government spends it on (because, frankly, i DON'T). I do it because I'd rather fork over PART of my income to Uncle Sam than for him to forcibly take ALL of my property and throw me in jail, and because whether or not they have the constitutional RIGHT to enforce the income tax (and I don't believe they do), they nevertheless have the MIGHT to do so.

Even if it is constitutional, IMO the income tax is inequitable and unfair. And even if it is equitable and fair, the IRS' attitude toward taxpayers, and their methods of enforcing tax laws, is most certainly NOT equitable nor fair.

I'm at liberty to file and assess my own taxes?

As opposed to requiring a third party to assess it for you, in the event of a thing like a sales tax, yes. You are free to assess your own taxes insofar as you are not required to have someone else do it.

it sitll must be done, but you may do it yourself.

As opposed to requiring a third party to assess it for you, in the event of a thing like a sales tax, yes. You are free to assess your own taxes insofar as you are not required to have someone else do it.

it sitll must be done, but you may do it yourself.

Oh, I may do it myself; how thoughtful of them...

Things like this is precisely why it is said lawyers will be the first against the wall when the revolution comes.

I'm at liberty to file and assess my own taxes? So, how come I can have proceedings brought against me for NOT FILING? How can something be "voluntary" if I'm penalized if I DO NOT DO IT?

Why do you need the same simple thing explained to you twice?

At any rate, here we go:

"It means that you are at liberty to file and assess your own taxes. The income tax is not computed and collected automatically by the government.

The income tax is voluntary, a sales tax is not."

You can't seriously expect us to believe that you don't understand the clear difference between the way a sales tax and the income tax are collected?

whether or not they have the constitutional RIGHT to enforce the income tax (and I don't believe they do).

How any reasonably intelligent and intellectually honest person can hold that position is beyond me.

Oh, I may do it myself; how thoughtful of them...

Things like this is precisely why it is said lawyers will be the first against the wall when the revolution comes.They could decide how much you pay in taxes and have that be final without you having any input into which tax breaks you actually qualify for.

Besides, lawyers do much worse things than this.

the governments are like the mafia

violent thieves. barbaric.

Oh, I may do it myself; how thoughtful of them...

Things like this is precisely why it is said lawyers will be the first against the wall when the revolution comes.

awww aren't you so very clever.

Things like this is precisely why it is said lawyers will be the first against the wall when the revolution comes.

Lawyers don't make the law.

Why do you need the same simple thing explained to you twice?

At any rate, here we go:

"It means that you are at liberty to file and assess your own taxes. The income tax is not computed and collected automatically by the government.

The income tax is voluntary, a sales tax is not."

You can't seriously expect us to believe that you don't understand the clear difference between the way a sales tax and the income tax are collected?

Oh, I understand the difference on how it is collected... My objection is the absurd inclusion of the word "voluntary".... Income tax is not "voluntarily" filed... Not by any normal sense of the word "voluntary"...

Now, you could keep speaking... But the more you hammer it in, the more absurd you become to me.

I would've thought this would have inspired a thread.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Lewis_Brown

The two are an elderly couple who refused to pay taxes, believing there was no valid law compelling them to do so (silly, I know, but that's not my point). Since they didn't pay for years, they ended up owing $625,000.

They moved to some ranch out in nowhere, and when they had electricity, phones, mail and so on cut off, they just used gas cookers, canned food and so on. They also started stacking weapons in case the state would try to come and get them.

Because they were friendly to their supporters (http://makethestand.com/), gave press conferences and so on, they ended up letting undercover police into their house and were overpowered. They're now being sent to jail, which their supporters call "kidnapping".

Now, I realise that the legal basis for their claim is ridiculous (like the state is going to make a mistake when it comes to taking the money it needs to grow), and that it's full of conspiracy theories. I think that they're most likely nuts, to be honest. I'm sure Ed is.

But this real-world thing makes me wonder about a theoretical question.

Why do we have to pay taxes?

There is one reason, which is that we take advantage of government services. Hence, if we didn't pay for them, we'd be stealing. On the other hand, it implies that if we didn't use government services to such an extent that the government wouldn't have to pay a single cent extra for our usage, we wouldn't be compelled to pay, correct? And even if this was somehow not possible, it would imply that the only correct tax burden to be paid by a person is the equivalent of the services used by that person and not a cent more or less.

There is another, altogether more "soft" reason, which is that taxes have something to do not with the government, but with society. So the money we hand over is some sort of "giving back" to a society without which we allegedly would be nothing. Of course, how precisely that works is seldomly explained, it's often just sort of assumed to be a last word on the issue.

So I wonder whether anyone can explain their thoughts on why it is we pay taxes and if and why it would be wrong if we didn't.

You really can't get away from using government services. You're using government services when you aren't being brutally opressed by a third world regime. The Government has to pay a bunch of guys, buy them guns, train them, and manage them, in order to protect it's citizens.

Now, you could keep speaking... But the more you hammer it in, the more absurd you become to me.

Ya know...just a hunch but...I don't think anyone around here is particularly worried about how you feel about them.

Lawyers don't make the law.

They don't? Then why are there so many of them in congress?

Oh, I understand the difference on how it is collected... My objection is the absurd inclusion of the word "voluntary".... Income tax is not "voluntarily" filed... Not by any normal sense of the word "voluntary"...

Now, you could keep speaking... But the more you hammer it in, the more absurd you become to me.

I don't know if you know this or not, but oftentimes in laws and legal language words are used a bit differently than they are by joe six pack.

You can cry about it being absurd all day long, but it doesn't change any facts.

There is even a term for what is wrong with the way you think, it is called the 'fallacy of equivocation,' and it means that you erroneously believe that a word must mean a certain thing in different contexts where it actually means different things.

As far as tax law goes, the income tax really is voluntary - the word 'voluntary' in that case refers specifically to the way the income tax is assessed, as opposed to other taxes like sales tax.

It does not mean "you are free to decide whether or not to pay income tax," and pretending that there is anything wrong with the former usage based on its putative meaning in the latter is a fallacy of equivocation.

They don't? Then why are there so many of them in congress?

That would make them congressmen/congresswomen, now wouldn't it?

They don't? Then why are there so many of them in congress?

psst, they're not actually practicing lawyers when they're in congress.

psst, they're not actually practicing lawyers when they're in congress.

No No No, you don't get it.

A lawyer you see is a sort of innate and eternal state of being evil.

When the devil comes down from hell and brands his cloven hoof behind a man's ear, and that man signs his name in blood in Satan's black book (the lawyers call this "passing the bar") then he becomes a lawyer in his immortal soul, and no matter what occupation he has, this sinister taint follows him and guides all his nefarious subversions of Christ and justice.

There is one reason, which is that we take advantage of government services. Hence, if we didn't pay for them, we'd be stealing. On the other hand, it implies that if we didn't use government services to such an extent that the government wouldn't have to pay a single cent extra for our usage, we wouldn't be compelled to pay, correct? And even if this was somehow not possible, it would imply that the only correct tax burden to be paid by a person is the equivalent of the services used by that person and not a cent more or less.

Actually you're incorrect. If true then any business that practices price discrimination would not meet the criteria above and therefore be illegitimate.

There is another, altogether more "soft" reason, which is that taxes have something to do not with the government, but with society. So the money we hand over is some sort of "giving back" to a society without which we allegedly would be nothing. Of course, how precisely that works is seldomly explained, it's often just sort of assumed to be a last word on the issue.

Government is generally seen as the trustee rulemaker/resource allocator of society. So it spends money on stuff like your eductation. With minimal interest rates it takes one a long time to be a net gain in tax returns. Various social investments help everyone in the long run.

I always look at this from the community village level, if you don't like the rules you can either:

A) vote
B) get a group together and protest (or on your own whatever gets you off)

the taxes pay for environmental, medical doo-dads and welfare* (along with some crappy stuff but I guess we get raped on the national as well)

now lets say you lived in a village full of villagers who didn't mind paying for the running of lets say a doctor, now as much as I hate to say this because its so overdone and retarded "you can either chip in or go somewhere where you don't have to"

there are plenty of uninhabited areas, go ahead and build your promised land :)

*no this isn't a debate on welfare it works out being profitable and keeps your streets safe (that is if you don't happen to care about helping people)

I hate paying taxes too but I'm not going to jail and have a felony because of it. Some people are just a little less inclined to see the big picture.

Maybe, I can explain things a bit. We pay for the things, which are not able to exist based on voluntarily donations. Let's look at national defense: since no one can be exempt from national defense, it'd make economically sense not to pay for it and be protected via the donations, others make. that is free-riding. Many matters of the state are like that (this is why I am not an anarchist, but a libertarian) and thus they are financed by taxes.

Maybe, I can explain things a bit. We pay for the things, which are not able to exist based on voluntarily donations. Let's look at national defense: since no one can be exempt from national defense, it'd make economically sense not to pay for it and be protected via the donations, others make. that is free-riding. Many matters of the state are like that (this is why I am not an anarchist, but a libertarian) and thus they are financed by taxes.

Taxes are a necessary evil. Excessive taxes are just unnecessary. I like flat tax though.

On the other hand, it implies that if we didn't use government services to such an extent that the government wouldn't have to pay a single cent extra for our usage, we wouldn't be compelled to pay, correct?

Actually, no. For a rough analogy, it doesn't cost the music industry anything more for another person to listen to a song, but considerations of externalities necessitate paying anyway. The same is true for a wide variety of government services.

The only way to get out of paying taxes at all, by that logic, would be to abstain from government services altogether... which, considering how they necessarily underlie basic structures of exchange, would mean you probably wouldn't have enough to be worth taxing anyway.

And even if this was somehow not possible, it would imply that the only correct tax burden to be paid by a person is the equivalent of the services used by that person and not a cent more or less.

I didn't know you opposed profit. ;)

I don't agree with this line of reasoning, because I think it's disingenuous--any "obligation" to pay for services disappears in the context of a coercive monopoly--and because I think it misses the purpose and real justification of taxation and the (government-established) property system as a whole, but it has a little more merit than you make it out to have.

There is another, altogether more "soft" reason, which is that taxes have something to do not with the government, but with society. So the money we hand over is some sort of "giving back" to a society without which we allegedly would be nothing. Of course, how precisely that works is seldomly explained, it's often just sort of assumed to be a last word on the issue.

Well, part of the way "that works" is provided in your own example: "without which we allegedly would be nothing." Without society, we would be loners living in horrible poverty... so we are not the primary causal factors in our own material wealth, society is. Therefore we have an obligation to pay back society.

Of course, as you've no doubt noticed, in truth this argument, too, is flawed: it is not "society" in aggregate that we owe, but particular people who either did what they did voluntarily (and therefore cannot demand compensation as a matter of right) or have already been compensated by us as part of mutually consensual exchanges.

So I wonder whether anyone can explain their thoughts on why it is we pay taxes and if and why it would be wrong if we didn't.

Well, the truth is somewhere in between the latter two reasons in the poll.

The key for the best versions of the "give back to society" argument is to move away from obligations rising out of material cause and effect ("'Society' raised me, without which I would be nothing, therefore I must taxes"). Instead we should simply recognize that our material success, such as it is, is not dependent on our own merit. It is not "merit" that we happened to have certain natural talents, or that we happened to receive the right opportunities, or that we happened to not be permanently injured in an automobile accident, or even that we had the right environment in which to develop an effective work ethic. As such, we do not deserve what we have... and because we have in a sense taken what is not ours, we have an obligation to give it "back" insofar as doing so might help others who did not have the same opportunities.

The other crucial element here is the artificiality of property rights: the property system is not a natural right, lacking any credible justification as such, but a government-established one whose only legitimate basis can be human happiness and freedom. To the degree that it interferes with these objectives, because they are its only justification it can be regulated and taxed so as to better be in accordance with them.

Blueblood;13118526']Actually, the the very technical sense, their claims are true, but its been established long enough that the courts wont support it. Also they didnt resist taxes, just the federal income tax. They paid their state taxes, sales taxes, etc.

Please, please try to explain to us these "techincally true" claims.

Because I am certain they are not true, in the very techincal sense or any other sense.

I don't know about anybody else on NSG, but the only reason I pay taxes is to keep from getting my property taken from me and my head blown off. I don't do it out of any sense of "obligation to society", or because I unquestioningly and mindlessly support everything the government spends it on (because, frankly, i DON'T). I do it because I'd rather fork over PART of my income to Uncle Sam than for him to forcibly take ALL of my property and throw me in jail, and because whether or not they have the constitutional RIGHT to enforce the income tax (and I don't believe they do), they nevertheless have the MIGHT to do so.

Even if it is constitutional, IMO the income tax is inequitable and unfair. And even if it is equitable and fair, the IRS' attitude toward taxpayers, and their methods of enforcing tax laws, is most certainly NOT equitable nor fair.

Think could be interesting.

Pray tell. Why doesn't the US have the Constitutional right to enforce the income tax? Doesn't the 16th Amendment expressly create such a right?

Why is the income tax inequitable and unfair?

Why are the IRS's attitude toward taxpayers and their methods of enforcing tax laws inequitable and unfair?

I don't know if you know this or not, but oftentimes in laws and legal language words are used a bit differently than they are by joe six pack.

You can cry about it being absurd all day long, but it doesn't change any facts.

There is even a term for what is wrong with the way you think, it is called the 'fallacy of equivocation,' and it means that you erroneously believe that a word must mean a certain thing in different contexts where it actually means different things.

As far as tax law goes, the income tax really is voluntary - the word 'voluntary' in that case refers specifically to the way the income tax is assessed, as opposed to other taxes like sales tax.

It does not mean "you are free to decide whether or not to pay income tax," and pretending that there is anything wrong with the former usage based on its putative meaning in the latter is a fallacy of equivocation.

Nicely handled. :)

Instead we should simply recognize that our material success, such as it is, is not dependent on our own merit. It is not "merit" that we happened to have certain natural talents, or that we happened to receive the right opportunities, or that we happened to not be permanently injured in an automobile accident, or even that we had the right environment in which to develop an effective work ethic. As such, we do not deserve what we have... and because we have in a sense taken what is not ours, we have an obligation to give it "back" insofar as doing so might help others who did not have the same opportunities.
That's horrible. How can you look into a mirror? You're willingly and deliberately reducing yourself from a human being to some pointless sack of muscles.

Do you actually practice this philosophy in real life? It seems impossible that anyone could.

That's horrible.

and trivially, obviously true

I
There is one reason, which is that we take advantage of government services. Hence, if we didn't pay for them, we'd be stealing. On the other hand, it implies that if we didn't use government services to such an extent that the government wouldn't have to pay a single cent extra for our usage, we wouldn't be compelled to pay, correct? And even if this was somehow not possible, it would imply that the only correct tax burden to be paid by a person is the equivalent of the services used by that person and not a cent more or less.

while that is logically correct, taxes over and above what one explicitly uses are required in part for services one recieves from the state, in a given timeframe, which are not necessarily "consumed", and due to distributive justice. i'd suggest looking into Rawls' theories on the subject as a good (if slightly wacky) explaination.

on this basis, i would somewhat agree with Soheran that the talents we have, where we are born, and to whom (supportive/abusive parents, 1st world or 3rd world country, rich or poor) are random. we have no control over these factors in our birth. as such, there can be no meritocracy. however, how far this theory goes in influencing my view on distributive justice seems less extreme than either Soheran's or Rawls'


but then, of course, there's also the issue of compassion. i feel compassion and empathy for my fellow man, even if i cannot see them. inside this state, a somewhat closed system, i believe that my taxes should go to help those who need it, be it because they are disabled, out of work, homeless, ill, etc, through healthcare and welfare. and through everyone paying into this system, i can be sure that should i ever need such help, i will receive it.
a practical example is the NHS. i am happy to pay my taxes to the NHS even if i don't use it from one year to the next, because i know that when i do need it, it will be there for me for free (at the point of consumption). it is on this longer-term basis that i am happy to be "out of pocket" so to speak for some years before i use the NHS. it is only when you look at this in a short-term, year-by-year basis that any discomfort enters my mind.

but then i know, of course, that position (compassion) is hinged on an emotion, which is clearly not a purely logical approach.

I picked "because we owe it to society", but I also picked "all property belongs to the state". The latter isn't technically true, however the state (or government) decides the level of private property that we have the right to. It could be anywhere from total (and thus no taxation) to none.

That's horrible. How can you look into a mirror? You're willingly and deliberately reducing yourself from a human being to some pointless sack of muscles.

Elaborate, please.

Do you actually practice this philosophy in real life? It seems impossible that anyone could.

Soheran explained that practicing this philosophy means giving a portion of one's resources to others to give them opportunities they wouldn't otherwise have. Paying taxes to give children an education or giving to micro-credit charities would be some ways to fulfil these obligations.

John Rawls for the goddamned motherfucking WIN

/PUI

The whole tax evader argument spectrum is a monument to stupidity. It's false. It doesn't exist. These tax evader arguments aren't based on sound legal judgement, they're based on nothing more than plain old fashioned greed.

There is no magic trick, no secret code. Yes the 16th amendment was properly ratified. yes the law requires you to pay taxes. No the word "voluntary" doesn't mean what you think it means. No, reading section 5 subsection (b)(6) backwards in a mirror at midnight while hopping on one foot facing the lincoln memorial will not suddenly reveal that you don't have to pay it.

Supposedly in the U.S Constitution, there is a statement that says federal income tax is voluntary.. something like that. Maybe?

No, there isn't. When the Constitution itself was framed, Federal government was able to tax interstate trade and foreign trade. Beyond that it had to ask the states to chip in.

But the 16th amendment gives it the power to tax individuals without having to consult the state governments.

First off, there are two types of taxes the Governments are allowed to use in the U.S. Constitution: Direct & Indirect. Someone had made a claim that "before such and such" all taxes were voluntary; that is not true. Indirect taxes are voluntary; direct taxes are not. Indirect taxes include, but are not limited to, taxes on alcohol, gas, cigarettes, sales tax (though I find it hard anyone can ever go without actually buying something to aviod paying this tax) and so forth. Basically, they are taxes that you can choose not to pay by simply not buying the product. Direct taxes are not voluntary and must be paid. A good example, excluding the 16th Amendement, are Corperate Income Taxes, which the Constitution allows for originally.

Next, your U.S. Federal Income taxes are not used for any government services. They are used to pay the ever increasing debt the U.S. government owes to The Federal Reserve for "borrowing" money that the U.S. Constitution gives the power to Congress to make, since we all seem to be so gung-ho about following the Constitution now when it involves the 16th Amendment. God forbid I should try to exercise my 2nd or 5th though, I'd be locked up.

Both people who claim that the 16th Amendment wasn't/was properly ratified rely on the "say so" of other, 3rd, parties. I doubt any one of you has gone out and actually done this research for yourself and knows all of the supposed 'facts'. Therefore, I don't think any one of you has the right to call the otherside any name or make any claim that their arguement is flawed or whatever. That said, someone please show me where in the IRS Tax code, U.S. Federal Law, U.S. State/local law, etc that it says I have to file a 1040, lest I be prosecuted. HINT: the 16th Amendment doesn't count. It gives Congress the right to levy a Direct, unaportioned, Tax on all forms of income. It doesn't say that I have to file a 1040 by April 15th. It simply gives them the right to tax my income.

Even if it is constitutional, IMO the income tax is inequitable and unfair. And even if it is equitable and fair, the IRS' attitude toward taxpayers, and their methods of enforcing tax laws, is most certainly NOT equitable nor fair.

How so? IMO the IRS enforces its relevant laws far more fairly than any other government agency.

If the IRS charges you penalties and interest for money it think you owe, and then you can prove you didn't owe the original money, then it will waive the penalties.

If you get arrested for assault, resisting arrest, and attempting to escape from prison by the police, and then prove that you never committed assault, you'll still stay in prison for resisting arrest and attempting to escape from prison.

If the IRS charges you penalties on money you do owe, you can call them up and say "couldn't you let it go just this once?" They will.

If the highway patrol pulls you over for speeding, they're not going to check to see if you've ever been given a warning on a moving violation. They'll only give you a warning if you have a minishield or a miniskirt. A rather corrupt practice IMO.

When the IRS resorts to making an arrest you can rest assured that they have tried every other method to get the money peacefully. Not because they're so nice, but because arresting people and putting them in prison costs money, and the IRS is all about getting money without spending it.

This is certainly how taxes should work, and why most taxes could (and perhaps should) be replaced with user fees.

Of course, if you want welfare that would have to be paid out of some sort of general revenue (because poor people don't have any money with which to pay user fees), but the consumption of most services is voluntary. Why should I pay for stuff I don't use?

The biggest crime of taxes is that people don't notice them. In the 1980s, the Canadian government replaced a tax on manufactured goods (paid by the manufacturers) with a tax on goods and services (paid by consumers). Everyone hated the new tax, and that's GREAT. People should hate their taxes, so in coverting a hidden tax we didn't kow about to a visible tax we dislike, the government did a wonderful thing.
This is why income tax withholding is such an evil. If we insist on imposing them, income taxes should be due, in full, on the appointed day. We should be able to measure their impact by the size of the check we write.

Why do we have to pay taxes?

There is one reason, which is that we take advantage of government services. Hence, if we didn't pay for them, we'd be stealing. On the other hand, it implies that if we didn't use government services to such an extent that the government wouldn't have to pay a single cent extra for our usage, we wouldn't be compelled to pay, correct? And even if this was somehow not possible, it would imply that the only correct tax burden to be paid by a person is the equivalent of the services used by that person and not a cent more or less.
This is certainly how taxes should work, and why most taxes could (and perhaps should) be replaced with user fees.

Of course, if you want welfare that would have to be paid out of some sort of general revenue (because poor people don't have any money with which to pay user fees), but the consumption of most services is voluntary. Why should I pay for stuff I don't use?

The biggest crime of taxes is that people don't notice them. In the 1980s, the Canadian government replaced a tax on manufactured goods (paid by the manufacturers) with a tax on goods and services (paid by consumers). Everyone hated the new tax, and that's GREAT. People should hate their taxes, so in coverting a hidden tax we didn't kow about to a visible tax we dislike, the government did a wonderful thing.

That's horrible.

Not at all.

To the contrary, the "horrible" thing is the image of society so many "libertarians" seem to have... the worthless masses and the natural, competent, intelligent elite.

The latter of which, of course, they are a part. :rolleyes:

How can you look into a mirror? You're willingly and deliberately reducing yourself from a human being to some pointless sack of muscles.

To the contrary, the objectification here is on the part of those who selfishness leads them to ignore the conclusions of reason and instead indulge in vanity.

Do you actually practice this philosophy in real life?

The "recognition" part? Yes. Do I act on it, always? No. But I should.

It seems impossible that anyone could.

Why does it?

Basically, they are taxes that you can choose not to pay by simply not buying the product. Direct taxes are not voluntary and must be paid.

Income tax is as voluntary as sales tax. Don't want a sales tax don't buy the product. Don't want an income tax, don't earn an income. I fail to see the difference.

since we all seem to be so gung-ho about following the Constitution now when it involves the 16th Amendment. God forbid I should try to exercise my 2nd or 5th though, I'd be locked up.

You realize 16 comes after 5, right? And any claim that taking your money is a violation of your 5th amendment right becomes rather silly, because even if that was the case, the 16th amendment, in allowing the government to tax your income, supercedes the 5th.

Both people who claim that the 16th Amendment wasn't/was properly ratified rely on the "say so" of other, 3rd, parties. I doubt any one of you has gone out and actually done this research for yourself and knows all of the supposed 'facts'.

Wanna bet?

That said, someone please show me where in the IRS Tax code, U.S. Federal Law, U.S. State/local law, etc that it says I have to file a 1040, lest I be prosecuted.

26 USC 6011(a) General rule. When required by regulations prescribed by the Secretary any person made liable for any tax imposed by this title, or for the collection thereof, shall make a return or statement according to the forms and regulations prescribed by the Secretary. Every person required to make a return or statement shall include therein the information required by such forms or regulations.

Any other questions?

Income tax is as voluntary as sales tax. Don't want a sales tax don't buy the product. Don't want an income tax, don't earn an income. I fail to see the difference. Only if you define 'choice' so narrowly as to make it meaningless.

Yes, you could choose not to pay income tax, by not earning an income. Your refusal would also make you ineligible for most social assistance programs, so your 'choice' would actually be between starving to death and paying income tax. When the 'choice' is between dying, and paying taxes, then the reasonable person would not perceive this as a choice at all.

Sales taxes however, are generally on 'luxury goods'. There are exemptions for 'necessaries' in most areas. The choice does not cause one to face death, only less luxury.

I don't believe the two are comparable at all in either a qualitative or quantitative sense.

Yet it remains a choice. It may be a bad choice. It may be a choice that's not feasible. It may be a downright stupid choice. Yet it is a choice.

I put a gun at someone and demand her money.

She has a choice, too: give me the money, or be shot.

Is her choice "voluntary"?

This is certainly how taxes should work, and why most taxes could (and perhaps should) be replaced with user fees.

Of course, if you want welfare that would have to be paid out of some sort of general revenue (because poor people don't have any money with which to pay user fees), but the consumption of most services is voluntary. Why should I pay for stuff I don't use?


That's fine, until you realize how much stuff the federal government pays for. How'd you get to work today? Drove on a highway?
Go to a public school? Go to a state university? Drink water or poop? Piping was probably originally paid for by the government, unless recently replaced. Eat? Nearly every farmer in the country gets some sort of subisdy. Not get shot on your way home? House didn't burn down? Canada didn't invade? Who do you think pays for the police, fire department, and military? Why should your neighbor bear the burden for your security?

Oh, and without government funding, the internet may have never come about.

Only if you define 'choice' so narrowly as to make it meaningless.

Yes, you could choose not to pay income tax, by not earning an income. Your refusal would also make you ineligible for most social assistance programs, so your 'choice' would actually be between starving to death and paying income tax. When the 'choice' is between dying, and paying taxes, then the reasonable person would not perceive this as a choice at all.

Yet it remains a choice. It may be a bad choice. It may be a choice that's not feasible. It may be a downright stupid choice. Yet it is a choice. All tax liability is a choice to the extent that you must first meet the taxing conditions in order to be taxed.

we do not have a "head tax" in which you are taxed simply by being. This might be the only tax one can construe as not being a choice.

The two are an elderly couple who refused to pay taxes, believing there was no valid law compelling them to do so

There isn't.

Since all taxation is inherently illegitimate, any "law" purporting to require one to pay taxes is ipso facto null and void.

Yet it remains a choice. It may be a bad choice. It may be a choice that's not feasible. It may be a downright stupid choice. Yet it is a choice. All tax liability is a choice to the extent that you must first meet the taxing conditions in order to be taxed.

we do not have a "head tax" in which you are taxed simply by being. This might be the only tax one can construe as not being a choice.

The concept of 'duress' is one I'm sure you are familiar with. One can not be said to actually have a choice or be acting of free will when under duress. Now generally, duress can be a mitigating factor in a criminal sense, or even a partial or complete defence. In this sense however, the concept would be closer to contract law, where the exercise of coercive power makes a contract void.

The choice you speak of here, is not between paying income tax or not paying. It is, as has been pointed out, between death and taxes :D. In this instance, the coercive force being applied negates the ability of the actor to have the actual free will to make a choice.

While it is true that an actual 'existence tax' of some sort would be a much clearer case of a complete lack of choice, I do not think that anything short of this kind of means that one is truly free to choose.

There isn't.

Since all taxation is inherently illegitimate, any "law" purporting to require one to pay taxes is ipso facto null and void.

Please don't pretend you understand the law. At least approach this from a position of fringe opinion, based in 'how I want the world to be' rather than trying legitimise it with a legal discussion you simply are incapable of carrying.

It's not about law.

It's abot objective moral principle.

All taxation is inherently illegitimate; this is an objective moral principle proven from the first principles of the Universe. There is, therefore, no moral obligation to pay taxes, and any "law" that claims to impose a legal obligation is therefore null and void, since civil law is properly subordinate to moral law.

The concept of 'duress' is one I'm sure you are familiar with. One can not be said to actually have a choice or be acting of free will when under duress. Now generally, duress can be a mitigating factor in a criminal sense, or even a partial or complete defence. In this sense however, the concept would be closer to contract law, where the exercise of coercive power makes a contract void.

The choice you speak of here, is not between paying income tax or not paying. It is, as has been pointed out, between death and taxes :D. In this instance, the coercive force being applied negates the ability of the actor to have the actual free will to make a choice.


Improper. For a contract (we'll stick with contracts because it's a more clear analogy than in the criminal context as you note), as you say there must be an exercise of coercive power exercised by one party to the contract (or on behalf of a party to the contract) and onto the other party of the contract. In the case of taxes, the parties can be assumed to be the government, and the taxpayer. For a claim of duress in a contract scheme, there must be a showing of coercision by the government, and to the taxpayer. Which there is none of. The government makes not threats (work and pay us taxes or we kill you) or exercises any other coercive measures. It merely creates the duality of work, and pay, or don't work. The fact that "don't work" is a highly unappealing option is not the fault of the government, it does not force those negative consequences on to the taxpayer, those negative consequences are merely the reality of the situation.

Unless, of course, one would argue that the government, setting up our system to be capitalist and requiring money to get things, is the one that set the precursive conditions in place to begin with. it is an interesting thought experiment, however the problem rises that a democratic government is merely a representative (or hopefully) expression of the intent of the voters, and it is indeed the people who propogate such a system to begin with. Likewise, if the taxpayer is a voting citizen, he would himself be part of "the people", and, having some degree of power within the government, would find himself coerced in an indirect situation by an entity of which he is a part of.

Or we could jsut say that the government isn't making him work, and if he is incapable of having someone support him or living off the land, well...oh well. I'd point out that there are numerous stay at home parents who earn no income.

In fact, as a student, how much income are YOU making right now? :p

The fact that "don't work" is a highly unappealing option is not the fault of the government

No... but the fault that "don't work" is the only option that gets you out of taxation IS the fault of the government.

As well let me maintain, while robbing someone, that it's not my fault getting shot is such a bad option--I just created the duality.

:rolleyes:

It's not about law.

It's abot objective moral principle.

All taxation is inherently illegitimate; this is an objective moral principle proven from the first principles of the Universe. There is, therefore, no moral obligation to pay taxes, and any "law" that claims to impose a legal obligation is therefore null and void, since civil law is properly subordinate to moral law.

Good, then. Stop using public goods. Right now. Unplug your computer from the internet. Shut off the power, water and sewage. Don't walk on the sidewalks, don't drive on the roads.

Live your ideology, or pay your damn taxes.

Please don't pretend you understand the law.

I think Linus and Lucy's failure is more along the lines of pretending he understands anything at all.

No... but the fault that "don't work" is the only option that gets you out of taxation IS the fault of the government.

well I would think that because it is an income tax that you earn an income, you get taxed, would be a fairly self explanatory idea. Again nobody is forced by the government to work. The government doesn't MAKE you work so that it can collect taxes from you.

You might be forced by circumstances, but that's not at all the same thing.

*snip*

:fluffle:

well I would think that because it is an income tax that you earn an income, you get taxed, would be a fairly self explanatory idea.

Yeah. But it is not "voluntary." Stop pretending it is.

Again nobody is forced by the government to work.

But people who do earn an income are forced by the government to pay income tax, which in and of itself is coercion. And since having an income is pretty much a necessity of life....

The government doesn't MAKE you work so that it can collect taxes from you.

No. And the robber doesn't MAKE you care about your life so he can collect money from you. Nor does he MAKE your body respond the way it does when a bullet hits it.

But it's still coercion.

But people who do earn an income are forced by the government to pay income tax, which in and of itself is coercion. And since having an income is pretty much a necessity of life....

Depends on your definition of "income". If we define income as "anything that comes to you" then yes. However TAXABLE income is another story.

When I was in college and law school I lived off student loans. I had money, but it wasn't taxable income. I didn't pay taxes for years, I made no taxable income. And that was my choice to go to school and take loans. So I did very much indeed make a choice to not earn a taxable income. Every stay at home parent who doesn't have a job but watches kids makes the choice to not earn a taxable income. Every person who retires and lives off cash savings or tax free retirement fund..you guessed it, makes a choice to not earn a taxable income.

There are THOUSANDS of people in this country, maybe a million or more, who have a net taxable income of 0 who are not starving to death (not even counting folks working illegally) So no, it's not that impossible.

No. And the robber doesn't MAKE you care about your life so he can collect money from you. Nor does he MAKE your body respond the way it does when a bullet hits it.

In your example it's the robber who inflicts penalties on you if you do not pay money. For that example, it would be the GOVERNMENT that causes you to starve if you don't earn an income.

It's not. It may be the rules of our society, the facts of our circumstances, but not the government. The roober is coercive because the robber inflicts a penalty on you for non compliance, but the government doesn't come into your house and take your food away.

But it's still coercion.

Except the fact that it isn't.

There are THOUSANDS of people in this country, maybe a million or more, who have a net taxable income of 0 who are not starving to death (not even counting folks working illegally) So no, it's not that impossible.

This is a better argument... and one that effectively responds to the distinction Neesika drew earlier.

But it's worth noting that this is a choice of the government, not a restriction on its power by right.

For that example, it would be the GOVERNMENT that causes you to starve if you don't earn an income.

Indeed, the government does not punish me for not earning an income. Rather, in effect it punishes me for not paying taxes by forcing me to not earn an income.

This penalty is caused by the government, not by circumstances. Its EFFECTS are caused by circumstance--but so are the effects of shooting someone.

Why do we have to pay taxes?

There is one reason, which is that we take advantage of government services. Hence, if we didn't pay for them, we'd be stealing.

That's very strange... I can't seem to recall ever asking the government for any kind of services....

What a strange servant the government is. Setting up rules and regulations for it's master, coercing the master into paying upwards of 40% of his income with threats of violence, locking up the master and such... Seems more like the behavior of a master than a servant...

Now again, I'm not saying everybody has the choice to do things that will mean they have no taxable income, and still survive. Clearly that is not the case. However, to describe it as coercion by the part of the government, it has to be shown that the government impedes your ability to survive and yet not earn an income.

And it doesn't. Our capitalist system may do so, but still, lots of people do. Every student living on financial aid, every stay at home spouse, every retired person living off a tax free retirement fund, all survive with no taxable income. Not everybody may be so situated as to be able to make those choices, but if we call it coercive elements of the government, then it would be the government saying "no, you can not be a stay at home father, you must either earn an income or starve, we will not allow it"

And it doesn't. Now, true, external circumstances may prevent you from finding a woman willing to support you while you raise your shared children. But that's not the government that's preventing you.

Indeed, the government does not punish me for not earning an income. Rather, in effect it punishes me for not paying taxes by forcing me to not earn an income.

You're saying the government punishes you by forcing you to not earn a taxable income if you wish to avoid taxes?

Well true, the government does make you not earn an income if you wish to avoid income taxes. I am unsure if it is proper to call this a "punishment" though.

Simply saying it's a punishment that it makes you not earn an income if you wish to not pay taxes...that's like saying ferrari is punishing you for making you pay for its cars if you want to have one. It's not a punishment, it's a simple cause and effect. If you want to NOT pay income taxes, don't earn an income. If you want to NOT pay for a ferrari, don't buy the ferrari. The ferrari corporation is not punishing you by refusing to give you a free car.

Now true, sometimes, the option to not make an income just isn't there, and the same can't be said for a ferrari, but the question becomes then, is that the fault of the government that you don't have the option, or just external circumstances?

I find it quite funny that when people don't pay their taxes, we waste the money of people who did putting them in jail.

This is certainly how taxes should work, and why most taxes could (and perhaps should) be replaced with user fees.

Of course, if you want welfare that would have to be paid out of some sort of general revenue (because poor people don't have any money with which to pay user fees), but the consumption of most services is voluntary. Why should I pay for stuff I don't use?

The biggest crime of taxes is that people don't notice them. In the 1980s, the Canadian government replaced a tax on manufactured goods (paid by the manufacturers) with a tax on goods and services (paid by consumers). Everyone hated the new tax, and that's GREAT. People should hate their taxes, so in coverting a hidden tax we didn't kow about to a visible tax we dislike, the government did a wonderful thing.

Ummm..... user fees are often extremely unpopular because people see them. Gas taxes, which compensate for use of roads and pollution spewed from the auto, are hated by by many. Same for congestion taxes, toll roads, and parking meters. The US produces some of the highest amount of garbage per capita because garbage collection prices are hidden in property taxes rather than use of the services.

I am unsure if it is proper to call this a "punishment" though.

Maybe it's a stretch, if we want to be pedantic about semantics.

But I fail to see what difference it makes in terms of coercion.

The ferrari corporation is not punishing you by refusing to give you a free car.

Actually, in an important sense, it is: it is making my ownership of its cars contingent on my compliance with its demands, and thus coercively restricting my freedom.

But even if you don't accept that line of reasoning, your argument still doesn't stand, because the relevant analogy here would be the Ferrari corporation not only refusing to give me its cars, but also stopping anyone else from selling me anything.

And that, surely, is a coercive penalty.

but the question becomes then, is that the fault of the government that you don't have the option, or just external circumstances?

It's not the "fault" of the government necessarily, but if we are concerned for freedom, it is nevertheless a factor we take into consideration.

It is not the "fault" of a particular employer that jobs are sometimes difficult to find, but that hardly justifies abuses of power.

but then, of course, there's also the issue of compassion. i feel compassion and empathy for my fellow man, even if i cannot see them. inside this state, a somewhat closed system, i believe that my taxes should go to help those who need it, be it because they are disabled, out of work, homeless, ill, etc, through healthcare and welfare. and through everyone paying into this system, i can be sure that should i ever need such help, i will receive it.
So you don't feel there is a difference whether you give money to someone else out of the goodness of your heart, or whether you give it away because otherwise you'll go to jail?

If being compassionate and generous is good in your opinion, then where is the good when you're not allowed to be evil? If you can't make a choice to be good, how can you feel better about yourself if whatever other people force you to do happens to end up having effects you would call morally good.

Elaborate, please.
People exist in the material world. Their purpose in life is to build their own meaning, their own quality of life and do something that, at the end, they can be proud of. Your life is a sum of your actions, a sum of the things you did in the physical world, prompted by your brain (and if the things you do are to have any sense and purpose, beginning and end, they'll be prompted by the rational part of your brain).

Now Soheran is saying that nothing we do matters. I'm sick of people telling me that because we can't control where and how we're born, we don't deserve whatever we make with what we start with. A capable person cannot be held back by anything, if he or she is it was a proof that he or she wasn't capable to begin with. It's easier in the US to lose money than it is to make it - heirs to a fortune don't stay rich if they don't (for want of a better word) prove themselves worthy to it.

If who we are and what we do is only a product of where and to whom we happen to have been born with, then there is no point doing anything. Either you were lucky and were born rich or you weren't. In neither case is there a reason to make anything of one's life - afterall everything was already determined for us.

That sort of view also holds that material achievement comes from nowhere and just sorta appears out of thin air. The people who became rich by developing new ways of doing things, the people who build this world we enjoy - well, they didn't matter, right? If it hadn't been Mr. Watts thinking of these things, it would have been some other hypothetical guy. What are ideas anyways, right...they just sorta flow about in space and happen to get absorbed by society through some meaningless vessel. So no one ever actually has an idea. No one can deserve the good that comes from an idea. Mr. Watts was not an inventor, he was a parasite.

And, conventiently, because material achievement doesn't require a mind or human action to come about or be maintained, it can just be taken over by someone else and nothing would change.

The latter of which, of course, they are a part. :rolleyes:
Anyone can be. It's not a matter of what you're born as, it's a matter of whether you want to be and do what needs to be done to be.

Why does it?
See above.

It's not a matter of what you're born as, it's a matter of whether you want to be and do what needs to be done to be.

That's trivially false, unless you allow for massive differences in "what needs to be done"... which kind of makes the whole principle worthless.

Do we have to pay taxes? Yes, and this story is a perfect example of why. Government - it doesn't really matter which, they're all pretty much the same when it comes to stealing from their people - will hurt you if you step out of line in the slightest way including but not limited to failure to pay heavy tribute to the corrupted parasites that do nothing to help you but batter you senseless if they are displeased in the slightest with your performance. So long as there is government there will be taxes and slavery. The question you should be asking is not "do we have to pay taxes?", it's "should we have to pay taxes?". To answer this requires that we examine what those taxes pay for and what would happen without those expenses. The most expense will always be a military and police force to keep peace and order and to protect the people of a nation from aggression both from within and without. With no military or police a nation becomes a defenseless lamb in a field of wolves.

But there are many expenses that can be done without. Corporate welfare is one of them. If there is not suffuicient demand for a product, the cost of production is too high, the methods now obsolete, the company thriving, the company struggling, etc. there is no reason for the government to fund it. Subsidization is a waste of money, it's pissing away cash on obsolete or unprofitable ventures that rarely if ever even return their costs.

Now for the speed assault. The Civilian Conservation Corp. was another big waste of money. New Deal programs never employed more than a third of the unemployed workforce. The CCC was run like a pressgang, young men being rounded up off the streets and sent away to labor camps where they were paid $5 a month for their baily back-breaking work. FDR really had a thing for camps because a few years later he rounded up every American with Japanese relatives and sent them off to camps. The government even hired "psychics" for intel purposes during the cold war. Your tax dollars at work.

I'd like to conclude with a reminder that there is no such thing as government money, all money is a representation of goods generated by people. The money belongs to the people, the government just takes it. There is no such thing as free healthcare, free energy, or free anything. Everything has a cost and the price that is paid for "freely" priovided services through the government remains the same and is simply distributed to everyone, including those that don't take advantage of said services or who don't qualify.

Now again, I'm not saying everybody has the choice to do things that will mean they have no taxable income, and still survive. Clearly that is not the case. However, to describe it as coercion by the part of the government, it has to be shown that the government impedes your ability to survive and yet not earn an income.

And it doesn't. Our capitalist system may do so, but still, lots of people do. Every student living on financial aid, every stay at home spouse, every retired person living off a tax free retirement fund, all survive with no taxable income. Not everybody may be so situated as to be able to make those choices, but if we call it coercive elements of the government, then it would be the government saying "no, you can not be a stay at home father, you must either earn an income or starve, we will not allow it"

And it doesn't. Now, true, external circumstances may prevent you from finding a woman willing to support you while you raise your shared children. But that's not the government that's preventing you.
But doesn't the government say, "If you are liable for tax payments, then you must pay"? Whether the income is earned or gifted or found, there are certain tax liabilities associated with it. Maybe it's a zero liability, but more likely not. And when that tax is owed to the government, won't it insist that it's paid? This is where the coercion exists. The government certainly says, "We must be paid, or we will take something away from you." Why isn't that coercion?

Supposedly in the U.S Constitution, there is a statement that says federal income tax is voluntary.. something like that. Maybe?

Nope. Lies spread by some ignorant documentarian. I WANTED to believe it, but when I did the research (I actually went so far as to contact a law professor) I discovered that, believe it or not, you ARE required to pay income tax. And it is stated quite clearly at that.

This phenomenon is no more than a most extreme case of wishful thinking. But with that being said, I'll end on a more opinionated note: fuck taxes and fuck the goods "we" get from them. If I wanna eat, I'll go kill a senator's dog.

But doesn't the government say, "If you are liable for tax payments, then you must pay"? Whether the income is earned or gifted or found, there are certain tax liabilities associated with it. Maybe it's a zero liability, but more likely not. And when that tax is owed to the government, won't it insist that it's paid? This is where the coercion exists. The government certainly says, "We must be paid, or we will take something away from you." Why isn't that coercion?

Governments set property rights. Unamity is impossible.

Governments set property rights. Unamity is impossible.
I'm not familiar with that word. Please explain.

People exist in the material world. Their purpose in life is to build their own meaning, their own quality of life and do something that, at the end, they can be proud of. Your life is a sum of your actions, a sum of the things you did in the physical world, prompted by your brain (and if the things you do are to have any sense and purpose, beginning and end, they'll be prompted by the rational part of your brain).

Now Soheran is saying that nothing we do matters. I'm sick of people telling me that because we can't control where and how we're born, we don't deserve whatever we make with what we start with. A capable person cannot be held back by anything, if he or she is it was a proof that he or she wasn't capable to begin with. It's easier in the US to lose money than it is to make it - heirs to a fortune don't stay rich if they don't (for want of a better word) prove themselves worthy to it.

So you are saying that causes outside of one's control, including genetics, family, culture, market forces, ect, have no effect on outcomes? Ludicrous

If who we are and what we do is only a product of where and to whom we happen to have been born with, then there is no point doing anything. Either you were lucky and were born rich or you weren't. In neither case is there a reason to make anything of one's life - afterall everything was already determined for us.

Soheran is just saying that much of what forms us is undeserved. How'd you earn your "good" genes? Your family and culture didn't drive the work ethic into you at all? Ayn Rand had no influnence on your ideas? They came out of yourself with no external input?

That sort of view also holds that material achievement comes from nowhere and just sorta appears out of thin air. The people who became rich by developing new ways of doing things, the people who build this world we enjoy - well, they didn't matter, right? If it hadn't been Mr. Watts thinking of these things, it would have been some other hypothetical guy. What are ideas anyways, right...they just sorta flow about in space and happen to get absorbed by society through some meaningless vessel. So no one ever actually has an idea. No one can deserve the good that comes from an idea. Mr. Watts was not an inventor, he was a parasite.

Really your views seem to imply the above. That individuals get ideas, inspirations, and innovations without any help from others or things outside themselves. They just spring up from the nothingness of the imagination fully formed.

And, conventiently, because material achievement doesn't require a mind or human action to come about or be maintained, it can just be taken over by someone else and nothing would change..

Soheran is just following Hayek when he says that market outcomes are not deserved.

I put a gun at someone and demand her money.

She has a choice, too: give me the money, or be shot.

Is her choice "voluntary"?

Yes.

She can weigh the pros against the cons and decide whether or not to give you the money. Sure, for most people it isn't a very pleasant voluntary choice, but it is voluntary.

I'm not familiar with that word. Please explain.

A misspelling of unanimity, ie people disagree on things like allocating property rights.

Now Soheran is saying that nothing we do matters.

I didn't say anything even approximating that.

I said the mere fact that I do x does not mean that I deserve certain rewards for doing x, if my doing of x has nothing to do with my merit.

I'm sick of people telling me that because we can't control where and how we're born, we don't deserve whatever we make with what we start with. A capable person cannot be held back by anything,

First, that's obviously nonsense. Capable people can still starve to death or be denied meaningful opportunities.

Second, "capability" is not an indicator of merit either. Some people are born more "capable"--at least by our society's conception of "capable"--than others. That's hardly an indicator of merit.

if he or she is it was a proof that he or she wasn't capable to begin with.

How convenient!

It's easier in the US to lose money than it is to make it - heirs to a fortune don't stay rich if they don't (for want of a better word) prove themselves worthy to it.

Making and keeping money has nothing to do with being "worthy"... indeed, being worthy often necessitates actions that run directly contrary to the pursuit of wealth.

If who we are and what we do is only a product of where and to whom we happen to have been born with, then there is no point doing anything.

I didn't say "only." I might actually maintain that in a different context, but I'm not interested in an argument about determinism at the moment. Regardless, it is absurd to deny that genetic and environmental factors--over which we have no control--are far more crucial to success than mere exertion of will.

That is not necessarily because "we cannot control ourselves" (the more interesting philosophical angle), but because we are limited by what we cannot do (and, conversely, privileged by what we happen to be able to do.)

If it hadn't been Mr. Watts thinking of these things, it would have been some other hypothetical guy.

Not necessarily, but we still cannot definitively speak of "merit" in the sense of something that might bring about desert.

Mr. Watts was almost certainly a man of exceptional natural talent, for instance. Hardly merit-worthy in and of itself; that's luck.

It's not about law.

It's abot objective moral principle.

All taxation is inherently illegitimate; this is an objective moral principle proven from the first principles of the Universe. There is, therefore, no moral obligation to pay taxes, and any "law" that claims to impose a legal obligation is therefore null and void, since civil law is properly subordinate to moral law.

And what, pray tell, are the "first principles of the Universe"?

Soheran is just following Hayek when he says that market outcomes are not deserved.

Indeed--that conclusion is fairly trivial. It's obvious that, say, an uneducated immigrant from Mexico who has worked hard all her life is more (or at least no less) deserving than some rich kid who manages to get all the best opportunities... yet who do we expect will end up making more?

That's why the best defenders of market outcomes as matters of right speak not of "desert" but of "entitlement."

they used to have this video embedded in their OLD myspace page,
but it appears their myspace account has been deleted or they quit.
IT also appears as though the new one linked from wiki might be a hack,
i.e. not really their page.
?



This is the vid i posted in another thread that is about
us not having to pay income taxes.
Only corporations have to pay income taxes,
because the tax is only on profits.
Money we get from work is an exchange of labor for money.
We see no extra gain.
Some other guy got off with a jury trial not having
to pay income tax.

titled
"America: Freedom to Fascism"
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1656880303867390173&q=america+fascism&total=1784&start=0&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=0

they dropped it out of the federal courts
because they couldn't get him and thought it would be easier at the state level. illinois for this guy.
but the illinois law said, anyone who has to pay a federal income tax has to file a state income tax.
since the court could not provide the jury with the text for the actual written federal law that requires people to pay an income tax, the jury figured the guy did not have to pay the illinois income tax.
the jurors even came to realize they did not have to pay tax either.

I find it quite funny that when people don't pay their taxes, we waste the money of people who did putting them in jail.


And there in lies the irony. Our taxes pay to incarcerate tax evaders. Makes you think........wait........no it doesn't. I have to say I feel bad for you people who have to pay state and federal income tax. In NH we only got the one. You're getting reamed my friends. I was rooting for the Browns but I am relieved it ended this way. I was thinking it would become another Ruby Ridge and the government would just mow them down. Given the choice between killed by the government or imprisoned by the government I'd choose the latter but either way, if you don't fall into line, they will hurt you. And badly. And the lesson learned here is always work under the table. You get income, you can pay your rent, and you don't have to give the government money.

Oh and no one has any right to any property in America. 1. Eminent Domain and 2. Property taxes. As in "You pay us rent to live here and if you don't you get evicted plus we can kick you out anytime if our relatives want to live there. Now bend over."

A misspelling of unanimity, ie people disagree on things like allocating property rights.
I've learned not to make assumptions here, one of those being that I don't have as big a vocabulary as I thought I did.

I've learned not to make assumptions here, one of those being that I don't have as big a vocabulary as I thought I did.

Since my spelling can be atrocious I pity you. ;)

That's fine, until you realize how much stuff the federal government pays for. How'd you get to work today? Drove on a highway?
I walked, actually. But, you could have a fee I have to pay to use the roads to receive a license to drive. Problem solved.
Go to a public school?
I did. But private schools would serve the need of the poor if there was market demand. Some places there is, and they do.
Go to a state university?
Subsidised post-secondary education is appalling. Why should ordinary folks have to pay extra taxes so I can go to school and earn more over my lifetime? I should have to pay for that, because I'm the one who benefits from it.
Drink water or poop?
I pay for that water. The price should probably be higher.
Eat? Nearly every farmer in the country gets some sort of subisdy.
And those subsidies HARM farmers who could otherwise compete. Poor foreign farmers, usually. If our governments didn't pay people to farm, then the poor people who have no other possible vocation would make a much better living. Everyone would benefit.
Not get shot on your way home? House didn't burn down? Canada didn't invade? Who do you think pays for the police, fire department, and military? Why should your neighbor bear the burden for your security?
The military is one of those things we should probably all have to fund. But there aren't many of those. Law enforcement, as well (and law enforcement should be equal - no special treatment for rich neighbourhoods).
Oh, and without government funding, the internet may have never come about.
At no point did I argue that nothing the government ever did turned out well. However, you'd be hard pressed to demonstrate that no one would ever provide a service the government provided if the government wasn't doing it. As with schools, there's little demand for low-cost private schools because that market niche is already filled by inefficient government schools.

these people aren't arguing against all taxes (at least i didn't think they were).

only against the personal income tax.
i think they believe there is no law, passed by congress, for enforcement of
personal income tax collection.

since money gained from work is generally an equal exchange of your labor for money, nothing is really gained.
but for a business, when profits are gained, there is received income.

or something like that

these people aren't arguing against all taxes (at least i didn't think they were).

only against the personal income tax.
i think they believe there is no law, passed by congress, for enforcement of
personal income tax collection.

since money gained from work is generally an equal exchange of your labor for money, nothing is really gained.
but for a business, when profits are gained, there is received income.

or something like that

That doesn't make sense as a matter of simply being logical, much less as a basis for overturning the tax laws of the US.

Pray tell, how can someone make an exchange that is is not "equal," and why would anyone enter into such an exchange in any setting? If both parties are willing to complete a transaction - be it where one party sells labor to the other, or shoes, or a seat on their airplane - how can one be viewed as 'more than equal' and therefore 'profitable' in the exotic way you are using the word?

Why is the labor transaction the only one which does not 'generate profit' while other fundamentally similar transactions do?

Why doesn't the analogy hold that if a person's income generation exceeds his expenses, he profits in the same way as a business, which measures its profits as the positive difference between its income generation and its expenses... ?

Furthermore, why should a person's expenses, for tax purposes, be defined as anything more than the bare necessities for being able to work for wages? If a business can only deduct expenses related to the operation of the business from its gross income when determining its profits, why should an individual be able to consider other spending?

That doesn't make sense as a matter of simply being logical, much less as a basis for overturning the tax laws of the US.

Pray tell, how can someone make an exchange that is is not "equal," and why would anyone enter into such an exchange in any setting? If both parties are willing to complete a transaction - be it where one party sells labor to the other, or shoes, or a seat on their airplane - how can one be viewed as 'more than equal' and therefore 'profitable' in the exotic way you are using the word?

Why is the labor transaction the only one which does not 'generate profit' while other fundamentally similar transactions do?

Why doesn't the analogy hold that if a person's income generation exceeds his expenses, he profits in the same way as a business, which measures its profits as the positive difference between its income generation and its expenses... ?

Furthermore, why should a person's expenses, for tax purposes, be defined as anything more than the bare necessities for being able to work for wages? If a business can only deduct expenses related to the operation of the business from its gross income when determining its profits, why should an individual be able to consider other spending?


no,
that's not illogical at all.
bare necessities of life are generally thought of by some to be food, clothing, housing, maybe car. they exclude things such as entertainment and/or things to nourish the mind and 'spirit'. such is just as necessary to live ones life.

and yes,
profit from buying shoes wholesale and selling them for another higher price,
the difference, after other expenses is profit. not an equal exchange.
equal implies fairness (if not means fair). one side only (the seller of shoes say) saying it is an equal exchange does not necessarily make it fair or equal.
if a price were negotiated it might be closer to an equal exchange.

they used to have this video embedded in their OLD myspace page,
but it appears their myspace account has been deleted or they quit.
IT also appears as though the new one linked from wiki might be a hack,
i.e. not really their page.
?



This is the vid i posted in another thread that is about
us not having to pay income taxes.
Only corporations have to pay income taxes,
because the tax is only on profits.
Money we get from work is an exchange of labor for money.
We see no extra gain.
Some other guy got off with a jury trial not having
to pay income tax.

titled
"America: Freedom to Fascism"
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1656880303867390173&q=america+fascism&total=1784&start=0&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=0

they dropped it out of the federal courts
because they couldn't get him and thought it would be easier at the state level. illinois for this guy.
but the illinois law said, anyone who has to pay a federal income tax has to file a state income tax.
since the court could not provide the jury with the text for the actual written federal law that requires people to pay an income tax, the jury figured the guy did not have to pay the illinois income tax.
the jurors even came to realize they did not have to pay tax either.

http://docs.law.gwu.edu/facweb/jsiegel/Personal/taxes/code.htm

So you are saying that causes outside of one's control, including genetics, family, culture, market forces, ect, have no effect on outcomes? Ludicrous
They're temporary at best. If something holds you back, you overcome it. That's what humans do.

Soheran is just saying that much of what forms us is undeserved. How'd you earn your "good" genes? Your family and culture didn't drive the work ethic into you at all? Ayn Rand had no influnence on your ideas? They came out of yourself with no external input?
I didn't earn my genes, my family or other influences. I earn everything I do with them. Just because someone else had a different environment to form to their liking doesn't take anything away from my achievements, and the fact that they're based on merit.

Was Paris Hilton's pocket money based on merit? No. And her achievement is not that she was born a rich heiress.

Is the money she earns with ads, magazine articles and modelling based on merit? According to those who part with their money for it, yes.

Did she not work for that money? Did she not play her cards well? Would even a single dollar of her earnings have been if it hadn't been for her actions, prompted by her mind? For that matter, would even a single dollar of her pocket money have been if it hadn't been for her father's mind?

You're trying to divide the money from the mind that created it. It's not possible.

Really your views seem to imply the above. That individuals get ideas, inspirations, and innovations without any help from others or things outside themselves. They just spring up from the nothingness of the imagination fully formed.
Not fully formed. Having an idea and developing it into something that helps others enough to make them give you their lives' product is a long and arduous process that can take a lifetime.

Of course people build on something previous. People before Watt discovered the properties of hot air. Put he managed to come up with a way to make it useful. If he hadn't done it, people would not have had this type of steam engine. If you want to say that it was not due to his merit, then you want to say that it was not due to him, that he played little to no part in the creation of a usable steam engine. So I say: take him out of the equation and see. And what you'll see is that he made this engine, without him that engine would not have been and there is no way you can take that away from him.

Soheran is just following Hayek when he says that market outcomes are not deserved.
http://www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2005/01/do_people_deser.html

Not that I'm following Hayek on this.

I don't think you people understand merit. You construct strange concepts so that you don't have to feel bad about taking what others create. Physical reality is clear: if Watt didn't invent this machine, it wouldn't exist. If Paris didn't earn that wealth, it wouldn't exist.

Regardless of whether or not you're going to accept that this in itself makes for a right to the machine or the wealth, I can think of no way whatsoever in which you can argue that it makes for a right of others to the machine or the wealth.

I said the mere fact that I do x does not mean that I deserve certain rewards for doing x, if my doing of x has nothing to do with my merit.
I think you need to define what exactly "merit" is.

I do something, and I do so because it provides me with some benefit, either directly or through others. There is no other valid reason for doing something. The rewards I get come about either directly, through the change in the material world I affected (for example by building shelter) or through others, because they give me some of their product for some of mine, or simply because it makes me happy to see them happy.

Why would you bother introducing a subjective judgement into this situation? You're not included in the action or the trade. You have nothing to do with it. Who deserves what is agreed upon by the people involved.

I took merit to be related to objective reality. I judge something based on its merits, which implies that I judge it on facts, stripping away the subjective parts. The facts in this case are that you did X and without your actions prompted by your mind X wouldn't have happened. No one else's actions and minds were involved in X. If you're adding some new side to the existence and performance of X so you can strip away the person from X, why would you do that? What's the need for it, unless you've already come to a conclusion and just seek for ways to rationalise it?

How convenient!
It's not convenient, it's self-evident. Physical reality is the standard against which we are measured. It is the only standard that matters.

Capability can only meaningfully be judged according to that measure. Fail materially, and you are not capable.

Making and keeping money has nothing to do with being "worthy"... indeed, being worthy often necessitates actions that run directly contrary to the pursuit of wealth.
How do you define "worthy"? I mean "capable of holding on to it", that is capable of making the right decisions and sticking to them.

Regardless, it is absurd to deny that genetic and environmental factors--over which we have no control--are far more crucial to success than mere exertion of will.
I think that if you look for a rich person who did not at some point make the right decision or did something to earn or keep the wealth, you will find it difficult.

I think that if you look at poor people (perhaps excluding mentally disabled ones), you will not find a single one who didn't fail to take opportunities or made wrong decisions.

Mr. Watts was almost certainly a man of exceptional natural talent, for instance. Hardly merit-worthy in and of itself; that's luck.
Define "luck".

Indeed--that conclusion is fairly trivial. It's obvious that, say, an uneducated immigrant from Mexico who has worked hard all her life is more (or at least no less) deserving than some rich kid who manages to get all the best opportunities... yet who do we expect will end up making more?
Both will earn according to what value they provide to other people, and both will have earned it on merit and have a right to this value. At the very least none of this value was earned on the merit of anyone else. Not a cent of either belongs to society.

If someone is uneducated, that is their choice (at least in the developed world, where schools are available), and they'll have to deal with the consequences.

That's why the best defenders of market outcomes as matters of right speak not of "desert" but of "entitlement."
That's because "desert" is a construct that allows the person who uses it to impose their own personal, subjective preferences on material reality.

To use an example from wiki: if I scratch off a winning lottery ticket, I may be entitled to the money, but I do not necessarily deserve it in the same way I deserve $5 for mowing a lawn, or a round of applause for performing a solo.

Why don't I deserve it? No reason is given, no reason is considered necessary. Did I not invest my money in an extremely risky investment?

The only thing that matters is that both I and the guy from the lottery agreed on the deal, that we both agreed on my entitlement to it.

Income tax is as voluntary as sales tax. Don't want a sales tax don't buy the product. Don't want an income tax, don't earn an income. I fail to see the difference.

So witty. You must have been proud of yourself on that one. The Constitution says all Direct taxes must be apportioned. If taxes on income were voluntary, then why does the 16th specifically state, "... without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration."


You realize 16 comes after 5, right? And any claim that taking your money is a violation of your 5th amendment right becomes rather silly, because even if that was the case, the 16th amendment, in allowing the government to tax your income, supercedes the 5th.

Again, that razor wit ... amazing you waste your talents here on this message board. My mentioning the 2nd & 5th Amendment was simply an example. You do know what an example is, right? Everyone who is so anxious to cite the 16th Amendment as the reason to pay Federal Income Taxes are usually the same people who call me a nut case because I don't think I don't think I need a permit on my "right" to carry/bare a gun or a permit on my "right" to own any gun/arm I so choose. As well as judges being known for holding you in contempt of court for exercising your 5th Amendment right. My mentioning those two had nothing to do with taxes, but I can see how easy that mistake was to make ...

Wanna bet?

Again, I said most people. Show me, please, where I singled you out. Though it's real easy to talk all big on the internet, all the things I've done, like climbing Mt. Everest, giving Elvis CPR and beating Michael Vick's dog in a dog fight. :rolleyes:

Armchair comandos, gogogogogo ...

26 USC 6011(a) General rule. When required by regulations prescribed by the Secretary any person made liable for any tax imposed by this title, or for the collection thereof, shall make a return or statement according to the forms and regulations prescribed by the Secretary. Every person required to make a return or statement shall include therein the information required by such forms or regulations.

Any other questions?
... any tax imposed by this title.

Yeah, but it isn't a new question, just more of the old. Where in the rest of that title does it say I have to file a 1040? All I saw was a title that says I have to comply with any regulation and form prescribed by the Secretary. I think perhaps you meant to quote the rest of that title? Or perhaps it's because there is no clear law that states that I have to file a 1040, which is why when you ask the IRS or Congress or anyone to show you the law, they can't and avoid the question or, like you just did, present a vauge law that talks about complying with a law that, to date and to my knowledge, has yet to be produced. If you think that title grants the IRS the right to tax my income, then I have a bridge I wanna sell you ... :p

They're temporary at best. If something holds you back, you overcome it. That's what humans do.

The next time I see someone with an 75 point IQ win the Nobel Prize I'll believe that.

I didn't earn my genes, my family or other influences. I earn everything I do with them. Just because someone else had a different environment to form to their liking doesn't take anything away from my achievements, and the fact that they're based on merit.

Without those influences you would not be able to earn what you do/will today.

Was Paris Hilton's pocket money based on merit? No. And her achievement is not that she was born a rich heiress.

Is the money she earns with ads, magazine articles and modelling based on merit? According to those who part with their money for it, yes.

Did she not work for that money? Did she not play her cards well? Would even a single dollar of her earnings have been if it hadn't been for her actions, prompted by her mind? For that matter, would even a single dollar of her pocket money have been if it hadn't been for her father's mind?

You're trying to divide the money from the mind that created it. It's not possible.

Paris Hilton was able to earn the money she did/does because with her parents' resources and contacts she had many more opportunities than most people. Dumb relatively pretty slutty women are not in short supply.

Besides not even you believe that all voluntary trades confer. If someone makes money off child porn or stolen merchandise by selling it to others does that mean the seller "deserves" his money.

Not fully formed. Having an idea and developing it into something that helps others enough to make them give you their lives' product is a long and arduous process that can take a lifetime.

Of course people build on something previous. People before Watt discovered the properties of hot air. Put he managed to come up with a way to make it useful. If he hadn't done it, people would not have had this type of steam engine. If you want to say that it was not due to his merit, then you want to say that it was not due to him, that he played little to no part in the creation of a usable steam engine. So I say: take him out of the equation and see. And what you'll see is that he made this engine, without him that engine would not have been and there is no way you can take that away from him.

Without the knowledge created by others Watts couldn't have invented his engine. Advancing science and technology is a collective endeavor. Without the work of others individuals would not be able to invent, discover, and innovate to the degree they do.

http://www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2005/01/do_people_deser.html

Not that I'm following Hayek on this.

Does this mean you are saying that Hayek didn't think the actions of people mattered and that he was a determinist?

I don't think you people understand merit. You construct strange concepts so that you don't have to feel bad about taking what others create. Physical reality is clear: if Watt didn't invent this machine, it wouldn't exist. If Paris didn't earn that wealth, it wouldn't exist.

Regardless of whether or not you're going to accept that this in itself makes for a right to the machine or the wealth, I can think of no way whatsoever in which you can argue that it makes for a right of others to the machine or the wealth.

Without the discoveries of others Watts couldn't have invented an engine. Without her parents resources and contacts to build upon along with her beauty Paris would not have earned what she had. You can not change theses facts.

I don't think you people understand merit. You construct strange concepts so that you don't have to feel bad about taking what others create. Physical reality is clear: if Watt didn't invent this machine, it wouldn't exist. If Paris didn't earn that wealth, it wouldn't exist.

Regardless of whether or not you're going to accept that this in itself makes for a right to the machine or the wealth, I can think of no way whatsoever in which you can argue that it makes for a right of others to the machine or the wealth.


Well, at this point I think their argument is going to simply point out that you have a curious concept of deserving whereby on the basis of using attributes you had nothing to do with earning to use materials you had nothing to do with gathering, you create a product and therefore deserve exclusive credit for that product.

But that's beside the point. The simple fact of the matter is that we don't live in a state of nature whereby all that anyone produces is theirs to do with as they please. No do we live in a society where by law all that anyone produces is theirs to do with as they please. We live instead in a society where we have selected a democratic republican form of government to determine what we need to do collectively and how, and that democratic republican government has decided, in accord with the original Constitution of the United States, to tax its citizens to meet certain needs. Insofar as they have said you should be taxed, and insofar as you have voted and/or used the goods this government has created, and further insofar as such voting and use of resources tacitly and expressely ratifies the legitemacy of the form of government used to enact laws, then as a citizen you are obligated to pay the tax even if you voted against the tax, because you have ratified the system by which this government decides how to lawfully enact laws.

To put it bluntly, you agreed to live in a society where we have decided it is legal to tax people on what they create. You have voted, and by voting ratified a method of policy enaction by which we agreed that such taxation could be lawful even if you yourself disagreed with the tax. As such, yes Virginia, we have the right to tax you if the tax passes lawfully, and you can either admit that you're an anarchist, you can leave the country, or you can pay the damn tax.

The next time I see someone with an 75 point IQ win the Nobel Prize I'll believe that.
Did having a relatively high IQ mean that Einstein didn't deserve his?

And besides, gaining material wealth is not something specific. It does not require specific skills or specific actions. There are as many ways to become rich as there are people in the world. I can't believe that there are people out there who are so intrinsically useless, before any choice they make, that they don't have the ability to provide another person with value or happiness.

Without those influences you would not be able to earn what you do/will today.
And that matters because...? The influences give me nothing. If I sit here and say "I had these influences", I will earn precisely zero dollars.

The way to earn money (or achieve anything, for that matter) is by taking the resources available to me and using them to some effect. If I had different resources, I would be using them, perhaps to some different effect.

100% of my earnings are due to me using the resources I have. 0% are due to the resources themselves.

Whether or not the total outcome is exactly equal to that of someone else is irrelevant when it comes to whether or not I earned/am entitled to/deserve that money. I am not them, they are not me, comparing us is a silly idea to start with.

Besides not even you believe that all voluntary trades confer. If someone makes money off child porn or stolen merchandise by selling it to others does that mean the seller "deserves" his money.
But that's just because no valid trade is possible if the seller doesn't own the traded good in question. I can't think of a valid way of producing stolen property or producing child porn, so the posession of it can't equate to any sort of ownership.

It doesn't mean that the concept of deserving something through production or trade no longer applies.

Without the knowledge created by others Watts couldn't have invented his engine. Advancing science and technology is a collective endeavor. Without the work of others individuals would not be able to invent, discover, and innovate to the degree they do.
In other words, Watt wouldn't have invented something if he had been the first inventor? He wouldn't have captured fire or made a wheel?

So you are ultimately saying that his ability and his work is irrelevant. You transfer the credit from him to some unnamed collective, because you hope it entitles you to the product of his mind, which the vast majority of mankind could never replicate.

Does this mean you are saying that Hayek didn't think the actions of people mattered and that he was a determinist?
I'm saying that you're misusing Hayek's writings by taking a thing he said to mean something else entirely.

You can not change theses facts.
I don't have to.

And besides, gaining material wealth is not something specific. It does not require specific skills or specific actions. There are as many ways to become rich as there are people in the world.

is there some requirement that you ignore reality for these rants?

I would've thought this would have inspired a thread.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Lewis_Brown

The two are an elderly couple who refused to pay taxes, believing there was no valid law compelling them to do so (silly, I know, but that's not my point). Since they didn't pay for years, they ended up owing $625,000.

They moved to some ranch out in nowhere, and when they had electricity, phones, mail and so on cut off, they just used gas cookers, canned food and so on. They also started stacking weapons in case the state would try to come and get them.

Because they were friendly to their supporters (http://makethestand.com/), gave press conferences and so on, they ended up letting undercover police into their house and were overpowered. They're now being sent to jail, which their supporters call "kidnapping".

Now, I realise that the legal basis for their claim is ridiculous (like the state is going to make a mistake when it comes to taking the money it needs to grow), and that it's full of conspiracy theories. I think that they're most likely nuts, to be honest. I'm sure Ed is.

But this real-world thing makes me wonder about a theoretical question.

Why do we have to pay taxes?

There is one reason, which is that we take advantage of government services. Hence, if we didn't pay for them, we'd be stealing. On the other hand, it implies that if we didn't use government services to such an extent that the government wouldn't have to pay a single cent extra for our usage, we wouldn't be compelled to pay, correct? And even if this was somehow not possible, it would imply that the only correct tax burden to be paid by a person is the equivalent of the services used by that person and not a cent more or less.

There is another, altogether more "soft" reason, which is that taxes have something to do not with the government, but with society. So the money we hand over is some sort of "giving back" to a society without which we allegedly would be nothing. Of course, how precisely that works is seldomly explained, it's often just sort of assumed to be a last word on the issue.

So I wonder whether anyone can explain their thoughts on why it is we pay taxes and if and why it would be wrong if we didn't.


Simple reason, TAXES SUPPORT THE GOVERNMENT! If the government just printed their own money (like they're doing now) the value of a dollar will drop to about the value of dirt.

Well, at this point I think their argument is going to simply point out that you have a curious concept of deserving whereby on the basis of using attributes you had nothing to do with earning to use materials you had nothing to do with gathering, you create a product and therefore deserve exclusive credit for that product.
That's because there is only one thing that made the product, and that happens to be my involvement in it.

We live instead in a society where we have selected a democratic republican form of government to determine what we need to do collectively and how, and that democratic republican government has decided, in accord with the original Constitution of the United States, to tax its citizens to meet certain needs.
A lot of "we", very little acknowledgement that I was never given a choice in any of this.

...use of resources tacitly and expressely ratifies the legitemacy of the form of government used to enact laws...
Like locking yourself in a self-sustainable house somewhere and not bothering anyone?

You have voted, and by voting ratified a method of policy enaction by which we agreed that such taxation could be lawful even if you yourself disagreed with the tax.
So if I don't vote, and I disagree with the tax, that changes something?

Look, your argument is hardly new, and neither is mine. By the power of a gun, the individuals who happen to call themselves "government" have created a world in which my choice is to comply with their will and therefore "agree" to their right to my life's time, thought and effort or disappear. Even if I lived in some far-away house and didn't cause a single additional dollar to be spent by the government, we have reached a stage in which any economic relationship between people is now said to be due to the government, even if there is no need for government-sponsored dispute resolution or anything of the kind.

You know as well as I do that whether or not I happen to put a cross on some piece of paper every four years doesn't change jack. I don't get to vote against taxes, and in modern times what I get doesn't need to have any relation with what I vote for.

So do I have to pay taxes? In practice, certainly. If I don't, they'll hurt me.

Morally? I am yet to see a convincing argument that I would actually be morally obliged to pay anything beyond the services that I use, and even some of those don't really count because I was never given a choice.

Therefore there is nothing wrong with me committing as much tax fraud as I can get away with.

Did having a relatively high IQ mean that Einstein didn't deserve his?

I am saying that things some constraints that can not be overcome. You said that all constraints are temporary at best and can be overcome.

And besides, gaining material wealth is not something specific. It does not require specific skills or specific actions. There are as many ways to become rich as there are people in the world. I can't believe that there are people out there who are so intrinsically useless, before any choice they make, that they don't have the ability to provide another person with value or happiness.

So if enough people disliked you enough to give your 3rd grade bully 1 billion dollars, collectively, you'd say he deserved it? If everyone suddenly developed incredibly strong tastes of hating you to the point that no one would hire or trade with you no matter how low you went would you deserve to die?


And that matters because...? The influences give me nothing. If I sit here and say "I had these influences", I will earn precisely zero dollars.

The way to earn money (or achieve anything, for that matter) is by taking the resources available to me and using them to some effect. If I had different resources, I would be using them, perhaps to some different effect.

100% of my earnings are due to me using the resources I have. 0% are due to the resources themselves.

Whether or not the total outcome is exactly equal to that of someone else is irrelevant when it comes to whether or not I earned/am entitled to/deserve that money. I am not them, they are not me, comparing us is a silly idea to start with.

Your wealth and income is ultimately controlled by what others will pay for your labor/resources, general tech level, and the institutions of society. The above is ultimately above your complete control.

But that's just because no valid trade is possible if the seller doesn't own the traded good in question. I can't think of a valid way of producing stolen property or producing child porn, so the posession of it can't equate to any sort of ownership.

It doesn't mean that the concept of deserving something through production or trade no longer applies.

Prove the one true private property regime that will result in unanimous agreement by everyone.


In other words, Watt wouldn't have invented something if he had been the first inventor? He wouldn't have captured fire or made a wheel?

So you are ultimately saying that his ability and his work is irrelevant. You transfer the credit from him to some unnamed collective, because you hope it entitles you to the product of his mind, which the vast majority of mankind could never replicate.

So you are ultimately saying that Watts didn't need to use the knowledge amassed by others, that his accomplishments were totally based on his own efforts, and had nothing to do with the efforts of others.


I'm saying that you're misusing Hayek's writings by taking a thing he said to mean something else entirely..

Hayek said that outcomes said that market outcomes are not morally deserved, but that they shouldn't be changed as long as the procedural rules are considered just. In the article you gave me the author agreed and links are provided by three others who agree that that was Hayek's view. How am I misusing his writings when I say he didn't believe market incomes are based on moral desert?

I don't have to.

Yeah ya do.

They should've simply cheated on their taxes like everyone else, rather than refusing to pay altogether. Not a brilliant group.

Do we have to pay taxes? Yes, and this story is a perfect example of why. Government - it doesn't really matter which, they're all pretty much the same when it comes to stealing from their people - will hurt you if you step out of line in the slightest way including but not limited to failure to pay heavy tribute to the corrupted parasites that do nothing to help you but batter you senseless if they are displeased in the slightest with your performance.

:D
Cracked me up.

no,
that's not illogical at all.
bare necessities of life are generally thought of by some to be food, clothing, housing, maybe car. they exclude things such as entertainment and/or things to nourish the mind and 'spirit'. such is just as necessary to live ones life.

and yes,
profit from buying shoes wholesale and selling them for another higher price,
the difference, after other expenses is profit. not an equal exchange.
equal implies fairness (if not means fair). one side only (the seller of shoes say) saying it is an equal exchange does not necessarily make it fair or equal.
if a price were negotiated it might be closer to an equal exchange.

That didn't address what I asked you.

Part 1:

A business' profit is the difference between its gross income and its operating expenses.

A person's profit would be measured the same way, the difference between gross income (wages from work, dividends, capital gains, &c) and the person's operating expenses (clothing, food, shelter).

QUESTION: Why should there be any difference in the way business profit and personal profit - AKA income - should be taxed and assessed?




--


Part 2:

If I agree to sell you a pair of shoes for 10 dollars, and you agree to buy them for 10 dollars, the exchange is equal. The exchange is equal no matter how much I paid for the shoes, since both parties are satisfied.

If I agree to work at firm for 40 dollars an hour, and the firm agrees to pay me 40 dollars an hour, then I have sold my labor for 40 dollars per hour, and the exchange of money for labor is equal, since both parties are satisfied.

QUESTION: Why should the exchange of labor for wages or salary be any different from any other exchange? If both parties are satisfied, then the trade is equal, by the standard that you apply to trading labor for money in your argument.

QUESTION: Why should there be any difference in the way business profit and personal profit - AKA income - should be taxed and assessed?


Ah. A good argument for the elimination of the corporate income tax. :)

You don't inherently "owe" anybody, anything. Not the government, certainly/especially not society as a whole.. And at the very least, not to strangers whom may or may not even have genuine need for it.

Legally speaking, is another matter altogether. With the power of force and all...

That's because there is only one thing that made the product, and that happens to be my involvement in it.

Really. Someone gives you the location of a treasure buried by someone else, someone else gives you the tools to dig it up, someone else gives you food and water while you work, and yet the treasure is nonetheless all yours. I'm not seeing why it is your labor that is any more crucial than the labor required to make the tools, find the treasure, or provide the food to the finished product. But I suspect that you'll disagree, because you don't want to have to agree.


A lot of "we", very little acknowledgement that I was never given a choice in any of this.

1) I believe that had a lot to do with how you edited it. You'd have found more "you" in other passages.

2) You speak as if "we" is something other than a collection of "I"s.

3) You weren't given a choice of whether or not to vote or to use social goods? I would think it's a matter of simply choosing not to walk into the ballot box, but I haven't voted in several months, so I might have forgotten how its done.


Like locking yourself in a self-sustainable house somewhere and not bothering anyone?

If you can find one, bully for you. If you can find more than one, maybe then we can hypothesize a political system that requires them. Until then, try not to shoot so utopian in your analysis.


So if I don't vote, and I disagree with the tax, that changes something?


In Lockean terms, yes. It means you've never expressely agreed to live by the dictates of the Constitution. Practically, however, you tacitly benefit from the fact that you are free-riding on our tax dollars used to defend the country, clean the air, pave the roads, prevent cholera epidemics in the water, etc. As such, you have an obligation to pay up or ship out to a place with less onerous obligations.


Look, your argument is hardly new, and neither is mine. By the power of a gun, the individuals who happen to call themselves "government" have created a world in which my choice is to comply with their will and therefore "agree" to their right to my life's time, thought and effort or disappear. Even if I lived in some far-away house and didn't cause a single additional dollar to be spent by the government, we have reached a stage in which any economic relationship between people is now said to be due to the government, even if there is no need for government-sponsored dispute resolution or anything of the kind.

You know as well as I do that whether or not I happen to put a cross on some piece of paper every four years doesn't change jack. I don't get to vote against taxes, and in modern times what I get doesn't need to have any relation with what I vote for.

So do I have to pay taxes? In practice, certainly. If I don't, they'll hurt me.

Morally? I am yet to see a convincing argument that I would actually be morally obliged to pay anything beyond the services that I use, and even some of those don't really count because I was never given a choice.

Therefore there is nothing wrong with me committing as much tax fraud as I can get away with.

Wonderful sleight of hand there. Your real justification isn't that "government" is confiscatory, and confiscation is always wrong; it's that apparently the Constitution is insufficiently democratic, supposing of course that democracy is defined as providing that which Neu Leonstein desires rather than what the public as a whole, of which Neu Leonstein is one voting member, desires. Further, you shift from a position of all tax is wrong because it's obtained through oppressive means to all tax is wrong because I pay more than my fair share of it.

For now I'll leave aside the question of what exactly you think a fair price is on not having any more smallpox epidemics and similar questions, and ask whether and in what cases you think a democracy can ever legitemately obtain the goods and services of a citizen in that democracy? For that matter, we should also ask whether or not a democracy can exist where compulsory service is denied, since the people don't really have any power in such a circumstance? Finally, I suppose its fair to ask whether or not you support the Constitution, seeing as how the Constitution seems to allow citizens to make requests of you in just such a manner as described above?

I ask these questions three because I want to pin down exactly what it is I'm trying to argue against Neu. If I had to take a stab at definitions, from your account of taxation I'd call you some kind of politically solipscist anarchist, a person who believes himself radically independent of, prior to, and superior than the mandate of the system of government in place. I won't state here what my assessment of how accurate those views could possibly be, but I want you to clearly state whether or not this is accurate. If it is, we can proceed. If it isn't, then I want to know what account of democracy could possibly satisfy you, and how exactly you think that account squares with the system you find yourself in. Only by figuring that out can I possibly explain to you why it is that notions of patriotism, honor, as well as obligation entail payment in the form of taxation; off-hand, it doesn't seem like those concepts have any meaning to you whatsoever.

That didn't address what I asked you.

Part 1:

A business' profit is the difference between its gross income and its operating expenses.

A person's profit would be measured the same way, the difference between gross income (wages from work, dividends, capital gains, &c) and the person's operating expenses (clothing, food, shelter).

QUESTION: Why should there be any difference in the way business profit and personal profit - AKA income - should be taxed and assessed?


oh, ok.
well, a business (and more specifically, but very different, corporations) are not people

Part 2:

If I agree to sell you a pair of shoes for 10 dollars, and you agree to buy them for 10 dollars, the exchange is equal. The exchange is equal no matter how much I paid for the shoes, since both parties are satisfied.

If I agree to work at firm for 40 dollars an hour, and the firm agrees to pay me 40 dollars an hour, then I have sold my labor for 40 dollars per hour, and the exchange of money for labor is equal, since both parties are satisfied.

QUESTION: Why should the exchange of labor for wages or salary be any different from any other exchange? If both parties are satisfied, then the trade is equal, by the standard that you apply to trading labor for money in your argument.



haha.
how many people who buy shoes for over 100$ are satisfied with that price?
hahaha
that is funny.
it's not like corporations allow anyone to negotiate the price.




------------------
sig for those who turn off sigs
read corporate history here http://www.poclad.org
read imperial history here http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com
the only rock we can live on,
yet we still have to pay rent to some master to be allowed

haha.
how many people who buy shoes for over 100$ are satisfied with that price?
hahaha
that is funny.
it's not like corporations allow anyone to negotiate the price.

All of them? Why would you buy a $100 pair of shoes if you didn't want to pay that much? Its not as though all shoes cost more than $100. If you don't want to pay more than $100 for your shoes, then dont. Buy a cheaper pair. You might not get a designer pair for that price, but thats a choice you have to make.

Well, the reasons you list are the reasons why we pay taxes. Unless these two grow all their food using tools they make from resources they gather using implements they make to gather them, make their own clothes from materials they produce, and grow or build everything else they use without any external input, they are relying on the services provided by taxpayers at some point along the line.

They're thieves and nothing more.

Indeed. They're leeching off other people's tax money. Note (from the wiki article) that they stopped paying local taxes (not just federal), but continued to use electricity from the grid. They were thieves.

They're also a pair of loonies:


Once you've used the lawful word, you've done it the absolute proper way, and they still come at you, they are now attacking the Creator himself or itself. [...] You kill them. That is exactly what the Ten Commandments tell you to do.


This is the beginning of one very huge movement. I'm not quite sure you understand the ramifications of what's going on right now. This is massive. This is international. We are fed up with the Zionist Illuminati. That's what this is all about. Loud and clear. Zionist Illuminati. Lawyers, whatever they are, okay, it's going to stop. And if the judge is a member of that, I know that McAuliffe [the Federal judge in Brown's tax case] is, I know that U.S. Attorney Colantuono is, they'd better stop. This is a warning. You can do whatever you want to me. My job is to get the message out, and I'm getting the message out, and I'm warning you guys - not you guys [referring to the radio show hosts], them - to cease and desist their unlawful activity in this country and every other country because once this thing starts, we're going to seek them out and hunt them down. And we're going to bring them to justice. So anybody wishes to join them, you go right ahead and join them. But I promise you, long after I'm gone, they're going to seek out every one of you and your bloodline.


On August 10, 2007, the New Hampshire Union Leader reported that Ed Brown said that a war was spreading and becoming an uprising against the federal government, eventually to develop into a revolution, and that the war would come within eighteen months. The Union Leader quoted Brown:

"It has never, ever been resolved without war!" an infuriated Brown shouted during an interview on his porch Wednesday [August 8th].
If federal agents storm Brown's property, he and his supporters will come out shooting. Brown said yesterday [August 9th] that if those agents kill him or his wife, Elaine, his supporters will systematically find and kill Plainfield Police Chief Gordon Gillens, Sullivan County Sheriff Michael Prozzo and others Brown says are sworn to protect him.


"We're not conspiracy theorists. We deal with conspiracy facts. Freemasonry and Judaism -- that is the truth. That is the fact. That is where all the world's problems come from . . . I know for a fact that they're working together."

A nutter who blames all his problems on "the evil Jews" and advocates murder... How can anyone support him?

Anyway... We all rely on tax-funded services. Calculating exactly to what extent would be all but impossible. And then there's the issue of society and solidarity. If society is to have any meaning, it is perfectly justifiable for the tax money of the fortunate to be used in support of the less-fortunate.

This cold-hearted neoliberal individualistic garbage whereby no-one in society has any obligation to any one else is not -contrary to what its supporters claim- a "natural" order of things. It is a comparatively recent, culture-specific and, in my view, profoundly perverse ideology.

I've never been to hospital (except at birth, when I was almost born dead and a nurse saved my life), never needed the services of firefighters or (directly) the police. But I'm perfectly content to know that my tax money funds these services when they're used by other people. (Not to mention the fact that the police services help us all in unseen, indirect ways.) It's all about solidarity and society.

Indeed. They're leeching off other people's tax money. Note (from the wiki article) that they stopped paying local taxes (not just federal), but continued to use electricity from the grid. They were thieves

Are you sure the electicity in NH is taxfunded?

A nutter who blames all his problems on "the evil Jews" and advocates murder...

Shooting people who come to take you away from your home. Not murder.

. If society is to have any meaning, it is perfectly justifiable for the tax money of the fortunate to be used in support of the less-fortunate.

Should society have any meaning?

http://images.libertyoutlet.com/prod/hlib-shirt.jpg

I feel the need to wear this after reading Ariddia's post.

Shooting people who come to take you away from your home. Not murder.


Yes it is. Especially if you shoot first. They're there legally, to arrest you for breaking the law. Are you saying, for example, that a convicted rapist should be allowed to shoot and kill cops to enter his home to arrest him?

Plus, re-read those quotes. He incited his followers to track down and murder police officers and judges. Sixty or so months in jail is a light sentence for inciting murder.


Should society have any meaning?

That's a matter of opinion. Thatcher believed (quite openly) that it shouldn't (except when it suited her purpose, and she wanted to whip up patriotism about the Falklands...). I disagree with her.

haha.
how many people who buy shoes for over 100$ are satisfied with that price?

spam edited out

I can answer you with one hundred percent accuracy:

Everyone who buys a pair of shoes that costs more than 100 dollars is satisfied with the price. Every. Single. One.

I can prove it unequivocally also: If they weren't satisfied with the price, they wouldn't buy the shoes.

You have yet to address either question that I asked, and instead have spammed the forum with a 'signature' in your post, which is sort of a 'ban me for trolling' advertisement for the moderators.

Yeah, but it isn't a new question, just more of the old. Where in the rest of that title does it say I have to file a 1040? All I saw was a title that says I have to comply with any regulation and form prescribed by the Secretary. I think perhaps you meant to quote the rest of that title? Or perhaps it's because there is no clear law that states that I have to file a 1040, which is why when you ask the IRS or Congress or anyone to show you the law, they can't and avoid the question or, like you just did, present a vauge law that talks about complying with a law that, to date and to my knowledge, has yet to be produced.

are you fucking high? No, seriously, did you even bother to read what I posted for you? Let me show you again:

26 USC 6011(a) General rule. When required by regulations prescribed by the Secretary any person made liable for any tax imposed by this title, or for the collection thereof, shall make a return or statement according to the forms and regulations prescribed by the Secretary. Every person required to make a return or statement shall include therein the information required by such forms or regulations.


Any person who is liable for a tax under Title 26 of the United States Code (that's the title that sets out income tax) is required to file a statement in accordance with the methodology perscribed by the Secretary of the Treasury.

There it is. Right the fuck there. This is nonsense in its extreme, it's the same old idiots tax dodge "if you ask someone to show you the law they can't!" I just did. The fact that you're incapable of understanding the law doesn't mean I avoided the question. It doesn't mean I pulled some magic trick over your eyes. It doesn't mean that i'm trying to be vague and obtuse. Read the fucking thing. Anyone required to pay a tax under title 26 is required to do file a return in the mannor perscribed by the secretary of the treasury. And right there, 26 USC 1 states, clearly:

There is hereby imposed on the taxable income of every individual . . . a determined in accordance with the following table:

Treasury regulatios define the forms as the 1040 in certain circumstances.

What the fuck is so hard about this to understand? Section 6011 of title 26 says anybody who is obligated to pay a tax through title 26 is required to do so with a return that is compliant with the regulations created by the secretary of the treasury.

There's the law. End of fuckin story.

Yes it is. Especially if you shoot first. They're there legally, to arrest you for breaking the law. Are you saying, for example, that a convicted rapist should be allowed to shoot and kill cops to enter his home to arrest him?

How is someone convicted before they're arrested?

And for the record: In some occasions I believe it is, or should be, legally and morally okay to physically resist an okay. Think of Texas law which permits doing it when the arresting officer uses excessive force, or when you have reasonable grounds to bleieve they are acting in an illegal fashion, like during a no-knock warrant or raid.

Kevin Harris was acquitted under similar circumstances.

That's a matter of opinion. Thatcher believed (quite openly) that it shouldn't (except when it suited her purpose, and she wanted to whip up patriotism about the Falklands...). I disagree with her.

I'm going to cry myself to sleep tonight, Ariddia.

How is someone convicted before they're arrested?

I see you've payed attention to the situation. :rolleyes:

He represented himself at court after his indictment and then stopped showing up. He then barricaded himself in his home.

I see you've payed attention to the situation. .

Ariddia was talking aobut 'convicted rapists', not about Brown.

Good, then. Stop using public goods. Right now. Unplug your computer from the internet. Shut off the power, water and sewage. Don't walk on the sidewalks, don't drive on the roads.

Live your ideology, or pay your damn taxes.

Did I ask for any of this?

It is no act of hypocrisy to simply try to cut my losses. My property is being expropriated; I may as well try to get something out of it. As long as I'm willing to do without what it pays for if that's the cost of not having it taken from me at gunpoint, there's nothing wrong with trying to get something out of it when it is taken from me.

And what, pray tell, are the "first principles of the Universe"?

A is A.

P cannot be equivalent to both Q and ~Q at the same time and in the same sense.

A is A.

P cannot be equivalent to both Q and ~Q at the same time and in the same sense.

Q is defined as 2. ~Q is thus the inverse of 2, or -2

P is defined as the value that is the square root of 4. the square root of 4 is both 2 and -2.

P = Q and ~Q

Whoops, I just disproved your entire philosophy. Shame that.

A is A.

P cannot be equivalent to both Q and ~Q at the same time and in the same sense.

Actually there's been this funny thing with quantum mechanics...

*shrug* nevermind, I like Neo Art's better.

You don't inherently "owe" anybody, anything. Not the government, certainly/especially not society as a whole.. And at the very least, not to strangers whom may or may not even have genuine need for it.

Legally speaking, is another matter altogether. With the power of force and all...This is true, but not for the reasons that you (probably) think.

Did I ask for any of this?By accepting it you agree to the terms and conditions.

Q is defined as 2. ~Q is thus the inverse of 2, or -2

P is defined as the value that is the square root of 4. the square root of 4 is both 2 and -2.

P = Q and ~Q

Whoops, I just disproved your entire philosophy. Shame that.

Not at all; you simply misunderstand the mathematics that you were taught in high school.

I thought like that too, until a professor I had explained to me how that's not actually true.

Actually there's been this funny thing with quantum mechanics...

Which is wrong.

Science relies on empiricism, which can only tell you what appears to be true--which may or may not be what actually is true.

Quantum mechanics is merely a useful model to help understand how things appear to be--it is not necessarily an accurate description of how things actually are. Any physicist will tell you as much.

Not at all; you simply misunderstand the mathematics that you were taught in high school.

I thought like that too, until a professor I had explained to me how that's not actually true.

Oh? We're getting into math now, I wanna hear this.

By accepting it you agree to the terms and conditions.

That is not the case, since my money is stolen from me whether I accept what is offered for it or not.

Not at all; you simply misunderstand the mathematics that you were taught in high school.

I thought like that too, until a professor I had explained to me how that's not actually true.

Then your professor was wrong. All positive numbers have two square roots.

That is not the case, since my money is stolen from me whether I accept what is offered for it or not.By remaining in and occupying a particular area, you inherently accept what is offered - namely, the right to occupy that particular area.
(Not to mention that it isn't your money anyway.)

Not at all; you simply misunderstand the mathematics that you were taught in high school.

awww, how cute. I guess i misunderstood the differential calculus, and the quantum mechanics, and the matrix equations I learned in college, before switching my major from physics to poly sci.

Go on, feel free to disprove anything I just said.

Q is defined as 2. ~Q is thus the inverse of 2, or -2

P is defined as the value that is the square root of 4. the square root of 4 is both 2 and -2.

P = Q and ~Q

Whoops, I just disproved your entire philosophy. Shame that.
Actually P is either 2 or -2. It can't be both at the same time. The roots of 4 are 2 and -2, but the square root can only be one at a time.

Good thing you switched to political science...

Actually P is either 2 or -2. It can't be both at the same time. The roots of 4 are 2 and -2, but the square root can only be one at a time.

Good thing you switched to political science...

Sure it can. They both always equal 4 when squared, they don't take turns. That's why an equation like x^2 - 4 = 0 has more than one solution...

Sure it can. They both always equal 4 when squared, they don't take turns. That's why an equation like x^2 - 4 = 0 has more than one solution...
It may have a set of solutions, but only one solution at any one time.

I don't think you people understand merit.

No, it is you who do not understand merit, and you show it repeatedly.

I think you need to define what exactly "merit" is.

"1. claim to respect and praise; excellence; worth.
2. something that deserves or justifies a reward or commendation; a commendable quality, act, etc.: The book's only merit is its sincerity.
...
4. Often, merits. the state or fact of deserving; desert: to treat people according to their merits."

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/merit

I do something, and I do so because it provides me with some benefit, either directly or through others. There is no other valid reason for doing something.

No, we can also act rightly even if it not only does not benefit us, but indeed harms us severely.

Indeed, doing so is the only rational course of action.

Why would you bother introducing a subjective judgement into this situation? You're not included in the action or the trade. You have nothing to do with it. Who deserves what is agreed upon by the people involved.

Not at all. You're confusing desert and entitlement. If I give a million dollars to a randomly selected person, that transfer of money has nothing whatsoever to do with that person's merit, and therefore nothing to do with desert. At most I can claim that she is entitled to it, because I consensually transfered to her justly-owned property.

But in the end that does not work either, because outside of very limited contexts most arguments for entitlement independent of desert only seem credible because of their superficial similarities to arguments from desert, and collapse under close scrutiny.

I took merit to be related to objective reality. I judge something based on its merits, which implies that I judge it on facts, stripping away the subjective parts.

You're assuming that conceptions of "desert" are subjective, and thus that morality is subjective... yet you suppose that "merit" is a matter of objective fact?

Sorry, that seems absurd to me.

No one else's actions and minds were involved in X.

Actually, they almost certainly were... but nevermind that.

If you're adding some new side to the existence and performance of X so you can strip away the person from X, why would you do that?

I don't deny that the person was part of the causal chain. I deny that this means anything in and of itself in terms of right, in terms of a just distribution of wealth.

That's because I recognize that "responsibility" is a more limited concept that you want to make it out to be. We are not "responsible" for our own talents, or our own circumstances.

It's not convenient, it's self-evident. Physical reality is the standard against which we are measured. It is the only standard that matters.

Capability can only meaningfully be judged according to that measure. Fail materially, and you are not capable.

So a child starving to death at two because she lives in an area struck by severe famine isn't a victim of bad luck or bad circumstances... she's just "incapable."

Yeah, okay. :rolleyes:

How do you define "worthy"? I mean "capable of holding on to it",

No, that's obviously not what you mean, because if that's what you meant rich people who are taxed highly would not be "capable" and gangsters who steal efficiently would be "capable."

No, you must distinguish between the right kinds of "capability" and the wrong kinds of "capability", and the only basis you can make that kind of distinction is on right. And that requires a deeper consideration of merit, worth, and desert than you're giving those concepts.

I think that if you look for a rich person who did not at some point make the right decision or did something to earn or keep the wealth, you will find it difficult.

I think that if you look at poor people (perhaps excluding mentally disabled ones), you will not find a single one who didn't fail to take opportunities or made wrong decisions.

Maybe.

Of course, I bet you would find lots of rich people who have made wrong decisions and failed to take opportunities, and lots of poor people who have "at some point" made right decisions and used opportunities well. So that proves absolutely nothing.

Not to mention the fact that sometimes which decisions are right and which decisions are wrong are not apparent to the person making the decision until long after the fact, if ever. Which makes it hardly a reflection of "merit."

Define "luck".

Arbitrary circumstance. Something that happens independent of responsibility.

Both will earn according to what value they provide to other people,

Maybe.

and both will have earned it on merit

Not at all.

We are not responsible for the circumstances that privilege us; therefore, they do not reflect on our merit. The quantity of value we produce for others is, however, highly dependent on the circumstances that privilege us.

and have a right to this value.

There is no credible basis for this claim, because the claim of desert is absurd and the claim of entitlement is based on very weak foundations.

At the very least none of this value was earned on the merit of anyone else.

No, but I have been talking about merit and desert, not causation.

Resources being scarce, claims of "right" are always competitive. If I cannot claim any special right, there is no reason not to distribute it according to the public good.

That's because "desert" is a construct that allows the person who uses it to impose their own personal, subjective preferences on material reality.

As well say the same of morality... in which case entitlement is just as useless.

(As is this conversation.)

Why don't I deserve it?

Because you did the same as thousands of other people. What makes you special?

Merit and desert deal with your worth. You winning the lottery tells us nothing more about you than it tells us about the thousands of others who participated. Your victory is not a matter of your merit, but of luck, of circumstances for which you were not responsible.

It may have a set of solutions, but only one solution at any one time.
What do you mean by 'at any one time'?

I mean, if I say "the square root of four is two" at the same time someone else says "the square root of four is negative two", is one of us wrong?

Q is defined as 2. ~Q is thus the inverse of 2, or -2

actually, it wouldn't be the inverse, it would be anything other than 2. doesn't really affect the example though.

It may have a set of solutions, but only one solution at any one time.

how so?

What do you mean by 'at any one time'?
I mean that x**2 - 4 = 0 can be solved with 2, or it can be solved with -2. It can't be solved with 2 and -2. Only one number at a time provides a solution.

That's important because -2 may be a solution that has no physical meaning, thus it's not a proper solution.

Or you can get into the solutions of homogeneous diff eqs, where there is a trivial solution -- but it's not useful...Look at this

x' = x + y
y' = -2x + 4y

x=0 and y=0 is a solution. It's not a useful solution, though.

So my point is that you must consider each solution independently, not as a set of equal alternatives.

Maybe this is just my way of looking at it. I figure you can only use one solution at a time, anyway, unless you're a mathematician. In that case, you aren't worried about the real world, so nonsensical solutions qualify as valid, despite their lack of practicality.

I mean that x**2 - 4 = 0 can be solved with 2, or it can be solved with -2. It can't be solved with 2 and -2. Only one number at a time provides a solution.

That's important because -2 may be a solution that has no physical meaning, thus it's not a proper solution.

Or you can get into the solutions of homogeneous diff eqs, where there is a trivial solution -- but it's not useful...Look at this

x' = x + y
y' = -2x + 4y

x=0 and y=0 is a solution. It's not a useful solution, though.

So my point is that you must consider each solution independently, not as a set of equal alternatives.

Err...useful? that was a criterion?

A is A.

P cannot be equivalent to both Q and ~Q at the same time and in the same sense.
Actually there's been this funny thing with quantum mechanics...
Which is wrong.

Science relies on empiricism, which can only tell you what appears to be true--which may or may not be what actually is true.

Quantum mechanics is merely a useful model to help understand how things appear to be--it is not necessarily an accurate description of how things actually are. Any physicist will tell you as much.

so explain to me how you arrived at this 'first principle of the universe' when it contradicts the way the universe appears to be.

Maybe this is just my way of looking at it. I figure you can only use one solution at a time, anyway, unless you're a mathematician. In that case, you aren't worried about the real world, so nonsensical solutions qualify as valid, despite their lack of practicality.

*raises hand* That's me, inventory of Johnny and his 4 - 3i apples.

Err...useful? that was a criterion?
No, keep up, will you?

That was just an example of why it's important to discriminate between solutions, rather than admit them all equally to the set. I did say that before, I know it...

*raises hand* That's me, inventory of Johnny and his 4 - 3i apples.
I don't have a problem with complex numbers. They solve a lot of phase and gain problems. They just represent sines and cosines...

I don't have a problem with complex numbers. They solve a lot of phase and gain problems.

But you don't like negatives? odd.

Then your professor was wrong. All positive numbers have two square roots.

You're contradicting yourself--he said exactly what you just said: all positive numbers have two square roots.

This problem comes from people using the same verbiage used by mathematics's rigorous, precise, formal definition but interpreting it in a colloquial, laymanesque manner.

In mathematics, the phrase "the square root of x", unless qualified, means the positive square root of x. Laymen, upon hearing that both 2 and -2, when squared, both equal 4, use the phrase "the square root of x" to refer to both 2 and -2 (for now, we'll leave aside the syntactical absurdity associated with the use of the definite article to refer to more than one entity).

So in fact, the square root of 4 does not equal both 2 and -2. If it were, then yes, P would equal both Q and ~Q. But that's not the case.

The square root of 4 is 2. The negative square root of 4 is -2.

so explain to me how you arrived at this 'first principle of the universe' when it contradicts the way the universe appears to be.

Simple: the observations (which are responsible for this picture of the way the universe appears to be) are wrong.

I will trust logic well before I trust man's eyes or instruments.

Simple: the observations (which are responsible for this picture of the way the universe appears to be) are wrong.

I will trust logic well before I trust man's eyes or instruments.

sounds great zeno, but achilles wins the race.

also, that doesn't answer the question, it just provides a rationalization for your position.

We pay income taxes because the government needs money. It should be printing its own instead of having a bank do it. It could then use all the money it needs to pay for stuff.

You're contradicting yourself--he said exactly what you just said: all positive numbers have two square roots.

This problem comes from people using the same verbiage used by mathematics's rigorous, precise, formal definition but interpreting it in a colloquial, laymanesque manner.

In mathematics, the phrase "the square root of x", unless qualified, means the positive square root of x. Laymen, upon hearing that both 2 and -2, when squared, both equal 4, use the phrase "the square root of x" to refer to both 2 and -2 (for now, we'll leave aside the syntactical absurdity associated with the use of the definite article to refer to more than one entity).

So in fact, the square root of 4 does not equal both 2 and -2. If it were, then yes, P would equal both Q and ~Q. But that's not the case.

The square root of 4 is 2. The negative square root of 4 is -2.

Ah, you mean the principal square root, which is implied by a radical, if i recall correctly. Simply "square root" is, however, ambiguous in that matter.

sounds great zeno, but achilles wins the race.


Zeno's paradoxes aren't actually logic: they're failed attempts at logic.

Ah, you mean the principal square root, which is implied by a radical, if i recall correctly. Simply "square root" is, however, ambiguous in that matter.

Not when used in its proper, formal context.

Really. Someone gives you the location of a treasure buried by someone else, someone else gives you the tools to dig it up, someone else gives you food and water while you work, and yet the treasure is nonetheless all yours. I'm not seeing why it is your labor that is any more crucial than the labor required to make the tools, find the treasure, or provide the food to the finished product. But I suspect that you'll disagree, because you don't want to have to agree.
It's moreso the issue of, if I hadn't gone and dug it up, the treasure having remained underground, where no one would have found it useful. If it enters the economy, it does so not because someone gave me food or water or tools - these things by themselves would not have dug it up. It was my action which dug it up, and if they hadn't given me food and water and tools, I would have dug it up with my bare hands.

And besides, I would most likely have paid all those other people for their help, so some portion of the total value chain did go to them. It's just that their roles in that chain were nowhere near as important as mine in the final result, so their portion is smaller.

2) You speak as if "we" is something other than a collection of "I"s.
Maybe you're different, but I've found that people tend to use words like "we", "us", "society", "community" and "public" as arguments in and for themselves against which there can be no counter.

The thing with calling it a collection of "I"s is that it becomes screamingly obvious that there is something wrong with some other I making decisions about my life ultimately based on nothing but violence. If we call it "we", we can pretend that it's all okay because surely I didn't happen to be the poor sucker who got outvoted on election day.

In Lockean terms, yes. It means you've never expressely agreed to live by the dictates of the Constitution. Practically, however, you tacitly benefit from the fact that you are free-riding on our tax dollars used to defend the country, clean the air, pave the roads, prevent cholera epidemics in the water, etc. As such, you have an obligation to pay up or ship out to a place with less onerous obligations.
But there is no such place, that's the problem. The idea of violence-based government has a world-wide monopoly.

Wonderful sleight of hand there. Your real justification isn't that "government" is confiscatory, and confiscation is always wrong; it's that apparently the Constitution is insufficiently democratic, supposing of course that democracy is defined as providing that which Neu Leonstein desires rather than what the public as a whole, of which Neu Leonstein is one voting member, desires.
That's the one big inconsistency in my thinking I'm still in the process of working out. I don't actually think full-on anarchism would work - it didn't in Somalia. There are practical limits to what private courts or police forces could do. Nor am I a 100% pro-market fanatic, I study economics at uni and I know that for optimal performance a market economy needs some sort of legal framework.

So some basic things are going to have to be provided by government, not by any ideological or philosophical reason, but simply because nothing else can. That's your trimmed-down nightwatchman-state. However, that state requires some sort of tax money to work too, and making it voluntary means 100% freeriding.

Further, you shift from a position of all tax is wrong because it's obtained through oppressive means to all tax is wrong because I pay more than my fair share of it.
In a way, that's a good summary. I find the concept of confiscating away years of my life appalling, but I can see the reason for it in the case of a nightwatchman-state.

I cease to understand when that state is expanded to include transfer payments, an aggressive military, bureaucrat upon bureaucrat and the enforcement of laws that have no business being laws.

Government provides a service to those people covered by its laws. That's a user-pays system. But surely the user should be able to choose what he actually wants to buy, rather than have others choose for him?

For now I'll leave aside the question of what exactly you think a fair price is on not having any more smallpox epidemics and similar questions, and ask whether and in what cases you think a democracy can ever legitemately obtain the goods and services of a citizen in that democracy? For that matter, we should also ask whether or not a democracy can exist where compulsory service is denied, since the people don't really have any power in such a circumstance?
Look, I like the idea of democracy, in that I prefer people to have some choice to having no choice. But the ultimate sovereignty must be by people over themselves. They can't be outvoted on matters that are of major concern to them, by people who have no idea what they're even voting for. Democracy is fine, as long as the ultimate reserve power remains with the individual, as defined by an inviolable constitution to that effect. Does that make democracy meaningless? Maybe.

But I think that if you had the option to tick the government programs you want to spend tax money on (thus taking out the current way of doing things, which is that a government elected by a majority rules over the product of my life as if I had nothing to do with it), that would be rather better in terms of freedom.

Finally, I suppose its fair to ask whether or not you support the Constitution, seeing as how the Constitution seems to allow citizens to make requests of you in just such a manner as described above?
I support the concept of a constitution, but not any claims described therein by some people upon others that weren't acquired in a trade.

If a constitution says "People have the right to a fair trial", that's okay. When it says "People must help each other", that's not.

I ask these questions three because I want to pin down exactly what it is I'm trying to argue against Neu. If I had to take a stab at definitions, from your account of taxation I'd call you some kind of politically solipscist anarchist, a person who believes himself radically independent of, prior to, and superior than the mandate of the system of government in place. I won't state here what my assessment of how accurate those views could possibly be, but I want you to clearly state whether or not this is accurate. If it is, we can proceed.
I think you're getting close, except that I think I that a government of some sort is necessary, but receives a valid mandate only because of my agreement to its establishment, and my option to choose something else.

Only by figuring that out can I possibly explain to you why it is that notions of patriotism, honor, as well as obligation entail payment in the form of taxation; off-hand, it doesn't seem like those concepts have any meaning to you whatsoever.
I understand honour, in the sense that I should try not to violate others' expectations I raised, and obligation in the sense that if I sign a contract, I have an obligation to fulfill the terms I agreed to. Patriotism, well, that just goes straight over my head.

Not when used in its proper, formal context.

uh, no, the definition of a square root of x is a number that, when squared, equals x. It doesn't specify the sign. It is often assumed that the principal square root is what is asked for, but that's not in the defined meaning.

Wankers. Put them in jail, but then don't give them food, beds, toilet facilities etc. on the grounds that they weren't up for paying for them.

I am saying that things some constraints that can not be overcome. You said that all constraints are temporary at best and can be overcome.
Well, what do you need to do to win a Nobel Prize? You need to make some great scientific discovery.

It will most likely be quite difficult to get to the point where you can do that with an IQ of 75, and I don't know how many people with a low IQ choose to devote their lives to scientific discoveries in the first place, but it's not impossible.

Still, I quite liked my question: Did Albert Einstein deserve his Nobel Prize?

So if enough people disliked you enough to give your 3rd grade bully 1 billion dollars, collectively, you'd say he deserved it? If everyone suddenly developed incredibly strong tastes of hating you to the point that no one would hire or trade with you no matter how low you went would you deserve to die?
The only meaning for "deserving" I can make out is whether or not you did something that others agreed was good enough to warrant a reward. Insofar as neither the bully nor I actually did anything, it seems that we don't "deserve" our fates. If the bully found a cure for cancer and I was a mass-murdering cannibal, things would be different.

If the bully was a particularly good marketing genius and worked to make people think he should be getting the money, I think that too would make him "deserving". So it seems to be a function the effects one's labour has on the real world and/or others' appraisal of these effects.

Your wealth and income is ultimately controlled by what others will pay for your labor/resources, general tech level, and the institutions of society. The above is ultimately above your complete control.
Yeah, but it just provides the framework. If we were cavemen, the weather, lions and cave location would be outside our control, but we'd still be putting our minds to something and earn some sort of reward for it.

In one case we might get a Bentley, in the other a fire. Not equivalent, but no less the product of our work, existing only because of it.

Prove the one true private property regime that will result in unanimous agreement by everyone.
I'm not sure I follow you. What does that have to do with it?

So you are ultimately saying that Watts didn't need to use the knowledge amassed by others, that his accomplishments were totally based on his own efforts, and had nothing to do with the efforts of others.
He didn't need it to invent, he simply took advantage of it to invent the specific thing he ended up inventing.

Hayek said that outcomes said that market outcomes are not morally deserved, but that they shouldn't be changed as long as the procedural rules are considered just. In the article you gave me the author agreed and links are provided by three others who agree that that was Hayek's view. How am I misusing his writings when I say he didn't believe market incomes are based on moral desert?
Are we reading the same article? Anderson, in her original claim that Hayek's view of prices can't reflect desert was wrong, says this article, because it misinterprets the Hayekian view of prices.

Prices convey information, but that includes information about the person who made the good in question, including something you might call merit. So the two don't exclude each other.

Yeah ya do.
Even if they don't tell us a thing about desert or merit? Even if the acknowledgement only serves to lessen their achievement and only serves as an argument to take that which we could not create and pretend we did?

uh, no, the definition of a square root of x is a number that, when squared, equals x. It doesn't specify the sign. It is often assumed that the principal square root is what is asked for, but that's not in the defined meaning.

Formally, it is, as any mathematician will tell you.

Ah, you mean the principal square root, which is implied by a radical, if i recall correctly. Simply "square root" is, however, ambiguous in that matter.
Ambiguous != nonsensical.

If √4 equals both 2 and -2 simultaneously, then the equation √4 = √4 suddenly isn't necessarily true, since a possible solution would be 2 = -2, and that's clearly false.

√4 equals either 2 or -2, but never both simultaneously. √4 = ±2. That's "the square root of four equals plus or minus two".

If √4 equals both 2 and -2 simultaneously, then the equation √4 = √4 suddenly isn't necessarily true, since a possible solution would be 2 = -2, and that's clearly false.


Nice...a succinct refutation of the attempt to claim that the fundamental laws of logic are false.

Much better than the one I came up with. Congratulations.

Always remember that mathematics is subordinate to logic; therefore, it can never disprove it.

Sure it can. They both always equal 4 when squared, they don't take turns. That's why an equation like x^2 - 4 = 0 has more than one solution...Actually. It has one solution: the set {-2, 2}.

"1. claim to respect and praise; excellence; worth.
2. something that deserves or justifies a reward or commendation; a commendable quality, act, etc.: The book's only merit is its sincerity.
...
4. Often, merits. the state or fact of deserving; desert: to treat people according to their merits."
So, you would say that these things are not subjective?

No, we can also act rightly even if it not only does not benefit us, but indeed harms us severely.

Indeed, doing so is the only rational course of action.
What are you thinking of?

As for "rightly", you know as well as I do that our ideas on that are most likely not the same.

But in the end that does not work either, because outside of very limited contexts most arguments for entitlement independent of desert only seem credible because of their superficial similarities to arguments from desert, and collapse under close scrutiny.
Actually, entitlements come from agreements between people. Merit doesn't have to enter into it.

My entitlement to the lottery money comes from me and the lottery guy agreeing on a contract.

If you're going to define merit as something that is independent of the views of all the people involved, you need to offer me some reason why and how. And if you can't, I just don't see why it matters at all.

You're assuming that conceptions of "desert" are subjective, and thus that morality is subjective... yet you suppose that "merit" is a matter of objective fact?
I tried, anyways. It's very hard to argue about things that no one has a decent definition of. The things from dictionary.com don't tell me the actual rule why A deserves X, and then you tell me that A doesn't deserve X because A won X at a lottery. Why?

I don't deny that the person was part of the causal chain. I deny that this means anything in and of itself in terms of right, in terms of a just distribution of wealth.
So what does?

That's because I recognize that "responsibility" is a more limited concept that you want to make it out to be. We are not "responsible" for our own talents, or our own circumstances.
But we are responsible for what we do with them, and that is the only thing that can have any affect on the material world or on other people. I'll ask you the same question: Did Einstein deserve his Nobel Prize?

He wasn't responsible for having a 160 IQ, or having been born into a country where he had the time to spend on physics. He wasn't responsible for Newton or any other physicist he built on. It's glaringly obvious that it did however take his mind and actions to develop the theories of relativity. Without him thinking and putting pen to paper, they wouldn't have existed.

So are you going to say that his Nobel Prize wasn't his? That it was Newton's? That it was that of everyone who didn't have the time, mind or will to discover it?

And if not, why would you say it about the wealth someone earns?

So a child starving to death at two because she lives in an area struck by severe famine isn't a victim of bad luck or bad circumstances... she's just "incapable."
I don't think you can define a two year old kid as a human in the sense that it can make decisions and use its ability to reason to change the environment to suit its purpose.

No, you must distinguish between the right kinds of "capability" and the wrong kinds of "capability", and the only basis you can make that kind of distinction is on right. And that requires a deeper consideration of merit, worth, and desert than you're giving those concepts.
How about this one: if a person creates value, he or she has a right to hold onto it because it would not have existed without him or her creating it. It is an extension, a manifestation of that person's rational mind, turned into material form. Creating it was a process with a final purpose, and that purpose was to change that person's world for the better, by putting it to some use determined by the person. Its reason for existence is to serve that person.

More importantly, the only way to violate this "right", if it is one, is by violence. Violence against people is violance against thought, it's anti-thought, if you will. You don't make people understand things with violence, you convey to them that their understanding is not required.

How do humans survive though? What do humans do? We don't have claws and teeth and that sort of stuff. The only tool we have for survival is our capacity to think. So our capacity to think is our capacity to survive and live.

If you build any sort of relationship in which a side isn't required to understand or agree, you're fighting that side's capacity for life. A system that does not grant property rights and allows for the freedom to produce and trade your product is a system that deprives people of any life beyond mere existence.

Of course the state that taxes and the gangsters who steal both use force rather than mutual agreement, so there's my distinction.

Arbitrary circumstance. Something that happens independent of responsibility.
So what makes some people luckier than others?

No, but I have been talking about merit and desert, not causation.
There is only one cause that could warrant a moral investigation of a difference between the two, and that is if someone got hurt against their will in the process.

Being born Paris Hilton doesn't hurt anybody.

Because you did the same as thousands of other people. What makes you special?

Merit and desert deal with your worth. You winning the lottery tells us nothing more about you than it tells us about the thousands of others who participated. Your victory is not a matter of your merit, but of luck, of circumstances for which you were not responsible.
If a meteor crashes onto me and kills me, I'm not "special" in any meaningful sense either. Maybe, according to whatever rules we end up coming up with, I didn't even deserve it. But that won't bring me back to life, and it won't make it feasible to build a giant anti-meteor laser or to build a tunnel out of other people's bodies so I can walk through it and be protected and they'll die instead of me.

-snip-
Dude, I'm sitting here defending your philosophy, and you spend your time arguing about square roots?

This might be the time where you can show that you actually understand this stuff beyond just proclaiming that X is X, as if that proved anything on its own.

If √4 equals both 2 and -2 simultaneously, then the equation √4 = √4 suddenly isn't necessarily true, since a possible solution would be 2 = -2, and that's clearly false.

isnt your argument contingent on the very principle in question?

Zeno's paradoxes aren't actually logic: they're failed attempts at logic.

what are the logical flaws in the arguments?

Well, what do you need to do to win a Nobel Prize? You need to make some great scientific discovery.

It will most likely be quite difficult to get to the point where you can do that with an IQ of 75, and I don't know how many people with a low IQ choose to devote their lives to scientific discoveries in the first place, but it's not impossible.

To make a great scientific discovery one needs the ability to understand the subject.

I don't see people with such low IQs possessing the comprehension to be able to make scientific discoveriess. Are you asserting that one is not limited by one's intelligence at all?

Still, I quite liked my question: Did Albert Einstein deserve his Nobel Prize?

Morally he did not because without many factors outside his control he would not have been able to come up with his thearies. In any case good ol' Albert was a determinist.

The only meaning for "deserving" I can make out is whether or not you did something that others agreed was good enough to warrant a reward. Insofar as neither the bully nor I actually did anything, it seems that we don't "deserve" our fates. If the bully found a cure for cancer and I was a mass-murdering cannibal, things would be different.

If the bully was a particularly good marketing genius and worked to make people think he should be getting the money, I think that too would make him "deserving". So it seems to be a function the effects one's labour has on the real world and/or others' appraisal of these effects.

People could think he deserves rewards for bullying you. They might pay him to continue to harrass you. Because "deserving" means others will reward one for one's actions. The bully is being rewarded for harrassing you.

Yeah, but it just provides the framework. If we were cavemen, the weather, lions and cave location would be outside our control, but we'd still be putting our minds to something and earn some sort of reward for it.

It provides the framework for every individual. Since individuals dont control others this leads to uncertainty of the outcomes of one's actions.

In one case we might get a Bentley, in the other a fire. Not equivalent, but no less the product of our work, existing only because of it.

And thus the product was not based 100% on one's own action


I'm not sure I follow you. What does that have to do with it?

It has every has everything to do with it. If what is legitimate is what is in accord with the correct rights and entitlements of individuals then finding out the correct ones is imperitive. The problem is that its impossible to prove. Every ideology has different standards of what is legitimate.


He didn't need it to invent, he simply took advantage of it to invent the specific thing he ended up inventing.

He used what he did not create to create something else.

Are we reading the same article? Anderson, in her original claim that Hayek's view of prices can't reflect desert was wrong, says this article, because it misinterprets the Hayekian view of prices.

Prices convey information, but that includes information about the person who made the good in question, including something you might call merit. So the two don't exclude each other.

I'm wondering if you read it correctly. From the article:

=Tyler Cowen;13124015]Now, I am torn between "strict philosopher" and "common sense morality" views. In the former, I am a metaphysical determinist who doesn't think much of desert arguments -- whether pro-market or not -- in any context.

hmmm... That edit didn't work right

Consequently, capitalism is constantly pulling the rug out from underneath even the most thoughtful, foresightful, and prudent production plans of individual agents. However virtuous they were, by whatever standard of virtue one can name, individuals cannot count on their virtue being rewarded in the free market. For the function of the market isn’t to reward people for past good behavior. It’s to direct them toward producing for current demand, regardless of what they did in the past.


Even if they don't tell us a thing about desert or merit? Even if the acknowledgement only serves to lessen their achievement and only serves as an argument to take that which we could not create and pretend we did?

You have merit and desert mixed with entitlement. If is lessens the accompliment ii is only in pointing out the truth that people dont create things ex nihilo. People can't not take/use what they didn't create in our reality.

But you don't like negatives? odd.
Numbers are to use, not to like or dislike. You really don't pay attention, do you?

Negative numbers rarely serve a purpose in the physical world. For instance,
πd**2-4π = 0 has a solution. Two, in fact.

But I defy you to give me a physical explanation of what d = -2 means, other than that I've picked the wrong root.

what are the logical flaws in the arguments?

Namely, a failure to make the distinction between discrete and continuous series.

Dude, I'm sitting here defending your philosophy,
I didn't ask you to, and anyway it's not necessary since I've already proven it.


This might be the time where you can show that you actually understand this stuff beyond just proclaiming that X is X, as if that proved anything on its own.

It does, since everything else follows logically from that.

Numbers are to use, not to like or dislike. You really don't pay attention, do you?

Negative numbers rarely serve a purpose in the physical world. For instance,
πd**2-4π = 0 has a solution. Two, in fact.

But I defy you to give me a physical explanation of what d = -2 means, other than that I've picked the wrong root.d is 2 units in the negative direction away from the origin. If |d| = north and d is measured in meters, then d = -2 would mean that d is two meters south of wherever you define zero to be.

Pretty much anything involving a vector, positive and negative are completely arbitrary and should be leveraged in a way to simply the task at hand.

Namely, a failure to make the distinction between discrete and continuous series.

and on the basis of what do you distinguish the proper sphere for each?

So, you would say that these things are not subjective?

They are certainly not wholly subjective, but they are not wholly objective either.

I think we can objectively declare someone "worthy" in a certain sense, but I also think that that is immaterial as far as a just distribution of property goes. With respect to a just distribution of property, however, I do think we can make a requirement of simple consistency.

What are you thinking of?

Moral action. We cannot rationally move from "it benefits me" to "I ought to do it"... and therefore if we are concerned for what we ought to do, as we must be as rational creatures who seek good reasons for their actions, our criterion cannot simply be whether or not it benefits us.

It may, of course, be the case that what benefits us coincides with what is right. Even in that case, however, we, if we are acting rationally, do the action not because it benefits us--because if that were our determining principle, we would be ignoring the is-ought gap--but because we recognize that it is right.

Actually, entitlements come from agreements between people. Merit doesn't have to enter into it.

Yes, but you are ignoring the specificity of my point... it was carefully worded.

I said that arguments from entitlement "seem credible because of their superficial similarities to arguments from desert"... not that they are the same as arguments from desert (which are the ones that depend, definitionally rather than just "intuitively", on merit.)

The foundation of all arguments from entitlement is our supposed entitlement to the product of our labor, but the proponents of the theory, I think, can only credibly establish the tenuous connection between "I 'own' myself" and "I own everything I produce" with an appeal, implicit or otherwise, to the desert arising from hard work.

I find that even most libertarians recognize this fact... they are very quick to defend free-market capitalism on "desert" grounds, to the point of being willing to grant very significant concessions to their opponents when it comes to things like education. If vast inequalities of wealth are handed out arbitrarily instead of on some grounds of desert or merit, entitlement theories seeking to defend them independently of any social gain lose most of their force.

Outside of certain specific contexts, anyway. Gambling, of course, is one... but only, I think, in the context of an already just distribution of wealth, in which I can really say that the stuff my friend and I gamble is justly owned. As part of freedom, I could also claim a right to receive what I have been guaranteed as remuneration for something, but crucially this principle tells us nothing about the kinds of things that should be remunerated and the kinds and magnitudes of the remunerations. Principles of entitlement, insofar as they have strong grounding, tells us little about the broad structure of a just distribution of wealth.

If you're going to define merit as something that is independent of the views of all the people involved,

That's implicit in the concept.

Whatever our standard for "merit", subjective or not, it clearly cannot depend on what other people involved happen to think any more than any other judgment can.

This is obviously true of objective truth: believe as much as you will that the Earth is flat, it still will be round. Yet it is true, too, of subjective judgment: the fact that other people thought "Live Free or Die Hard" was a great movie hardly alters, or should alter, my dislike for it.

you need to offer me some reason why and how.

If you mean, "Why I think I can interfere," the answer is simple: for the sake of the welfare of society.

You may protest that your stuff should not be sacrificed for the sake of society's welfare... but then you have to present a credible argument for why your right to your stuff is independent of its role in securing society's welfare. And that is precisely what this argument is about.

The things from dictionary.com don't tell me the actual rule why A deserves X,

Of course not, and if it did, that would be a bad definition--first, because it would make it biased, and second, because it wouldn't actually define the term.

and then you tell me that A doesn't deserve X because A won X at a lottery.

This, I think, follows from the definition without any need for a specific "rule."

The definition speaks of "worth" and "excellence", but it is clearly not any worth or excellence on the part of the lottery ticket buyer that made her win the lottery as opposed to all the other participants.

So what does?

To advance a credible claim, we would have to have a distinction between people that is not arbitrary: we would have to have one that is not dependent on attributes (for which we are not responsible) nor on circumstances (for which we are not responsible) but simply on will, which is the stuff of our responsibility.

The only reasonable, absolute distinction on that basis that comes to mind is morality. I see no reason to reward people for exertions of will toward non-moral ends. Of course, I see no reason to reward people materially for exertions of will toward moral ends, either... I might hold them in high esteem, but it seems a stretch to argue that they deserve more. And, anyway, incorporating that element into the social system would be impractical, because once people begin seeking the appearance of morality for the material rewards, it becomes impossible to tell the truly moral from the merely practical.

So, to be succinct: nothing.

But we are responsible for what we do with them,

Yes.

So the person who would have done the same with your attributes and circumstances is exactly as merit-worthy and deserving as you. Even if, because of the attributes and circumstances he or she received, that person did not actually accomplish anything near what you have.

I'll ask you the same question: Did Einstein deserve his Nobel Prize?

Yes. And if I create a Next Person to Post in This Thread Prize, whoever that person is, as the next person to post in this thread, will deserve the prize.

But neither deserves a larger share of the social product as a consequence.

And if not, why would you say it about the wealth someone earns?

Because prizes are not scarce. We can hand them out as we see fit.

Should a physicist who would have done the same thing as Einstein if he or she had the same attributes and circumstances be ashamed because Einstein got it instead of him or her? No. And that is the real question.

I don't think you can define a two year old kid as a human in the sense that it can make decisions and use its ability to reason to change the environment to suit its purpose.

You can't deny that similar risks exist for adults as well, if to a lesser degree.

And you have made a crucial concession... might the government be justified in taxing you to ensure that that two-year-old does not starve?

How about this one: if a person creates value, he or she has a right to hold onto it because it would not have existed without him or her creating it. It is an extension, a manifestation of that person's rational mind, turned into material form.

I can use exactly the same arguments with respect to desert that I've used all along right here.

Creating it was a process with a final purpose, and that purpose was to change that person's world for the better, by putting it to some use determined by the person. Its reason for existence is to serve that person.

Interesting. So if, for instance, we lived in a communist society where no reasonable person would create an object to serve him or herself, knowing that it will not be used so, would this right disappear?

More to the point of your thread, if the creator knows that her creation will be taxed and regulated in certain ways, won't its "reason for existence" take this into account... again, causing this right, insofar as it acts against taxation and regulation, to disappear?

More importantly, the only way to violate this "right", if it is one, is by violence.

Nonsense. I climb a fence onto someone else's property. That's not violence. That person calls the police, who forcefully drag me out. Now, that's violence. ;)

Violence against people is violance against thought, it's anti-thought, if you will. You don't make people understand things with violence, you convey to them that their understanding is not required.

Agreed. But we both know that violence is sometimes necessary anyway, when other means fail.

If you build any sort of relationship in which a side isn't required to understand or agree, you're fighting that side's capacity for life.

I agree most fundamentally. I am, after all, an anarchist.

In fact, I believe in this principle even more than you do. For instance, I reject the right of the property owner to do as she pleases regardless of what others affected by her actions think. I think "property" is a right dependent on the understanding and agreement of others... because otherwise the relationship between the owner and everyone else is a relationship "in which a side isn't required to understand or agree."

A system that does not grant property rights and allows for the freedom to produce and trade your product is a system that deprives people of any life beyond mere existence.

You haven't remotely justified this.

Of course the state that taxes and the gangsters who steal both use force rather than mutual agreement

That's the first step.

What difference does this make?

So what makes some people luckier than others?

Random chance.

If I roll a die six billion times, sometimes I'm going to get sixes... and other times I'm going to get ones.

There is only one cause that could warrant a moral investigation of a difference between the two, and that is if someone got hurt against their will in the process.

No, people don't get a free pass just because they happen to own things. They have to actually justify that ownership if they want to contest my right to vote for candidates who support higher taxes.

But that won't bring me back to life, and it won't make it feasible to build a giant anti-meteor laser or to build a tunnel out of other people's bodies so I can walk through it and be protected and they'll die instead of me.

Obviously that would be disproportionate. But it would be quite absurd for survivors of equal merit than you to claim they "deserve" more because they happened to have not been hit by a meteor.

and on the basis of what do you distinguish the proper sphere for each?Huh?

How about this one: if a person creates value, he or she has a right to hold onto it because it would not have existed without him or her creating it.What if I think that the "value" should not exist? For instance, if you clearcut and strip mine a forest, I might think that your actions decreased the value of the forest.

What if I think that the "value" should not exist? For instance, if you clearcut and strip mine a forest, I might think that your actions decreased the value of the forest.
Then you should be committed to an asylum, where people like you belong. :)

d is 2 units in the negative direction away from the origin. If |d| = north and d is measured in meters, then d = -2 would mean that d is two meters south of wherever you define zero to be.

Pretty much anything involving a vector, positive and negative are completely arbitrary and should be leveraged in a way to simply the task at hand.

Okay, I'll give you that, but remember -- the negative quantity is only a abstract representation of a physical quantity -- north, south, up, down, left, right, etc. It has absolutely no meaning of its own. In fact, we could dispense with the '-' sign all together and redefine a vector to have double the components that it has now, where each positive value would represent a direction from the origin. For a 2-D vector, we could write ai+bi'+cj+dj' = 0, or even ai + bj + ck + dl = 0. It would be messier, but just as valid.

But back to my main point -- If you want to use a vector to compute something like energy, or in my example, area, you must use the magnitude -- a positive number. Real things depend on positive numbers, negative numbers are nonsense. Working backwards using the area of a shape to find a dimension had better result in a positive number, too.

Those guys are absolute fucktards. I mean seriously, how can you be opposed to the concept of paying taxes? Without being a complete retard I mean? It's like being opposed to the idea of clean drinking water. We are so unbelievably fortunate in having society as we do now, Producing a government paid for by the people is one of the greatest acheivements of mankind, and I am in no way exaggerating in this, life is so much better with a system looking out (certainly to some extent) for the greater good of sociey.

You feel like anal raping someone, mudering them, eating their children? Ahh, not so fast sunshine, we have people whose job it is to stop you! But hey, let's stop funding the police. We SOOOO don't need that kind of over-bearing crap telling us what to do :rolleyes:

You know another thing I think is a complete waste of time? Surfaced roads! I personally think we should scrap all funding for that sort of nonsense. I mean hey? When was the last time you ever needed to use one of those things? Exactly, how ridicuolous are we?

I could go on. But I hope you get my point. Just think how fucked we would be if everyone suddenly decided "actually lol, i'm not going to pay my taxes this year, i don't really feel like it lol"

Those guys are absolute fucktards. I mean seriously, how can you be opposed to the concept of paying taxes?
Because I don't like having my stuff stolen.

You feel like anal raping someone, mudering them, eating their children? Ahh, not so fast sunshine, we have people whose job it is to stop you! But hey, let's stop funding the police. We SOOOO don't need that kind of over-bearing crap telling us what to do :rolleyes:
The proper functions of government should be funded by heavy punitive fines levied on (real) criminals. They're the ones whose actions necessitate government anyway; let them pay for it.

You know another thing I think is a complete waste of time? Surfaced roads!
Not government's job.