Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Transfers of wealth from productive to unproductive industries arent risks worth rewarding Down that path lies authoritarianism: who decides what is productive? Is art productive? Is your comment on HN productive? Is beer productive? Is Haskell productive? Are you productive? It isn’t hard to argue most everything is non-productive. Remove all non-productive uses of money or time, and what is left?
I think you may be confusing economics terms with moral and ethical distinctions. I’ll grant that the idea of productive and unproductive labor is an outdated economic concept. Regardless, academically defining something as more or less productive than something else is not authoritarian. Nor is deciding personally if something is “good” or “bad”. Now if someone in government decided to create and pass legislation ba…
mjburgess’ comment appears to be using virtuous, religiously worded, moral arguments against the “waste” of cryptocurrencies. I am not making an economic argument and neither was mjburgess: my argument is about liberty and I am against people that imply that our personal choices or values are unworthy, because by their morals the choices of others are waste. I personally might agree that cryptocurrencies appear to be negative value for the economy, and I might see them bring negative value to some of my acquaintances. That is not the issue. We should aim for the ideal of being as free as practical to make wasteful choices: the waste of having a child, breathing, thinking, or doing absolutely anything, really. As you say, that freedom needs careful balancing against how our personal liberties affect others.
I am looking at that comment as an single example within a wider milieu: one dangerous opinion dressed up in what superficially appears to be a sensible economic argument.
> is not authoritarian
Strawman words in my mouth. I never said it was authoritarian, I said: “down that path lies authoritarianism”.