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Small payments sharply diminish gap in responses to partisan factual questions

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Re: Small payments sharply diminish gap in responses to partisan factual questions

#151

Post by hoorayimhelping »

kristopolous wrote: post #81
didibus wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very true. Coming from Quebec, Canada, I actually say that. It's more ingrained in our culture that what we are taxed for is services that benefit us all and that makes our societal environment more enjoyable. Now in the US, I can't seem to find anyone who think this. My biggest issue is that I can't even find anyone who thinks that the government is the people. Everyone seems to think of the government as this black…

It's a pro-private, anti-democratic push by chicago school, objectivists, and other groups, to essentially slander civic institutions as terrible and "privatize" them with capital extracting robber barons. "Government" is a 4 letter word and some people are insufferable in their hatred for it - thinking that some private selfish interest of people would magically make the world ... look, it's all preposterous ... it'…

"People think differently than me cause they're brainwashed by charlatans."

Don't try to give any benefit of the doubt to the people you disagree with on this. Don't try to see things from their perspective, and whatever you do, don't assume they have good intentions - you might just end up understanding someone else a little better and be forced to change your world view.

Re: Small payments sharply diminish gap in responses to partisan factual questions

#152

Post by state_less »

brownbat wrote: post #149
btilly wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When we say "rose under Foo" we typically mean from start to finish. I doubt that anyone who said it rose under Reagan said so because of uncertainty about what was asked. As for the facts, this shows up with clear cut and simple examples. Does economic theory say that raising minimum wages increases unemployment? Was Obama born in the USA? Do Democrats by and large care more about black deaths than white ones? Were…

> When we say "rose under Foo" we typically mean from start to finish. Huh, I don't. If I ask you if you got out of bed yesterday, I don't care whether you are currently in bed or not. I'm asking if you rose at all. On economics, if I ask you if there was mass unemployment during the 30s, I don't mean "only in 1939." On WMDs, well, here we go again. Sarin tipped missiles were found in Iraq according to intelligence d…

Wasn't it yellow cake uranium? Weren't we all supposed to shit ourselves because Saddam was going to nuke us? Or was it terrorist up in them hills? Or maybe we just need to show em' what freedom looks like?

Whatever it was, it's nice of the administration to dig up some old missiles from the last war for us skeptics. Because when you're getting fucked, it's nice to get a little reach-around.

Re: Small payments sharply diminish gap in responses to partisan factual questions

#153

Post by zodiac »

dnautics wrote: post #54

"For example, Republicans are more likely than Democrats to say that the deficit rose during the Clinton administration; Democrats are more likely to say that inflation rose under Reagan." These are both really tricky questions, because the questions described are derivatives of derivatives! The deficit is the time derivative of the debt; so it's possible that someone is hearing "did the debt rise during clinton" (wh…

Hmm, I think it's more accurate to say that the debt is the integral of the deficit. It's not like Congress passes laws to set the debt, then we examine how much the debt changed year to year and call that the deficit. Instead they pass a budget that exceeds (typically) tax revenue by a certain amount, and the shortfall (the deficit) is raised by borrowing money, which adds to the existing debt.

You could argue that "the debt is the integral of the deficit" is equivalent to "the deficit is the derivative of the debt" but in that case, I could construct a well-defined quantity which is the definite integral of the debt starting from the year, 1800 and the deficit would then be the fourth derivative of that quantity.

Re: Small payments sharply diminish gap in responses to partisan factual questions

#154

Post by cderwin »

notquite774 wrote: post #147
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A huge part of the problem is that people think one system is better than the other when it's really a spectrum where both extremes are absurd. Suppose you want to have some roads, how do you do it? a) Pure Communism. The state builds the roads. The state needs road workers and workers need food so the state grows food. The workers need steamrollers so the state manufactures steamrollers. The workers need asphalt so…

a) it's ridiculous to summarize the collapse of the USSR as being due to centralized planning. There were grocery stores sitting empty and corruption saw wealth going towards fewer and fewer hands. Plus they were more of a totalitarian dictatorship than communism b) dramatized perhaps but ok c) layers on ridiculous rule after rules, hands out contracts then only to those than can afford to abide all the rules (conven…

In a) and c), corruption is inescapable. It is an unavoidable consequence of centralized power, not something that can be fixed with endless (corruptible) oversight committees or particularly prescient design. It is cot an implementation bug, it is a bug in the spec. Meanwhile in b), corruption is a feature that looks like a bug. Self-interest is harnessed instead of ignored. And while b) certainly has its problems (one of which, infrastructure, is noted above), corruption is not one of them. However, despite its problems, the lack of central authority in b) has caused the single greatest reduction in both poverty and mortality in the history of mankind.

Re: Small payments sharply diminish gap in responses to partisan factual questions

#155

Post by AnthonyMouse »

smallnamespace wrote: post #148
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Congestion tolls are great -- they encourage better utilization of a scarce resource (the road at a certain point in time). Congestion tolls are the rich man's way of getting the government to build enough infrastructure for them without having to pay for enough infrastructure for everybody. If there is congestion it's either because you don't have enough roads or because you don't have good enough mass transit whi…

For any given amount of infrastructure, proper pricing makes its use more efficient (of course, minus the inefficiency of actually implementing tolls), by shifting demand towards less busy times or encouraging use of mass transit and pooling. In a lot of jurisdictions it's essentially impossible to build enough road so there is zero traffic, because buildings can grow upwards but roads cannot. Your point about the ri…

> For any given amount of infrastructure, proper pricing makes its use more efficient (of course, minus the inefficiency of actually implementing tolls), by shifting demand towards less busy times or encouraging use of mass transit and pooling.

You also have the inefficiency of destroying demand outright. Some people will just stay home.

It also seems like the presence of congestion would already be diverting traffic to less busy times, because nobody wants to sit in traffic. So there is not a lot of low-hanging fruit there.

And if you want to shift demand to mass transit through pricing, instead of making the roads more expensive, make mass transit less expensive. Then you don't need a toll collection infrastructure for roads and may even be able to eliminate the fare collection infrastructure for mass transit.

> In a lot of jurisdictions it's essentially impossible to build enough road so there is zero traffic, because buildings can grow upwards but roads cannot.

Sure they can: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Washington_Bridge

But high density cities are the obvious case for mass transit improvements.

> Your point about the rich getting infrastructure seems like a non sequitur here. It's voters' job to get their representatives to build enough infrastructure, not just the rich.

The point is that congestion pricing benefits the rich over the poor, as compared with alternatives like funding another bus or subway line via taxes, or reducing/eliminating fares. Which voters care about when deciding what to get their representatives to do.

> I agree that congestion tolls are somewhat regressive, but the solution is to have a progressive tax system, not to avoid efficiency taxes.

It's politically a lot easier to not impose regressive fees than to impose them and then try to balance it by transferring more money to low/middle income people who are already paying negative effective tax rates.

Re: Small payments sharply diminish gap in responses to partisan factual questions

#156

Post by smallnamespace »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #155
smallnamespace wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For any given amount of infrastructure, proper pricing makes its use more efficient (of course, minus the inefficiency of actually implementing tolls), by shifting demand towards less busy times or encouraging use of mass transit and pooling. In a lot of jurisdictions it's essentially impossible to build enough road so there is zero traffic, because buildings can grow upwards but roads cannot. Your point about the ri…

> For any given amount of infrastructure, proper pricing makes its use more efficient (of course, minus the inefficiency of actually implementing tolls), by shifting demand towards less busy times or encouraging use of mass transit and pooling. You also have the inefficiency of destroying demand outright. Some people will just stay home. It also seems like the presence of congestion would already be diverting traffic…

I think the strongest argument against congestion pricing is the cost of infrastructure to collect it.

All the other arguments apply equally well to other consumables that are normally priced, like food and energy. Consumption taxes are inherently regressive, and poor people consume more of their income than their rich, but the solution is not to simply price consumables at $0.

IMO, the burden should be to show why roads are such a special good that they should always be free, regardless of externalities.

You're right that mass transit should be a part of the equation. Singapore is a city where this works well -- mass transit is (relatively) cheap, universal, and efficient. Car ownership is ridiculously expensive due to taxes, and congestion pricing is high (around $15 at rush hour) [1]. This prices road travel appropriately, as a luxury good in a dense and crowded metropolis, and pushes all normal transportation needs onto mass transit.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_Road_Pricing

Re: Small payments sharply diminish gap in responses to partisan factual questions

#157

Post by CountSessine »

cderwin wrote: post #154
notquite774 wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

a) it's ridiculous to summarize the collapse of the USSR as being due to centralized planning. There were grocery stores sitting empty and corruption saw wealth going towards fewer and fewer hands. Plus they were more of a totalitarian dictatorship than communism b) dramatized perhaps but ok c) layers on ridiculous rule after rules, hands out contracts then only to those than can afford to abide all the rules (conven…

In a) and c), corruption is inescapable. It is an unavoidable consequence of centralized power, not something that can be fixed with endless (corruptible) oversight committees or particularly prescient design. It is cot an implementation bug, it is a bug in the spec. Meanwhile in b), corruption is a feature that looks like a bug. Self-interest is harnessed instead of ignored. And while b) certainly has its problems (…

I'm shocked that anyone actually disagrees with this.

Re: Small payments sharply diminish gap in responses to partisan factual questions

#158

Post by Flimm »

CountSessine wrote: post #157
cderwin wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In a) and c), corruption is inescapable. It is an unavoidable consequence of centralized power, not something that can be fixed with endless (corruptible) oversight committees or particularly prescient design. It is cot an implementation bug, it is a bug in the spec. Meanwhile in b), corruption is a feature that looks like a bug. Self-interest is harnessed instead of ignored. And while b) certainly has its problems (…

I'm shocked that anyone actually disagrees with this.

You need to expose yourself to more ideas, it's not at all unusual to disagree with that kind of summary.

Re: Small payments sharply diminish gap in responses to partisan factual questions

#159

Post by cabalamat »

chc wrote: post #60
dnautics wrote: post #54

"For example, Republicans are more likely than Democrats to say that the deficit rose during the Clinton administration; Democrats are more likely to say that inflation rose under Reagan." These are both really tricky questions, because the questions described are derivatives of derivatives! The deficit is the time derivative of the debt; so it's possible that someone is hearing "did the debt rise during clinton" (wh…

The point is that people tend to answer the question in a way that favors their party and disfavors the other party if you just ask them, but they're more likely to get it right if you offer an incentive to do so. This can't be explained just by "The questions are tricky," though that might be contributing factor that helps people fool themselves when they want to.

> they're more likely to get it right if you offer an incentive to do so

The explanation for this is that people subconsciously keep note of which of their beleifs are Merit Beliefs and which Crony Beliefs.

See http://www.meltingasphalt.com/crony-beliefs/

Re: Small payments sharply diminish gap in responses to partisan factual questions

#160

Post by NOSHSHNACKERS »

kristopolous wrote: post #118
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A huge part of the problem is that people think one system is better than the other when it's really a spectrum where both extremes are absurd. Suppose you want to have some roads, how do you do it? a) Pure Communism. The state builds the roads. The state needs road workers and workers need food so the state grows food. The workers need steamrollers so the state manufactures steamrollers. The workers need asphalt so…

C can be a problem. It's how the military industrial complex that Eisenhower warned us about is structured. "C" is what leads to things like corporate bail outs. Parenti talked about this with Conrail in the 80s. It was a train system that was put in public trust because it couldn't make money in the 70s. Then after the public made it profitable, under Reagan, it was reprivatized - not because it didn't work, but bec…

the USSR was an oligarchy not communism .. this is so 1997 FIDOnet.. ugh.
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