It almost as if housing is a human right and not an investment opportunity for the wealthy to exploit.
How is it a human right? How does that work?
Welcome to 2023. Everything's a human right.
Hawaii governor vows to block land grabs as fire-ravaged Maui rebuilds
51–60 of 71 posts
Re: Hawaii governor vows to block land grabs as fire-ravaged Maui rebuilds
#52Earlier quoted context omitted.
It doesn’t work in a capitalistic society, as capitalism only benefits, those who own. It’s my belief that we create enough resources in this world for everyone to live a comfortable life but we don’t love one is because a few thousand people hoard all the resources and say we have to keep working.
> as capitalism only benefits, those who own A rising tide lifts all boats, and that is what has borne out by historical fact for capitalism. The easiest way to see how it benefits everyone, even the poorest, is to look at the median person's living standards in places that don't have "capitalism" (which in this context is shorthand for rule of law, strong private property rights, and a market economy). > a few thous…
> A rising tide lifts all boats, and that is what has borne out by historical fact for capitalism.
To a point and then not, which is why capitalism in tbe narrow sense was rejected generally in the early-mid-20th century in favor of the modern mixed econony, which, like strict capitalism before it, is almost certainly not the end of the road on the advancement of economic systems.
Re: Hawaii governor vows to block land grabs as fire-ravaged Maui rebuilds
#53I am really curious whether the current governor of Hawaii should take responsibility for the failures and resign. Out of all 50 states Hawaii is supposed to have the most advanced early warning system and yet, the reality check went disastrously wrong. There will be no real improvement if accountability at the top level is not enforced.
Re: Hawaii governor vows to block land grabs as fire-ravaged Maui rebuilds
#54Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's important to distinguish negative rights (the state cannot do X to you) from positive rights (the state is required to have X happen for you). There is a school of thought that says the latter is not really valid, since it may (or eventually will) be that some negative rights be violated to make it happen.
Yes, I was reading Bastiat (The Law) a while ago and he made a point that struck me: the state can't enforce positive (philanthropic) rights (i.e., you are entitled to this and that) without violating a natural right. For the state to enforce a citizen's philanthropic right to some stuff, the have to dispossess someone else of it - after all, the state can't produce anything, it can only expropriate what's been produ…
Do taxes violate a natural right?
Re: Hawaii governor vows to block land grabs as fire-ravaged Maui rebuilds
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, I was reading Bastiat (The Law) a while ago and he made a point that struck me: the state can't enforce positive (philanthropic) rights (i.e., you are entitled to this and that) without violating a natural right. For the state to enforce a citizen's philanthropic right to some stuff, the have to dispossess someone else of it - after all, the state can't produce anything, it can only expropriate what's been produ…
Do taxes violate a natural right?
As a libertarian, I'd say yes, but I don't want to start a shitstorm, so...
Re: Hawaii governor vows to block land grabs as fire-ravaged Maui rebuilds
#56Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do taxes violate a natural right?
As a libertarian, I'd say yes, but I don't want to start a shitstorm, so...
Even a libertarian would agree that some small level of taxation is necessary to fund the apparatus of the state that would enforce property rights and contracts, safeguard the border from invasion, and whatnot.
One can only dream of a time and place where government is only funded by a strict land-value tax, though...
Re: Hawaii governor vows to block land grabs as fire-ravaged Maui rebuilds
#57It's become a philosophical kind of question, eh? What is Hawaii, what should Hawaii be in the future. One vision is that it stays the way it is forever, becoming a "nature preserve" of a human settlement. Another vision which I suspect they're trying to avoid is "a limited resource monopolized entirely by the rich". The 2nd vision may well have happened over a longer time scale as families slowly get priced out and…
The particular problem with the rich is they tend to like high land values, it allows them to sell their purchases for profit and keeps those they view as undesirable out
But this comes with catch-22 for said rich people. They don't want to pay the poor working class they employ so they can't actually afford to live at these places and all forms of service suffer. You see this in the big expensive cities that the government and civil workers have typically have long commutes to cheaper places as their salaries are typically capped. This becomes very problematic on islands where the the amount of habitable land is low and the demand high.
Re: Hawaii governor vows to block land grabs as fire-ravaged Maui rebuilds
#58"Land grabs" is a dishonest term for voluntary land sales.
"voluntary" is a dishonest term for locals forced to sell and move after a major disaster
A blanket moratorium with strip locals of their freedoms, rights, and agency.
If the state of Hawaii wants to do something to help, they should help the victims by giving them better alternatives. Stripping away their options is not that.
There are plenty of options that don't leave the impacted victims worse off. The state might provide emergency financing for individuals so they don't want to sell. The state might Place competitive bids for land that would be sold to other parties.
Re: Hawaii governor vows to block land grabs as fire-ravaged Maui rebuilds
#59Earlier quoted context omitted.
It doesn’t work in a capitalistic society, as capitalism only benefits, those who own. It’s my belief that we create enough resources in this world for everyone to live a comfortable life but we don’t love one is because a few thousand people hoard all the resources and say we have to keep working.
> as capitalism only benefits, those who own A rising tide lifts all boats, and that is what has borne out by historical fact for capitalism. The easiest way to see how it benefits everyone, even the poorest, is to look at the median person's living standards in places that don't have "capitalism" (which in this context is shorthand for rule of law, strong private property rights, and a market economy). > a few thous…
>A rising tide lifts all boats, and that is what has borne out by historical fact for capitalism.
This also misses that it does so by FORCING said highest boats to pay the state/federal taxes in which are used to ensure those with sinking boats don't turn into pirates to stay alive.
>The mega-ultra-rich (the top richest few thousand people in the world, like you said) aren't piling vaults with gold, Scrooge McDuck style. Their wealth is the productive assets they own, almost always companies that generate value for consumers.
Because we incentive investment. If we did not there would be plenty of ultra mega rich sitting on piles of gold pretending they were dragons.
Every damned discussion I see about this tries to pain everything in a binary when it's a far more complicated topic. The wealthy are far better off putting some sizeable portion of their wealth to ensure society works because it creates a feedback cycle where both their wealth, and the gross wealth of the society increases, and the society is one that is generally safer to take part in.
Re: Hawaii governor vows to block land grabs as fire-ravaged Maui rebuilds
#60It almost as if housing is a human right and not an investment opportunity for the wealthy to exploit.
No, you're wrong, I your local trillionaire am totally allow to buy up all the housing on the planet and let you rats sink! There is nothing that could possibly go wrong with this idea, it's what pure capitalism demands!