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The world is socialist

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Re: The world is socialist

#31

We all get hungry, but we buy food from farmers on the market. We all need shelter, but we're buy our rent our homes. We all need clothing, but we clothing manufacturers are for profit. There are a variety of good arguments for socialized health care, but "we all get sick" is not among them. This article is banal in the extreme, and I'm not sure why it's on the front page.

> There are a variety of good arguments for socialized health care, but "we all get sick" is not among them.

I disagree. The more specific "we all can get very sick, and being very sick is very expensive" is a very good argument for pooling our resources to make sure that we all get help when we need it.

Re: The world is socialist

#32
post #26

I think I must be the only person ever who read Atlas Shrugged and thought it was a very entertaining book, but didn't either love it or hate it because of the politics. Is there anyone else out there who just loves the book like I do without applying the politics in real life?

As the book is so poorly written, those who enjoy it as literature are indeed in a small club.

Re: The world is socialist

#34
And this is where we see the clowns who don't understand economics. Snow removal is handled by the folks who have a greater vested financial interest in having roads clear. And if you seriously can't imagine a nation with private roads, than you simply haven't tried very hard.

Re: The world is socialist

#35
post #32
post #26

I think I must be the only person ever who read Atlas Shrugged and thought it was a very entertaining book, but didn't either love it or hate it because of the politics. Is there anyone else out there who just loves the book like I do without applying the politics in real life?

As the book is so poorly written, those who enjoy it as literature are indeed in a small club.

Heh. More along the lines of a good story. Though I have to admit, I had to skim John Galt's 50 page monologue.

Re: The world is socialist

#36
The heart of the matter is this question: should the community violate the consent of the individual or not?

Coming at it from the utilitarian point of view (for sake of argument -- I am not a utilitarian[1]), does it really need to be argued that every humane person should naturally wish to respect individual consent to the fullest extent possible? The only remaining question should be to determine to what extent this is possible. Is there a way to get the road clearing paid for without violating the consent of those who don't care if it's cleared or not?

It turns out that we can form systems whereby this is possible. For example, take a home owners association (HOA). It violates no consent to have contracts that stipulate that you must pay a yearly fee (or "tax") to join the HOA. So there you go, the snowplowing problem is solved, all without any violation of consent.

If you're creative, it turns out that you can solve all of these dilemmas, without resorting to government fiat, which of course can only be implemented by being willing to point a gun at your neighbor's head. No humane person would prefer this, ergo actually humane people would seek more creative solutions.

[1] https://leanpub.com/reasonandliberty

Re: The world is socialist

#37
post #14

1. Can we agree that both full socialism and full rand style capitalism end in tears? 2. Token rebuttals. a. Someone lives irresponsibly, I live responsibly. The sick that comes for us all devastates them early and I'm told "since we all get sick, they got sick much earlier due to all the crack and booze, they can't pay because they were grasshoppering it up while you worked, so now you pay". This is an extreme examp…

With regard to 2.b.)

Rand, however, also condemned voluntary communal activities, depending on individual participants' motivations.

E.g. on charity: "To view the question in its proper perspective, one must begin by rejecting altruism’s terms and all of its ugly emotional aftertaste—then take a fresh look at human relationships. It is morally proper to accept help, when it is offered, not as a moral duty, but as an act of good will and generosity, when the giver can afford it (i.e., when it does not involve self-sacrifice on his part), and when it is offered in response to the receiver’s virtues, not in response to his flaws, weaknesses or moral failures, and not on the ground of his need as such."

If it were truly merely a matter of voluntary choice, there would be no moral blame on me if I chose to help someone, regardless of my motivations as such. If I were giving handouts out of the apparently perverse reason that someone needs it, Rand would condemn that; in contrast, a libertarian emphasis on choice would mean it's as valid as any other motivation, so long as it's non-coercive. (In the same line of argument, she would condemn me for advocating communitarian policies, because speech, even though it's inherently non-coercive, can be morally stained.)

Overall, though, I like the concepts you're pushing for in 2, though I don't think Ayn Rand would have embraced them. You're looking for someone closer to Elinor Ostrom, who is much less inflammatory and not at all focused on moral questions but also much more thoughtful and interesting.

Re: The world is socialist

#38
post #18

When you attack capitalism by attacking Ayn Rand, you are attacking a terrible straw man. You'll notice that people rarely start by attacking the works of von Mises or Hayek or Rothbard, because those guys were actual serious academics who knew what they were talking about. Much easier to poke holes in the eccentric philosophy of one novelist.

I doubt the point was attacking capitalism. Capitalism and socialism are not mutually exclusive in a society.

They are. Socialism is an economy where production is owned and run by the workers for the benefit of the working class, which would be the ruling class at that time.

Simply having a welfare state or some nationalized industries is not socialism. The source of power and ownership of production is still in the hands of the bourgeoisie.

Mises as serious? Hah. But yes, he and the others are attacked less but only because they are less famous. Their ideas are as worthless.

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