> If both enter into the contract freely
Ah, yes, the "freedom" thing again.
When you're on a salary that barely keeps you afloat, that you cannot really afford to lose, suddenly you start reading different meanings into that word.
Ah, yes, the "freedom" thing again.
When you're on a salary that barely keeps you afloat, that you cannot really afford to lose, suddenly you start reading different meanings into that word.
Imagine yourself back in a time where a flood or some random "act of god" could destroy your harvest and make it so you and your whole family died of hunger through no fault of your own (or anyone else's).
Today, thanks to centuries of improvements, one doesn't have to know how to build a house or even how to acquire food or clean water.
These things are given even to people who do nothing but drink and play video games all day on government dime.
Do you realize? We live in a time and place where not being basically given food, water, sanitation and shelter, even for contributing absolutely nothing of value is seen as shocking.
And then, some of the people from that time and place go on this crazy thing that allows them to communicate with half the population of the world in realtime and complain about "barely keeping afloat"!
The very notion would have been laughable 100 years ago. Hell, it's disconnected from the reality of even a large part of the world TODAY.
Actually our society has decided that that is not the case.
>These things are given even to people who do nothing but drink and play video games all day on government dime.
When will this welfare queen myth end?? This is not most people.
>Do you realize? We live in a time and place where not being basically given food, water, sanitation and shelter, even for contributing absolutely nothing of value is seen as shocking.
I don't see the problem.
>And then, some of the people from that time and place go on this crazy thing that allows them to communicate with half the population of the world in realtime and complain about "barely keeping afloat"!
I don't see the problem.
Yet society could easily have decided the other way around. I bet you wouldn't be calling the majority rule moral at that point. The argument of "social morality" is only used here because it is convenient for you and aligns with your own values. Just think about those "societies that decided on policies that you disagree with". Those are the ones you would call immoral. Saudi Arabia, Iran, N.K. and Afghanistan comes to mind (?)
> When will this welfare queen myth end?? This is not most people.
True. It's not most people. But then again, it's not about the number of people. It's about the idea that I owe you something simply because you breath.
> I don't see the problem.
That's the problem.
> I don't see the problem.
Again, that's the problem.
Our society is set up to allow your success. Your success is also highly correlated with the circumstances of your birth. Society takes from some of your success to give others the same chance at success. There's no problem with that.
Ever stopped to think about that? I get that you believe that society's role is to take from X and give to Y. But what IF that belief is wrong? aren't you then responsible for all the pain and suffering that is to take place due to your beliefs?
I'd still love to see it.
>but then I remembered that when a person uses their feelings to argue, you cannot counter-argue them with logic.
My last post listed facts... and you didn't exactly address them. Also there is nothing more frustrating when arguing with libertarians, neo-reactionaries, republicans, etc. than when they bust out the "stupid liberal emotions" trope. Try to be honest with your argumentation, you don't believe what you believe because you're more honest or smarter or more logical than I am. It's just your belief. You may have facts to back them up but I do as well, why we find those facts comes from our belief system.
>what if you are wrong? what then? what if the morality you speak of here is actually injustice and evil itself disguised as goodness and justice? what remedy do I have against your tyranny?
You mean to ask do I take responsibility for being an evil tyrant if I am secretly an evil tyrant? I suppose I do but reject the premise.
>Ever stopped to think about that? I get that you believe that society's role is to take from X and give to Y. But what IF that belief is wrong? aren't you then responsible for all the pain and suffering that is to take place due to your beliefs?
I openly advocate for redistribution and if redistribution is "wrong" and causes all sorts of pain and suffering then sure I'll take my share of responsibility. Once again though, I reject the premise.
*
Now that I've answered that let me pose the same to you. What if you are wrong? If redistribution is a vital tool in order to give people a fair shot at life, do you take responsibility for depriving them of that? What if your beliefs are evil and used by powerful interests to entrench the already powerful?
Charity should be the social value, achieving redistribution by encouraging people to voluntarily give to whom & how they see fit.
That view is completely antithetical to the core belief system of progressive liberals and it's not something you can really have a discussion about. It's like arguing over whether God exists.
8 acres is your fair share of Earth. Here's a $20 bag of assorted nutritious seeds. (If you're really uptight about this, I'll throw in a $40 sack of rice as enough to get you to first harvest.) There we have the stark reality of "barely keeps you afloat" and "cannot really afford to lose": subsistence farming. Harsh as it sounds, that's the real-world baseline.
Capitalism gives you the option of doing something other than self-sufficient farming. You can put in the same effort, with the equivalent "cannot really afford to lose" work-or-starve option, and leverage the available contract - or not. The notion that you're somehow not "free" to accept or reject the contract (if living at that bare edge of survival) is practically no different than subsistence farming.
I acknowledge that "freedom" seems rather moot at that level, but so long as the effort required is little different from the effort for subsistence farming, that's the hard reality of being a human living on Earth. If you're accepting the contract because of "work or starve" in the context of effort I'm harping on, and you have the liberty to pick between whatever contracts are available ("start digging & planting" always being one) then yes that's "freedom". If you're compelled under threat of abuse/injury/death to work for a disproportionately meager return, and/or literally confined with no options, then that is an immoral denial of the "freedom" I'm referring to.
To wit: the natural law of "produce or starve" is not to be confused with, nor equated to, compulsory hard labor within incarceration sustained with a scant moldy loaf.
(I'm writing this much about the subject because I'm trying to sort thru & refine ideas, bouncing 'em off HN for insight.)
Therefore, I would say society owes all of us at least the land and the education—real hands on education and family-style support—before anyone can start saying wage "slavery" is a choice.
As for "hands on" and "family style support", you're demanding luxuries that many settlers didn't have. I'm reading the Foxfire books, they're all you'll need for a good fair start.
1. Every 8-acre plot of land is suitable for sustaining a person
2. Every person is legally free and able to relocate to an 8-acre plot of land
Rough estimate is one typically needs 1-3 acres to grow enough food for one person. 8 acres should be more than enough, enough so to generate quite a surplus. Multiplying that by # of family members leverages productivity further, giving a simple family of 4 some 32 acres to work with, and into 50-100 acres for a larger family (leveraging another HNer's calculations, that can push a half-million $ revenue).
2. Most people are legally free; those who aren't are either incarcerated (and subject to equivalent subsistence by the state), or are the subject of criminal abuse (and freeing them is a major purpose of the state). Wasn't all that long ago that the USA was first settled by people who literally picked up what little they had and walked (or rode a mundane covered wagon) hundreds or thousands of miles across unpaved terrain to reach their settlement.
I just looked on zillow.com for land in the 8 acre range. There is enough available for well under $10,000 (with just a few seconds' search effort) to make the thought experiment viable. "Able to relocate" is little more than picking up a briefcase and hitching a ride no more than halfway across the state.
And it is a thought experiment. It is not a comprehensive analysis of encyclopedic depth and peer-reviewed correctness; it is a back-of-the napkin sanity check of what would roughly constitute a bottom-line standard, bracketing the discussion skewed by "soak the rich" redistributive thinking. Insofar as there will be complications: yes, there will be complications; figure it out, yes you may have to break ties (we're talking survival here), yes it will require effort (we're talking survival here), no it may not be pleasant (we're talking survival here).
There's a recurring discrepancy I see on the subject: - some people expect "functional poverty" be achievable with virtually zero effort by the individual, all resources & energy supplied by others - some people expect "functional poverty" requires an all-out effort by the individual, with virtually zero resources & effort supplied by others. My great-grandparents having hauled themselves into Central Nowhere, Utah and elicited a decent living from the dirt there, without prolific & compulsory government welfare programs to do so, I'm rather firmly in the latter group.
Bottom line is: one is expected to work AT LEAST as hard is required for subsistence farming on an average 8-acre lot. Whether the reality is actually farming an 8-acre lot, or working a mundane job in a factory, or writing apps on a borrowed MacBook, it is not unreasonable to expect/require an individual to produce at least that much in exchange for basic sustenance. This notion that the capable idle should be sustained, thru the confiscation of at least that much productivity from others, for the mere act of breathing is preposterous. Survival isn't free; you're expected to work at least that hard.
Are you proposing then that every person should start from that baseline, say from age 18, and any wealth accumulated by their parents not made available to them?
> This notion that the capable idle should be sustained, thru the confiscation of at least that much productivity from others, for the mere act of breathing is preposterous.
Are you describing idle rich here as well?
Relevant: https://www.reddit.com/r/LateStageCapitalism/comments/61zjqf...
In no way do I contend everyone should, compulsorily, start from that exact baseline. If someone wishes to share the fruit of their productivity with you, fine - that's basically a contract between the two of you, and none of anyone else's business.
The "idle rich" are plainly not what I meant. They achieved (and exceeded) baseline productivity somehow; again, so long as it's either the direct result of their efforts, or otherwise the fruit of a mutually-agreed contract, they've done their part to not be an unnecessary burden on others.
The "capable idle" are those who could work and sustain themselves, but opt not to because they leverage a system of coercive redistribution based on police power of the state.
I do think if you're going to have a government-mandated education system, it should prepare every child to be capable of starting from that baseline, should ill circumstance befall them.
I do appreciate the thought exercise aspect of your proposed model, as well as the usefulness of finding a model that can be used to find rational social minimums.
Contending that "freedom" somehow requires others to associate with you, or requires an effort-free poverty-line income, is to grossly misunderstand the nature of "freedom". Your "freedom" starts with the bottom-line obligation to work hard enough to sustain yourself, by whatever means morally available without compelling others to comply or supply.