Comment by Sir_Substance | Hacker News Reader

Comment by Sir_Substance | Hacker News Reader

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>What if there was solid data decisively showing that there were substantial externalities effectively being paid for by the public?

That's always a risky argument to engage in. Everything has externalities, whether it's "sinful" or not. For example, there are a lot of externalities that the public pays for in order to allow everyone to drive a car. Probably round 30% of the driving public should not be driving a car. In western countries, drivers licence programs are much more about babying idiots through the basics of car driving than they are separating the incapable and denying them access. I don't know anyone who has wanted a drivers licence and been refused one. I do know multiple people in multiple countries who have taken the test more than 3 times to get it.

For the moment, we still value granting people freedom of movement. A society where there are two classes, those who can move themselves and those who cannot, would be deeply undesirable to most of us.

I for one value the right of people to make their own life decisions. The notion that my tax money might be used to treat lung cancer or buy sturdier surgery tables for obese patients doesn't bother me. What the hell is the point of a health care system if not to isolate ourselves from the harsh realities of life that prevent us from enjoying ourselves?

I don't want to live in a society where there are two classes, those who can pay for private health cover and therefore drink as much as they want, and those who cannot and thus may not party too hard. That might sound a bit weird, but would you want to live in a society where if you can't afford private health care you're not allowed to cycle on public roads?

I'm always in favor of letting people making their own decisions and then supporting them no matter the consequences. When that cost is spread across an entire society, it's a pretty light burden. Could be lighter if we stop letting companies dodge taxes tho.

One person's "consequences" have minimal impact when spread across society--but when we talk about society-level action, we're never just talking about "one" person, but are instead talking about ratios.

Sure, it doesn't impact us much if one person drinks themselves to liver failure. But if we're talking about 0.1% or 1% or 10% of people drinking themselves to liver failure by 50, we eventually have to start making hard tradeoffs.

It might seem ideal from a maximal-freedom perspective to let anyone who wants to drink themselves to liver failure do so, but it's worth thinking ahead to whether those tradeoffs increase or reduce the maximal-freedom-per-capita.

I'm not following how sin taxes entail a bifurcated society. Can you elaborate on that?

I certainly can, I did so in simple, easy to understand language with examples right here in this post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17746413

Really? I asked in good faith for you to better articulate your position, not to be condescendingly told to read it again.

Your post consists of a paragraph about externalities, some lovely-sounding "I believe that..." positions, and a couple example axes on which a society might bifurcate. I don't see a logical connection between them, and I think a leap like that warrants articulation.

So, one more time for the folks who don't share your implicit premises: how do sin taxes result in a structurally bifurcated society?

EDIT: phrasing

>I don't see a logical connection between them, and I think a leap like that warrants articulation.

I do see a connection, and moreover that connection is obvious to me. I genuinely see your statement as a low quality argumentative technique to ask me to repeat a very clear statement in different phrasing in the hope that you will find some triviality that is easier to attack than my core premise.

If you'd really like an answer, please articulate the nature of the logical disconnect you see.

> ... in the hope that you will find some triviality that is easier to attack than my core premise.

That "core premise" is the very thing I want to see articulated here. What you've offered is your conclusion: that sin taxes somehow entail a structurally divided society.

> If you'd really like an answer, please articulate the nature of the logical disconnect you see.

That's literally not how argument works. The burden of proof lies with the party making the positive assertion — in this case, something about societal bifurcation and sin taxes and their causal relationship. I suppose you could say that means I somehow need to "prove" that I don't follow you, or amn't merely trolling you into tripping up as you assert, but that's a reductio and then some.

If the connection is "obvious" to you, but you are unwilling or unable to articulate it, it isn't implausible for me to surmise that we're talking around unexamined axioms (or, as I often call them, "articles of faith") of yours. Which is fine; I have my own such.

But what you're doing here isn't argument, and I have now spent more time explaining that than I think hearing whatever argument you might have to articulate is likely to be worth, in terms of the amount of my life spent.

EDIT: Not trying to be mean. Just, with this dialogue as my sample, I'm not inclined to anticipate an argument that will enlighten me, or change (or even challenge) my perspective. I'd be delighted to have been mistaken, though.

It wasn't obvious to me either. It sounded like you made an argument that at least 30% of people shouldn't be allowed to drive, and then leaping to that leading to some sort of societal bifurcation? Your argument or point isn't obvious or clear at all.

>It sounded like you made an argument that at least 30% of people shouldn't be allowed to drive, and then leaping to that leading to some sort of societal bifurcation?

Aha, a tangible argument. You don't see the possibility of social bifurcation from 30% of the population not being allowed to drive?

Most tradie jobs require a car. It's very hard to be an electrician, plumber, chippie etc. that services homes as if you don't have a car. It might be possible to do commercial work in those fields without a car but every apprentice I've ever known has needed one to carry around the huge pile of tools they're expected to bring on site themselves.

There are also a lot of entry level unskilled jobs that require a drivers licence (assuming you consider a drivers licence "unskilled", which it sort of is but wouldn't be of 30% of current drivers had their licence revoked overnight), like delivering pizza or doing private courier work.

So yeah, changing driving laws to make it a requirement that drivers be consistently safe, courteous and predictable and refusing to give licences to people who can't meet that criteria would definitely be a social bifurcation because it would all but eliminate whole categories of otherwise relatively accessible industrial for the people that cannot get the licence, and in so doing widen the already increasingly wide (lower/middle)/high income divides that most western nations are seeing.

However, that was not my point. My point was that the argument "we shouldn't let people do this because it has costs to society" doesn't really go anywhere as an argument. That's true for pretty much everything we do in society, it's a nothing argument.

> Most tradie jobs require a car. It's very hard to be an electrician, plumber, chippie etc. that services homes as if you don't have a car.

Then how do people do those jobs in countries that do meaningfully select for good drivers, instead of dispensing licenses to all comers? Last I checked, continental Europe hasn't entirely descended into disrepair, because not everyone can drive.

If your position is that overnight switching to a tough drivers licensure regime would be disruptive, I can only say, "Of course it would". Literally no-one is advocating that, either in this thread, or in The Fine Article, however, so I'm vague on its relevance.

> My point was that the argument "we shouldn't let people do this because it has costs to society" doesn't really go anywhere as an argument.

Which would be an interesting discussion if that was the argument being made. Sin taxes aren't "We shouldn't let people do this", and it's a fundamental mischaracterization of them to say they are. They discourage it, sure. They can also be used to mitigate the cost of the "sin" in question.

But it is fundamentally incompatible with most of the goals of a sin tax, to be used to outright prevent the thing being taxed.

No, I don't see "social bifurcation" (which I think needs to be defined) happening over drivers licensing requirements. Over race? Sure. Over systemic income/opportunity inequalities? You bet. But over driving? I just don't see it.

First, how is this 30% cut going to be enforced? At the licensing test? Is it that if you get a single ticket or report for unsafe driving, your license is revoked? You are going to look at existing drivers license holders and determine their fitness to be operating a vehicle, how exactly? Is it a lifetime ban from driving? How many times can I take the test of it just didn't come naturally to me?

Second, there's already a portion of the population that for whatever reason (DWI is a common one) aren't allowed to drive, and I don't see them rising up in the streets.

I don't think anyone is arguing that people shouldn't be allowed to do things that have costs to society, they are discussing whether or not taxation of the behaviors is effective.

as "obvious" as the connection may be to you, I don't understand it either. could you please elaborate

Please don't pull uncivil tricks like that here.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

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