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Comment by tsunamifury | Hacker News Reader

I understand a well off nation ruled by democracy due to distributed table-stakes, and a poor nation ruled by a dictator due to centralized table-stakes, but I've never known a well off nation to intentionally sabotage its own table-stakes in order to surrender to dictatorship. Why is this happening? Who supports it? Why do they think it is necessary?

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Alaska has a basic income distributed to all residents (oil dividend). Alaskans want that increased regularly, despite falling oil revenue. That money has to come from somewhere, and it's going to be the voting minority. This is not dictatorship, this is pure democracy in action - the popular vote. Tyranny of the majority.

> That money has to come from somewhere, and it's going to be the voting minority. This is not dictatorship, this is pure democracy in action - the popular vote. Tyranny of the majority.

This is a little like discussion of frictionless surfaces and spherical cows in high school physics. In reality, a lot of laws are written for the rich minority.

I agree that there is a lot of regulatory capture in lawmaking. However, this is a case of exactly the opposite. The cuts are happening to a relatively wealthy minority in Alaska (academics, college attendees, the engineering community, and oil corporations that depend on engineering schools) while more popular welfare and training programs go untouched.

But this is good. Those who the cuts impact will relocate to better states, and Alaska will be left holding that bag as oil revenues continue to decline.

Market forces at work.

What is kind of interesting is - does it make sense for the environment to actually grow the population of Alaska? Its not like its an easy environment to live in without using an increasing amount of greenhouse gases.

The population should migrate toward areas where the temperature/humidity does not require resources just to be comfortable. The population should also migrate toward where energy that is renewable and trending toward free cost/free carbon (wind/solar) is prevalent.

Alaska is part an artifact of the fossil fuel industry and part a need to maintain the US border.

Alternatively, let people live where they'd like to.

Oh yes, certainly. I just don't want my money going to them to incentivize things. So I don't want the government to subsidize living in flood plains or in Alaska or even in coastal California.

We will all pay a carbon tax and we'll all live with the results of our actions. Let the chips fall where they may.

Alaska is not nearly the cold wasteland you think it is. Its largest city, Anchorage, shares the same weather pattern that keeps Seattle, Vancouver, and Portland warm and wet. Though by being 1000 miles further north, it is much colder than any of those cities. However, compared to some continental cities, it actually has milder weather. For example, Anchorage's average January low is higher than Minneapolis's, and its average July high is lower, so you need both less heat and less A/C to live in Anchorage than Minneapolis.

Because most of the benefits of the former are getting concentrated into the hands of educated and urban dwellers. So people want change, but end up stupidly sabotaging.

Disclaimer: I am not a Trump supporter.

I don't think that holds water. In the article, these are the urban dwellers being sabotaged.

More accurately, very wealthy urban dwellers.

And most of these urban dwellers did not vote for Trump or this vindictive Governor.

brookhaven_dude isn't agreeing with what he's saying. He's just trying to explain why people are acting the way they are. He even calls their sabotage stupid.

Note that only 9% of rural residents support Dunleavy right now, especially since he is cutting ferry service by 2/3, which will be catastrophic for the many towns which rely on it and are not accessible by road.

http://midnightsunak.com/2019/07/10/poll-dunleavys-approval-...

His reputation is utterly trashed across the whole state right now.

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