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Comment by tartoran | Hacker News Reader

Why would a hereditary system work any better? Plenty of monarchies based on heredity ran themselves into the ground.

It's interesting how people never even learn about any upsides to that. Even if the balance comes out on the side of elected officials, it's good to at least have some idea of why so many societies have worked like that (other than "they were dumb and evil I guess").

The main thing is long-term stability and limits on backstabbing and ruthless competition. Sure it doesn't bring it to zero, plenty of bloody examples from history. But when someone gets close to power for the first time and might be out of there quite soon, and have to watch out for being replaced quickly, they will behave quite differently than someone who plans ahead in decades and generations (if all things go well). If you have a short time under the sun, you better extract all you can while it lasts.

It's kind of like a lifetime appointment or like tenure, except also across generations. Tenure allows professors to ignore short-term ups and downs and allows them some resilience and slack (though funding is still an issue). Similarly a nobleman can "relax" and take a longer-term view on things. The failure mode is that they stop caring and become lazy and just enjoy their position.

You already get this in the UK, and also in other countries, most of which have royal families and associated aristocrats.

There are also - notoriously - foreign-funded influencer, lobbyist, and donor operations.

And the traditional industries - fossil fuels, property, finance, arms - also have a huge say.

The reality is most decisions aren't made in Westminster. Parliament is a device for packaging and legitimising decisions made by the oligarchy. And the House of Lords is largely ceremonial.

It's not there to shape policy, it's there to provide a reward for loyal service to the country's real rulers.

Being in the Lords is a very nice deal. You get up to £371 a day just for turning up, with the option to claim expenses on top of that.

You get access to high quality heavily subsidised food and drink. And you get the status of being a lord, which opens doors if you happen to be someone for whom they weren't already open.

371 x 250 days is about $100k...in London...that's pretty middle class if you ask me. Just look at how Congress makes out in comparison. They legalized insider trading for themselves and only themselves. What you describe is quaint by comparison.

If you are in a position to be appointed to the House of Lords, it is reasonable to assume that you were not hand-to-mouth before that happened. At worst, you had a good job in one of the classes that gets you access to British Costco. At best, you have an estate and staff.

Heredity is only one of many flavours of cronyism.

It provides an additional check. Much like a monarch, a noble's interests are tied to the welfare of the country itself. Without the country, they're just a toff with some money and an overinflated sense of self-importance.

This is the most convincing argument for the house of lords/monarchy that I've ever heard. Going to be thinking about this for a while, thanks.

> a noble's interests are tied to the welfare of the country itself.

I'd argue their interest is tied to the welfare of the country for themselves, not the country itself or the general public.

The usual elitist slop.

Every single citizen has a skin in the game of their country. They live there.

The comparison isn't to the average person off the street but rather the typical elected politician.

I didn’t stutter. People criticize so-called democracy and then I take that as the charitable premise: we are indeed discussing genuine democracy, not just the fake and typical democracy of only politicians having any power.

Your fortunes are not inextricably tied to your country any more than mine are. I've lived in four countries; am now a citizen of two. I have no passive incomes or sociolegal status which is tied to an estate or a title in a country that must continue to prosper or that status and wealth will diminish. If I see shit going sour, I'll sell my farm in Ireland for twice what I paid for it, move somewhere else, and still be a commoner.

Sorry about the aggressive initial response.

It’s difficult for me to respond to these comments. I have to argue against the idea that there is virtue to setting up a hereditary parasite (passive income) who can do good for his/her country because they have, well, passive income.

Why can’t we just not do that? People, i.e. commoners, already have a stake in their country by virtue of living there. Even outlier globetrotters like you do.

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