I was trying to argue from a moral point of view. The existence of state, which itself is an immoral institution, doesn't justify the absurdity of the idea to demand being employed.
One might argue that it is moral (if not legal) for parties to by mutual consent expressly agree to conduct an economic exchange under terms other than those set by the law of the jurisdiction in which the exchange is conducted (even if the law prohibits such waivers and alternations), but I think its a much harder case to make that it is generally moral for one party in arms-length exchange where no such waiver is expressed to simply elect to ignore the governing law, except when one makes the case that what the law demands would be immoral even as a term agreed to by consent, or that the change in the law which occurred after the agreement violated the fundamental premises on which the agreement was based (and even in the last case, only if the the party acted timely to notify the other party of their objection and to either terminate or renegotiate the relationship based on the changed context.)
If, for example, 100% of people who SpaceX could hire would express concern over a possible layoff, then SpaceX would have no choice, but to put this into the contract, specifying potential payouts in the case of such a layoff. However, I think people would actually compete to get into SpaceX, thus the actual terms of the contract wouldn't include that. In short, let the market decide voluntarily, what are the best terms.
What's going on now is one side (employees) taking advantage of the other side. I don't care how rich Elon Musk is. If he made his money honestly, he doesn't owe a cent to those employees.
No, its not. Both sides voluntarily entered into an agreement with knowledge of the legal context (well, at least constructive knowledge -- in terms of actual knowledge, there is a real imbalance, here, but it almost always favors the employer, as the side who is more likely to both motivated and able to secure expert assistance prior to making decisions whether, where, and on what terms to engage in employment agreements.)
> I don't care how rich Elon Musk is. If he made his money honestly, he doesn't owe a cent to those employees.
To the extent that SpaceX makes money by not treating people according to the law under which they agreed to employment, the money is not made honestly, so even if I accepted your maxim, it would be irrelevant.
Because
1) What incentive would people have to abide by their deals ? (also known as : NEVER sign a contract with any royalty or any parliament or congress. They are not bound by them. Just don't get yourself into that)
2) How would you even know the terms of a contract ? People may think they agree about every detail, I have done enough law to know perfectly well they never do. Given the chance, people will sign things like "I rent this room for 800 euro per month", for example. Now, the primary renter dies in a car crash, what happens ? Who owes what ? What if they're married ? What if there's children ? Does the inheritor inherit the obligation ?
3) How would you resolve obvious assymetric bargaining positions ? Suppose someone signed a contract selling someone into slavery ? Before you say otherwise, note that under muslim law, that is legal. Without law of the land, who is to say this is wrong ? And what would you do about it.
But these are the obvious arguments. How about I save the 5000 page book this would become if we went over the entire set of problems that contracts pose. Here's a link, I guarantee that every single paragraph identifies a problem in "pure" contract law and free agreements between parties :
http://www.law.cornell.edu/ucc
Or how about the European law version :
http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/content/download/1950/13681/ve...
Read a few pages. It's not nonsense.
But, seriously, the state is an immoral institution?
Building the national highway system and all the related infrastructure (bridges, etc), the public school system (which didn't always and needn't suck, even if it is in distress now), the various social safety nets that keep us from discarding the elderly like trash, the means of protection of yours and everyone's wealth from banditry, the means of protection of our land from outside invaders, etc, etc, etc... this is an inherently immoral institution? What an incredibly dumb and short-sighted thing to say.
Public infrastructure projects often involve bribery and cronyism. Public school system may be used for ideological indoctrination. National safety nets foster risk aversion and allow young people to throw off the burden of care for their elderly. Police may be overly brutal when protecting your wealth from banditry. The means of protection of your land from outside invaders can become the means to invade outsiders and to conduct mass surveillance of the locals.
It's a superhard design challenge to create a set of checks and balances which prevent abuse of power.
The very idea that anything like modern society is possible without government is entirely faith-based (since there are no successful examples to prove it) and, I would argue, very naive on the subject of the many failings humans have when not regulated by outside checks and balances.
And yet, when a government takes tax money by force or threat of force and spends them on bloody wars where many people die, you say "but it also builds roads and educates our children and enforces private property, so it's not that bad, it's not evil". Well, it is. You're just avoiding using logic when it comes to government, it somehow is exempt from logical thinking for many people.
If you can't come up with a solution how to build a society without government and taxation, you're simply not thinking hard. The fact that there is no country on earth without government (except for Somalia, which you cannot compare to, say, the US, but which you SHOULD compare to the surrounding countries) means nothing. In the 16-th century there was no country on earth without slavery. In the same century hardly anyone in the society could imagine how to organize it without God, because, supposedly, without the fear of God humans would go crazy and start killing each other. So, please, stop and think about this: if there was no way for anyone to form a government, how would I solve all the problems governments are currently responsible for. It's a useful exercise.