frevaljee

Oh yes the voluntary dietary habit of taking a sentient being’s life against its will because it’s tasty and I can’t be bothered to learn how to cook properly using plants.

It is not legal where I live, and I assure you that the tax agency where I live will hunt me to the edge of the world if I refuse to pay exactly what they demand.

We are just looping around the same arguments here, and do not move anywhere.

Let’s try not talking about the binary situation of refusing a government or taxes altogether. I can agree that certain things can be handled by a state (although not in the most efficient way imo). There are still a shit ton of things that governements spend money on that I might not want. For example, where I live a significant portion of my obligatory tax goes to state run “public service”, i.e. state run entertainment. And our process for public procurement is a mess, where things cost insane amounts of money, and most of the time don’t even lead to any actual executed projects.
How are such things defensible with an obligatory tax design?

What I’m trying to say is that yes in a perfect world taxes are fine and dandy, and we get nice roads and healthcare, but in the reality that at least I live in it is just an expensive mess of things that I mostly don’t want, but am forced to pay for.

Edit: a word

https://lemmy.ml/post/1167199?scrollToComments=true

Ah, I see. That is quite clever. And I like the idea of implementing it in non-centralised market. This could be an actual use case for those, instead of all those pictures of cats and monkeys.

This would have to scale quite significantly for those betting against climate change to be able to affect it. Like you say, corporations could cooperate and also gain some goodwill. And venture capitalists, or just any investor, could chip in.

I really like the idea of creating direct economic incentives for positive development, at the same time as you insure those that are harmed if it doesn’t go so well. And this would also be global and have direct effects, and not sensitive to populist politicians and temporary government investments like climate politics tend to be today.

Edit: spelling

It is called exchange of goods and services. Damn you guys really put the “ML” in lemmy.ml

Damn you just won’t let it go. I will still not agree with you however more you ramble on. You have not and will not convince me that a government will ever be more competent and efficient at solving these issues than alternatives. And, I repeat, it is not voluntary. If private property is not a right, what gives the government right to dictate my life because I happened to be born on this particular plot of land? And that is rhetorical, I would like to repeat:

I don’t think we will move past it tbh, so we should perhaps leave it at that.

Sure, whatever works for you.

My issue is still with the fact that my work is used against my will, to pay for things I have not chosen.

If I wish to pay for protection, healthcare, food for the poor etc, that should still be my own choice.

But I think it is at this point where the core of our disagreement lies: you think it is a fair compromise to give up freedom and have a government solve these issues however it sees fit (as a part of a “social contract”), whereas I see it as a basic human right to be able to choose. I don’t think we will move past it tbh, so we should perhaps leave it at that.

Ok so you believe that your work input is not worth anything then? I.e. it is ok for a government to make you work a number of hours equivalent to the taxed part of your income? My work is a contract between me and my employer. If I wish to use a part of that work to build roads (muh roads), pay for schools etc, that should be by my own will. Not because I am part of a social contract by default. That is not voluntary. And like I said earlier, yes I can vote, but the minority is ruled by the majority in a democracy.

Private property, and by extension currency, does not need to be a social contract tied to a state to get value. There are other types of money than fiat (and no I am not saying we should all become crypto bros). It is quite bizarre to claim that we need a massive bulky and expensive state with a monopoly on violence to be able to exchange goods and services.

So is it theft for me to install a lock on someone’s door because I’m stealing another thief’s potential income?

Now you are just being silly. I guess your point with that statement is that private property does not exist, otherwise it makes no sense. My point about piracy was that it is difficult to define intellectual property. And therefore theft is a difficult concept to apply to piracy. But you do you.

“words don’t have definitions, they have usages”.

Indeed. And the way I use the word theft applies to taxation for the reasons stated above. But it apparently doesn’t for you, which is fine.

You are committing what is called a fallacy fallacy, and do not address how they are different — you simply say that it is an oversimplification and call it a day. But arguing about definitions aside, taxation is not voluntary, at least not by default. And my opinion is that transactions should be voluntary.

I take it you refer to online piracy? It is in some ways a grey area. On one hand you are not taking anything away, you are just copying. But on the other hand, to cite yourself, that is of course an oversimplification. As you are stealing potential income. But it is virtually impossible to measure that “theft” in currency, since you don’t know if you would buy the good if you didn’t pirate it. A tax slip, on the other hand, is defined in dollars and cents.

That sounds like an interesting idea. So this is a blockchain based idea?

How is it implemented? Is there a payout depending on how the predictions turned out to incentivise positive change?

How are they very distinct? If I am forced to pay someone money against my will, with threat of violence if I don’t, how is that not theft? Just because a state does it, does that make it different somehow?

If I didn’t vote for it, it is by definition against my will.

I would argue that voting doesn’t make it voluntary. Even if I don’t vote for a particular taxation, it might go through anyway if the majority wants it. Majority rule goes against the will of the minority.

I do agree to an extent. Anarcho capitalism is perhaps more of a theoretical idea rather than a practical social structure. And it is not possible to uphold the NAP in an absolute sense – it is inevitable to cause aggression in some ways, through e.g. pollution or whatever. And private ownership of natural resources is, let’s say tricky.

I am not an anarcho capitalist myself, but I believe society and interactions should be voluntary. But it is difficult to find a practical social structure where that is possible. I am actually rather pessimistic about people tbh, and our track record shows how bad we are at getting along and leaving people be.

https://kbin.social/m/privacy@lemmy.ml/t/283970/Cops-still-take-more-stuff-from-people-than-burglars-do#entry-comment-1326204

Sure, but that wasn’t my point. My point is that you have no say, and therefore it isn’t voluntary, making it theft technically.

What do you call taking someone’s money without their consent, using force/threat of violence?

I don’t think I follow your reasoning tbh. What exactly are you comparing? You said that capitalists favour intervening governments, which is simply not true. Not in any general sense anyway.

Anarcho capitalism is probably as far into anarchy you can go. They want to completely abolish the state and enforce property rights privately.

Or are you saying that such a society will fall into some kind of feudalism? At the core of anarcho capitalism is the NAP which is not really compatible with feudalism. In feudalism you have a hierarchy not based on voluntarism, and that would therefore not be anarcho capitalist.

Do you imply that we need a strong state with a monopoly on violence to keep us in check, otherwise we would descend into chaos? Thats a pretty bleak and pessimistic view of mankind.

A government which only enforces private property rights is still significantly smaller than most alternatives.

Enforcement of private property rights is a part of virtually all governments, and then you pile all other stuff on top of that hence making the government bigger.

And ofc the taxes will be below the profits, no sane person would make any investments in anything if it was above the profits.

Edit: and to add, many hardcore capitalists, like minarchists, libertarians, or anarcho capitalists, propose that you don’t even need a government to enforce private property rights. They’d rather solve that issue privately.

Oh yes, an ideology defined by private ownership and small government intervention is also somehow responsible for the basis of government intervention - taxes.

relevant video