fayfreethinkers.com

Give me a break dude. I didn't count, but a lot of your sources were government websites, I don't see how that's any better. Certainly it's not any less biased. At least the Independent Review is peer-reviewed.

I shall apologize for the part about "mental illness" though, I simply misread.

Questions, would you say Social Security...

1) is meant to reduce wealth inequality,
2) actually has reduced wealth inequality,
3) is meant to redistribute a significant amount of wealth from the rich to the poor, (if yes I leave you to define "significant", "rich", and "poor"),
4) and/or has redistributed a significant amount of wealth from the rich to the poor.

Or would you say that that's another dichotomy you don't accept?

Edit: also, I will give David credit for being nice to me so far, unless I missed anything. Thanks David.

Edit2:

Dardedar wrote:And it's a conscious choice because you don't have to look to quacky sources, even though the authoritative sources are going to be rather dry and boring

O.o

First of all, I explicitly asked you what sources you thought would be good before posting anything controversial. You said use "all of them", and said you wouldn't dismiss something simply because it came from a think-tank. I'll ask again, what sources would you consider "authoritative"? How do you suggest I judge? How do you judge? Objective standard please.

Second of all, the source I provided to counter your claim about fire-departments doesn't seem quacky, and while I also cited the Reason Foundation's paper on it, the sources they cited didn't seem to be quacky either, and the source you cited basically agreed with them, as far as facts go.

Third of all, what makes you think it's dry? Would you consider the Journal of Political Economy "authoritative"? Would you consider them to be "dry"?

Libertarians are nothing if not literary.

Indium Flappers wrote:Questions, would you say Social Security...

1) is meant to reduce wealth inequality,
2) actually has reduced wealth inequality,
3) is meant to redistribute a significant amount of wealth from the rich to the poor, (if yes I leave you to define "significant", "rich", and "poor"),
4) and/or has redistributed a significant amount of wealth from the rich to the poor.

5) None of the above. Think about it.

Edit: also, I will give David credit for being nice to me so far, unless I missed anything. Thanks David.

I guess I'm the "good cop". This time.

David Franks wrote:

Indium Flappers wrote:Questions, would you say Social Security...

1) is meant to reduce wealth inequality,
2) actually has reduced wealth inequality,
3) is meant to redistribute a significant amount of wealth from the rich to the poor, (if yes I leave you to define "significant", "rich", and "poor"),
4) and/or has redistributed a significant amount of wealth from the rich to the poor.

5) None of the above. Think about it.

Thank you for the clarification.

David Franks wrote:

Edit: also, I will give David credit for being nice to me so far, unless I missed anything. Thanks David.

I guess I'm the "good cop". This time.

Guess so.

In regard to an earlier statement you made:

David Franks wrote:The contention that there is no Social Security trust fund is an old-fashioned and simplistic view of how money works. Al Gore's suggestion that Social Security be put in a "lockbox" was just as silly. Money is no longer an asset that sits in a vault. Paying retiree benefits with revenue from current workers is one of the ways that money circulates-- and not just in Social Security or Ponzi schemes. When my retirement investments grow, it is because other people are working; though it is a very indirect form of payment-- and not very dependable, as Bush's grand recession demonstrated-- current workers pay for my retirement.

It seems to me that retirement investments actually produce wealth, in that they enable those other people working to work, so that investment and entrepreneurship constitute a form of trade, while with Social Security the money is taken from workers through taxation. Perhaps you could argue that the government creates wealth through other ways, (something we would have to debate later), but it does not seem that Social Security creates wealth. That investments create new wealth while SS merely involves coerced circulation seems an important distinction between the two programs.

I am sure you will next say it is not the purpose of SS to produce wealth. I do not intend to imply that it is. But wealth creation is not necessarily my purpose in purchasing a retirement fund or a private insurance program either.

Indium Flappers wrote:It seems to me that retirement investments actually produce wealth, in that they enable those other people working to work, so that investment and entrepreneurship constitute a form of trade, while with Social Security the money is taken from workers through taxation.

Social Security funds are then loaned out (at low interest), and used for various government enterprises. Any such use of money is an investment (not on the part of the individual worker, but on the part of the government). To the extent that this money is used to keep people employed, to buy supplies, or any of that other mundane stuff, it is involved in creating wealth.

Perhaps you could argue that the government creates wealth through other ways, (something we would have to debate later)

Of course the government creates wealth. The government hires people to do things that society needs done; decent jobs create wealth. But here's another example: Real estate is the only real wealth, and part of the American Dream is owning a home as the foundation of one's wealth. What are the three most important characteristics of a piece of real estate? What aspects of location are important to home buyers? Who builds schools, transportation, parks, police and fire protection, decent drinking water, and all those other things that most people look for in a location? And another: Ignoring wealth displacement and redistribution for a moment, how much wealth was created by the interstate highway system?

...but it does not seem that Social Security creates wealth. That investments create new wealth while SS merely involves coerced circulation seems an important distinction between the two programs.

If investment inherently creates wealth as you appear to say, then how is the source of the money invested relevant? Social Security funds are loaned and borrowed. Are you saying that investing in a bank doesn't create wealth? Social Security is a form of insurance that produces a small return. As a general rule, low-yield investments are safer than high-yield investments. That's why financial planners suggest that one alter one's portfolio as one ages, shifting from high-yield to low-yield investments. Social Security funds return low interest; that adds to the stability of the trust fund. Also note that some private products are not designed to create wealth. For example, Colonial Penn sells a single-payout policy that is rather similar-- small payments that accrue over time, paid out at death, for the purpose of covering "final expenses". Nothing lavish.

I am sure you will next say it is not the purpose of SS to produce wealth. I do not intend to imply that it is.

Good. Social Security is meant to produce security for the individual and for society; that's why the program is not called "Social Wealth".

But wealth creation is not necessarily my purpose in purchasing a retirement fund or a private insurance program either.

What, then, would be your purpose? Money that hasn't become wealth is either desperate or boring.

Indium Flappers wrote: ...a lot of your sources were government websites, I don't see how that's any better.

Yes, why would one look to the government to explain a government program? And why would I look to an owners manual created by Toyota to tell me how my Prius works?
One might as well laugh as cry.
Like most people, I don't start from the assumption that government is evil or a conspiracy. I've had, with no exception that comes to mind, nothing but a perfectly enjoyable experience with all of the government interactions I've had. Some people devote themselves to reading great piles of anti-government material and then they become some variation of conspiracy hobbyists or anarchists. I don't know why they choose to do this. Maybe fear is a big drive. I'm not very fear driven, I don't get it.

I... explicitly asked you what sources you thought would be good before posting anything controversial. You said use "all of them", and said you wouldn't dismiss something simply because it came from a think-tank.

That was meant generally. Once it is apparent from reading even just the abstract that the entire premise is based upon a quacked up foundation, I have better things to do.

...what makes you think it's dry?

The topic of the arcane nuances of SS I think is quite dry. But maybe it makes for snappy reading compared to reading or writing computer code.

The notion that SS will be privatized is all quite whistling in the wind (this is a different question from whether it should be done). If you read the link I gave regarding the immense hurdles (what it does the the debt)... A primer on Bush's SS plan, and this one one detailing a few reasons why it failed, this should be very very clear. This makes it a rather dry topic for me (although it wasn't when Bush was trying to do it). It's talking about something that, while destroying SS is a Holy Grail of the far right, is not likelyi to happen, and for very well understood reasons. I prefer to talk about things that are possible.

@David

I perceive much of some worth to discuss in your post, but I wish to clarify my main point. Investment does not merely create wealth, it involves a trade, it creates wealth for the workers you spoke of. If I invest in your business and you pay me a return, we are engaging in trade, if I take money from your business and invest in roads, then it may be the case that I have in some indirect, loop-de-loop way produced some wealth for you as well, but if I understand the subjective theory of value correctly you would be better equipped to decide where your money is put than I, since, for example, it might be better for you to use helicopters for transportation rather than roads. (If you have a strong say in how I spend the money, or if I have an intimate idea of your values, then it may still be as strong as a trade.)

I was writing in response to your point that in investment the wealth created comes from workers, my contention being that the wealth/security/what-have-you that you receive is yours in return for your helping which-ever company is concerned build its profits. The money, (loosely), goes from you to the business, on to the workers, and back.

I also wish to clarify that I would not say that investment always creates wealth, as I wish to account for the contingency that the business you invested in fails, sputters, and dies a horrible and gruesome death involving cubes, wheat, and cake.

We are, essentially, bordering on the issue of taxation vs. trade, but I'm not sure I wish to get into this topic lest our discussion devolve into ethical squabbles for which we would be incapable of accounting for.

David Franks wrote:

I am sure you will next say it is not the purpose of SS to produce wealth. I do not intend to imply that it is.

Good. Social Security is meant to produce security for the individual and for society; that's why the program is not called "Social Wealth".

But wealth creation is not necessarily my purpose in purchasing a retirement fund or a private insurance program either.

What, then, would be your purpose? Money that hasn't become wealth is either desperate or boring.

Perhaps my powers of perception fail me, but these two snippets seem to answer each other.

David Franks wrote:

Indium Flappers wrote:Perhaps you could argue that the government creates wealth through other ways, (something we would have to debate later)

Of course the government creates wealth. The government hires people to do things that society needs done; decent jobs create wealth. But here's another example: Real estate is the only real wealth, and part of the American Dream is owning a home as the foundation of one's wealth. What are the three most important characteristics of a piece of real estate? What aspects of location are important to home buyers? Who builds schools, transportation, parks, police and fire protection, decent drinking water, and all those other things that most people look for in a location? And another: Ignoring wealth displacement and redistribution for a moment, how much wealth was created by the interstate highway system?

And thus we delve deep into intricacies for which I do not currently feel qualified to provide adequate citations for. I concede that governments can provide for all of the services you have mentioned, but governments are only one method of providing services out of a whole slew of methods: government, private enterprise, non-profit organizations, mutual aid, volunteer services, and whichever others I have not thought of. It seems to me that what is required is not so much a demonstration that these methods exist, but an analysis of which ones provide different services at a lower cost and higher quality than the others.

It is my overwhelming impression that government provision and regulation tend to work at a higher cost and lower quality than alternative methods. I have obviously not exhaustively examined every industry or every case of particular industries, and I have seen literature proporting to demonstrate instances where this is not the case, but for the most part the more research I do the more evidence I find in favor of my thesis.

So, to cut the turgidity and answer your question, people provide all the services you mentioned and do so through a variety of means and institutions, one of which is government. But it does not follow that government is the only method, nor the superior method, for providing any particular service.

In regard to your statement that "Real estate is the only real wealth", I'm not sure what you mean.

Footnotes:

schools
(for)
- Haven't studied much.
- Salman Khan: Let's use video to reinvent education ~ TedTalks
- School Choice (talks about vouchers)
- Alliance for the Separation of School & State
- Machinery of Freedom ~ David D. Friedman
- Some Schools Now Track Students Like Prisoners ~ Peter Gray
- Big Brother or peeping tom? UK installs CCTV in school bathrooms, changing rooms ~ Russia Today
- The War On Kids 01
- Outcry over Sweden’s Persecution of Homeschoolers Grows
- The Benefits of Unschooling: Report I from a Large Survey
- Dispelling Some Homeschooling Myths, by Lori R.
- A couple cyber-schooling sites.
(concerns)
- Top home-school texts dismiss evolution for creationism ~ Dylan Lovan, The Associated Press

transportation
(for)
- Are Public Goods Really Common Pools: Considerations of the Evolution of Policing and Highways in England ~ Bruce Benson
- Municipal Ownership in Great Britain ~ Everett W. Burdett
- Enterprise Programs ~ NCPA
- Machinery of Freedom ~ David D. Friedman
- 'Pothole Robin Hood' Steals Asphalt, Fixes Potholes ~ Geetika Rudra, abcnews
(partial for)
- A New Approach to Private Roads ~ Engel, Fischer, Galetovic
(against)
- I thought I'd seen some but I can't find them now, remind me later.
(just for fun)
- No Traffic Lights Vs Traffic Lights

parks
- Haven't studied yet, but Disney World doesn't seem too bad.
- Oh, also, this is yahoo, but here you are anyways.

police
(for)
- Are Public Goods Really Common Pools: Considerations of the Evolution of Policing and Highways in England ~ Bruce Benson
- Private Policing in San Francisco ~ Edward P. Stringham
- Enterprise Programs ~ NCPA
- Machinery of Freedom ~ David D. Friedman (Mostly theoretical.)
(against (Not against the existence of but arguing in favor of certain regulations.))
- Policing for Profit: The Future of South Africa's Private Security Industry ~ Jenny Irish
- Counterparts in Modern Policing: The Influence of Corporate Investigators on the Public Police and a Call for the Broadening of the State Action Doctrine (Didn't finish, got sidetracked when he started the hypothetical about Ebay torturing people. Will pick up again later. For the record, I have no problem with laws against torture, though I wouldn't mind if they applied to the government too.)
(Mostly descriptive rather than normative)
- India’s Private Security Metamorphosis
(completely against, as far as I can tell)
- Private Police Forces ~ Bruce Schneier
(two communities without police)
- A Fleeting Moment in History, Modern Times ~Verne Dyson
- Living Without Laws: Slab City, USA ~ Vice

fire protection
- In this thread I cite this and that and Dar cites so.
- An account of the fire insurance companies ... in Great Britain and Ireland during the 17th and 18th centuries ... ~ Relton, Francis Boyer (Rather long, haven't gotten far into it. Looked like it talked about Friendly Societies a little bit.)

decent drinking water
- Municipal Ownership in Great Britain ~ Everett W. Burdett (point made briefly, not a major point of the article)
- Small-scale entrepreneurs in the urban water and sanitation market ~ Tova Maria Solo

(P.S., I saw that Dar posted and shall reply in due time, though I need to take some time to finish reading some of the articles I've downloaded, (hopefully I'll come back with more citations for you), so I may be a while.)

Dardedar wrote:Like most people, I don't start from the assumption that government is evil or a conspiracy. I've had, with no exception that comes to mind, nothing but a perfectly enjoyable experience with all of the government interactions I've had. Some people devote themselves to reading great piles of anti-government material and then they become some variation of conspiracy hobbyists or anarchists. I don't know why they choose to do this. Maybe fear is a big drive. I'm not very fear driven, I don't get it.

By conspiracy hobbyists do you mean people who watch things like so?

Indium Flappers wrote:Investment does not merely create wealth, it involves a trade, it creates wealth for the workers you spoke of.

By "trade", I take it you mean "exchange" and not "paid activity". All transactions-- purchases or investments-- involve a trade. The creation of wealth is not necessary to trade. An even trade creates no wealth, but it is still trade.

In the rest of this paragraph, it appears that, despite my efforts to make the separation clear, you are conflating the contributions (not investments) that the individual makes with the investments the government makes with those contributions.

If I invest in your business and you pay me a return, we are engaging in trade

And if you give me money to invest safely for you, we are engaging in trade.

if I take money from your business and invest in roads

You're getting off-topic, whether deliberately or accidentally. Social Security is an insurance product that the government requires that one buy. Coercion within the law does not make it any less a transaction. Social Security is a business expense. It is no more "taken from your business" than money spent on a copier contract.

then it may be the case that I have in some indirect, loop-de-loop way produced some wealth for you as well

The directness of wealth creation is irrelevant to the discussion, but you should know that most wealth is created indirectly.

but if I understand the subjective theory of value correctly you would be better equipped to decide where your money is put than I

When one chooses to live in a society, whether under a government or not, one does not always get the final say in individual decisions that have a bearing on the well-being of society.

for example, it might be better for you to use helicopters for transportation rather than roads. (If you have a strong say in how I spend the money, or if I have an intimate idea of your values, then it may still be as strong as a trade.)

The fact that I might not use public services is irrelevant. I'm happy to pay school taxes even though I don't have any children (as far as I know) because society as a whole is better with schools. Same with roads. Part of my wealth-- both real and personal-- is living in a good society. And a good society is something that no individual can buy.

my contention being that the wealth/security/what-have-you that you receive is yours in return for your helping which-ever company is concerned build its profits. The money, (loosely), goes from you to the business, on to the workers, and back.

That's pretty much what I meant. My investments help companies grow, they hire people and create wealth (the ones that pay better than a living wage, anyway), and those companies send me a little of the profit that the employees generate for them. But investment and wealth-creation are risky.

We are, essentially, bordering on the issue of taxation vs. trade

Taxation and trade are not necessarily in opposition. Taxation results in the purchase of lots of infrastructure, protection and paper clips, all of which is trade.

Perhaps my powers of perception fail me, but these two snippets seem to answer each other.

Perhaps both of us have perception problems, then, because the only relationship between them that I can discern is that they share a few words.

And thus we delve deep into intricacies for which I do not currently feel qualified to provide adequate citations for.

There's nothing intricate about it at all.

It seems to me that what is required is not so much a demonstration that these methods exist, but an analysis of which ones provide different services at a lower cost and higher quality than the others.

There would be no clear winner.

It is my overwhelming impression that government provision and regulation tend to work at a higher cost and lower quality than alternative methods....for the most part the more research I do the more evidence I find in favor of my thesis.

Then you need to keep reading. And visit some public works facilities, such as the waterworks or the sewage treatment plant. Visit a few street and highway construction sites. Attend a few City Council and Planning Commission meetings. Read the city ordinances and the health code. Visit Houston, Texas (no zoning-- it's an adventure). Compare the fees and inefficiency of trash hauling and recycling in Wichita, Kansas (private) with the fees and efficiency of the trash hauling and recycling in Fayetteville (public).

So, to cut the turgidity and answer your question, people provide all the services you mentioned and do so through a variety of means and institutions, one of which is government

You don't give government enough credit; at least three of them are governments. And if you came out to my house, you would see a big drop-off in quality from the public roads (county, state and federal) and the private roads.

But it does not follow that government is the only method, nor the superior method, for providing any particular service.

A relevant question here: How would a society as large and diverse as ours cooperate without forming, even accidentally, a government? Having no government might well work for small, relatively homogeneous groups of people, but feudalism has never been particularly successful at creating a dynamic peacetime society-- or peace-- and, for example, the assorted small states in present-day Italy didn't do very well until they were united-- though a few families became very wealthy.

In regard to your statement that "Real estate is the only real wealth", I'm not sure what you mean.

It is a tad bit philosophical, but then it has been so for a long time. Paper assets have abstract value, as do valuable items and substances such as oil, gold and diamond. That value fluctuates, sometimes wildly. But never mind the oil, gold and diamonds-- where do we get the things that ultimately have value-- water, food, and shelter? From land, for the foreseeable future. The main reason the United States became a world power was its land and resources. When there is no fresh water, what is the value of gold? What did Sam Gamgee want, if he could just survive the quest to destroy the Ring? A little piece of land where he could make a garden. Where can you sit, stand or sleep, without land? It's called "real estate" and "real property" for a reason: it's real. Our nation was built on the premise and promise of making land available to everybody, because land is wealth.

Perhaps it is a little late in the discussion, but: define "wealth".

Indium Flappers wrote:By conspiracy hobbyists do you mean people who watch things like so?

He probably had something more like this or this in mind.

David Franks wrote:

Indium Flappers wrote:By conspiracy hobbyists do you mean people who watch things like so?

He probably had something more like this or this in mind.

Ah yeah, there's too much real stuff going on, so I don't worry about that too much. Perhaps they give the anarchist/libertarian movement a bad name, I don't really know, but I trust curious and critical individuals to be able to distinguish between them and other libertarians. (I'm assuming here that the people you linked to are libertarians.)

My response to Dar would be two-fold. First, the government seems to engage in its own style of irrational paranoia in the form of this whole terrorism business. Do you not think the data collection they're engaging in is a sign that they're paranoid? Do you not think the wars that have been started (under both parties) and the talk of national security is a sign of paranoia?

Second, it's not fear that drives me, it's hope. Anarchists desire to live in a freer, more peaceful world, so we're working to create it.

But this leads me back to David's response, and I think we've departed from the topic of Social Security enough that we need a new thread in which to discuss the philosophical points we've brought up. In regard to this though:

David Franks wrote:You don't give government enough credit; at least three of them are governments.

Which three?

(edit, oh hey, post 42!)

Indium Flappers wrote:(I'm assuming here that the people you linked to are libertarians.)

More to the point, they're conspiracy hobbyists.

First, the government seems to engage in its own style of irrational paranoia in the form of this whole terrorism business.

I agree. Create a market, then exploit that market.

Do you not think the data collection they're engaging in is a sign that they're paranoid? Do you not think the wars that have been started (under both parties) and the talk of national security is a sign of paranoia?

I suspect that the motivation is more base than paranoia. Data is worth money-- whether it is being sold or used to streamline law enforcement.

Second, it's not fear that drives me, it's hope. Anarchists desire to live in a freer, more peaceful world, so we're working to create it.

If you're working to create peace for large groups of people, anarchy won't work. Feel free to continue to call yourself an anarchist, though. It's sort of cute.

Which three?

My next sentence lists three governments. The fourth is city, but I don't live within any city limits. Government accounts for three or four of the means and institutions you mention, not one. (There are also regional governments, but they are usually combined city and county governments, not in addition to them.)

David Franks wrote:

Indium Flappers wrote:(I'm assuming here that the people you linked to are libertarians.)

More to the point, they're conspiracy hobbyists.

Well alright. True. Perhaps Dar didn't mean it as a criticism of libertarianism/anarchism, but in any case it doesn't work as one.

David Franks wrote:

First, the government seems to engage in its own style of irrational paranoia in the form of this whole terrorism business.

I agree. Create a market, then exploit that market.

Do you not think the data collection they're engaging in is a sign that they're paranoid? Do you not think the wars that have been started (under both parties) and the talk of national security is a sign of paranoia?

I suspect that the motivation is more base than paranoia. Data is worth money-- whether it is being sold or used to streamline law enforcement.

True.

David Franks wrote:

Second, it's not fear that drives me, it's hope. Anarchists desire to live in a freer, more peaceful world, so we're working to create it.

If you're working to create peace for large groups of people, anarchy won't work. Feel free to continue to call yourself an anarchist, though. It's sort of cute.

Lol. Sorry but it's already worked. Even the literature I cited above arguing for more regulation of private security forces acknowledges that it already plays a dandy role in our lives today, and that if it weren't for private security the public police would have an even harder job than they do now. The historical record shows it can work, time and time again. Feel free to continue saying it can't though, it's kind of cute.

It's nice that you almost concede that it can work in a small, homogeneous community though. Here's your mistake, (besides not knowing history), anarchists don't have to create a more peaceful world for large groups of people. I subscribe to a subjective theory of value. (I was wanting to get into this in a new thread, but I guess I might as well go ahead.) It's incredibly easy to show that anarchism works wonderfully in a small community. That's good enough for me. I would prefer living in a community like Modern Times to living in a community with a government. Ergo anarchy. This is my personal preference, if you're content to live somewhere with a government, that's your personal preference. If you want to live somewhere where, if your neighbor decides to starve themselves to death, you can call up some group of people to go knock on their door, drag them to a hospital, strap them to a bed and force-feed them, then you probably don't want to live in an anarchy. (One of the people living in Modern Times actually did starve themselves to death, for those wondering where this example came from.)

This is one of the differences between libertarians and others. I feel no need whatever to impose my views on the rest of the world. I feel no need to make the whole world over into a free society. I don't have to do anything to a large group of people, it's enough to show enough people that it can work so that a small community can be created somewhere. I want to live in that kind of community, thus I'm an anarchist. The rest of the world may do as it pleases and believe what it will.

David Franks wrote:

Which three?

My next sentence lists three governments. The fourth is city, but I don't live within any city limits. Government accounts for three or four of the means and institutions you mention, not one. (There are also regional governments, but they are usually combined city and county governments, not in addition to them.)

The methods I list are:

Indium Flappers wrote:government, private enterprise, non-profit organizations, mutual aid, volunteer services, and whichever others I have not thought of.

So government is only one of the methods I mentioned. I guess you're expanding government to be different kinds of government or levels of government, which in the U.S. would be federal, state, local, etc. That's fine, but they're all still government. I could expand private enterprise to mean large businesses like Wal*mart and local businesses like Ma and Pa's Bent n Dent too.

In any case, I don't think you give enough credit to alternative methods to government. I at least give credit where credit is due, I concede that governments provide different services, but I think other methods can almost always do better. And in some cases you give credit to government where the credit should at a minimum be shared by the government and private enterprise. For example, you tell me to go visit some road construction sites, but road construction is generally done by private companies, even though they are working in the government's employ.

This seems to be something done a lot actually among modern "liberals". There will be some great thing created through a sort of partnership between governments and businesses, and all of the credit goes to the government. Do you think the government created the internet too?

Indium Flappers wrote:Sorry but it's already worked

That article pretty much confirms what I said. Besides acknowledging that private agencies can be considered "government" and that government was always in the background ("lurking" is not a particularly scholarly way of putting it), the areas being discussed were relatively small, relatively localized, in many cases self-sufficient, and, if organized, governed. (If a claims association creates a constitution and by-laws, elects officers, creates a judicial system and keeps records, it is governed.)

The total population of San Francisco in 1860 was 56,802. Per your article, the vigilante committee in 1856 numbered "more than 8,000". That's over 14% of the population-- and not very efficient, however good the results.

Even the literature I cited above arguing for more regulation of private security forces acknowledges that it already plays a dandy role in our lives today, and that if it weren't for private security the public police would have an even harder job than they do now. The historical record shows it can work, time and time again.

I don't disagree. However, having privately-handled agencies, elements or functions in a government does not make that government an anarchy, and it is no proof that anarchy works. Feel free to continue to confuse a few private entities with anarchy though-- despite the caveats in the article you linked to.

It's nice that you almost concede that it can work in a small, homogeneous community though.

It has nothing to do with being nice; it has to do with being correct.

Here's your mistake, (besides not knowing history)

Do show my error.

anarchists don't have to create a more peaceful world for large groups of people.

I guess it's just too bad for those large groups of people, then.

I subscribe to a subjective theory of value. (I was wanting to get into this in a new thread, but I guess I might as well go ahead.) It's incredibly easy to show that anarchism works wonderfully in a small community. That's good enough for me.

As I said. And as long as you don't want to screw things up for the rest of us, that suits me, too.

I would prefer living in a community like Modern Times to living in a community with a government.

Why? What does government keep you from doing?

If you want to live somewhere where, if your neighbor decides to starve themselves to death, you can call up some group of people to go knock on their door, drag them to a hospital, strap them to a bed and force-feed them, then you probably don't want to live in an anarchy. (One of the people living in Modern Times actually did starve themselves to death, for those wondering where this example came from.)

But where is your example of a private citizen being taken to a hospital and force-fed, thanks to the government? On the other hand, every level of government lets homeless people starve to death all the time. Isn't that good enough for you?

This is one of the differences between libertarians and others. I feel no need whatever to impose my views on the rest of the world.

Good thing. You'd have to be a lot more persuasive. I wish that Hogeye Bill were so considerate.

I feel no need to make the whole world over into a free society. I don't have to do anything to a large group of people, it's enough to show enough people that it can work so that a small community can be created somewhere.

Somalia and a few other places show the hellhole potential for anarchy. Have you considered relocating?

I want to live in that kind of community, thus I'm an anarchist.

You'll have to move to an anarchist enclave before you can be any good at it, though. Until then, it's just cute.

The methods I list are:

Indium Flappers wrote:government, private enterprise, non-profit organizations, mutual aid, volunteer services, and whichever others I have not thought of.

So government is only one of the methods I mentioned.

But your list admits multiple non-profits and volunteer organizations. Why not multiple governments?

I guess you're expanding government to be different kinds of government or levels of government, which in the U.S. would be federal, state, local, etc. That's fine, but they're all still government.

Good guess. They perform different functions, just like different non-profits and different volunteer organizations serve different purposes.

I could expand private enterprise to mean large businesses like Wal*mart and local businesses like Ma and Pa's Bent n Dent too.

You should.

In any case, I don't think you give enough credit to alternative methods to government.

Then you're not reading my posts carefully. I'm giving them as much credit as you are, to the extent that credit is due.

This seems to be something done a lot actually among modern "liberals". There will be some great thing created through a sort of partnership between governments and businesses, and all of the credit goes to the government. Do you think the government created the internet too?

Yes, in the same way the government created the interstate highway system. Without the government, private innovation (a lot of which happened in state-funded schools and government-funded laboratories, using government grants) would not have resulted in the Internet.This seems to be something that conservatives do a lot: misrepresent or outright lie about the role of government in our lives.

David Franks wrote:

Indium Flappers wrote:Sorry but it's already worked

That article pretty much confirms what I said. Besides acknowledging that private agencies can be considered "government" and that government was always in the background ("lurking" is not a particularly scholarly way of putting it), the areas being discussed were relatively small, relatively localized, in many cases self-sufficient, and, if organized, governed. (If a claims association creates a constitution and by-laws, elects officers, creates a judicial system and keeps records, it is governed.)

The total population of San Francisco in 1860 was 56,802. Per your article, the vigilante committee in 1856 numbered "more than 8,000". That's over 14% of the population-- and not very efficient, however good the results.

At this point we'd just be arguing over nomenclature again. If you want to take private law and law-enforcement, contractual agreement, and so-on, and call it government, then anarchists are fine with government. But you're still left with a peaceful example of the system we advocate.

Thank you for actually reading my source though, I'm surprised at you.

David Franks wrote:

Even the literature I cited above arguing for more regulation of private security forces acknowledges that it already plays a dandy role in our lives today, and that if it weren't for private security the public police would have an even harder job than they do now. The historical record shows it can work, time and time again.

I don't disagree. However, having privately-handled agencies, elements or functions in a government does not make that government an anarchy, and it is no proof that anarchy works. Feel free to continue to confuse a few private entities with anarchy though-- despite the caveats in the article you linked to.

It isn't a few private entities, private security plays a major role in our lives. As does private arbitration. Law is not necessarily a function of government.

David Franks wrote:

It's nice that you almost concede that it can work in a small, homogeneous community though.

It has nothing to do with being nice; it has to do with being correct.

Here's your mistake, (besides not knowing history)

Do show my error.

It would be nice if you were more correct than you are. Your error is that there have been examples of societies or associations of individuals functioning peacefully without a government. How about the Bedouin, would you say their system of law constitutes a government?

David Franks wrote:

anarchists don't have to create a more peaceful world for large groups of people.

I guess it's just too bad for those large groups of people, then.

If they wish to create a more peaceful world for themselves, they can. I'm not going to force it on them.

David Franks wrote:

I subscribe to a subjective theory of value. (I was wanting to get into this in a new thread, but I guess I might as well go ahead.) It's incredibly easy to show that anarchism works wonderfully in a small community. That's good enough for me.

As I said. And as long as you don't want to screw things up for the rest of us, that suits me, too.

The problem is that you don't mind forcing things onto anarchists.

David Franks wrote:

I would prefer living in a community like Modern Times to living in a community with a government.

Why? What does government keep you from doing?

Oh my. Do you really want a list? You could start by getting rid of all victimless crimes. You could continue by, for example, offering an opt-out for social security. You could further get rid of numerous licensing laws and barriers to entry in various industries. You could let people sell raw milk and collect rain water. (I'll have to look up citations if you want some.) I could go on for quite a while.

David Franks wrote:

If you want to live somewhere where, if your neighbor decides to starve themselves to death, you can call up some group of people to go knock on their door, drag them to a hospital, strap them to a bed and force-feed them, then you probably don't want to live in an anarchy. (One of the people living in Modern Times actually did starve themselves to death, for those wondering where this example came from.)

But where is your example of a private citizen being taken to a hospital and force-fed, thanks to the government? On the other hand, every level of government lets homeless people starve to death all the time. Isn't that good enough for you?

Suicide is illegal I believe, so no, it's not.

David Franks wrote:

This is one of the differences between libertarians and others. I feel no need whatever to impose my views on the rest of the world.

Good thing. You'd have to be a lot more persuasive. I wish that Hogeye Bill were so considerate.

As far as I can tell, the reason I'm not persuasive is because when I offer real-world examples of the sort of society I wish to live in, you either say it can't work on a large scale or isn't an example of what I'm advocating. Which is incredible really. (There are no apples. What about this? Oh that doesn't count.)

David Franks wrote:

I feel no need to make the whole world over into a free society. I don't have to do anything to a large group of people, it's enough to show enough people that it can work so that a small community can be created somewhere.

Somalia and a few other places show the hellhole potential for anarchy. Have you considered relocating?

I've thought about the Free State Project, but I don't have the money to relocate, so I guess you're stuck with me.

David Franks wrote:

I want to live in that kind of community, thus I'm an anarchist.

You'll have to move to an anarchist enclave before you can be any good at it, though. Until then, it's just cute.

We'll see.

David Franks wrote:

The methods I list are:

Indium Flappers wrote:government, private enterprise, non-profit organizations, mutual aid, volunteer services, and whichever others I have not thought of.

So government is only one of the methods I mentioned.

But your list admits multiple non-profits and volunteer organizations. Why not multiple governments?

You can expand the list if you want, the number doesn't really matter. The point is the alternatives play a larger role than you or Dar admit of.

David Franks wrote:

I guess you're expanding government to be different kinds of government or levels of government, which in the U.S. would be federal, state, local, etc. That's fine, but they're all still government.

Good guess. They perform different functions, just like different non-profits and different volunteer organizations serve different purposes.

True.

David Franks wrote:

I could expand private enterprise to mean large businesses like Wal*mart and local businesses like Ma and Pa's Bent n Dent too.

You should.

I don't know why but ok.

David Franks wrote:

In any case, I don't think you give enough credit to alternative methods to government.

Then you're not reading my posts carefully. I'm giving them as much credit as you are, to the extent that credit is due.

I see. Perhaps I'll go back and reread.

David Franks wrote:

This seems to be something done a lot actually among modern "liberals". There will be some great thing created through a sort of partnership between governments and businesses, and all of the credit goes to the government. Do you think the government created the internet too?

Yes, in the same way the government created the interstate highway system. Without the government, private innovation (a lot of which happened in state-funded schools and government-funded laboratories, using government grants) would not have resulted in the Internet.This seems to be something that conservatives do a lot: misrepresent or outright lie about the role of government in our lives.

Sorry, but your article only shows that government played a role, not that without its role private enterprise wouldn't have done what it did. I already admitted government played a role by calling it a "partnership."

edit: oh I forgot, it'd be nice if my tax money wasn't spent on traumatizing children in Pakistan. If you really want a list of the crimes "our" government has committed, watch the Young Turks.

Indium Flappers wrote: [to David]

Here's your mistake, (besides not knowing history)

Oh God, that's precious. That was worth the price of admission right there. Made my day.

Oh, also, on wealth, I don't consider wealth to be just physical or material, I would say it's whatever people value. If I write a song, I've increased the amount of wealth in the world, but I haven't added any material resource. Similarly, since different people value things more than others, if I trade you an apple for a dog, then we both gain simultaneously, because I value the dog more than the apple, and you value the apple more than the dog. So in some sense we both end up with more wealth than we had, meaning trade creates wealth. Classic libertarian philosophy, I'm sure you've heard it before.

Dardedar wrote:

Indium Flappers wrote: [to David]

Here's your mistake, (besides not knowing history)

Oh God, that's precious. That was worth the price of admission right there. Made my day.

Yeah I figured you'd like that. Plenty of people just as sure of themselves as you would agree with me. The fact that you're not familiar with mutual aid means you don't know much about an important aspect of human history.

In regard to David I was more specifically referring to the fact that law, commercial law in particular but also other forms of law, has been produced privately throughout human history. Thus, conflating government and law means he is unaware of this fact. Meaning he doesn't know history. Also, he apparently is unaware of the numerous examples of stateless societies that have functioned quite peacefully over the years.

I'll leave this to David's most capable hands, but just a couple peanuts if I may...

At this point we'd just be arguing over nomenclature again. If you want to take private law and law-enforcement, contractual agreement, and so-on, and call it government, then anarchists are fine with government.

And so it goes. It seems that this anarchy thing always devolves to semantics and word games, and pretty quickly in this case. They seem to be so devoted, so devoted to straining language in order to put things in the wrong boxes in order to get radical answers. A language thing. SS goes in the Ponzi box. Well, no actually, it doesn't. It seems like if they would just be honest with language this whole anarchy thing could be dispatched in an afternoon and we could get on to doing something useful.

The problem is that you don't mind forcing things onto anarchists.

Last I checked, living in an area of the world that has a government and is not in a condition of anarchy, is optional. About 15 years ago I asked Hoggy if he knew of an existing location/society/area where this anarchy thing was functioning, somewhere on the planet. He only had an virtual online experiment. This was long before the attempts to spin Somalia into some kind of idiotic poster child.

for example, offering an opt-out for social security.

And then when the person's investments go south and they are destitute, broken, elderly and sick, we just have society pick up the tab right? We've tried that method. See history. (Oh that's right, you're the one who knows history!)

You could let people sell raw milk...

Only about 7 states don't allow sales, and others have various regulations. The ones that do ban it and regulate it more harshly have good reasons for doing so last I checked. You might acquaint yourself with those reasons.

and collect rain water.

I have five 330 gallon rain barrels and collect all the water I want. Am I in trouble? I have heard of some attempts to restrict water collection in far away lands but it was being done by corporations, usually something anarchists tend to love, no?

Suicide is illegal I believe, so no, it's not.

Oregon, Vermont, and Washington have legalized physician assisted suicide, a handful of other states are unclear. We'll get there some day but it does need to be regulated very carefully with oversight so there isn't a wide variety of funny business in the procedure. A lot of people make money when an older relative dies.

Dardedar wrote:

At this point we'd just be arguing over nomenclature again. If you want to take private law and law-enforcement, contractual agreement, and so-on, and call it government, then anarchists are fine with government.

And so it goes. It seems that this anarchy thing always devolves to semantics and word games, and pretty quickly in this case. They seem to be so devoted, so devoted to straining language in order to put things in the wrong boxes in order to get radical answers. A language thing. SS goes in the Ponzi box. Well, no actually, it doesn't. It seems like if they would just be honest with language this whole anarchy thing could be dispatched in an afternoon and we could get on to doing something useful.

The Old West is a valid example of the sort of society in which market anarchists would wish to live. It has nothing to do with word games. The only reason it devolves into word games is because you two can't understand the difference between law and government. The actual facts support my case.

edit to add, corporations wouldn't exist in an anarchy, and cool on the different examples of states passing cool laws.

edit again: see history.

Indium Flappers wrote:At this point we'd just be arguing over nomenclature again. If you want to take private law and law-enforcement, contractual agreement, and so-on, and call it government, then anarchists are fine with government.

It sounds like you're having that argument over semantics with yourself. But you're forgetting the constitutions, by-laws, elected officers, judicial process and record-keeping.

But you're still left with a peaceful example of the system we advocate.

I have simply pointed out that anarchy doesn't work on a large scale. As long as you're talking about small-scale anarchy, we have little disagreement.

Thank you for actually reading my source though, I'm surprised at you.

Don't be. I'm really pretty boring.

It isn't a few private entities, private security plays a major role in our lives. As does private arbitration. Law is not necessarily a function of government.

But these private functions, however extensive, are subsumed by the governmental milieu and operate within its purview. They hardly demonstrate the viability of anarchy. That's rather like saying that mistletoe demonstrates the viability

Your error is that there have been examples of societies or associations of individuals functioning peacefully without a government.

I never said that there are no successful examples; I pointed out (perhaps too obliquely) that there hasn't been much peace or progress on a large (national) scale under anarchy. (Of course this is particularly true when anarchy comes about as a result of the fall of government, and I'm sure that the correlation between long periods of war and widespread anarchy is just a coincidence.)

How about the Bedouin, would you say their system of law constitutes a government?

Would you say that Bedouin tribes are not small, relatively isolated and relatively self-sufficient?

anarchists don't have to create a more peaceful world for large groups of people....If they wish to create a more peaceful world for themselves, they can. I'm not going to force it on them.

That first statement sounds like an admission that anarchy doesn't work for large groups of people. That, or anarchists don't believe that peace is vital.

The problem is that you don't mind forcing things onto anarchists.

Not that I'm trying to get rid of you, but nobody is forcing you to stay here. Staying here is a privilege, not a prison.

Oh my. Do you really want a list?....

None of these remediations require anarchy for their success.

Suicide is illegal I believe, so no, it's not.

No example, as I requested? Anyway, suicide is legal in the United States. As far as I know, there is no law that directly requires a neighbor to intervene in a suicide. That's a nosy neighbor problem, and anarchy won't solve it. However, if it came to it, I (well, my lawyer) would argue that not intervening in a suicide is covered by "Good Samaritan" law.

As far as I can tell, the reason I'm not persuasive is because when I offer real-world examples of the sort of society I wish to live in, you either say it can't work on a large scale or isn't an example of what I'm advocating. Which is incredible really. (There are no apples. What about this? Oh that doesn't count.)

Don't blame me for the failure of your argument. I have agreed with you that anarchy can work on a small scale. You have shown no examples of anarchy working on a large scale. Private security, arbitration, trash service, and whatever all else are not per se anarchy, and, as they are not the sole providers of these services and they operate within a strongly governmental context, they do not show that running every (currently) government-run aspect of society privately will work. It is a piecemeal argument; there is no evidence that private providers can act as a system to run all of the functions of a society. (I suspect that as services are privatized additively, the failures will increase multiplicatively.) My other objections come directly from the material you have offered as evidence. If your position is that anarchy has been shown to work on only a small scale, then never mind.

I've thought about the Free State Project, but I don't have the money to relocate, so I guess you're stuck with me.

Again, I'm not trying to get rid of you. But it seems you're the one who is stuck.

You can expand the list if you want, the number doesn't really matter. The point is the alternatives play a larger role than you or Dar admit of.

I just wanted your list to be consistent and accurate. My point is that private alternatives don't prove your point, regardless of how large their role is.

I don't know why but ok.

In the absence of more formal institutions, stores become important social hubs. The Post Office, too. This is not as true now as it used to be (though people gather at the mall to walk), but it is still a valuable consideration in a government-free society.

Sorry, but your article only shows that government played a role, not that without its role private enterprise wouldn't have done what it did. I already admitted government played a role by calling it a "partnership."

Regardless of what you said, your article-- which is what I referred to-- claims that the government's role was very minor. That is simply not true.

edit: oh I forgot, it'd be nice if my tax money wasn't spent on traumatizing children in Pakistan. If you really want a list of the crimes "our" government has committed, watch the Young Turks.

That also is not an issue of the form of government, or the presence of government. Lots of governments don't traumatize children in Pakistan. (By the way-- children in Somalia are pretty traumatized, too. Of course Somalia doesn't have pure anarchy....)