Myth: Economic conservatism is the only political philosophy favoring reason.

[suarezguy]

@ineptsegue Yet Beingism claimed that possible goals (presumably consistent with themselves) were creating egalitarianism and happiness for a majority of people.

[suarezguy]

Happiness is inherently subjective (some people will never be satisfied) and therefore the goal should not be guaranteeing happiness (an impossible goal) but allowing people to pursue it.

Fixed egalitarianism is antithetical to happiness as many people would prefer to have more than others.

[emaster01]

@ineptsegue Its not that government is bad, it is the incentives that government bureaucrats have aren't for the greater good they are for their own good. For example, government bureaucrats have no incentive to criticize bad behavior the way insurance does or a person's family does, because its bad politics. While the profit motive in the case banking, insurance, or the family give incentive to PREVENT bad behavior instead of simply giving aid to what lies in its wake.

[Beingism]

@emaster01

Government programs can be set up with whatever incentives we design them to have. I don't get it. How is it that you think the profit motive is equivalent to the greater good? It causes *huge* problems in many cases.

Myth: All (or virtually all) important goals in society can be addressed by the profit motive.

[emaster01]

@Beingism Its because the profit motive (except when business and government collude) always leads to the greater good in a true capitalistic society. It only harms when the businesses don't go for profit in the most efficient way.

Government agencies have never have any incentive to decrease in size. Businesses do when the circumstances are correct. If you are in charge of an agency that helps get unemployed people jobs, and the employment increases, your incentive is to increase size wrongly

[Beingism]

@emaster01 First off, for reasons I've recently mentioned to you, there's no such thing as, and can never be such a thing as, a "true" capitalistic society. Second, you're completely ignoring a ton of problems that a profit motive situation has no natural incentive to address with respect to "commons" resource management and meeting needs of low to no income people. Third, though decreasing government agencies may certainly be a problem, they can be given what ever incentives we build in.

[emaster01]

@Beingism That profit motive has no incentive to deal with low income people is a questionable claim to me. Lets say that there is employer A underpaying group B for industry 1. I start an efficient business in industry 1 OR industry 2 and hire members of group B at a higher wage (so I am competing with employer A for workers). Basically, if you underpay your workers than you are vulnerable to someone taking the workers away through higher wages (due to profit motive of someone else)

[Beingism]

@emaster01 Close to a billion people in the world are starving; millions more die of preventable causes annually. There is no doubt whatsoever that we could abate this if we simply applied resources toward that goal. The profit motive isn't getting the job done. Quite simply, it's more profitable to sell beer and ice cream.

[emaster01]

@Beingism None of those people live in a capitalistic society. Most of those people die to government regulating the food industries, therefore it is getting mishandled. A lot of food spoils in warehouses while people suffer. Furthermore, when food is given to those countries in aid by the US where does it go? to their government who is in charge of handing it out, and are usually oppressing its people. In addition, food would be cheaper in a free market than US because gov raises prices

[Beingism]

@emaster01 The world doesn't consist of unconnected isolated areas; it's a global community, and many businesses employ poor and starving people (e.g. in sweatshops), or they could if they wanted to. Regardless, they (we) could clearly do *orders of magnitude* more to help. Except there's no incentive.

Also, there's considerable poverty and homelessness in the developed world (less in socialized nations).

The idea that most problems go away when government does is ludicrous. Somalia, anyone?

[emaster01]

@Beingism These sweatshops (like nike shoe factories) on average pay twice as much to the locals as other jobs in the area, and the experience they get at the american (not necessarily american but you get my point) factory makes them earn more at other jobs in their area later on due to the experience, because everyone wants the employee with such experience.

[Beingism]

@emaster01 If they don't pay a living wage with humane working conditions, it's not benevolent—and regardless, much, much more could be done.

Also, rich elites and international corporations are often responsible for creating policies that rape these countries into destitution in the first place.

[emaster01]

@Beingism Alright so if a company has a choice between paying these workers twice what anyone else will, or placing factories in the US for minimum wage workers here, and charging more for the american consumer to pay for it, you would choose the latter?

And if these countries have government(s) make policies to help them that isn't an argument against capitalism, its an argument against fascism.

[Beingism]

@emaster01 Given the choice, we would choose an entirely different system and use public funds to create systems to help these individuals leave poverty and not spend their lives working shitty jobs for pittance.

As to the rest, I've already explained, an anti-government philosophy is not well equipped to defend against Facism, which is one reason why there are no libertarian governments and never will be.

[emaster01]

@Beingism @Beingism You cant be santa clause and "give" everyone everything.

Second, you falsely claimed taht an anti government philosophy is not well equipped to defend against fascism. In US history, every time "safety" or "public" crusaders, with good intention as yourself, have tried to bring government in to do things like you want to do, the businessmen have taken over without any resistance from progressives.

When you advocate big government, business people (or worse) get the control.

[Beingism]

@emaster01

Why do you assume that creating systems to help individuals leave poverty means just giving things away?

Without people advocating for safety we would not have countless needed features, from seat belts to nutritional information on labels and a relative lack of poisoned air and water. The are countless collectively funded services that enhance the quality of my life on a daily basis, and there could be more if there was less anti-government rhetoric.

[emaster01]

@Beingism Car safety has never been helped through government mandates whether on safety belts or air bags or whatever.

Cars now put out a lot more airbags than are require by law and how safe their cars are gets more customers, it was never needed.

You could argue that neither airbags or even safety belts increase safety overall. I have seen compelling arguments that have a good point.

FDA has caused many, many more deaths than it has saved lives.

[Beingism]

@emaster01 It's amazing what people will try to argue when they start with the premise that government is necessarily impotent and try to work backward to show why this is the case in every possible situation.

[emaster01]

@Beingism Well I didn't start off that way actually I started off in a more anti business greed corporation look and than researched more.

I am not going to say that these safety regulations necessarily are bad, but its controversial. Safetybelts cause people to feel more safe and drive more wrecklessly (fact) so pedestrians are killed more often, is it worth the trade off?

The thing is, is that I see every decision as a trade off because there is no such thing as a solution

[Beingism]

@emaster01 Most courses of action have disadvantages and advantages. Most of the time, though, there are some that clearly outweigh the others—and at least some of the time, that means intervention is better than doing nothing...

[emaster01]

@Beingism Okay so there are trade-offs in decisions, but government action usually consist of categorical decisions instead of incremental decisions.

In addition determining that is extremely difficult to do. For example, after some people attempted to ban allowing toddlers to sit in their mothers lap on planes an economist showed that it would cause 8 deaths for every one it saved by diverting traffic to other modes of transportation.

[Beingism]

@emaster01 Sometimes it's hard to do, but you can exaggerate the extent of the difficulty. Action needs to be based in research, and a flawed system is not a failure if it yields information that can be studied and used to create improvements.

[emaster01]

@Beingism If you use a specific example, than you would probably progress further because than I know that what you are saying is true in some case or more.

You speak in can's and possibilities in such a general sense, when you could say something specific that has been done or a specific change for a specific case or issue.

[Beingism]

@emaster01

This page gives a description of some ideal goals for collectively financed action:

beingism [dot] org/community/?q=node/195

[emaster01]

@Beingism Those ideals don't seem any different from the ideals of other socialists. And once more, you are going to have to play santa clause. You claim, that the wealth exists for everyone to have healthcare, yet we dont. There simply aren't enough doctors and nurses to go around. You claim you can teach people all these things, but schooling is expensive we dont have the resources to do so (besides all the claims about how bad gov. is doing at that).

[Beingism]

@emaster01 Of *course* we can teach people to do those things! As we point out at "Myth: Wealth distribution in our society is relatively balanced," the amount of inefficiently allocated resources is tremendous. No more rationing healthcare based on wealth. No more giving up control over the benefits of the increased efficiency brought about by new technologies to the rich.

[emaster01]

@Beingism Exactly, rationing based on wealth. You have to ration one way or another, whether by money people are willing to pay, lines or lotteries (or some other rule).

And I am not sure about the benefits of increased efficiencies benefits only or mostly the rich... Like everyone has cell phones today because of that, and everyone has TVs and cars because of it.

Things become more efficient who gets TVs? Who got the cell phones? who got the cars? Look at the goods and services

[Beingism]

@emaster01 I didn't say technology only benefited the rich—just (very) disproportionately. That's why no matter how much wealth society accumulates, the work week never decreases.

You only have to ration when there are insufficient resources. Even if this had to be the case, when it comes to medical care, rationing based on anything other than need is ethically inexcusable.

[emaster01]

@Beingism For some reason the most obvious fallacy didn't seem to jump out at me first, but I will make a small quote "By using the wealth that is currently doing little more than unfairly making extremely rich people even richer" Everything about that statement is false. When a rich person invests, it goes straight to the masses. Besides that, you make the fallacy of looking at the dollars instead of the resources they would be spent on.

[Beingism]

@emaster01 Well, the resources our society gives to the privileged for no good reason don't do *nothing* (naturally the rich invest in things), but this isn't even remotely close to the most efficient use for those resources.

[emaster01]

@Beingism You are missing the point entirely. Investment goes to people who need money, not from rich people to other rich people who dont have any want or need for money.

I am not convinced that resources are allocated so inefficiently, neither am I convinced that the investments by rich is a bad thing.

People who said that have kept the third world poor because its not open to outside investment (the free market correction for one nation being poorer than another

[Beingism]

@emaster01 Of course investments go to people who *want* money. Need—not so much.

So it's not inefficient... but yet we invest billions in beer and ice cream when we apparently can't afford to meet the medical needs even of our own citizens?

[emaster01]

@Beingism No matter how much money you throw at doctors, they can only do so much.

There are a limited amount of doctors and nurses, and that needs to be addressed.

Beyond that, would you want to give up beer and ice cream in general? or perhaps music, or video games.

You might be thinking about things categorically, but the market decides things incrementally.

You obviously wont give up heart surger for beer, but you might forego 10 years worth of bandaids for beer (I hate beer myself :P)

[Beingism]

@emaster01 "Free" markets prioritize wealth over need. Some people will die so that other people can play video games. Maybe you don't have a problem with that. We do, and will advocate for a system that works to meet human needs—especially since no one actually has to give up ice cream to accomplish this. Resources must simply be distributed more rationally.

[Beingism]

@emaster01 Also, I hate beer, too. But I don't speak for other Beingists in saying that. :)

[emaster01]

@Beingism Further more, it seems to me to be a more drastic step to go from almost no government action, to government protecting industries than

to go from government regulating an industry and making slight tweaks in the regulations to protect businesses.

[Beingism]

@emaster01 Probably the best counterexample here is that a lack of government systems or policies when it comes to campaign financing means that corporations fund the people they want into power, which means those corporations *will* get what they want—and what they want is legislation that benefits them.

[emaster01]

@Beingism I had no qualms with that and felt that money given to politicians had to be heavily regulated. But just a few days ago I started reading freakonomics and (of the many ideas) it shows how that when a politician doubles his spending he only gains 1% more votes.

I am still unsure of the reasoning, I have one doubt with it but I will continue chewing on it.

Excellent book though, not really an economics book but just systemic reasoning. I would recommend it (after Basic Economics)

[Beingism]

@emaster01 Not advocating for "big government" here. Advocating for effective government at whatever size it needs to be to be effective.

Businesses will always take over to some extent simply because "pure" capitalism can't exist.

Government does good & bad, & much more with both positive & negative outcomes. You can respond to this by saying we should make it as small as possible, or you can take a more nuanced & rational approach by working to eliminate the bad ones & add to the good ones.

[emaster01]

@Beingism In a society where government intervention is extremely small, if government policy leans toward ill ends, its easy to spot.

Currently, there are millions of pages, tens of thousands of volumes of laws, who is going to notice abuse?

In addition to that, it only takes the smallest tweaks for businesses to take control with big government. For example, government mandates safety tests for something and a year later government starts testing themselves. (business dont pay) boon for biz

[Beingism]

@emaster01 Starting off with the idea that government should be a certain size ("big" or "small") is backward. Having a very small government might be one way to minimize government corruption (though not, of course, business corruption), but I'd rather focus on making government effective. That means a lot more than just minimizing abuse, but that's a part of the process.

See also: Myth: Socialism puts too much trust in government to be benevolent.

[emaster01]

@Beingism For the somalia example, I dont know much you would have to inform me, but government going away isn't a solution. Government needs to do a few things to bring prosperity. some of which are bringing stability, with a framework of laws and protecting property rights as well. So government dissapperaing isn't good.

[Beingism]

@emaster01 Fair enough. But there's no reason government shouldn't do whatever best maximizes equality and freedom for people.

[emaster01]

@Beingism I have trouble arguing one system. I dont believe in government safety things except for one case, government DOES need to require business to freely give out the information about their products that people need to know (prevent fraud and abuse). but thats a longer argument.

I have trouble arguing against one system, and thats friedmans negative income tax. If you take away ALL wellfare programs (food stamps unemployment whatever) and i will detail next comment

[emaster01]

@Beingism Set a given yearly income as what is needed per person/household.

Set a negative tax rate (1/2) and pay people 1/2 of the difference between their actual income and the desirable income, that way there is still great incentive to increase you wages.

[Beingism]

@emaster01 Something like that might work. The minimum should be sufficient to survive but not have everything one wishes, thus balancing compassion and motivation.

It's expensive to have poor people in society (prisons, police, hospitals).

Of course, some people can't work, so this can't be a replacement for all other services.

Also, tax rates need to soar on the very wealthy such that though there's never a penalty for making more money, it gets progressively much harder.

[emaster01]

@Beingism

By the way did a quick search on somalia I quote wiki "Somalia has also managed to sustain a free market economy which, according to the UN, outperforms those of many other countries in Africa

[Beingism]

@emaster01 Anarcho-capitalistic paradise! Not sure why more extremist libertarians don't move there.

[emaster01]

@Beingism well I would have too look more into it, but the United States has been doing pretty good so far, bankrupt now though :(

[emaster01]

@ineptsegue No what I'm saying is at 20 years old they were marxists and then became libertarians because through the study of economics they found that every policy they came across ended up hurting the people it was sincerely intended to help.

[emaster01]

I'm sorry to say this to you man, but that last part is a vicious attack. You are saying that because libertarians do not advocate your same ideals that they must not care about poor people. This is not the case at all. Lets take the war on drugs for example. The Libertarian argument starts off by saying that the proponents of the war on drugs have good intentions, and that drug use is bad. However good your intentions may be, the war on drugs has caused many more problems than it has solved.

[Beingism]

@emaster01 Sorry. Some of the original Myths were a bit snarky sometimes.  This is an old version; look at the text on the website.

Mind you, I think many—probably most—libertarians suffer from extremely low empathy & ability to put themselves in other people's shoes, but that doesn't necessarily mean they don't care about the poor.

Anyway, the so-called drug war is hardly an example of good social policy. There are many more potential bad government actions than good ones.

[emaster01]

@Beingism I still think that is a vicious attack on libertarians.

Take Thomas Sowell or milton friedman (now dead). They were both libertarians and BOTH started off as marxists for the exact same reason you are a progressive. As they studied economics their viewpoint changed. In the words of thomas sowell "My values didn't change" Over time as he studied he found out that social or collective policy hurt those its meant to help.