When some of us pull together it’s called voluntary cooperation.
So, government by another name…
Tell me you’re kidding.
Probably. On a net basis? Not sure. Opportunity costs of all government actions not related to uncontroversially core functions? Priceless.
I can’t. I’m not the one whose philosophy is a badly premised joke.
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Literally nothing.
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Not because one will be defeated by the well reasoned and supported arguments. But because batshit responses and you get will cause both hair loss and insanity of Lovecraftian proportions.
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Maybe I should pull out my APL environment? Writing an APL incanta programme, with a consequent summoning of a̛̦̦̗̥̞ ͚̞̹G̨͇̗̼͖̣r̴̫̤̲̺̼̦͚éa̲͇̼͇̝̞t̛̜͓̩͕̦ ͇O͇l̗̪̖d̙̰̫̼̳ ͚̰͕̪̗̘̱O̢͎͖̲̬n̖͔̳͕e͔̗̻͍̲ͅ, is less batshit crazy and less harmful than libertarianism…
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Yes, socialism (“[there is] literally nothing … not related to core functions of government” a la @Phrenological ) just hasn’t been tried properly yet. It’ll work next time for sure.
Guess what, when the “need to pull together” is obvious, people will pull together without your type to force them. When it comes to roads, trash, sewers, - geez - step outside your urban paradise and look around. People and companies outside city limits do these things for themselves ALL THE TIME. That you can’t imagine it happening without the benevolent fist of government speaks more of you than of the economics of infrastructure.
That’s right, it doesn’t work at all in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Canada, the Netherlands, Ireland, New Zealand, Belgium…
http://blog.peerform.com/top-ten-most-socialist-countries-in-the-world/
(I’m omitting China because China is communist, not socialist).
All of those countries are hell holes compared to the libertarian paradise of Somalia!
I’ve been outside my “urban paradise.” Generally, I’ve seen dirt roads (except on roads paved by the government), septic tanks, and landfills where people drop things off themselves.
Dirt roads, septic tanks, and “drop off your own garbage” landfills work well on a small scale, but there’s a reason that they’re not in use in cities everywhere: they don’t scale well. For a big city, you need garbage collection, paved roads, and a sewage system.
I will note one exception: my grandparents have a cottage, way out in the middle of nowhere. It’s at the end of a dirt road. The richest of the owners of the cottages in that road wanted to have this road paved, so he talked to the people who owned the cottages between his cottage and the main road (paved by the government). They all chipped in, and paved the road - and stopped when they hit the cottage of the richest guy. The people further down the road weren’t consulted, weren’t asked if they wanted to have the road taken any farther than that.
So, when the rich people pull together with the poor, they will pull together (and some will even let the poor pull with them) right up until it no longer benefits them personally. Then, they stop pulling, and let the poor fend for themselves. After all, the system must be working, because it works well enough for them.
If that isn’t a perfect picture of what is wrong with anarcho-libertarianism, I don’t know what is.
Oh, maybe this:
During Dubai’s economic boom in the 2000s the city’s growth meant that it was stretching its existing sewage treatment infrastructure to its limits. Sewage from areas of Dubai not connected to the municipal piped network at the time was collected daily from thousands of holding tanks across the city and driven by tankers to the city’s only sewage treatment plant at Al-Awir. Because of the long queues and delays, several tanker drivers resorted to illegally dumping the raw sewage into storm drains or behind dunes in the desert resulting in much controversy. The result of sewage dumped into storm drains was that it flowed directly into the Persian Gulf, near to the city’s prime swimming beaches. Doctors warned that tourists using the beaches ran the risk of contracting serious illnesses like typhoid and hepatitis.
(From Sanitation in Dubai - Wikipedia)
Just smell all of that freedom!
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That’s right, it doesn’t work at all in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Canada, the Netherlands, Ireland, New Zealand, Belgium…
Don’t move goalposts by redefining terms. (And anyway there are a great number of “mere problems with the implementation” even of the socialism-lite flavours in those places.)
… but there’s a reason that they’re not in use in cities everywhere: they don’t scale well. For a big city, you need garbage collection, paved roads, and a sewage system.
And why do you believe that at a certain scale, a government body is absolutely necessary to provide infrastructure services at scale? Could there not exist underground easements, private/toll roads, private water supplies / tankering, etc. services, from some inherent contradiction?
Or if you’re going to argue that these services are de facto natural monopolies, then you better be against de jure monopolization of those same services by government. To have courage of your convictions, you know.
Why are you bothering to spout that crap here when obviously nobody present is enough of a rube to buy that trickle-down drivel?
You do realise its pretty much only crazy so-called ‘libertarian’ USians who talk like you, right? The rest of the world defines that term somewhat differently.
Most all of us are aware that such Chicago-School Randian balderdash is well past its prime as propaganda, and that these days, economics is no longer so thoroughly doctrinaire that virtually nobody doing it makes any sense in the real world, unlike the last few decades.
http://piketty.pse.ens.fr/en/capital21c2
/mic drop
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Excuse me? You’re the one who added an extra definition to your post after I quoted you.
All along, my argument has been, “private industry is good, but there are some things that work better if we all pull together, and government is the best way to do that.” You reply to my post, and say, “well, socialism doesn’t work.” I assumed, since you’re replying to me, that it’s my argument that you’re labeling as socialism, and point to places where such things are working.
If you want to argue with the imaginary communists in the thread, reply to their posts, not to mine.
[quote=“fche, post:91, topic:77613”]
(And anyway there are a great number of “mere problems with the implementation” even of the socialism-lite flavours in those places.)[/quote]
Of course. We’re human: fundamentally flawed and often irrational. Anything we do will have problems. I will note, though, that these countries consistently rank above the US (and Somalia) for good places to live.
[quote=“fche, post:91, topic:77613”]
And why do you believe that at a certain scale, a government body is absolutely necessary to provide infrastructure services at scale?[/quote]
Absolutely necessary? Of course not. Again, we’re flawed creatures, so it’s pointless to deal in absolutes.
Historically, though, we’ve lived with dirt roads until there government paved them, open sewage in the street until the government set up sanitation, bandits and pirates until the government set up police forces.
I’m certainly not saying it’s impossible for private citizens to improve things, but generally, for wholesale improvement across a while society, that needs government intervention.
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On Libertarian Candy Mountain, maybe yes. In the real world, investors don’t assume excess liability and remain investors for long.
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Maybe you could name some of these places that have excellent infrastructure and a flourishing community with no crime in spite of the absence of cumbersome government.
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Gosh, libertarian paradises in action sure do seem to be places that colonialists/capitalists have systemically destroyed and can’t find a way to drain dry of resources any further.
I wonder why these rugged individualists don’t move there en masse, and why all the self-ascribed but fully deregulated Galt’s Gulches all seem to be filled with confidence tricksters. What a mystery!
Sure must feel good to be scammed by your own kind rather than beg the State and their Men With Guns for permission to do anything.
ps buy gold.
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And I like to dispute two out of the three claims there.
Regarding all pulling together, government is of course not that. Pulling is done by those who pay taxes, and the vast majority of taxes are paid by a small minority (80% $ by the top 20% people at the federal level, e.g.). If you count instead in terms of votes, then of course again it’s not all together - it’s some 50%+1 of voters. So stop this reference to unanimity as if it were anything even close to reality.
Regarding government is the best way to do that, well, let’s just say that remains to be seen. “best” measured how? cost? benefit? cost/benefit? opportunity cost? number of individuals in favour? And compared to what alternative, when you consider that when a government enters a service business, it nearly always crowds out alternatives. So how could you know if it is the best, if it made itself the only?
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Look, you crazy idealist.
Nowhere else in the world is infected with the USian strain of libertarianism, which by all appearances is blatant propaganda designed to unfetter the supposed ‘elite’, or as I refer to them, the Scum.
Nowhere else on the planet is crazy enough to try to build a society without socialised medicine (even though the proper way to do it is being eroded in many places by the arsehole American way). Nowhere else worth a damn do people tolerate regular mass slaughter of schoolkids in order to pander to frontier fantasies.
Paying more and getting less for health care and monthly mass murder are great advertisements for a hands-off approach. Companies and individuals need no oversight, sure.
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You’re the one who brought up the idea of unanimity. It would be foolish for me to argue against you and say that the government represented the will of 100% of the electorate, for two reasons. First, I wouldn’t argue against you because the fact that you disagree with me proves that it doesn’t represent 100% of the electorate; second, I wouldn’t argue against you because you’d be right about everything you’re saying.
If people were willing to vote for the things that the government needs to do, to put the long-term interest of the country ahead of their own short-term interests, of coming to agreements and making decisions through consensus, then we wouldn’t need a government. We could do things just how you say: having private companies take care of the environment, the policing, the garbage, the roads. If everyone always agreed on the best way to do things, your anarcho-libertarian utopia would be possible.
Sadly, such is not the case. We’re still irrational creatures, so we need someone to ensure that we have what we need to survive for the long-term, instead of squandering everything in the short term.
[quote=“fche, post:97, topic:77613”]
Regarding government is the best way to do that, well, let’s just say that remains to be seen. “best” measured how? cost? benefit? cost/benefit? number of individuals in favour? And compared to what alternative, when you consider that when a government enters a service business, it nearly always crowds out alternatives. So how could you know if it is the best, if it made itself the only?[/quote]
[Quality of Life?] (OECD Better Life Index)
Top 10 Ranking: Australia, Sweden, Norway, Switzerland, Denmark, Canada, United States, New Zealand, Iceland, Finland.
[Happiness?] (World Happiness Report 2015 | The World Happiness Report)
Top 10 Ranking: Iceland, Denmark, Norway, Canada, Finland,the Netherlands, Sweden, New Zealand, Australia.
[Income equality?] (List of countries by income equality - Wikipedia)
Top 10 Ranking: Slovenia, Denmark, Norway, Czech Republic, Slovak Republic, Belgium, Finland, Sweden, Austria, Hungary.
[Crime rate?] (Countries Compared by Crime > Total crimes per 1000. International Statistics at NationMaster.com)
Top 10 Ranking: Iceland, Sweden, Dominica, United Kingdom, New Zealand, Finland, Belgium, Denmark, the Netherlands, Canada.
[Press Freedom Index?] (World Press Freedom Index - Wikipedia)
Top 10 Ranking: Finland, the Netherlands, Norway, Luxembourg, Andorra, Liechtenstein, Denmark, Iceland, New Zealand, Sweden.
[Life Satisfaction?] (Where-to-be-born Index - Wikipedia)
Top 10 Ranking: Switzerland, Austria, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Singapore, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Canada, Hong Kong.
The “socialist” Scandinavian countries are showing up on those lists a lot.
I’ve put up my facts. Now you show me yours.
There’s a lot of space on this planet, many different kinds of society and culture, hundreds of countries and billions of people.
Show me something, somewhere, where anarcho-libertarians are doing a better job than socialists are.
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So in short your argument isn’t based on any real evidence. Thank you for clarifying that. I’ll stop waiting for you to answer my question since you’ve made a tacit admission the places you referred to are just something you made up.
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