Tax Land [value], not Labor (or Capital).

Everyone: read Henry George’s Progress and Poverty, then we’ll talk.

Our household income is right around the U.S. average and not only do we pay no federal income tax, but we effectively receive a wealth transfer (welfare) through a combination of child tax credits (x4) and earned income credit. I can feed my family for the year based on what I get back from the government. So I’ve no complaints about fairness of the tax system.

“It’s still odd to say that the tax code systematically discriminates in favor of the rich, when the wealthy not only give up such a greater proportion of their income in taxes.”

So much verbage and nothing but ignoring the FACT that income from LABOR is taxed at a higher rate then income from sitting on your ass, cashing your trust fund check. It’s like you never even READ Bramwell’s
article. Ignoring even this simple fact really puts most of your article in the trash can
of rational debate.

Of course, not surprising since you quote the “Tax Foundation”, the premier PIMP outfit for the rich since forever. Ehich of course, disqualifies you as being an objective source of facts on the issueof taxes.

Look, not only are income from wages taxed at a higher rate then investment income, but
the entire discussion of “income” taxes ignores the hidden “income” tax---the payroll taxes.
Most working folk (they like to call themselves the “middle class”, althought they are not)
pay more in PAYROLL taxes then they do in INCOME Taxes. The payroll tax (approximately 15%) accounts for
approximately 45% of all Federal revenues, and is not subject to typical tax deductions that
working folks use, like child care, medical expenses, home mortgage interest, etc.

For years you so-called “free marketeers” have been claiming that the FEDERAL deficit is a
lot less then it really is because you took the Social Security SURPLUS and mixed it in with the
rest of the FEDERAL Budget...it was originally that corporate pimp GREENSPAN who came up
with this idea, of raising payroll taxes to create a “surplus” for the Babyboomers, which
was always a fraud to hide the fact that Reagan’s tax cuts were not generating the additional
revenue the “supply siders” (another bit of pimpery for the rich) promised would cover their
costs. So you free market fanatics can claim the budget deficit is actually LESS then it is,
because you’ve pimped the working folks’ Social Security to pay for your failed economic
theories.

The so-called “Conservative” tax cut economic policies have totally failed...they have ‘
never worked---that is, created enough economic growth to pay for themselves. Like most of
“free market” theory---the other being IMPERIALISM---it never pays for itself. The working
folk pay the bill for the rich to have a free ride. 

Look, PIMP is the only term I can use to describe anyone who might say that the tax system
benefits the working class and is unfair to the top 10% who enjoy the majority of the wealth
of the nation. You arguments are so irrational, and so devoid of reality, that they
resemble McCain and Bush’s prounouncements that the “economic fundamentals of the economy
are sound...”. It’s the primary reason that the so-called “conservative” movement has lost it’s
white working class base.

Joe Populist does bring in a point relevant to the overall subject of taxing and spending and rich and poor. In addition to the income tax and estate tax that Mr. Bramwell discussed and the income tax that I discussed there are also the various employment taxes. For a truly comprehensive picture I suppose you’d have to add state, local and other federal taxes into the mix and then worry about whether X is able to shuffle the effective tax burden onto Y. And after that you’d have to try to figure out where the money goes and who ends up with the benefit.

On Social Security and similar arrangements: does anyone know of a good analysis of their overall distributive effects? To the extent the taxes fund benefits--they are tied to them when it’s determined how high they should be set--the Social Security and similar systems shouldn’t be regressive as a whole since those paying the taxes presumably tend to have more income than those receiving the benefits. On the other hand it’s likely as a practical matter that not all the taxes imposed today will end up funding benefits. They’ll just get spent for other things, replacing income tax receipts, and the future of Social Security will have to take care of itself.

While specific portions of the tax code may benefit the “rich”, all you really need to
know to figure out the “fairness” of the tax system is that
“1% pay a greater dollar amount in income taxes than the bottom 90%”. 
This is consistent with all the figures I have ever seen released by
the U.S. government. In addition, the specifics are not always what they seem as noted
repeatedly in this posting. Joe Populist lists the different rates of taxation on labor
versus capital gains.  What he did not note is that capital gains taxes generally
are the result of double taxation.  Taxes are first paid at the labor rate when income
is earned.  When this income is subsequently invested, there is an additional tax on
income and capital gains.  A portion of that second tax, capital gains, gets favorable
tax treatment.

Frank D,

The preferential treatment afforded capital gains was passed in order to benefit Wall Street fund managers and high level executives of publicly traded companies, not a working class couple’s hard-earned equity in their house.

Senor Doug:  I made no statement as to how the benefits of the preferential treatment of
capital gains are distributed.  I only meant to note that in general the so called
benefit is not a benefit at all since a tax has already been paid on the income prior
to realizing the gain.

Is it only working class people whose income is “hard earned”?

The rich pay a higher dollar amount, but that is only mildly progressive when compared to their share of wealth. The issue is not dollar amount but proportional amounts. The rich have higher disposable and discretionary incomes. Hence the poor pay, like the widow and her mite, out of their need, not their surplus.

As for the double taxation issue, it would be easy to solve simply by making dividend payments deductible to the company. Why isn’t this done? Because neither the rich nor the corporations want it done. Corporations already have so many deductions that it would not be worth it to them, and the rich don’t want it because it would eliminate the preferential treatment they get. 2/3rds of all corporations don’t pay taxes. Of those that do, they pay nothing like the advertised rates. For example, Exxon takes lists a $29B tax liability last year. However, $23B of that is in “deferred taxes,” meaning that they are unlikely ever to pay anything near that amount.

The truth is, tax cuts for the rich are funded by raids on social security taxes and by borrowing, which is a tax on the next generation.

And yes, there are “irrationalities” in the tax code, and this is necessarily so, because the concept of income turns out to be flexible and ambiguous. The flat-taxers want to solve this by converting tax accounting from an accrual to a cash basis, but that is even more irrational.

Patrick Hall’s suggestion is well-taken; the real question is whether incomes should be taxed at all. But the rich have far more objection to Henry George than the George Bush. Hence, they will have to live with the system we have.

One other thing. I have strong objections to Mr. Kalb’s title. It is gratuitous and condescending. It is mere snobbery. People who write things like that are always the first to charge others with “elitism.”

I have a couple more thoughts that I don’t feel like developing at the moment so I’ll just enter them here:

1. “Who ends up holding the bag” is a difficult question in taxing and spending policy. If employment taxes are raised and the employer pays half maybe he views it as part of his wage bill and reduces salaries accordingly. Or maybe employees look at their share of the tax as a reduction in wages so employees in general demand more before they’re willing to work and employers have to raise their offers. So it can be hard to say who’s getting soaked how much.

2. I seem to recall reading somewhere that similar countries have similar distributions of income regardless of taxing and spending policies. Maybe the moral is that when a tax is imposed or benefit paid at some particular point in the economy the system adjusts so most people end up with more or less what they would have had anyway. I don’t have a cite though.

3. In my entry I didn’t state any particular preferences as to taxing and spending. On the whole I’d like less of each, I think it’s a bad idea to have who gets how much of what too much in play politically, but I have no ideal system.

4. The point of the entry was that there are some things that in some moods seem odd to people but are actually quite reasonable. What follows is not that we shouldn’t tax the rich more, but that some arguments for taxing them more aren’t very good so proponents of the idea should use other arguments if there is to be a reasonable discussion.

4. To JM: originally I referred to proportionate contributions rather than absolute dollar contributions but that got changed when the piece was edited. I didn’t protest because the change made the argument simpler if less compelling and those concerned with the point could go to the Tax Foundation link showing the relation between AGI and tax.

Frank D,

Fund managers and executives are not paying capital gains taxes on the sale of assets purchased with after-tax income.

Re:  “hard-earned,” that is the rhetoric, but the reality is the preferential tax treatment is for people who, because of externalities imposed by the tax code, get paid to play with other people’s money.

To JM again: I wanted a play on the word “soaking” that suggested maybe the situation wasn’t so bad and that was all that came to mind. I thought that the juxtaposition of the article to Mr. Bramwell’s piece, as well as the archaic nature of the expression, would make the intention clear. It’s quite difficult to use “the great unwashed” seriously today, and I’m sorry you took it that way. I apologize to anyone who feels injured.

As to complaints of elitism, I think we would agree with each other that charity is good and resentment is bad in discussing social issues, certainly in a forum like this one.

Also, inflation is a terribly regressive tax, and a subsidy to asset owners and upstream recipients of the newly created dollars:  investment banks and government employees, contractors and welfare cases.

In short, the middle class is screwed in every way imaginable, and they keep voting Republican and signing up for foreign wars, because they know the Democrats want their extinction.

Really, if there were any spine left in us, we’d be in open revolt.

This blasted and hollowed out economy we have will amply demonstrate that taxes are the least of one’s worries when compared to the forces that will soon work their charms on a public that still thinks they are not an emerging country going backwards.

Pay attention to the Chinese Central Bankers who are going a tad restless over their poor judgement in Bond Purchases.

The only exceptionalism possessed by the American Government of these last eight years is a breathtakingly exceptional level of astounding idiocy.

Discussions of tax rates are just one of the bait and switch diversions in their grab bag of Bunko Writ Large.

The top 1% pay about 40% of all income taxes while the botton 50% pay 3%.
I’m not sure how that can be described as mildly progressive.

@ Frank The top 1% pay about 40% of all income taxes... Yes, but they own 38% of the wealth; that would seem to be mildly progressive.

@Jim, the person who edited your piece did the right thing; he merely made it accurate. And despite what you read, distributions vary widely in the developed world, largely based on tax policy and cultural factors; most developed nations simply would not accept such a deep division between rich and poor. The GINI distribution tables are widely available. I suggest you consult them.

And there does seem to be a lot of resentment, but mostly by the rich directed against “the great unwashed,” as they refer to their fellow-citizens. We seem to be returning to the class warfare policies of Nassau Senior, the economic light of the Liberal Party, whose vitriol against the poor and calls for open warfare against them long preceded Marx. His greatest legacy is the workhouse, and the end of England’s rather generous welfare system (known as the Speenhamland system). As Warren Buffet noted, “If there is a class warfare going on, my class is winning.”

John: I’ll have to drop out due to lack of specific knowledge. A quick web search didn’t turn up the source I remembered but I think it had to do with stability of national income distributions in spite of various interventions. A particular example would be this discussion of the Canadian case. Cross-country comparisons would of course be complicated by local differences: Japan for example has a low Gini coefficient without large transfer payments (both comparatively speaking).

The richest 1% own closer to 20% of the nation’s wealth than 38%.

http://www.columbia.edu/~wk2110/bin/estate-NBER.pdf

This puts the ratio of tax burden to wealth at about 2:1, which I think can fairly be called progressive.

Also the idea of social security payments subsidizing tax cuts doesn’t really fly.

If the wealthy are paying a far greater share of taxes, any borrowing from social security just means that their share of the burden is slightly less disproportionate.

It’s sort of like we had a joint bank account and I was putting 80% of the money into the account, and you were putting 20% of the money in.  Let’s say I was drawing 70% of the money from it and you were withdrawing 30% of the money from it.  If I started drawing 75% of the money instead of 70%, I wouldn’t be taking money from you, I would just be giving less money to you.

David. The data you cite is estate tax data. This is entirely bogus. How do I know this? Because my father was an estate-tax planner.  What is presented to the government is a highly manipulated number, designed by the best lawyers and accountants to expose the least amount to taxation and state the estate at its lowest plausible (or even implausible) value. But even using their figures (which they admit might not be reliable), you get the top 1% owning 20% of the wealth. And that doesn’t pass the smell test, because they show the share declining, when nearly every other (non-tax data) study shows it increasing.

Nor do your arguments about the FICA tax subsidy to the rich seem to be convincing. Why should there be any subsidy to the rich? However, your solicitude for the rich is touching.

John: 

What is your source for the 38% wealth figure? 

What “non-tax” data studies are you refering to?

I cited the source. It was wikipedia. But that was just a quick reference. Read Edward Wolff’s “Top Heavy,” which takes it through 2000,

or try this one:

http://74.125.45.104/search?q=cache:Br415dF1NPsJ:www.minneapolisfed.org/research/QR/QR2122.ps+wealth+distribution+us&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=11&gl=us&lr=lang_en

Most studies put the top 1% as holding between 33 and 40%. Saez’s estate tax study is the only one I know of that puts it in the 20’s, a number which more reflects the accountant’s abilities to hide assets rather than a real number.

The INCOME tax is a tax on INCOME.  Given that the highest earners pay more taxes on INCOME in absolute terms as well as a % of total INCOME, it is cleary a progressive tax.  Also, based on the statistics that have been noted, I would classify the tax as highly progressive.  Although it may not be progressive enough for some.

Notwithstanding, bickering over which study or statitsics are most reliable misses the point.  The income tax is a means for the state to conduct organized theft.  The fact that the poor sometimes benefit at the expense of the rich does not make it any less of a crime than if the situation was reversed.

Jim is to be commended for making sense of how the tax code distributes or doesn’t distribute tax benefits. What
is however the clinching argument in his case is how heavily the tax burden already rests on the upper 10% of the
income curve. In Germany the same income group pay close to 95% of the revenues collected by the government, and similar situations exist in other Western “democracies.” No matter how hard I think about it, it seems foolish that these people are being forced to yield so much of their earnings to state bureaucrats. What moral right does the government have to these earnings, even if some of us are disturbed that not everyone is “paying his share”? My view
is Good for them, if they don’t pay even more to fatten the managerial state, which for me is a much bigger eyesore
than watching someone lounging on his yacht.

I am surprised--no, saddened--to see Paul Gottfried take such a beggar thy neighbor attitude. There are of course legitimate objections to the totalizing modern state. But that is a sad reaction to it. I am not offended by a person lounging on his yacht--if it really is his yacht and not the fruits of a mere rentier income.

And John is right. Statistics do miss the point--if you are an ideologue--because statistics pollute the ideological purity of a question with mere facts, which can never be admitted if they conflict with a fixed ideology.

Still, I wish the “taxes are theft” crowd would show a bit more consistency. If they don’t like taxes, they should stay off the public roads, avoid the public airports, not eat in publically inspected restaurants, don’t drink water from public water systems, don’t eat inspected beef, avoid doctors with public licenses, and most of all, don’t post on that system developed and supported with tax dollars, the internet. Perhaps this holds libertarians to too strict a standard, since we must all live in the world as it is. But since we do live in the world, we must pay for the things we use. This is not theft, it is merely being an adult.

I oppose the income tax, but not for any of the reasons I read here. If you look at the history of the tax, it was not the poor who forced it on the rich (a doubtful proposition in any case) but the other way round. Because the alternative to taxing incomes is to tax wealth, especially wealth in land.

“I am not offended by a person lounging on his yacht--if it really is his yacht and not the fruits of a mere rentier income.”

Be offended by whatever, but you have no right to empower the State to determine who is deserving or not of their property.

“Still, I wish the “taxes are theft” crowd would show a bit more consistency. If they don’t like taxes, they should stay off the public roads, avoid the public airports, not eat in publically inspected restaurants, don’t drink water from public water systems, don’t eat inspected beef, avoid doctors with public licenses, and most of all, don’t post on that system developed and supported with tax dollars, the internet. Perhaps this holds libertarians to too strict a standard, since we must all live in the world as it is. But since we do live in the world, we must pay for the things we use. This is not theft, it is merely being an adult.”

By this reasoning, those who protested totalitarian states should not have eaten, or survived in order to preserve their ideological purity. A person who owns a gun in the US but who believes in the right to keep and bear arms is a hypocrite because he complies however reluctantly with myriad local, state, and federal gun laws.  An unjustly imprisoned man should perish behind bars rather than survive for another day in order to demonstrate his innocence.  My enemy the State occupies part of my life, so I must hide from it and not use any of its resources, paid with money stolen from me and countless others over the years, based on the reasoning of a statist.

Simon, my friend, it is clear that you do not understand the nature of property. Private property always depends on state power. After all, if you cannot call your neighbors to evict an intruder from your living room, you cannot really be said to own your own home. And if the community does not recognize your claim, they will not come. Now, we normally don’t call our neighbors; it is a power we have delegated to the police. And we don’t ask our neighbors to judge every property claim; we go to the courts. Private property is a paradox: it cannot exist without the state. And the more abstract, complex, and concentrated the forms of property, the more concrete, bureaucratic, and gargantuan the state that defends it. Adam Smith understood this principle perfectly when he said that gov’t “is in reality instituted for the defense of the rich against the poor, or of those who have some property against those who have none at all.” Therefore private property is paradoxical. That does not make in illegitimate. Not at all. But it does make it intellectually incoherent to uphold the private nature of property and deny its public origin and defense.

As far as the totalitarian state goes, protest all you like, and eat well while you do so. I will join you in this. But in the meantime, let us pay for what we eat.

JM, the brigands called the State impose themselves as the monopolists of force.  I consent to the State’s domination out of wariness of the State’s superior force, not out of the State having any moral claim to authority other than the truncheon.  I am responsible for the removal of the intruder, nor should I be able to coerce my neighbors to help me with my problems. I would pay private entities to assist me with matters beyond my means.  Saying only the State guarantees property is the same as saying the State ultimately owns the property - true by State force but not by natural right. Rather than resign myself to my own pillage at the hands of mankind’s greatest temporal enemy, I seek alternatives, such as that proposed by the Bay Area National Anarchists, which would allow for multiple societies that would address both your desires in a commonwealth, as well as mine and others, as different as they all may be.
I hope you are not lying about your ownership of B-H shares, since the more wealth the better, even if it is possessed by those with whom I have fundamental disagreements.  The wealth not only benefits you but also uncountable others. I care not, nor is it any of my or anyone elses’ business, how you obtained your shares, but that if you have them that is good.

Simon. I do not understand your comments. On the one hand, you seem to want to resolve private property to private violence. On the other, to natural law. Which is it? The only third alternative I can see is that you believe that natural law dictates force, and force alone. But I think this will turn out to be self-contradictory. If force is all, than group force is generally stronger than individual force, and therefore more “right.”

And if you catch this intruder in your living room, or your private army does, what will you do to him? Take him to a “private court.” Which one? Yours or his? Who gets to choose? Will you use the most competitively-price one? “Justice at pennies on the pound.” Or will you just shoot him?

The problem is, if private property depends on private force, then his claim might be better than yours, if he brings more force. I do not think you can escape this problem. And as for defending yourself with “private entities,” what if he outbids you for their services? Is every neighborhood, every homestead, every apartment, to be engaged in a perpetual arms race?

I don’t think you would actually like to live in the world you envision, and you only think you do because you haven’t given it enough vision.

And why do you assume I am lying about owning BH? Do assume people lie to you as a matter of course? More importantly, why do you think that owning one or 100 shares would make me better. Am I my bank account, my equity shares? And a few posts ago, you were convinced that Buffet was a robber of widows and orphans; now participating in this robbery supposedly benefits “uncountable others.” Well, if force is all, that would, I suppose, be true. But it is not. And if his fortune was from theft, I would not share it.

I’m sorry Simon, but I do not understand your world. And I suspect that when you describe it to others, some at least do not understand either. Or rather, perhaps they understand it all too well. Perhaps they prefer the devil they know to the hell your describe.

“Simon. I do not understand your comments. On the one hand, you seem to want to resolve private property to private violence. On the other, to natural law. Which is it? The only third alternative I can see is that you believe that natural law dictates force, and force alone. But I think this will turn out to be self-contradictory. If force is all, than group force is generally stronger than individual force, and therefore more “right.”

And if you catch this intruder in your living room, or your private army does, what will you do to him? Take him to a “private court.” Which one? Yours or his? Who gets to choose? Will you use the most competitively-price one? “Justice at pennies on the pound.” Or will you just shoot him?”

I am primarily responsible for the protection of myself, family, and property.  The violence I would being against he or those who would violate my rights would not be ‘private violence’ but proportional response, whether I do so myself or with the voluntary co-operation of others, paid or not.  The State is under no obligation to assist me in my time of need, as the SCOTUS as often ruled. I should force others to pay for my protection or other needs outside of what I can provide, or that others should force me to pay for theirs. You believe that multiple private jurisdictions are not feasible, yet I do not hear you complaining about State law and judicial co-operation on local, county, state, or centgov level.  Somehow we can have all sorts of alphabet agencies with State gun slingers such as BATFE, FBI, Homeland Security, locals, Agriculture, Forest, ad nauseum, not shoot one another up on a regular basis, because somehow the State’s ‘bl*ssing’ turns ravening private beasts into noble public servants. John, how many people have to have a State agent watching their moves to prevent them from committing criminal acts, and I mean real ones against someone’s person or property, or do they behave properly from other motives?  Mencken was right in stating that the State has people stirred up all the time against hobgoblins, mostly imaginary. Most peoples’ behavior is libertarian, live-and-let-live, without the State barging in to set us against one another.

“BH? Do assume people lie to you as a matter of course? More importantly, why do you think that owning one or 100 shares would make me better. Am I my bank account, my equity shares? And a few posts ago, you were convinced that Buffet was a robber of widows and orphans; now participating in this robbery supposedly benefits “uncountable others.” Well, if force is all, that would, I suppose, be true. But it is not. And if his fortune was from theft, I would not share it.”

I suspect people who make unprovable claims in their arguments from authority. Because I am adddressing you and not another B-H claimant I said that wealth is good for you, as well as the other people that B-H benefits.  Since you asked my opinion, I would rather you be ultra-wealty than poor.  I was criticising one aspect of Buffet’s financial empire, and lamenting the fact that the son of Old Right icon Howard Buffet would stoop to using the State’s tax-theft laws to enrich B-H, and that he would have the cheek to try to maintain the brigandage.  I object to Buffet or anyone else who uses political means to obtain wealth.  To the extent that he uses economic means to enrich B-H and himself Buffet has my admiration, but that does not excuse his partnership with the State for spoilation.

I cannot help your inability to comprehend my arguments in support of freedom, the free-market, non-aggression, and private property. Perhaps my writings, vastly inferior to the works of Woods, Gutzman, DiLorenzo, Raimondo, and others at this site who have libertarian leanings, are not clear enough, which is why I recommend people to try the above authors’ articles, or to venture over to http://www.lewrockwell.com or http://www.mises.org.  JM, I thank you for your comments, since I am now better informed about B-H than I was previously.  ST

http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig/jones1.html From a Buffet admirer.  ST

John M sed: “@ Frank The top 1% pay about 40% of all income taxes… Yes, but they own 38% of the wealth; that would seem to be mildly progressive.”

If 45% of ALL federal tax revenue comes from payroll taxes, then the top 10% pay LESS then 25% of all federal taxes, if you count the entire PAYROLL tax, which includes both the employee AND the employer contribution...This is because the PAYROLL tax only falls on individual incomes of less then...I believe $50,000. So anyone with an
income of $50,000 pays the full 15% on ALL of his income--in addition to the INCOME tax---remember the payroll tax is not subject to any deductions. Someone making $250,000 does not pay the additional 15% on $200,000 of his wealth.

Factoring in the REGRESSIVE payroll tax with the PROGRESSIVE income tax, and it turns out the “progressive” income
tax is far LESS progressive then the public is led to believe.

Mr. M is also correct that the burden on the “progressive” income tax falls hardest the lower your income, as the less you make, the more that income is spent on basic necessities...food, clothing, housing, insurance, etc. While the rich only pay on the EXCESS above and beyond the basic necessities, the income on their luxuries, the 10,000 ft2
home, the $50,000 automobile, the vacation home on the beach.

Thus you have the basic logic of the progressive tax system is that those who benefit the most should pay the most. The rich pay more on the income above the basic necessities, and the poor pay less on a total income that is destined entirely to be spend on necessities.

It is logical and just that those who benefit the most ffrom the economic system, should pay the most, and those who
can least afford to pay should contribute proportionately LESS. It is called simple equity.

Simple Simon sez: “I cannot help your inability to comprehend my arguments in support of freedom, the free-market, non-aggression, and private property.”

Only because the arguments on behalf of “Lazy Faire” and “Free Traitors” are illogical and based on flawed---nay, SKEWED data. You don’t understand basic economic principles, and rely on the 19th Century---iow, discredited--economic theory, and the writings of paid PIMPS for the CEO classes at the big “libertarian” think-tanks.

It’s not that anyone is opposed to “freedom, the free market, non-aggression and private property”, the problem is that the “free market” isn’t really free, and in fact doesn’t exist in the real world. The fact that you can’t comprehend that the use of economic power by the rich to stifle competition isn’t “aggression” is what makes your so-called “logic” so illogical. Aggressive behavior is AGGRESSION, and it has nothing to do with state power. How you can rail against the STATE, and not against the economic power of the CORPORATION---an extention of the state btw---is why “libertarian” theory is a joke, and “libertarians” are hypocrites.

Simon, you claim that your use of violence is merely “proportional response.” In whose judgment? Yours, or the intruders? And what if he is not an intruder, but someone with a counter-claim? This happens every day. How do you resolve such claims? By violence, or appeal to a common authority? But what authority is that if you don’t accept government authority?

You have yet to explain to me what you mean by the term “property,” or how it comes about. Here is the concrete problem: down at the county records office, there is a chain of title for your property that traces it back to what is known in law as “the sovereignty of the soil.” The first entry will always be something like “Grant from the King of Spain to Don Juan Diego” or “Homestead grant from the state of Oklahoma to John Smith.” From what you’ve told me, these would not be legitimate titles, since they depend on a gov’t grant. Very well. What would a libertarian chain of title look like? You haven’t shown me anything but privatized violence. So would a legitimate “libertarian” chain begin with “Simon Tregarth killed an Indian and took his land.” (Which, by the way, would be more descriptive of what actually happened.) Libertarians make a fetish of property, but never tell you precisely what they mean. (At least on the right; some left-wing libertarians do take the problem of property seriously.) The same is true with the other terms they use. They speak of “free markets” without ever telling us what they mean. The closest they get is to deny gov’t involvement, a market policed by private violence. Unlike most libertarian claims, such markets have existed; they can actually point to an existential corollary to their theories. However, such markets are always and without exception mafia dominated kleptocracies. Orderly markets always depend on an ordering authority that is superior to any individual player. If the state does not fill that role, some sort of mafia will. That’s history.

And I do not wish to be “ultra-rich.” Wealth is good when it reflects actual work, but bad when it reflects mere economic rent or externalized costs. Adam Smith noted the problem exactly: “Wherever there is great property there is great inequality. For one very rich man there must be at least five hundred poor, and the affluence of the few supposes the indigence of the many. The affluence of the rich excites the indignation of the poor, who are often both driven by want, and prompted by envy, to invade his possessions. It is only under the shelter of the civil magistrate that the owner of that valuable property, which is acquired by the labour of many years, or perhaps of many successive generations, can sleep a single night in security. He is at all times surrounded by unknown enemies, whom, though he never provoked, he can never appease, and from whose injustice he can be protected only by the powerful arm of the civil magistrate continually held up to chastise it. The acquisition of valuable and extensive property, therefore, necessarily requires the establishment of civil government. Where there is no property, or at least none that exceeds the value of two or three days labour, civil government is not so necessary.”

You tell me your ideas come from the Bible, and when I point out that the Bible says something else, you say, “Not that part of the Bible.” Very well. What part then? And how do you reconcile “your” part with all the other parts?

We differ in our approaches to the inheritance tax: you don’t like it because it breaks up estates; I don’t like it because it doesn’t. The point of the tax is not revenue, but social order and the preservation of property. If property can accumulate across endless generations, soon there will be a privileged and powerful group that dominates society through its control of property. Inheritance is of course a human right, but like all real rights it is not absolute, but has real limits; that’s what makes it a real right.

Finally, I think you are confusing personal testimony with the argument from authority. As a mere technical matter, this is incorrect.

“Only because the arguments on behalf of “Lazy Faire” and “Free Traitors” are illogical and based on flawed---nay, SKEWED data. You don’t understand basic economic principles, and rely on the 19th Century---iow, discredited--economic theory, and the writings of paid PIMPS for the CEO classes at the big “libertarian” think-tanks.”

No reasoning, just unsupported assertion backed by cheap invective.  Marvelous example of dying statist thinking.

“It’s not that anyone is opposed to “freedom, the free market, non-aggression and private property”, the problem is that the “free market” isn’t really free, and in fact doesn’t exist in the real world. The fact that you can’t comprehend that the use of economic power by the rich to stifle competition isn’t “aggression” is what makes your so-called “logic” so illogical. Aggressive behavior is AGGRESSION, and it has nothing to do with state power. How you can rail against the STATE, and not against the economic power of the CORPORATION---an extention of the state btw---is why “libertarian” theory is a joke, and “libertarians” are hypocrites.”

No one opposed to freedom, the free market, non-aggression and private property, except Joe Jacobin and his fellow state worshippers.  The part about aggressive behavior having nothing to do with state power is especially pungent, as if the blood-soaked 20th century never existed.  More class-warfare and name-calling from the anti-Christian bigot who sneeringly referred to me as a “Christian mystic” who should practice “Christian mysticism” on several occassions at this site.

@JP, I agree entirely with you on the nature of regressive and progressive taxation. Our tax system is nominally progressive but actually regressive, as a mere matter of empirical fact.

But whatever the moral arguments over a regressive tax, the economic arguments are unambiguous. When the burden of taxation is pushed down the economic scale, the market is narrowed and there develops an inevitable shortage of aggregate demand. This failure of demand must be redressed by non-economic means: charity, welfare, gov’t spending, or usury. All capitalist societies have gone to one form of Keynesianism or the other not necessarily out of conviction, but out of necessity; without such redistributions, demand fails and the economy collapses. Pre-Keynesian capitalism in the United States (1853-1953) was in recession or depression 40% of the time. Since 1953, the economy has been in recession only 15% of the time. And the post-Keynes recessions were shorter and milder than the pre-Keynes variety; our great-grandfathers would hardly have called them recessions at all.

Of course, Keynesianism is a stop-gap answer and deteriorates over time. We are in a time, and long past it, when that answer no longer works.

Now it’s Stupid Simon: “The part about aggressive behavior having nothing to do with state power is especially pungent, as if the blood-soaked 20th century never existed.”

Uh, Simple Simon is NOW Stupid Simon. The blood that has soaked the earth that you attribute to “statism” is actually IMPERIALISM, which is the use of state power to protect the interests of the FEW. In other words,
“liberatarianism”...I mean why is the US in Iraq, my dear? Yes, to protect the “free market” system of international finance capitalism, and the PETRO-DOLLAR which sustains it.  Yes, the military occupation of the Mideast is about forcing “democratic capitalism"---a la, IMPERIALISM on the world, at the mouth of a gun.

You Lazy-Faires and Free-traitors are a laugh riot, Simon, supporting globalization on one hand, and the system of finance that sustains it, and then claiming that it is “statism” that creates the wars--which are really about protecting the “free market"…

I mean it is American NATIONALISTS like myself that are the non-interventionists, not you “free traitors” that demand that the American worker on one hand bear the economic insecurity that YOU and YOURS champion, and then fight and DIE to sustain the system that oppresses them. We’ve had this discussion before, the more “free trade” the US has had to suffer, the MORE militarism and bloody wars that we have. I support Americcan economic sovereignty, and the government policies and tariffs that protect that sovereignty. YOu support “free trade” and the bloody wars that sustain it.

As we’ve pointed out before, you’re a muddle of confusion, a hopeless utopian, who can’t reconcile your ideological zeoltry with the REAL world, in which all the suffering is the result of your own ideas. Take ownership of yourself.

Another hypocrisy and disingenous argument we need to correct here is the myth of “double taxation” of corporate profits. The “libertarian” argument is that profits are already taxed at the corporate level, so taxing money when it is paid out as dividends to shareholders is taxing the same profit a second time.

Of course, any rational individual realizes that this ignores the enormous benefits granted to private interests to exist as a free standing legal entity with the important advantage is limited liability. If a corporation produces dangerous products or emits dangerous substances that result in thousands of deaths, shareholders in the corporation cannot be held personally responsible for the damage. The corporation can go bankrupt, but beyond that point, all the shareholders are off the hook, the victims of the damage are just out of luck.  What the state is doing is allowing private investors to shift private risk to society as a whole.

In exchange for this and other privileges of corporate status, the corporation must pay income tax on its earnings. We know that investors consider the benefits of corporate status to be worth the price in the form of the corporate income tax, because they voluntarily choose to form corporations. If investors did not consider the benefits of corporate status to outweigh the cost of the income tax, then they are free to form partnerships which are not subject to corporate income tax.

In this way, corporate income tax is a completely voluntary tax. Anyone can avoid the tax by investing in a partnership, or alternatively, any corporation can be restructured as a partnership.

The whole “libertarian” argument of ‘freedom’ falls apart when they attack state power, but then defend the “rights” of legalities created by the state over the rights of individuals. All the “government-is-theft” nonsense that Simple Simons spout is proven to be mere HYPOCRISY as corporate power is a form of state power that “libertarians” support under the rhetoric of “free enterprise”.

One more thing on Simple Simon, now Stupid Simon: Now it’s Stupid Simon: “The part about aggressive behavior having nothing to do with state power is especially pungent, as if the blood-soaked 20th century never existed.”

Uh, as Pat Buchanan pointed out, WWI/WWII---the bloodest wars in history---were about protecting the British Empire, ie, “free trade”....Winston Churchill, like Bush2 was a “free traitor"…

Simple Simon sez: “No reasoning, just unsupported assertion backed by cheap invective.  Marvelous example of dying statist thinking.”

Uh, you’ve failed to defend the illogical contradictions in your “libertarian” ideology. That is the failute to recognize that the use of economic power is as much “aggression” as the “state power” that protects the rest of us from that aggression.

Again, we prove that “libertarian” rhetoric about “freedom” is either illogical zeolotry comparable to Communism, or mere simplistic thinking for intellectual morons, or just disingenous arguments on behalf of oligarchy.

Or perhaps a combination of all three.

“Uh, Simple Simon is NOW Stupid Simon. The blood that has soaked the earth that you attribute to “statism” is actually IMPERIALISM, which is the use of state power to protect the interests of the FEW. In other words,
“liberatarianism”...I mean why is the US in Iraq, my dear? Yes, to protect the “free market” system of international finance capitalism, and the PETRO-DOLLAR which sustains it.  Yes, the military occupation of the Mideast is about forcing “democratic capitalism"---a la, IMPERIALISM on the world, at the mouth of a gun.”

Yes, those two well-known libertarians, Mao and Stalin, under the banner of Mises made their nations epic graveyards.  Why, they were only supporting free-trade, non-aggression, and property rights, along with such free-market stalwarts as Pol Pot, Mengistu, and Castro.  Ah, the blessings of the enlightened State.  Anything that Joe Jacobin likes is due to the State, anything he denounces is the fault of the all-pervasive Libertarian boogey-man.

“I mean it is American NATIONALISTS like myself that are the non-interventionists, not you “free traitors” that demand that the American worker on one hand bear the economic insecurity that YOU and YOURS champion, and then fight and DIE to sustain the system that oppresses them. We’ve had this discussion before, the more “free trade” the US has had to suffer, the MORE militarism and bloody wars that we have. I support Americcan economic sovereignty, and the government policies and tariffs that protect that sovereignty. YOu support “free trade” and the bloody wars that sustain it”

You mean American National Socialist, as you so charmingly admitted before of being an advocate of state capitalism, Herr Hitler’s free-market system.  Non-interventionist yet singing the praises of military spending for its wonderful economic effects, as well as the safety and stability the increasingly authoritarian State provides. more name calling, but perhaps if you close your eyes, hold your breath, and wish really hard, those terrible all-powerful world-besridding libertarians will go, leaving you with the imperial carcass you so love.  And of course, Joe Jacobin would never employ ad hominem attacks, he just loses control of his cap lock keys sometimes.

Again, we prove that “libertarian” rhetoric about “freedom” is either illogical zeolotry comparable to Communism, or mere simplistic thinking for intellectual morons, or just disingenous arguments on behalf of oligarchy.

The only thing that ‘we prove’ proves is that you have multiple personalities, all of which are ranting statist grandiose wonders.

I notice that few other posters reply to your primal screaming, but will correspond with one who often agrees with you, such as JM.  Perhaps those other posters are on to something.

@JP, I don’t think that Simon is the least bit “stupid” or “simple.” I just think there are issues he hasn’t faced.

As for the “double taxation” argument, even if valid, it is easy to fix by simply making the dividends deductible to the firm. But the firms don’t want this, since they already have enough deductions and “deferrals” to keep them from paying very much in taxes.

I do think capital gains should be taxed as ordinary income, although inflation-indexed for the time they were held.

“Simon, you claim that your use of violence is merely “proportional response.” In whose judgment? Yours, or the intruders? And what if he is not an intruder, but someone with a counter-claim? This happens every day. How do you resolve such claims? By violence, or appeal to a common authority? But what authority is that if you don’t accept government authority?”

I believe in multiple societies, so in the case above I would have legal (not necessarily) recourse to treat the intruder as I please in some, such as Texas, or practice more limited means in others, all actions subject to review by the private courts in my jurisdiction. Early Iceland and Ireland, as well as pre-colonial (and to some extent post-colonial Somalia under the Xeer, may prove instructive. You in turn have not made a case, moral or otherwise, for the state’s claim to the monopoly of force within its boundaries.

What is private property? Hoppe has a better answer than I can formulate at: http://www.lewrockwell.com/hoppe/hoppe11.html.  See Section III for a short answer. You keep on about private violence as if public violence is to be preferred, as if a badge, a gun, and a brigand in a black dress possess some talismatic powers unattainable by the private sector. Hoppe also discusses private property in terms of legitimate possession of self as well as property.

You are within your rights to reject wealth for yourself.  It is when you use poltical means to circumscribe the wealth of others that you cross over into immorality, if not criminality.  As long as someone does not use theft or violence to obtain his wealth, he is entitled to it.  You lack understanding of self-ownership as well as property ownership, but here we will have to disagree and go on.

“You tell me your ideas come from the Bible, and when I point out that the Bible says something else, you say, “Not that part of the Bible.” Very well. What part then? And how do you reconcile “your” part with all the other parts?”

The Decalogue, the Golden Rule, the Old Testament unless it is supperseded by the New Testament.  Quaint notions such as not stealing, not coveting my neighbors goods, not worshipping false g*ds, such as the State (see Bierce’s definition of Satan in The Devil’s Dictionary), not lying, not killing - all matters that the State vastly exceeds in defying throughout known history.  See Samuel Book II regarding kings.

“We differ in our approaches to the inheritance tax: you don’t like it because it breaks up estates; I don’t like it because it doesn’t. The point of the tax is not revenue, but social order and the preservation of property. If property can accumulate across endless generations, soon there will be a privileged and powerful group that dominates society through its control of property. Inheritance is of course a human right, but like all real rights it is not absolute, but has real limits; that’s what makes it a real right.”

The inheritance tax is wrong because it steals just as does the thief when he takes the church’s poor box, only the state does so on a vastly greater level and does much greater harm.  A similar comparison would be Ted Bundy and George Bush.  See Augustine of Hippo account of Alexander the Great Killer and his confrontation with the captured pirate.  Yes there is a privileged and powerful group - it’s called the State, the greatest property owner in the US, the largest employer in the US, and the only entity in the US that its worshippers expect to police itself and properly judge and administer its own limits.

I appreciate your measured and intelligent questions and answers, and look forward to reading the link you posted.  Civility is prized especially in the heat of rhetorical combat involving fundamental disagreements.  ST

Uh, as Pat Buchanan pointed out, WWI/WWII---the bloodest wars in history---were about protecting the British Empire, ie, “free trade”....Winston Churchill, like Bush2 was a “free traitor"…

I did not know that PJB used marxoid analysis to link libertarianism to the British Empire.  Your constant conflation of the British Empire with libertarianism shows that you cannot tell the difference between British crony capitalism/mercantilism/corporatism and a child’s lemonade stand.

Simon, Hoppe is merely regurgitating Locke’s theory. However, Locke doesn’t have one theory. He has two. One is usufruct for “original appropriation”; the other is contract for everything else (of course, he doesn’t tell us how you can have contract without law.) The central premise of his thesis is not even addressed: namely that original use confers absolute and endless possession. He just slides from one concept to the other without really examining it. Maybe, but there is no logic linking the two. It is merely asserted; a hiatus in the central part of a theory is always the sign of a failed theory. But Locke really wasn’t interested in theory’s flaws. Rather, he was trying to justify a new form—or newly dominant form—of property that resulted from the seizure of the monasteries and the enclosure of the commons. This turned England over to a completely new class and impoverished the previously prosperous peasantry. If Locke’s theory is true, if valid title depends on original occupation, no one has any valid titles. But this is not important, because the use of the theory is ideological rather than legal.

Land is not like anything else. If, with my own labor and my own tools and my own materials I make a widget, the widget is mine as long as it lasts. Of course, it doesn’t last forever, so the ownership of it is self-limiting. But even the “original user” did not make the land. You cannot claim the God-given land in the same way you claim the man-made widget. I am quite happy with a usufruct theory; I am unhappy with two theories. If ownership is originally usufruct, why isn’t it always usufruct? What happens between the first owner and every other owner that changes the nature of ownership of usufruct to contract? Hoppe (and Locke) does not address this question, and hence has no real theory. It is a mere ideology, because it has no effect on current ownership.

This last point is critical. Neither you, nor I, nor Hoppe can trace any actual title to this original use. You’re from San Francisco, I gather, hence your land originates in a grant from the King of Spain. More accurately, it originates in an act of violence against the previous possessors. If you were consistent, you would renounce the land you own, because its original title is defective under your own theory. But libertarians always find libertarianism something meant for somebody else. Hoppe’s theory serves an ideological function; it is ahistoricism parading as history. But the history is well-known, and it contradicts Hoppe.

And I fail to see how you can call a court “private” if it has jurisdiction over you. You are quite willing to kill the intruder; the more interesting question is what happens when the intruder kills you and takes possession. Who will dispute him, since no one has authority? He doesn’t like your court and has bought one of his own. What will you sorrowing heirs do? You cannot and will not answer these questions because there is no answer within radical libertarianism (mutualist libertarians do recognize the authority of the community to resolve such questions.)

You assert, without saying how, that the Decalogue forbids taxes. Odd that nobody in the Bible seems to notice this, and only your interpretation makes the conclusion Holy Writ. Yet, I am willing to grant to the Jews knowledge of their own law. And when I point out what Deuteronomy actually says about land, somehow that part of the Bible doesn’t apply. This sounds like a highly selective reading of the Scriptures, one dictated more by ideology than theology. And yes, I address Sam II in my paper. I even address the competing land ideologies in the Bible.

You don’t address my point about the accumulation of property; you merely respond with the incantation, “State bad; private court good.” Pardon me if I point out that this does not add up to an argument. Public authority has existed in every single human society, from the most primitive to the most advanced. I find it suspicious that you want to get rid of that which nobody thought they could do without. You may be right, and the rest of humanity wrong. But a certain humility compels us to give deference and respect to the common opinions of mankind, especially when so universally held across all times and places, no matter how diverse the forms or different the cultures or contentious the religions.

As for the moral case for the public monopolization of force, let me say that individual force is only justified for immediate and individual defense. The use of force is a public decision, not a private one. As a practical matter, if this is not true, that all of society must dissolve into a series of purely private decisions on when to use force. This is why libertarianism strikes me as mere violence elevated to the level of philosophy, the guiding principle of the mafia.

States exceed their briefs, which should be very brief. But one cannot conclude from that that states have no brief. For this function, which you claim they do not have, is the very function no society has felt it could do without. Now, let me give you my test for any theory that deals with the real world: Do the people who hold that theory act in a way consistent with that theory. There are one or two libertarians who actually do; for the rest, it seems to be a game. No Libertarian of my acquaintance reads Locke and says, “Ohmygosh! I don’t own my land!” Since the theory Hoppe proposes is not the one he follows, we are permitted to conclude that he is not serious, but a mere ideologue.

And now with the bail-out of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, people are further reinforced in the impression of the US as an incompetent plutocracy.  So when the hoi polloi start thinking maybe socialized medicine and an expansion of the EIC isn’t such a bad thing, I assume nobody here will be shocked.

Simple Simon sez:  “Your constant conflation of the British Empire with libertarianism shows that you cannot tell the difference between British crony capitalism/mercantilism/corporatism and a child’s lemonade stand.”

No Simple Simon. What you think libertarianism is doesn’t exist. The WAR against Terrorism is about
defending globalization, which is the “free market” in the real world, where everyone but ideological zeolots like
you seem to exist.

Endlessly debating how many angels can dance on the head of a pin makes for entertaining amusement for adolescent boys, academics, and others with a lot of empty time on their hands. But it has a much relevance to the rest of us, as your continuous pontification about the “free market” and “government-is-theft”, and other inane ideas that only the idle can afford to devote any effort to.

The rest of us live in the REAL world, where the “free market” is about the reality of international finance capitalism---the FED/World Bank/Wall Street/IMF system, and the endless war that the working folk must suffer through to defend it.

Mark sed: “@JP, I don’t think that Simon is the least bit “stupid” or “simple.” I just think there are issues he hasn’t faced.”

Well, I agree. But it’s far worse then that. Simon is an ideological zeolot, he doesn’t see the issues because he doesn’t want to see them. I’ve spent a lot of time in the labor movement fighting communists, to know one when I see one....not a communist, but an ideological zeolot, a mindless utopian. What makes him dangerous is not only that he can’t face up to the issues you point out, but that he would mindless pursue his own agenda no matter what the consequenses.

He is a the moral and intellectual equivalent of a Communist, the only difference is the commies demand “perfect” equality, and libertarians demand “perfect” freedom, and under both systems the rest of us suffer.

Simple Simon sez: “Yes, those two well-known libertarians, Mao and Stalin, under the banner of Mises made their nations epic graveyards.  Why, they were only supporting free-trade, non-aggression, and property rights, along with such free-market stalwarts as Pol Pot, Mengistu, and Castro...You mean American National Socialist, as you so charmingly admitted before of being an advocate of state capitalism, Herr Hitler’s free-market system.”

Oh poop. I fought communists in the Labor movement for 30 years, so I don’t need to defend myself from the likes of YOU...and I’ve suffered plenty of accusations by these commies that I am a “fascist” so you pathetic accusations are as silly as your blind belief in the existance of the “free market"…

Simplistic Simon sez: “Non-interventionist yet singing the praises of military spending for its wonderful economic effects, as well as the safety and stability the increasingly authoritarian State provides...”

More poop. Look, I merely point out to YOU that the technological advances that YOU attribute to the “free market” are actually the result of state financed research and technology...not only military contractors but the
NIH, and the SPACE program...the fact that you can’t admit it only proves what a hopeless boob you are.

“No Simple Simon. What you think libertarianism is doesn’t exist. The WAR against Terrorism is about
defending globalization, which is the “free market” in the real world, where everyone but ideological zeolots like
you seem to exist”

The war on some terrorism exists to expand the powers of the State and to enrich its cronies.  I am a ‘freedom zeolot’.

“I’ve spent a lot of time in the labor movement fighting communists, to know one when I see one....not a communist, but an ideological zeolot, a mindless utopian. What makes him dangerous is not only that he can’t face up to the issues you point out, but that he would mindless pursue his own agenda no matter what the consequenses.”

More ad hominem from someone whose logic and written contradictions from week to week take more twists and turns than a New York pretzel on acid.  Such is to be expected from an anti-Christian bigot - would you like to get into my ‘Christian mysticism’ again, Joe Jacobin?  How about submitting an article about endemic union violence that has plagued this country for years, such as the interesting Kohler Strike, and the actions of the irenic Teamsters and UAW?  You write like a union thug with your cheap threats and hollow bravado.

Simple Simon sez: “Yes, those two well-known libertarians, Mao and Stalin, under the banner of Mises made their nations epic graveyards.  Why, they were only supporting free-trade, non-aggression, and property rights, along with such free-market stalwarts as Pol Pot, Mengistu, and Castro...You mean American National Socialist, as you so charmingly admitted before of being an advocate of state capitalism, Herr Hitler’s free-market system.”

Oh poop. I fought communists in the Labor movement for 30 years, so I don’t need to defend myself from the likes of YOU...and I’ve suffered plenty of accusations by these commies that I am a “fascist” so you pathetic accusations are as silly as your blind belief in the existance of the “free market"…

The question was what ideology resulted in the horrible losses of life in the 20th century, statism or libertarianism.  You do not answer this but instead backtrack on your previous writings where you admit that you espouse state capitalism, the ideology of Hitler and Mussolini.  You do not defend your belief on its merits, but then your claimed experiences with communists illustrate Pogo’s maxim, “We have met the enemy, and they are us.”

“More poop. Look, I merely point out to YOU that the technological advances that YOU attribute to the “free market” are actually the result of state financed research and technology...not only military contractors but the
NIH, and the SPACE program...the fact that you can’t admit it only proves what a hopeless boob you are”

If your claim is correct, then take credit for the ultimate horrors created in the State’s terror shops, such as nuclear weapons and other WsMD, all blights that could not have been developed by the free market.  More rhetoric from a poster child for naked statism.

“This last point is critical. Neither you, nor I, nor Hoppe can trace any actual title to this original use. You’re from San Francisco, I gather, hence your land originates in a grant from the King of Spain. More accurately, it originates in an act of violence against the previous possessors. If you were consistent, you would renounce the land you own, because its original title is defective under your own theory. But libertarians always find libertarianism something meant for somebody else. Hoppe’s theory serves an ideological function; it is ahistoricism parading as history. But the history is well-known, and it contradicts Hoppe”

Hoppe answers this question with his remarks about a possessor’s holdings, time, and valid prior claim subject to legitimate authority.  I am not anti-authority, I am anti-state.  I see no contradiction with my position.  I do see that you and I have turned this thread into the JM-ST show, and that is perhaps why we are the only two making comments on this off-topic matter.

“You assert, without saying how, that the Decalogue forbids taxes. Odd that nobody in the Bible seems to notice this, and only your interpretation makes the conclusion Holy Writ. Yet, I am willing to grant to the Jews knowledge of their own law. And when I point out what Deuteronomy actually says about land, somehow that part of the Bible doesn’t apply. This sounds like a highly selective reading of the Scriptures, one dictated more by ideology than theology. And yes, I address Sam II in my paper. I even address the competing land ideologies in the Bible”
JM, substitute ‘taxes’ for ‘slavery’ in your quote above. Neither you nor anyone else on this site has made any moral justification for taxation.  I purchase state-controlled adulterated milk, courtesy in part to Reagan - I do not purchase the threat of pre-dawn no-knock raids financed by my tax frns.  I try to adhere to “Thou shall not steal”, but such a doctrine is impossible with the State oozing into every life aspect.  I reject utterly your contention that the State creats property rights - I am born with the right of self-ownership that consequently endows me with having the right to own property.  The State can only recognize or deny rights - it has only powers granted to it by the subject/citizen.  Bastiat’s and de la Boetie’s priciples trump any that you have stated, no matter what your eloquence and scholarship, which I admit are both deep and formidable.

“You don’t address my point about the accumulation of property; you merely respond with the incantation, “State bad; private court good.” Pardon me if I point out that this does not add up to an argument. Public authority has existed in every single human society, from the most primitive to the most advanced. I find it suspicious that you want to get rid of that which nobody thought they could do without. You may be right, and the rest of humanity wrong. But a certain humility compels us to give deference and respect to the common opinions of mankind, especially when so universally held across all times and places, no matter how diverse the forms or different the cultures or contentious the religions.”

Substitute the word ‘slavery’ for ‘public authority’.  I am hardly the first to attack the very legitimacy of the State, but thanks for the compliment anyway.  An idea’s popularity is hardly a test of its legitimacy.  The belief that “all men have a piece of God within them, whether slave or Emperor”, (paraphrased from Andre Morrell’s all-too-brief performance in “Ben-Hur"), was not popular when first propogated, but was and is nonetheless true.  When mankind’s opinion (hard to define, but I understand your concept) is wrong I try to do what I believe is right, based on my previously stated beliefs.  If man could not evolve spiritually, socially, and politically, we would still be living in the dark and Dark - for example, the enormity of no Chevy mega-cubic inch Rat motors.

“As for the moral case for the public monopolization of force, let me say that individual force is only justified for immediate and individual defense. The use of force is a public decision, not a private one. As a practical matter, if this is not true, that all of society must dissolve into a series of purely private decisions on when to use force. This is why libertarianism strikes me as mere violence elevated to the level of philosophy, the guiding principle of the mafia”
JM, you again endow the State with magical powers that you nowhere justify.  I reject your concept of a ‘Mad Max’ jungle if we had no state.  I propose that most human action is anarchic, whether on the roads or in the supermarket.  A quasi-anarchic society of fallen men and women creats order, not a fear of public goons or the universal presense of same.  If you were right, the Hobbesian masses would easily overwhelm the relatively few guardians of the State in very short order.  Vermont gun owners behave the way they do not because of draconian gun laws, but rather in part from the laws’ paucity. The State is an organized gang and always evolves from recognized pillage into something made more appealing by court philosophers, but put lipstick on a pig ... (with due respects to the noble porkers).
“States exceed their briefs, which should be very brief. But one cannot conclude from that that states have no brief. For this function, which you claim they do not have, is the very function no society has felt it could do without. Now, let me give you my test for any theory that deals with the real world: Do the people who hold that theory act in a way consistent with that theory. There are one or two libertarians who actually do; for the rest, it seems to be a game. No Libertarian of my acquaintance reads Locke and says, “Ohmygosh! I don’t own my land!” Since the theory Hoppe proposes is not the one he follows, we are permitted to conclude that he is not serious, but a mere ideologue.”
Your question does not meet the standard that it trys to impose.  Is a fallen Christian to give up his pursuit of God despite multiple shortcomings?  The ideas of freedom and self-ownership stand on thier own - the personal flaws of their exponents mean little but to their possessors.  I do not reject the liberty theses Mises or Rothbard because of their reputed atheism, but I recognize their God-given messages of dignity and freedom, and hope God embraces them both despite their past denial of Him.

JM, do you have a weblog - we have hijacked this thread and may be in danger of ejection, and even if not we are violating the providers’ generosity?  Thank you for your measured and thought-provoking comments.  The best to you.  ST

JM, a quick addition to my reply to your statement about libertarians adherence to their own principles.  Mises and Rothbard both turned down offers of power, prestige, and pelf throughout their professional careers, even as their beliefs evolved, and remained unbending champions of freedom to the end of their days, sacrifing fame, mainstream acceptance, and greater financial reward.

Simon, my blog is at http://distributism.blogspot.com

You seem to be agreeing with me that your ideas involve a certain contempt for the general opinion of mankind. Your excuse is slavery, an argument which would impress me, if slavery were abolished today, which it is not. Libertarians have not the slightest hesitation using goods made by slaves, and worse than slaves. In fact, slavery designated certain social arrangements, from the meanest to the highest. The Grand Viziers of the Turkish empire were almost always slaves, as were the highest officials of the late Roman Empire.

The rest of the argument is just a repetition of “State bad!”, with a naive belief, based on nothing you’ve shared with us, that everything would work out fine without a state. This may be true, but no one has tried it. And the source of your confidence remains a deeply held secret.

JM, thank you for the link. It’s still action and reaction with us. I oppose state-imposed boycotts for reasons you will understand, based on my previous comments.  I buy products from chattel-slave states just as I buy products made in the hyper-imperial tax-slave USA whose centgov is in the midst of turning several areas in the world into charnel houses. US embargoes work so well, which is why the Castro and Kim dictorships passed away so many years ago. Yes, I am aware of janissaries, and even read the thrilling three book series of the same name, written by Jerry Pournelle and his collaborators.

John, I never claimed, and would never claim, that a libertarian society would create a paradise on earth for fallen man.  I oppose the State in part because it takes virtually every evil that besets man and amplifies them beyond anything a free society could create.  Dislike violence - the State gives us world spanning wars.  Dislike gang violence - the State gives us the Waco holocaust and threatens more. Hate abortion - the SCOTUS overrides the lesser tyrants and makes it a State-sanctioned secular sacrament. Oppose thievery - the State is the largest thief of all time, and spends much of its efforts in convincing us otherwise. I use slavery in my response to you to illustrate a practice that was always immoral but that was not until recently thought immoral and then made illegal (except tax-slavery and conscription still survive).  Mises started small - in 1920 he prodicted the eventual implosion of the Soviet Empire when such a forecast was considered jejune to the extreme.

http://distributism.blogspot.com

JM, that is quite a blog you have.  Clean, professional, readable, with much wheat mixed in the chaff.  It’s no http://www.mises.org, but it surely beats the pants off Sojourners. Recommended. Congratulations.  Your new blog vistior, the ‘Freedom Fanatic’, ST

Simon, Thank you for your comments on my blog. As for this conversation, you just keep repeating, “I hate the State!” But the only alternative you seem to offer is privatized violence. I don’t know what else to say.

Our experience is that when states fall apart, mafias take over. And “hate the state” is not a principle. All the state-haters who came to Washington and London under Reagan and Thatcher, and came with copies of Hayek and Mises in hand, ended up growing the state faster than the liberals could have imagined.

You may hate cancer as well. But as it turns out, mere hatred won’t shrink it.

John would seem to have the traits of a fine totalitarian.  Always has to have the last word.  Data that support his opinion are always the most authoritative. Dishonestly dismisses his opponents arguments with over simplification and false characterization.

Simon, JFourtier continues what seems to be a libertarian motif on this list, namely the descent to personal invective and pure ad hominem. Is this some kind of Libertarian tradition?

John:
You just keep making my point.

As usual, the aptly named Dirk W Sabin makes the best statement of the thread when he writes that we are arguing over deck chair placement on a certain 1912 mega-liner, what with the coming societal disaster via our masters and ourselves.

JF, I thank you for chiming in - those of my ilk have been in short supply on this thread.  Statism is a large tent, but a system that ultimately ends in totalism.  That JM is a statist is beyond question - he would use State means to accomplish ends he desires.  Libertarianism also casts a wide net, as witness the liberventionists.  My problems with JM stem from his arguments from tradition, as if man must bear the burden of the State because he has for so long, his claim that the State created property rights (in the same way that King John created the rights of Englishmen at Runnymeade in 1215?) and that society would explode into an all against all death match without the State. He and I talk past one another because we both reject each others basic premises, so the best we can do is to maintain a civil discourse and hope that he, a highly intellegent and erudite individual, will make a breakthrough at some point in his scholarship.  Reading his posting and his weblog, he is not a Red Guard cadre - whether or not he would permit the State to use force up to and include killing, to enforce his ideas regarding fair wages and other social justice concepts is a question best put to him. We talk past one another - when he accused libertarians of commerce with ‘evil’ states I pointed out that those in the US live in a enormous glass house regarding such matters, as well as the futility of state embargoes (be interesting to see when other states get sick of the drunk-as-a-lord spending, mad-bomber regime in DC, and declare an embargo against the US - guess the centgov will just have to invade more countries, and teach the lessers their manners.) The US centgov is in the race for the gruesome honor of top body count worldwide, but I am not about to kill myself over the evil perpetrated by those I oppose.  Also note that the number of US companies that employ ‘convict labor’ withing the US is large and growing - to avoid not purchasing for such would take up more time than obtaining toilet paper in line in the USSR. He throws out a lot of red herrings, such as libertarianism is an all or nothing proposition.  For some perhaps, but again too broad a brush.  I am also a voluntarist, so a return to Constitutional gov would be a vast improvement over the present situation, and one I would support.  At that point, freedom could be expanded, perhaps on a local or regional level, and results assessed.  I support the Bay Area National Anarchists for this reason - many communities free to live their own way, such as Amish, Catholics, Socialists, everyone.

Basic premises: hold the State to the same standards you apply to libertarianism.  Hold the State to the same standards that are applied to individuals.  If my private security company had been responsible for the Ruby Ridge Murders or the Waco Holocaust, would the public and the State react as they did?  Why or why not?  The argument concerning private vs state violence is specious - both should be held to the same scutiny yet are not.  Why do we hold the State up as a false g*d on Earth, with extra-moral powers?  The state is composed of people, who all share the tendency to wish the most with the least effort.  When you empower those who use political means, rather than ecomonic means, to make concrete their desires, what do you obtain? Albert J Nock had that answer.

Mankind this, mankind that.  Peter the Rock did not ask mankinds opinion - he set out to change it in the Risen One’s name (it’s thrilling to write on a pro-Christian web-site).  I find the Lord’s aphorism regarding Caesar, the false g*d, to be an unsurpassed defense of private property, as was pointed out on the finest sole-author weblog site that I have found on the Internet, http://www.freedominourtime.blogspot.com (cannot recommend highly enough)from the keyboard of treasure William N Grigg.  Since Caesar is nothing but a thief, aggressor, and murderer we owe him nothing but contempt, but must pay our debts to our debtors, as well as respect one another’s private property, yielding God our ultimate allegience.  Who knows mankind’s mind?  No one, because mankind doesn’t have one, only individuals do.  Reject the groupthink and the constant royal ‘we’.  Since it is but force and fear, how does the State see fit to judge anything?  Its sole concern is its own survival, followed closely by its lust for aggrandisement.  The State is indeed a cancer, JM, and has proven itself thus since the first brigand set his hand to people and land.
Regarding the loutishness you perceive on this thread, JM, try to rise above it and keep to the debated premises.  Some intemperance is one thing, but if statism and libertarianism were to be judged by the remarks posted here, which side do you think would win the civility debate (simple, stupid, commie, snicker,hate, ad nauseum)?  The Christian Mystic

Simon, To start with “loutishness,” why are you lecturing me? I have called no one bad names, even though I have been called bad names. I have merely pointed out that Libertarians seem to stoop to this argument on a fairly regular basis, and it is fair to point that out.

As far as being a “statist,” this is not true. I am an enemy of the modern, totalizing state. But I am a friend of order, and every breakdown in government leads not to a libertarian paradise, but a mafia-style kleptocracy. This is not an argument from “tradition,” it is an argument from history. History is the only laboratory of social ideas. We know how things work by seeing how they actually did work.

Both Marx and Mises have a history; both lead to the same place. Both promise a “withering away of the state.” Both lead to the gargantuan state. History will teach us nothing if we ignore it; experience is meaningless is we value ideology over actuality. I am suspicious of abstractions. It is easy enough to come up with abstract systems, perfect in their completeness. But only history tells you if they work. As the sage notes, “Philosophy is easy; plumbing is hard.” Building castles in the air is easy; making the toilets flush is hard. Personally, I do not believe any social idea unless and until someone can show me how it works on the ground, and everything I have advocated has a history which honest men can judge in practice, and not merely in theory.

Further, it is easy to conclude that Libertarians do not take their own ideas seriously, meaning they do not put them into practice in their own lives. I ask you the origins of your property, and you point me to Hoppe, who points me to a fanciful “history.” But the real history is that your property traces to an act of state violence against an innocent and harmless people.

All of your arguments are “all or nothing” arguments. But, as I never tire of pointing out, such arguments always end up in favor of the “all,” since no one in practice chooses the nothing. The answer to the modern state is not “no-state,” but examining what a proper role for the state is, and how it is properly constituted and by what practical means it is limited.

JM, substitute ‘we’ for ‘you’ re: loutishness. I descibe you as a statist since you believe in the State as final arbiter, as creator of property and individual rights. Marxism claims to lead to freedom, but to get there via the State fist, totally different from Mises. JM, what happens to those who defy your fair wage - will you allow them to secede, to go their own way, or must it be only your way by way of the State? I am a volunteerist - who is being the all or nothing one here?  I reject your concept of property - man has always had that and other rights, such as the right to keep and bear arms - it is the State that has to be dragged kicking and screaming to reluctantly recognize facts on the ground, rights that it later twists and denies when the State believes it can so act. If mankind’s opinion were so all-important, the First American War of Secession would not have been launched. You claimed that libertarians have truck with slavers - I answered that the US hardly has clean hands in this matter, and ask you to hold the State to the same impossible standard you hold libertarians and individuals.  Silence on your part, because you cannot morally justify either taxation or the State - you use the ‘ends justify the means, and I use State means’ excuse. I reject your definition of property. Land is unique, as is air, water, and to a lesser extent, oil.  But they are all still commodities, and based on their characteristics can be treated as commodities. Do you not see that your idea of property and its origin applies equally to the State? JM, as I stated before, we reject each other’s basic premises, so what is the use of arguing?

JM, please do not require that libertarians be purer than the State when the US State on all of its murderous level enables over one million abortions per year, even funding some of the infanticide with taxes, and gives billions of frns to other countries who do the same, such as Israel and its near sixty thousand yearly abortions (Israel abortion rate is twice the US). Stop making the good the enemy of the perfect,but only when it comes to libertarians.  Christian Mystic

Simon, there you go again. The argument is “everybody who is not an anarchist is a statist.” Sure, by that definition, who isn’t? Let me just observe that your world lacks nuance.

But it is somewhat amusing when you speak of gov’t and abortions. Sure, the government allows it, but private enterprise does it. Without gov’t, what would be the bar? Indeed, without gov’t, what we be the bar to killing anybody you disliked? Revenge by the relatives? Maybe your tribe is stronger and you don’t worry about that tribe.

You say that people hold property apart from gov’t, but in all of human history, you cannot provide me with an example. Nor can you even tell me in theory what happens. Yes, you say you will hire people to shoot the intruder, but won’t tell me what happens if he shoots first, or hires more than you can.

One doesn’t have to dream of anarchy; we know what it looks like, and it is a nightmare.

But at least you have explained adequately the Libertarian penchant for personal invective. After all, if the world is divided into black and white, those who are not “white” must be black-hearted indeed. Now I understand.

And as a simple matter of fact, I have never used “the ends justify the means as an argument.”

“Without gov’t, what would be the bar? Indeed, without gov’t, what we be the bar to killing anybody you disliked? Revenge by the relatives? Maybe your tribe is stronger and you don’t worry about that tribe.”

Fantasy.  Who is history’s greatest killer - the State.  JM, you and your neighbor are not at each other throat’s only because of the State? The State gives us judgement, morals, religious morals, restraint, self respect? the State tells us to steal, cheat, murder, lie - as long as it’s sanctioned by the State.  How could libertarians invade Iraq, world wars? I would take my chances with a libertarian society, but it is House odds with the state, unless you are properly connected.

All totalists are statists.  All statists are not totalists.  You have sound judgements on your weblog, and I would not have recommended it if it were totalist groupthink.

But at least you have explained adequately the Libertarian penchant for personal invective. After all, if the world is divided into black and white, those who are not “white” must be black-hearted indeed. Now I understand.

Denigration by over simplification.  You still have not answered how you would treat those who oppose your policies, how you hold libertarianism and individuals to impossible standards but give the State a pass subject only to its self-restrain (state restraint being ahistorical to the max), ignore the pre-colonial quasi-libertarian Somalian experience, and ignore my respect for a Constitutional republic, with the hope and goal for more freedom in the future. It is ironic that the State has created the current bloody meltdown of order and diminution of freedom, yet I am expected to give you a detailed plan of libertarian blueprints for the future.  JM, the Amish are doing fine without the State (to the extent the State allows their existence) and I believe all sorts of societies are possible without an overlord, even one that would fill your bill. This much is true - while the State exists in its current form there will never be freedom for experimental societies on a widespread basis. Some of those societies may be abortionist, and some may not, but they would not all suffer under the centgov (all for one and only state).  Only 100 years ago did we have documented powered flight, but the laws of aerodynamics probably hadn’t changed before or since.

“And as a simple matter of fact, I have never used “the ends justify the means as an argument.”
When you assert that the State has powers and rights that are to be denied the individual, by the nature of being the State, and that the State in fact has rights and powers that supercede individual rights and powers by nature of being the State, and that the State has created property rights and its own self-judgement and restraint ... how are the State’s ends to