We're doing alright, but not as well as last year

CHILD LABOUR. The horror! :O




Seems like a fairly simple voluntary solution to me. Throw in benevolent sponsors, cradle-to-grave friendly societies, for-profit and not-for-profit student loan investors and straight charities and there'll be a vibrant mix of consumer and supplier advocates that balance the needs, resources and desires of a wide spectrum of people. Greater competition in education and greater consumer-purchasing power is sorely needed. The advent of the internet is starting to crack the entrenched system but is still struggling to break the required face-to-face areas.

 

Pay in services or cash of the equivalent value. This way, if you're lucky enough to have a decent job, you don't have to give it up to serve for less at the academy. Service would begin while a student, but could continue past graduation if required (e.g. student did not merit higher duties therefor needs to clock more hours; academy requires further service under a paid arrangement and extends employment offer). In the first graduate scenario, the student would be indentured to the academy until their service value equals course fee. Alternatively, a prospective employer could make a salary offer which includes repayment to the academy in order to release the graduate from their servitude debt.

 

Need to free up our labour markets a bit more first I think. (How dare people hire their person out under the terms and conditions that they believe is in their interest! It's immoral <or something>.)

 

Positive rights can enhance our freedom - right.
They can also impinge upon it - right.
But if the freedom they enhance is greater than the one they impinge, the overall freedom increases. If I have X and I do nothing to it, I continue to have X. But if I add 10 and subtract 3, I get X + 7, which is greater than X.
Then, even the society that upholds freedom as the highest virtue will be based on positive rights too.

That's exactly right. That's what I and lgf have been saying since the beginning. You may lose 3 but if you earn 10 you profit 7. You continue to look only at one part of the equation (the costs). If everyone thought like you, there would be no businesses in this world, once they all have costs.

That's like saying: "in attempting to start a new business, a person has destroyed his savings". Easy, only a small percentage of the savings were spent and they may actually turn a profit.
Same thing for the positive rights. Education is an investment in freedom.

Yeah, let's leave it to the goodwill of others.
I have another idea: the world governments and the banking system has stolen from us a lot of money via inflation, corruption and abusive practices. Let's make them pay but only at their discretion. In other words, we will rely on their goodwill to compensate us as they see fit. Great idea, isn't it? They may give thousands and thousands of euros.

You're mistaken. In a democracy you are free to think and vote as you like. No one will force your vote or dictate what your ideas should be. And you are also free to leave the system, if you think you need more freedom.

I never said the opposite.

We in Portugal do not come from inside our mothers but from storks that carry us in a white cloth, from generation to generation over the past centuries. Our parents are always late on the scene and take all the credit. Poor storks...

Really? Usually they do that to me also when I do some spending and don't pay the bills. Bastards...

 

Let me reply with a question: do you have any of your money directly on the derivatives market?

Both the society and the derivatives market don't force you to stay. If you happen to be in one of them and not on the other, I would say the former is fair and the latter isn't. I would say that because, when I think of me, I only play fair games. I presume the others do the same.

 

Sorry bro, I'll answer you tomorrow. I really don't have more time today.

And don't forget about the other comments you were to make.

Take care!

 

Not to mention that the equation relies on the valuation of different individuals. In the absence of a voluntary trade there's no way of calculating whether the forced loss of negative rights was in reality of greater value to that individual than the gain from the positive rights.

 

Or more precisely - valuation by different individuals.

 

Basically you're suggesting a bunch of opt-in mini-states and each person would choose what he wanted. Hopefully (for you) there would be one that didn't demand mandatory taxes. But would that work? It hardly would, essencially because of 2 problems:
1 - Non-mandatory taxes would make the mini-state very frail, essencially in security.
2 - The mini-states would be very small (if they were big, there would be corruption as it is in the national states around the world we have today) and thus heavy and large groups of thugs could easily take over them.

If that could have any change of being successful, we would have already seen that in Africa, the continent of tribes rather than countries. What has actually happened? Large and powerful groups of thugs took over.

Those are the addle democracies. A strong and healthy democracy incites citizens and the media to audit every action of the government and provides tools for protesting and voting for a change. Participative democracies are even one step further, letting the people themselves to meritocraticly size power of the State through active forums of policy design and decision-making.

As you can see, this is not much different from the system you desire. It mainly differs on how the laws and policies get approved: every man for himself VS not letting game theory to harm the common good.

 

Precisely. Let's consider person A (a rich man) and B (a starving man). If I remove a piece of bread from A and give it to B, I am indeed transfering freedom. Person A will become a bit less free and B will get the freedom not to starve. Is it fair? Of course it isn't. A did nothing wrong to become less free and B did nothing to deserve that piece of bread. But I'm not assessing fairness. I'm only regarding freedom. And, in regards to freedom (which is a matter of options), A continues to have barely the same options (of purchasing stuff, investing savings, etc.) while B has dramatically increased his freedom. Overall freedom is undoubtly greater now.

Into the Wild - the very same place you'd be in if there were no other humans on the planet, since no other human wants that either. If there were, you all together could be a group. If there were many, you all together could be a civilization and eventually a State or a nation.

But you can't force other people to go with you and you can't force them to change a system you don't like.

 

Excellent work Phransisku!
I've been quite busy these days and I haven't been able to reply to all these comments. And since that situation doesn't seem to change in the next days, I'll just add here the most fundamental question I raised in a previous post and that everyone was so afraid to answer:
Why does the son of wealthy people deserves more freedom than the son of poor people?

 

That's the same as saying that in a company "who has the right and the skills to determine what resources should be taken and redistributed, how much should be redistributed...?". Someone has to decide that. Just because different people have different visions for the company, the latter should only do the moves that everyone agrees on? No! People understood that the company would only perform well, if it had a CEO in charge of ultimately deciding on the strategy and direction to follow. Who should that person be? The person that the majority has perceived as the most skilled and competent to do that job. It's how organizations are managed and that includes companies and nations.

Because it's you who doesn't agree with this society. Why do you want to force everyone to live by your values?

 

So you're contradicting yourself, because you are in favour of some children having access to everything just because their parents pay them and others (whose parents cannot afford it) are not even entitled to Education so that they can pursuit a better future.

 

I think you'll find we want you to stop using force against us to live by your values. We aren't forcing anything - that's the point. The initiation of force is illegitimate. (Also in a liberal democracy we are allowed to disagree and voice our preferences.)

 

The parents deserve the right to use their time and resources in the way they see fit. If that increases the opportunities for their kids so be it. The child doesn't deserve this. Children of wealthy parents aren't entitled to their parents wealth nor are they entitled to the wealth of anybody else.

 

You're not talking about freedom. You're talking about pride.

You're talking about your "freedom" being destroyed because they took a piece of bread from you, like a talented pugilist that has been deeply harmed because of a girl's punch that caused a small and irrelevant bruise on his face. His pride was deeply harmed, not his body.

Freedom is a matter (of quantity and relevance) of options in life. If the State removes a piece of bread from you, you continue with barely the same options. If the State gives that piece of bread to a starving man, that man sees his options (in both relevance and quantitative terms) dramatically improved. Overall freedom gets undoubtly greater, even if you lose your pride or dignity or whatever you resent from seeing your belongings touched by the State.

I'm not talking about the right to take, I'm not talking about how we could manage redistribution, I'm not even talking about fairness or pride or dignity. I'm just talking about freedom.