This video is promoting the central assumption of libertarianism: "Government sucks". If government sucks, what does that imply? We should have as little as possible. How do we provide the benefits of government when we have a minimal government? The market magically takes care of that. This is the libertarian position. This guy doesn't like to state his position flat out, because it's less seductive to his audience, preferring to focus instead on demagogic government bashing. Here is another video where we explicitly argues for libertarianism.
it's very easy for you to sit on your high horse and look down on people who, on your view, are too naive to understand the complexities involving a government...
What? That's not what I said at all. I said libertarianism is naive because it assumes people are angels and that we'll all be better off without regulation. I make no claims about anyone's ability to understand government.
Coming to a debate with the preconception that your opponent is naive...
I didn't have that preconception. That was my conclusion after watching the video and considering his argument.
I think we should ask these kinds of questions more often
We ask these questions all the freakin' time, at least here in the United States. Small government is a core demand of the Republican party.
I think all these questions are worth asking, don't you?
Of course.
To me, your previous argument sounded pretty similar to those used by religious people
What's your point? That my argument is based on blind faith? Not at all. The benefits of government I listed follow clearly and logically. It would take too much time to argue each point, so I'll just do one: Government provides public goods. This is necessary due to the free rider problem. This truth is widely accepted in economics.
I'm not saying I have answers, or maybe not even better alternatives...
This is why I get so annoyed. I constantly deal with guys who rant about the evils of government. Not because they want what's best for mankind, but because they are selfish bastards who want to take all they can for themselves and to hell with everyone else. They never have an alternative solution, they just want to tear down the one thing that stands between us and the solitary, poor, nasty, brutish state of nature.
I'm not saying you or Molyneux are like them, I'm just explaining my motivation for deriding the libertarian argument.
I'm just honestly looking for a solution.
A more direct Democracy based on internet communication platforms like the one we're using now is the best idea I've got.
I've seen this guy's stuff before, and it always annoys the hell out of me. Classic naive libertarianism. "If we just had minimal government the market would make everything sunshine and roses."
Democratic governments protect human rights, provide public goods, prevent monopolies, maintain national security, enforce laws, regulate the economy, protect the environment, etc. These things are very important for the well being of society. Government is supposed to compel people to do stuff they don't want to do, for the good of society. Yes, government has problems, but the alternatives are all much worse.
Government is the one thing that prevents us from becoming human livestock to the most powerful 1% of society.
I won't even get started on the tons of ridiculous distortions and bad logic in the video, cuz that would take all day.
we're there to get the Taliban and specifically Osama, that's all, then we need to get the f--k out.
The problem is that killing Taliban members won't accomplish much. The unstable political situation combined with radical Islam is the problem. Unless we can stabilize the region, new jihadist groups will rise up.
And as far as Iraq, who knows, I don't even know what we're still doing there
Eh? You do know we're in the process of pulling out, right? We've withdrawn troops from major cities. The remaining troops are there to train Iraqis and ensure things don't go back to how they were.
Yeah, but both will require extensive nation building which will cost tons of dollars and lives. The current strategy is to empower the sane people so they can resist the radicals on their own. Iraq is almost there. Afghanistan is just getting started.
I know of no evidence that shows Cheney was corrupt. See FactCheck for a debunking of common misconceptions.
There are a number of regulations to prevent lobbyists from having excessive influence. Also, not all lobbyists work for corporations, some are working for the public. Lobbyists are a necessary part of the political process because there is simply not enough time for lawmakers to chat with everyone who wants to talk to them.
The FDA is a joke, huh? Seizing animal feed, discovering bacteria in teethers, examining Xolair for links to heart attacks... these are all things they've done in just the last few days. That doesn't sound to me like a corrupt agency. You've just offered a couple of cherry-picked, unsourced examples and damned the whole organization.
they are run by corrupt politicians who are in the pockets of the corporations
I don't buy this. America is a Democracy. If there's proof of corruption a politician is going to have a very hard time staying in office. Just look at Nixon. Look at Blagojevich.
the people have no rights/control of corporations
Yes we do. We've got the EPA and the FDA among many other regulatory agencies. We've got legal authority demonstrated by the antitrust laws that broke up Microsoft.
Well I do agree that an international agency with the power to enforce peace would be the best thing. I actually created a debate along those lines. But that is way easier said than done. It seems almost impossible that all of the world's great nations would relinquish that much power. And it's a lot of power to give up. Whether this international agency enforces peace through military force or extreme economic isolation, it must have the power to devastate any country. Further it must have a widespread ability to monitor the activities of each nation to ensure that no one is developing WMDs in secret. And it must wield all this power without becoming totalitarian. A daunting task to say the least.
I just don't see nukes going away any time soon.
States, because they make the laws and have control of the military which can enforce those laws.
Corporations exist because the public wants them to exist. The public wants them because they are the most efficient way of turning raw materials into consumer goods.
That's an interesting argument, but I think you're greatly overestimating the power of corporations. In a democratic country, power ultimately lies with the people. The people create the state, and the state commands the military, which it can use to enforce the people's will over corporations. Sure large companies hold more sway than the average person -- they can manipulate people through advertising and manipulate corrupt officials through bribery. But they don't have more power than a big group of pissed off voters. It's overly cynical to say they are pulling the strings of government. Did industry elect Obama to push for global warming regulations?
Why is it that once scientists predict something based on past data, the same must occur in the future no matter what?...We don't know.
What are you talking about? Scientists aren't claiming to have magic crystal balls that see the future, they're just drawing conclusions from the available evidence. Obviously when deciding future actions we have to look at past data in order to make an educated guess as to the best course of action.
I honestly don't think human beings have caused as much effect as before our time, what with volcano eruptions, meteor strikes, and the countless amount of animals with flatulence issues. :) lol
And you're basing this view on what exactly? Are you not aware that the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere far exceeds that of any time in history? Do you not understand how the greenhouse effect works? Have you looked at any of the information andsoccer has provided here and in other debates?
Well, the executive position is the most important one at the company, and you only have one person filling that role. You get the most bang for your buck by making that spot ultra-competitive with really high pay. And like I said to andsoccer below, if you look at a company like McDonald's with a lot of minimum wage employees, the employees account for over 90% of labor costs while all of the executives combined take less than 10%. Paying executives less would not significantly impact their operating costs.
A hundred years from now people will say, "I'd be extremely upset if I could never press a button again, or feel the gentle rolling of a scroll-wheel under my finger..." just like people once said, "I'd be extremely upset if I could never hear the impassioned voice of a storyteller, or gather around with my friends to hear a new tale..."
Well you can't really say "the economy" or "the environment" because you need to look at issues on a case by case basis. For example, offshore drilling would probably provide more benefit to the economy than damage to the environment, so we should do it. On the other hand, global warming is a serious threat due to rising sea levels and because it could cause widespread crop failure. In this case we should take action to prevent it even at (short-term) cost to the economy. Failing to do so would cause much damage to the environment and be worse for the economy in the long run.
Ok, it's not that those jobs aren't valuable, it's that anybody can do them. They should be paid less because supply exceeds demand. By paying garbage men above market wages, we as a society have less money to spend on everything else. We are allocating our resources inefficiently, and are all worse off because of it.
Not really. Economic damage is bad, but it can't wipe people off the face of the Earth the way nukes can. Nuclear devastation is straightforward and easy for people to understand. Economic devastation is much less tangible and as such is less likely to deter people. How many post-apocalyptic movies start with nuclear war? How many start with economic collapse?
Yeah, the filtering systems could use some perfecting, but it's only a matter of time before we come up with some way of dealing with problems like the one you mentioned. The first solution that pops into my head: Allow the sorting order to be different for each user. Then, allow users to flag other users as "smart" so that their votes, arguments, and debates are weighted more heavily.
Also, the Kindle was designed to be readable outside in the sunlight.
I think all books, e or otherwise, are nearing obsolescence. I posted my thoughts a while ago in this debate.
Basically anything books can do can be done in much better ways through technology. When information is filtered through up/down voting or something like that you can get the wheat without having to slog through the chaff; this can make information exchange much faster. You can have an idea be commented on by many people very quickly by posting it on the internet; this leads to stronger ideas. You can process digital text through computer programs to quickly find a particular sentence or do other cool things. The list of advantages that digital content has over books goes on and on.
If we could somehow enforce a mutual disarmament, that would be great, but I don't see how we could. All it would take is one country building one in secret to ruin it. How could we know for sure no other country was working on one in some hidden underground bunker?
Also, some people do argue that nuclear weapons do more good than harm. This is because if two countries have nuclear weapons, they basically can't go to war without wiping each other out. This is an effective way of enforcing peace. Obviously it's risky, but the presence of nukes is the biggest reason we haven't had any wars between major countries since WWII.
McDonald's employs about 400,000 people in the United States. Let's assume the majority of them (300,000) are minimum wage.
Federal minimum wage is $6.55, giving a worker an annual income of $13,624.
$13,624 * 300,000 = about $408,720,000 paid to minimum wage employees.
The CEO, James Skinner, made about $14 million last year, counting bonuses and all of that.
So if my (conservative) calculations are correct, only 3% of U.S. labor expenses go to the CEO. Even if we include the other executives, over 90% of labor expenses would go to employees. Paying executives less would not significantly impact their operating expenses.
It's simple: if a company has to pay its employees more, than they have to raise their prices in order to maintain profitability. This is why minimum wage is bad for the economy.
So you may be making more money, but that money is worth less because minimum wage has led to increasing prices.
There are numerous examples of fairness in the real world. Just the other day I was out with some friends and one of them dropped his wallet without realizing it. Some stranger came running up and returned it to him. If people never behaved honorably there would be no civilization.
No, companies wouldn't pay third world wages. The reason third worlders don't get paid more is because they have very few educational opportunities. Thus there is a very large supply of unskilled labor which leads to a proportionally low demand by companies. We in developed countries don't have that problem because we have the option to do skilled labor, thereby shrinking the supply of unskilled labor.
People should get paid according to the amount a value they have added. Low skill jobs don't add much value and should be paid as such. Minimum wage is basically just a twisted form of welfare. If we want to address income inequality, we should do it through progressive taxation and straightforward welfare programs, not by distorting the labor market.
Look, here's an example: Say I can print a bunch of newspapers for $5 in total costs. If I can get somebody to deliver them to people's houses, I can get $10 in revenue. It will take 1 hour to deliver them. I can't make a profit unless I pay somebody less than $5 to deliver them. So with current minimum wage laws, I can't make a profit selling my newspapers, and that delivery job won't get created.
