Re: Letwin: We will redistribute wealth

"abelard" <abelard2@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:f68oq1tfb49mirq6cblkstkb995n64mq6t@xxxxxxxxxx
> On Fri, 23 Dec 2005 15:59:52 -0000, "Energumen" <ener_gumen@xxxxxxxxxxx>
>
> typed:
>
>><mmaker@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
>>news:1135351194.311719.177110@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>>> AlanG wrote:
>>>> Whichever way you twist it a society needs some socialist bits to
>>>> operate. Without it you have anarchy and collapse.
>>>
>>> Socialism causes anarchy and collapse, because it encourages
>>> parasitical behaviour and discourages productive behaviour: the whole
>>> basis of socialism relies on the smart being willingly being enslaved
>>> by the arrogant and stupid.
>>>
>>> A few decades of socialism have turned a country that used to run a
>>> quarter of the planet into a total basket-case. You'd think that would
>>> be enough to put people off the idea.
>
>>The problem here is that AlanG has basically said that it's a matter of
>>degree, finding the right equalibrium, and you have come in and seem to be
>>saying that socialism is inherently bad. It is certainly true that any
>>society that has ever existed has pooled resources and acted as a group as
>>well as as individuals. That was certainly true of Britain in the days of
>>empire. There were still taxes and public spending etc. Perhaps you don't
>>consider that socialism? Then what is your definition of socialism?
>>
>>As for encouraging parasitical behavour it would likely be much better if
>>taxes were shifted to be extremely high on returns to land (since that
>>would
>>not discourage any economic activity, and such returns are not morally
>>justifiable), and shifted away from labour earnings and spending and onto
>>returns to capital (which is one area were pure capitalism does not justly
>>reward people for their efforts). A general increase in the market
>>mechanism
>>and away from the state providing goods and services would probably be a
>>good thing IMO though.
>>
>>Returns to land and capital are themselves parasitical since they directly
>>or indirectly afford rights in land to individuals rather than the group,
>>and thereby people are rewarded for other than their own efforts. However
>>Marx was wrong in attributing this to extracting a surplus from workers
>>returns to labour. It is itself the land contribution, but *individuals*
>>have no natural right to extract the contribution of the land for
>>themselves
>>alone.
>
> that which is owned by nobody is cared for by nobody...
> apparently recognised by aristotle....

I am advocating group ownership, not "ownership by nobody". Is AstraZeneca
Plc owned by nobody?

>
>>As I have wondered whether the free market could be retained while
>>still respecting the natural right to land of the group and thereby doing
>>away with capitalism by altering the axiomatic property rights of the free
>>market capitalist system. Even if it were not possible, if we must have a
>>mixed economy anyway it is more just to shift the burden of taxation away
>>from returns to labour and onto returns to land (99% tax rate wouldn't
>>hurt
>>the economy at all) and returns to capital.
>
> all tax flows from production....no matter however it is wrapped up by
> the tax gatherers...

But not all is the product due to labour. This was Marx's central flaw. If
you doubt that 99% tax on returns to land would not effect economic
productivity then read Adam Smith.

If you start at year zero, and parachute in twenty people onto more
productive land and twenty other people onto less productive land and come
back twenty years later, if absolutely everything else is equal (talent,
effort, luck, amount and quality of labour expended by each individual) the
first group will end up wealthier, in aggregate, than the second. To whom is
that excess, that difference, rightly due? That is what BOTH the return to
land AND the return to capital (ie. return to improved land) actually are.
That's what Marx's "surplus value of labour" actually is.

Of course when I say land I mean it in the economic sense, including, for
example, oil.

"The oil of Iraq belongs to the people of Iraq" - Colin Powell


.

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