Libertarianism opposes both definition of corporatism: both the fascist interest group-based direct central planning sort and the sort also called corporatocracy based around the business corporation. In fact, the corporate model is based entirely in State privilege, i.e. limited liability and corporate personhood, plus the occasional (or not so occasional) subsidy as well as more indirect forms of privilege such as zoning laws, regulations, and intellectual monopoly.
Sam29: I agree. Electronic money still contributes to an overall increase in dollars, right?
I agree. Electronic money still contributes to an overall increase in dollars, right?
The Electronic Money Myth
Charles Anthony:< < You cannot create wealth through force. > > Sure you can. You can round up everybody in the country and make them your slaves. You can force them to work in factories, running on treadmills to generate electricity, convince them that they need government to protect them from the Boogey-man who will do even worse things to them.. etc. etc.
Sure you can. You can round up everybody in the country and make them your slaves. You can force them to work in factories, running on treadmills to generate electricity, convince them that they need government to protect them from the Boogey-man who will do even worse things to them.. etc. etc.
If people need to be enslaved to produce what the slave-driver wants, then obviously they didn't find value in his desires in the first place. Hence it's questionable whether they would say they're creating wealth. They'd probably consider themselves worse off due to their slavery. Of course, the slave-driver would certainly think they're creating wealth -- for him. However, hasn't it been proven that freely traded labor is more cost-effective than slave labor?
Charles Anthony:If you do this to a largely sedentary population, a people who are content eating fruits from the trees, root from the earth and sleeping all day long then you can arguably say that the government has created wealth.
Again, it depends on what definition of "wealth" is being used. Such a population would not consider the things they're producing as slaves to be wealth ab initio. One could say that what they'd call "wealth" -- eating fruits from the trees, roots from the earth, and sleeping all day long -- has been lost.
Charles Anthony:Yes, I am playing the devil's advocate with a deliberate purpose. My purpose is to make you all think differently of government acgtion. I think we should criticize government action by saying that it is morally wrong for them to force their particular form of wealth creation instead of just saying that the government can not create wealth.
Even more generally, the point is to advocate moral universalism as opposed to moral egoism, at least when it comes to aggression.
The keyboard is mightier than the gun.
Non parit potestas ipsius auctoritatem.
Voluntaryism Forum
No. Wealth is only created in a mutually beneficial action. Otherwise it is simply transferred.
Im not sure I know what you mean by wealth. Wealth creation from what I understand is the production of things that people value. Wealth can be and is created even by slaves. Being a slave dosent mean your production has no value, only that the slaves production has no value to the slave.
By your logic, I could force you to give me your wallet and claim I've created wealth. As Paul points out above, if you enslave a population you have not created wealth, even if you force them to do something productive.
I'm not sure anyone would claim that the act of taxation, stealing a wallet or the enslavement of people is the act of creating the wealth. I think the arguement is more along the lines of can what you have taken by force be used to create wealth?
Yes they can. History is full of examples. Southern slavery, colonialism, fuedalism... all economic systems based on the use of force and coercion that also produced large amounts of wealth.
Could more or less wealth be created if they didnt take the money in the first place? Well that where the rest of your post comes in. And I think we agree that the only way to tell is throught mutually beneficial exchange.
But the question is what would have been produced if the wealth had not been taken from those who had produced it.
You are committing a selective attention fallacy. You are completely ignoring my refuting argument and simply restating what the original user said. You're also engaging a definist fallacy, although you at least addressed that one. You simply (and vaguely) define wealth as “something that people value.” First of all, how many people have to value what I’ve created before you consider it wealth? One? A hundred? A majority? Second, by that logic, all I have to do to create wealth is produce something that meets that arbitrary number.
For example, suppose I and one other person value fire ash more than anything in existence. By your logic, (if I had the power to confiscate all these things, of course) I could take by force and burn millions of acres of farmland…thousands of works of art (I’ll throw some Rembrandt’s and some Monet’s on there for more kindling)…hundreds of millions of dollar bills, a small city’s worth of structures, buildings of all kinds, medications, technologies, all the digital media containing the map of the human genome…and produce a lot of ash. And I’ll have created wealth. I’ll have “produced things that people value.” After all, it doesn’t matter if you or anyone else I stole from thinks I’ve destroyed wealth…because as you said: slavery doesn’t mean your production has no value…it only means the slave’s production has no value to the slave. In the same way, the ash that I’ve produced by burning all of that fuel doesn’t mean it has no value…it just has no value to you.
In essence, your entire argument is no more sophisticated than the original poster who essentially said the same thing: that as long as someone values what is produced, then wealth is created. And my entire refutation is that that is simply false. Unless both parties involved benefit (that is, both voluntarily agree to the terms and outcome of the arrangement) then wealth is not created…it is merely transferred. This second is the part you completely ignore.
I do not deny that when you force a slave to produce something that you value, you are wealthier. But this does not mean you have created wealth (i.e. produced wealth that didn’t exist before). You have merely taken the wealth of the slave. Sure, you had to force him to convert it to a form you preferred…but that transfer doesn’t mean you’ve created new wealth. In other words, the act of converting the wealth to a different form doesn’t constitute wealth creation…it just means there’s an extra step for you to have to take before you steal it.
To address (and attempt to refute) this truth you commit yet a third fallacy. The argument at hand is whether wealth can be created through force. And you state quite clearly (paraphrase): stealing the wallet [the act of force] is not the act of creating the wealth…it is what you use the wallet and the money for, after you have stolen it. So basically, your argument is that “yes, wealth can be created through force…because you can initiate force and then create wealth afterward.” This is nothing more than a sort of post hoc false cause fallacy…that A can be caused by B simply because B can happen and then A can happen. Your examples are a product of the same fallacy. You even state: “…all economic systems based on the use of force and coercion that also produced large amounts of wealth.” Now whether that sentence was meant to say that it was the force and coercion that produced the wealth, or you were just simply saying that wealth was produced in economic systems that included force and coercion, I can’t be sure. But if it’s the first one, then you’re contradicting your statement that came before it, and if it’s the second one, then you’re not saying anything more than wealth can be created in societies where force and coercion are used. That does absolutely nothing to prove one is caused by the other.
Not only does this make your argument invalid, it supports the notion that you agree with the very premise you are debating. By stating what you’ve said, you essentially imply that wealth cannot be created through force…You initiate the force, and then create wealth later through non-forceful, voluntary acts. If you believed wealth could be created through force, you’d simply claim the forceful act created wealth.
You attempt to skirt around this fact by speciously admitting that perhaps the wealth created after the force has occurred is less than would be created if it didn’t occur. But this does nothing to refute the entire point being debated. The question was “can wealth be created through the use of force”…not “can wealth be created after force has been used.”
I would guess your best hypothetical of this would be if I did steal your wallet, I could invest the money I stole into something that produced something I or others valued. But again, this is no different than the transference I just spoke of. Just because I had to convert what I stole from you into something that I actually valued does not mean I have created any new wealth. And what’s more, the act of investing the money—the part you claim is the wealth-creating part—would be a voluntary transaction…so you’ve made my point for me.
The slave example is debunked by the farmland analogy. Just because you can force someone else to convert their time and labor into something that you value, doesn’t mean you have created wealth any more than if you burn everyone’s farmland…just because I can burn farmland and bring more fire ash into existence (thus making me, someone who values ash, more wealthy) does not mean I have created wealth. I have merely stolen things that other people value more than I do and turned them into things that I value more than they do. There is not more wealth in the world. There is just existing wealth that has been transferred from those people to me. It’s no different than if we all valued the same thing and I simply stole it all. The result is the same: I have more of what I want most because other people have less of what they want most. This is not wealth creation.
However…if right now I value your cow more than I value my car, and you value my car more than your cow, and we voluntarily trade, then we are both better off. We are both wealthier than we were before. If either one of us didn’t think he would be better off in the arrangement, it wouldn’t have voluntarily taken place. Wealth has been created where it didn’t exist before. This can only take place through voluntary action.
I think I need to clarify. My responses are framed by the original post that governments can’t create wealth. My point of veiw is that government can create wealth. From my understanding wealth creation is taking something with less exchange value and converting it into something with more exchange value.
You're also engaging a definist fallacy, although you at least addressed that one. You simply (and vaguely) define wealth as “something that people value.”
I assume you mean my definition of wealth. Well it’s not just my arbitrary definition that I used. Really it is the commonly accepted definition. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/wealth So no I don’t believe I have defined anything unfairly, maybe incompletely though. But I do believe that you need to define what you mean by wealth because it is apparent that we are not talking about the same thing.
First of all, how many people have to value what I’ve created before you consider it wealth? One? A hundred? A majority? Second, by that logic, all I have to do to create wealth is produce something that meets that arbitrary number.
Only one person who is willing to exchange for it.
For example, suppose I and one other person value fire ash more than anything in existence…..
Maybe I should be more complete with my definition next time. Its not wealth if only you value it. If others value that big pile of ash then yes. If not then no.
In essence, your entire argument is no more sophisticated than the original poster who essentially said the same thing: that as long as someonevalues what is produced, then wealth is created.
I was not trying to make a sophisticated argument. Only trying to clarify what I thought was a key point of difference.
Unless both parties involved benefit (that is, both voluntarily agree to the terms and outcome of the arrangement) then wealth is not created…it is merely transferred. This second is the part you completely ignore.
Again I agree. I have not stated differently. The act of taking something from someone else by force does not create wealth. But if I change what I took from you and converted it into something that has more exchange value I (the thief or the government) have just created wealth.
Sure, you had to force him to convert it to a form you preferred…but that transfer doesn’t mean you’ve created new wealth. In other words, the act of converting the wealth to a different form doesn’t constitute wealth creation…it just means there’s an extra step for you to have to take before you steal it.
I disagree with this statement. Converting wealth from one form to another is exactly what economic activity is all about. We take things with lesser value (one form of wealth) and convert them into things with more value (another form of wealth).
The question was “can wealth be created throughthe use of force”…not “can wealth be created after force has been used.”
As I have tried to clarify above. This is not exactly the question that I was answering. I was trying to clarify the point that I thought Charles was making when he responded to anothers post about the government not being able to create wealth because everything it has must first be taken from someone else. So I am saying that the act of theft does not create wealth but the thief can create wealth with the stolen goods by converting that wealth into a different form which has a higher exchange value.
First of all, how many people have to value what I’ve created before you consider it wealth? One? A hundred? A majority? Second, by that logic, all I have to do to create wealth is produce something that meets that arbitrary number. Only one person who is willing to exchange for it. For example, suppose I and one other person value fire ash more than anything in existence….. Maybe I should be more complete with my definition next time. Its not wealth if only you value it. If others value that big pile of ash then yes. If not then no.
What? You just said only one person is needed to have something considered to be wealth. I said "how many people have to value what I've created before you consider it 'wealth'?" And you say "only one". And in the very next sentence you tell me "Its not wealth if only you value it." Are you serious on this? (Besides, in the hypothetical, it's not just me..it's me and one other person...that way there are "people" who value it, to fit your original definition to the letter.)
So what you are saying is that as long as I find "one person who is willing to exchange" for all the ash I've created by burning millions of acres of farmland, then I have created wealth by burning the crops. Am I reading you correctly?
Yes just one. Due to division of labor typically what is produced by an individual has no value to the individual. They produce it only to exchange with other people for things that do have value to them.
The worker at the rubber factory has no use for the rubber he makes. But he makes it in exchange for money (which by the way is not really what he wants either). He then exchanges the money for a big screen tv. The worker values that TV and makes things that have no value to him in order to obtain the tv.
So if I produce a work of art that no one else wants, I have produced no wealth. I may value it but its not wealth because it has no exchange value. But if there is at least one person who would want to buy my art then I have produced wealth. So only one person who is willing to trade with you is required.
Maybe, Maybe Not.
In your fire ash example if you burn everything you own or have taken from another to the ground to make ash only because you like ash then no you have not created wealth. If there is no one to exchange with then you have created something worthless(economicly speaking).
Now if there are others (or even just one person) who would be willing to pay you more for the ash than the cost of all the things that you destroyed making it.... then yes wealth has been created.
If the value of those things that you burned to make your ash is more than the value of the ash then you have destroyed wealth.
I would really like you to define some of your concepts, because I really feel we are not on the same page. What is wealth? Once you define that please describe the process by which it is created. We may be talking about two completely different things.
So what you are saying is that as long as I find "one person who is willing to exchange" for all the ash I've created by burning millions of acres of farmland, then I have created wealth by burning the crops. Am I reading you correctly? Maybe, Maybe Not.[...] if there are others (or even just one person) who would be willing to pay you more for the ash than the cost of all the things that you destroyed making it.... then yes wealth has been created.
Maybe, Maybe Not.[...] if there are others (or even just one person) who would be willing to pay you more for the ash than the cost of all the things that you destroyed making it.... then yes wealth has been created.
That's not what you said. You literally said wealth creation "is the production of things that people value." You also said that "people" really just means one person. So why should it matter what the man was willing to give me for the ash? I produced something that people value. By your very definition I have created wealth.
I also think your false notion that a producer places zero value on what he himself produces leads you to other problems. It is simply not true that the worker at the rubber factory has no use for the rubber he makes. You might say the same thing about a farmer who "has no use" for the crops he grows. Even if we assume that the rubber worker never uses any rubber, in any form, in any capacity his entire life...and even if we assume that a farmer never uses any of the crops he grows, in any way, ever in his lifetime (for feed for animals or to consume himself)...saying they simply do not value what they have produced is completely false. Just because someone trades something away, it does not mean he places no value on it. It simply means he values what he has received more than what he gave away. This is completely different from saying something has no value.
If what you say is true, and "what is produced by an individual has no value to the individual", then why would the individual make it at all? Obviously whatever is produced offers at least the value of whatever the man thinks he can trade it for...Unless your contention is that the rubber maker and the farmer do what they do for nothing more than the joy they get out of the process of doing it (e.g. a painter who paints and then throws his art in the trash.) If the man placed no value on the results of his production, why would he care if you stole it? Surely you would not suggest that a rubber maker or farmer would not bat an eye if you came and took everything that he produced. But why would he, if he placed no value on it?
By the same token, if you and I were walking down the street and someone handed me a flyer for a MADD seminar, and you took it from me without my permission, I would not care. Because I place virtually no value on it.
I think this is another part of your problem. It sounds like you're under the impression that things have intrinsic value.
I suppose I would define wealth as a claim on resources (commodities, capital equipment, time, physical labor, etc) that have the potential to make the individual's life easier, more comfortable or more enjoyable (i.e. "better") than it would be in the absence of such things. Wealth is created when the claim of any one individual increases through fully voluntary human action or interaction. Again, if any part of the interaction is not voluntary, then there is no new wealth created, there is only existing wealth transferred (i.e. stolen). In other words, if I am better off, but only because someone else is worse off, then I haven't created any new wealth. I have only stolen/transferred wealth that already existed. I am wealthier than I was before, but only because someone else is poorer than he was before. However, if all parties involved are better off, then new wealth has been created...because it would be impossible for each person to become wealthier unless more wealth exists than before.
The comment that started this part of the debate was here, when Charles Anthony proposed that wealth can be created through force. I stated this was false, here,and stated (among other clarifications) that wealth is only created through a mutually beneficial action and that otherwise it is simply transferred. This is where you joined the debate and claimed that wealth creation is nothing more than "the production of things that people value" and that just because a slave doesn't value what you have forced him to do doesn't mean you haven't created wealth, here.
I do not believe we are talking about different things. I think we just understand them differently. You believe that as long as one person values what you produce, then you have created wealth, even if you have produced it through a forceful, non-voluntary act. I disagree. I do not see the theft of wealth as the creation of wealth. You also believe that what one produces has zero value to him. I do not see this to be true. All human action I have ever observed or heard of points to this being false.
Now, if you wish to claim that wealth can be created after it is stolen, obviously I would not argue. Of course one can steal wealth through force and then create more wealth through voluntary action later. (So in retrospect, I suppose I could have been more precise in my original post in which I responded to the question that began this thread, which should have read: "Governments cannot create wealth without first stealing it"...as, individuals in government could supposedly steal wealth and then use it to only engage in wealth-creating voluntary acts from then on...but again, as I also stated, if a government were only engaged in voluntary interaction, it would cease to be a government. And in reality, it's not as if the government is creating any wealth even with the wealth that it steals, which was also part of the original question (i.e. "CAN AND DOES"))
But this is irrelevant, as the debate you have joined was centered around the question of whether wealth can be created through force. And as I pointed out previously, you have not shown this to be true. In fact, as I said, it would appear as though you have confirmed it to be false, by your statement of (paraphrase) "yes, wealth can be created through force…because you can initiate force and then create wealth afterward"...thus admitting that it is in fact the voluntary acts that take place outside of the force that create the new wealth...not the theft that takes place originally. (If I'm mischaracterizing what you said there, feel free to correct me.)
Well almost. The debate was started with the original post about governments being able to create wealth. Somewhere in the middle it was claimed that government cant create wealth because wealth cant be created through the use of force that is where Charles came in. So I repeat my responses are in that frame. So yes we are discussing two different things.
Now, if you wish to claim that wealth can be created after it is stolen, obviously I would not argue
This is exactly my claim. See here:
So I am saying that the act of theft does not create wealth but the thief can create wealth with the stolen goods by converting that wealth into a different form which has a higher exchange value.
And here:
I'm not sure anyone would claim that the act of taxation, stealing a wallet or the enslavement of people is the act of creating the wealth. I think the argument is more along the lines of can what you have taken by force be used to create wealth?
So why are you still arguing?
Well it is relevant. Because I have not tried to show that it is true. Because we are debating two different points. As you have pointed out.... that I have pointed out....., I have in fact claimed that the forceful act itself does not create the wealth. I have claimed that government or a thief can create wealth by first taking from you and then transforming it into something with more value than what was taken. And the way I am measuring value here is its market value.
That's not what you said.
Not initially... no. But I did clarify in my next post that my brief definition was incomplete. Then more clearly defined what I meant and then gave you a link to make sure you knew exactly what I was talking about. It seems you are intentionally ignore portions of my posts. Why?
I also think your false notion that a producer places zero value on what he himself produces leads you to other problems. It is simply not true that the worker at the rubber factory has no use for the rubber he makes. You might say the same thing about a farmer who "has no use" for the crops he grows.
What I am saying is this. The farmer and factory worker don't produce the crops and rubber because they want wheat and rubber. They produce it so they can exchange it for other stuff they do want. It is true that the farmer and rubber factory has no use for the crops and rubber itself. Afterall what is a farmer going to do with 100 tons of wheat? He does not want 100 tons of wheat.
This is completely different from saying something has no value.
You are right I should have not said "no value". I should have said they don't want it. They value things they don't want because they can exchange it for things they do want.
then why would the individual make it at all?
I have answered that here:
I have admittedly misused the word value. Please replace want in the above quote.
why would he care if you stole it?
Because he would have lost the ability to exchange the stolen goods for something else.
Thats a bit of a leap. From my artist example it should be clear that i don't believe things have intrinsic value. Economically speaking the only value something has is what someone else is willing to give you for it.
I don't think I would disagree with much here.
a hyphotetical situation to both of you:
there is a man A, man B and a man C.
A has a house. C offers a proposal to B: if he burns down A's house, C will give him (B) 10 cows.
B accepts it and burns down A's house.
Has in this situation been created wealth or not (among these three people)?
(suppose I am economical illiterate, which is not too far from truth).
(english is not my native language, sorry for grammar.)
Hell, there is no doubt that I have much to learn. That why I am here and having these discussions.
there is a man A, man B and a man C. A has a house. C offers a proposal to B: if he burns down A's house, C will give him (B) 10 cows. B accepts it and burns down A's house. Has in this situation been created wealth or not (among these three people)?
On the face I would say no. You have only burned down a house. That economy started with a house and 10 cows. After there were only 10 cows. At a simple glace it appears that you have destroyed wealth.
I was thinking about this on the way home from work, so I would like to elaborate a little.
My feelings are that wealth is based on the value of the things you possess relative to the value of the things others possess. Wealth is a relative thing. The value of all those possessions is subjective. The market takes all of these subjective values and creates objective prices. So in order to determine if wealth was created or destroyed we would have to have a functioning market with prices. With these market prices you can determine the value of what was taken vrs. the value of what the thief did with it. To be clear this would only work with those things that have a market value. If the thief took Grandpa's old squirrel rifle that you would never sell, then there would be no way to tell.
In your example there is no market. There are no prices. So we have no way of knowing if burning down A's house actually created wealth. If there were prices we could possibly tell.
If I A would have sold his house for $100k to C. And C would have bought A's house for $100k. We can say that when his house was burned A was deprived of $100K.
If after his house was burned A could only get $50K for the empty lot that his house once stood on, then we could confidently say that $50k of wealth was destroyed.
If after his house was burned A could get $150K for the empty lot that his house once stood on, then we could confidently say that $50K of wealth was created.
If after his house was burned A would never sell the lot or no one would ever buy the lot. Then we have no way of knowing. With out those prices it becomes impossible to compare the subjective valuations that individuals assign to objects..
Southern, I have some thoughts on that last elaboration. I don't think value is subjective while prices are objective. It's the other way around. The value of possessions can be measured pretty objectively. Usually we can say that this item is good for you while this one is bad. But prices are marginal. You are willing to pay less for the fifth milkshake than for the first. Prices are not an objective measure, they intermediate a trade-off between options at a particular moment. Two items with the same price are not worth the same. One might be a house, while the other might be a bottle of water in the desert. The goods that changed hands are not worth the same because those who traded them happened to agree on the same number.
The value of possessions can be measured pretty objectively. Usually we can say that this item is good for you while this one is bad.
Arent the terms good and bad subjective? What I think is good may not be what you think is good.
You are willing to pay less for the fifth milkshake than for the first. Prices are not an objective measure, they intermediate a trade-off between options at a particular moment.
To clarify. When I say prices are objective, I am not claiming that they are somehow absolute. They do change. Like you say depending on the when, where and how the price of an object can change.
But a price is 100% objective. When I buy a gallon of milk for $3.50, there is no disputing the fact that the price that I paid for the milk was $3.50. That price dosent exist only in my head, it is the price I paid.
Also, now everyone now knows that a gallon of milk to me is worth at least $3.50. So if a theif comes along and steals my gallon of milk, it would be rediculous to claim that the milk was really worth $1 million. No you were deprived of $3.50 of wealth.
The only way we can objectively measure value is through price. By actually observing peoples actions through a market we can now divine what minimum value they place on things.
The goods that changed hands are not worth the same because those who traded them happened to agree on the same number.
So you are going to be the one to tell them that their bottle of water is not worth the price they paid for it? The transaction revealed information about their personal valuations of the object when they agreed on a price. Prior to their agreement we had no information about their value scales. After the transaction we do.
It also occured to me that what we are discussing is similar to the calculation problem of communist economies. Without a free market and prices those governments have no way of knowing if what they are producing is actually making their society wealthy or whether they are impoverishing thier people.
How do they know if producing 1 million shoes is creating wealth? Or producing 100 tons of steal is creating wealth? The Soviet Union in fact surpassed the United States in the production of many things. But because they did not have any market to know what value people placed on the things they were producing, they were actually making themselves poorer despite the massive amounts of stuff they produced.
The market and prices is what capitalist and entreprenuers use to know if they are actually creating wealth or not.