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CarlShulman comments on Shut Up and Divide? - Less Wrong
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I never understood how this morality worked. The problem I see with this view is that you are double counting the value of money.
The $10 doesn't leave the system and everyone who touches it just killed a whole slew of people because they sent it somewhere other than aid. Why are you carrying the moral burden?
Even if you did send it to aid you can blame them for charging $10 for their work instead of $9. (Or whatever company that is selling the rice, nets, stoves, filters, bottles, condoms.)
You could even blame the person receiving the aid for using the aid instead of giving it to someone less fortunate. Or using less of it. Or selling it for $11 and putting the extra money back into aid.
Somewhere in here something goes horribly wrong and it gets ridiculous. Where did I misstep?
EDIT: I really don't want to give the impression that you shouldn't give money or help people less fortunate than yourself. I think these are great things. I just don't understand the jump from "I bought a latte" to "I killed people."
The point is that if, counterfactually, you chose to act to reduce death and suffering in the world today you could save lives. Others could do the same, but both you and they are refraining from doing so. And your post (talking about "money in the system") sounds like it is confusing money as a medium of exchange for the productive value of your labor (which has a certain market value).
I get the point. What I don't understand is why the point ends up at:
A weird part of this sentiment is that it has nothing to do with haircuts or Starbucks. If I stop going to movies, I don't stop killing people. If I spend all of my money not killing people, I don't stop killing people. No matter how I act, I will always be killing people.
In addition, everyone is always killing people. The people dying are killing people. This is obviously wrong but I don't see how the beginning parts about drinking Starbucks can be true but the latter parts about everyone killing people can be false.
$10 is an easy way to talk about value. The specifics of monetary systems and their relation to labor isn't really relevant to the point. (At least, as far as I can tell.)