terasinube comments on Proportional Giving - Less Wrong

10 Post author: gjm 02 March 2014 09:09PM

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Comment author: RichardKennaway 04 March 2014 12:13:26PM 2 points [-]

I haven't proposed a totalitarian state.

You are talking about a state that takes everything from everyone beyond what they "need". When I asked how my desire for a bigger house than I "need" would be met, this was the exchange:

What happens in this society, if I want a bigger house than the state thinks I need?

I don't know but I imagine that some kind of balanced utility function could be produced that could provide different resource allocation. e.g. bigger shelter (if requested).

"Totalitarian" is exactly the right word for this. This is a vision of the state giving and the state taking away, where all belongs to the state and personal property is to be justified by a plea of need.

One very fine idea I found was in a Howard Gardner interview for BigThink (scroll down to " What is the US getting wrong?" )

I don't agree with caps on individual wealth, and were I Swiss, I'd have voted against 1:12 even without seeing any of the so-called FUD. (You don't think it possible that any of the opposition was from people who simply judged it to be a bad idea for the society?) But something Gardner says later on I find worth quoting:

I think one of the good features about the United States—since I've been bashing it—is that it's built into our DNA to take a chance, and if we fail, to try again. ... I said [to East Asians asking for a recipe for creativity] you've got to try something out, try to get some other people to support you, and if it doesn't work, what can you learn from it?

Compare this succinct statement of why capitalism works so well, from a recent comment here:

The only reason capitalism works is that the losing experiments run out of money.

That brake on failure is really important. When someone decides to Do Something and commits their resources to it, if it doesn't work out, they have to stop. A government's ability to carry on regardless is in comparison almost unlimited. The government of the day have their jobs at risk, but nothing more.