taelor comments on Non-standard politics - Less Wrong

3 Post author: NancyLebovitz 24 October 2014 03:27PM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Comments (231)

Sort By: Best

Show:

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: DanielLC 25 October 2014 02:51:07AM * 0 points [-]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but explicit mercenaries (like Blackwater) give worse results for vastly more money than normal volunteer (paid) soldiers.

I find this unlikely, though I haven't seen any evidence either way. Where did you learn this?

Not being able to conscript more soldiers limits our ambitions to smaller wars against inferior powers.

We can conscript as many as we want if we pay them enough. If we're willing to draft people, then why wouldn't we be willing to raise taxes?

Comment author: taelor 25 October 2014 03:52:00AM 1 point [-]

We can conscript as many as we want if we pay them enough. If we're willing to draft people, then why wouldn't we be willing to raise taxes?

Taxpayers are generally better organized politically than potential conscripts.