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EHeller comments on Value ethics vs. agency ethics - Less Wrong Discussion

-1 [deleted] 26 July 2014 07:34AM

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Comment author: EHeller 27 July 2014 03:37:34AM 0 points [-]

It still works at the margins.

Only if there are people who are spending less than the tax increase on leisure goods, this seems unlikely to me.

Not to mention that even if nobody just cancels an operation because of a $50 tax bill, they might postpone a doctor's visit a week, leading to an 0.1% greater chance of death, or postpone a car repair with the same result, or decide to buy the slightly more rickety ladder because their balance between price and safety comes at a slightly different point, etc

But now cause is weaker- if people have less money they may choose to be riskier, sure. But now they are choosing the risk, which is a very different case then killing the man for his organs.

Comment author: Jiro 27 July 2014 04:38:39PM *  0 points [-]

Only if there are people who are spending less than the tax increase on leisure goods, this seems unlikely to me.

The point is that there are people who aren't spending anything at all. If there's a gradation between people who aren't spending anything at all and people who are spending a small amount, there have to be people in the middle who are just spending a tiny amount.

By your reasoning, even a large tax couldn't possibly have this effect. Just divide the large tax increase into a series of smaller taxes and argue that each individual small increase has no effect. In fact, the smaller taxes will have an effect at some point, after you've added enough of them and the next one goes over some limit. Now, consider that there already are taxes--there will be people for which this new tax is the one that sends them over the limit.

if people have less money they may choose to be riskier, sure

If people have less money, then choosing a riskier option may be the rational thing to do. If it wouldn't have been a rational thing to do if you hadn't taken away their money, then the increase in risk is your fault. You can't launder the effect of taking the money by saying that they chose to take the risk--you're the one who changed the balance to favor a higher risk.

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