[Borodog]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Do you socialists really want the gap between rich and poor to be smaller...

[/ QUOTE ]

I am probably a socialist based on American nomenclature (I wouldn't be called in Europe). That the gap becomes smaller to the richest is not an important goal, it is about securing an adequate living standard for everybody. You cannot do that in any way which will not hurt the rich either through direct taxation of them or through any other interference into business life that will affect them negatively. For me the x% has y% is more a way to show that there are funds available for distribution.

[/ QUOTE ]
Wow

[/ QUOTE ]

Hehe [img]/images/graemlins/cool.gif[/img]. I am not an extremist aka. communists or such, but I don't believe you have a 100% right to keep what you earn/have. I understand that taxing too hard is both hurting the economy and also crossing a moral line. But I believe that the boy next door is more entitled to your money for food and schoolbooks if he/his parents can't afford than you are too them for your own consumption.

[/ QUOTE ]

The problem with this is that, if accepted, everyone is then "entitled" to everything. All property claims become subjective verbal claims about who can put what to "the best" use. It's a recipe for never ending conflict. It destroys the very purpose of property, which is to reduce and resolve conflicts over scarce resources, not foment them.

[ QUOTE ]
If you don't agree to that I am willing to use force to make it happen anyway.

[/ QUOTE ]

Exactly my point.

PS. Why isn't the boy next door entitled to *your* money, and why don't you just hand it over instead of using force to take someone else's? My opinion is that the "compassion" that underlies this flavor of socialism is a hollow, empty compassion. The socialist doesn't actually care enough about the poor and the downtrodden to get off his duff or reach into his own pocket; he would rather stay on his duff and have a man with a gun reach into someone else's.