Question for ACists about charity/welfare

[Dan.]

So what of societies that did not recognize property? How do you explain them? Native Americans did just fine for many years without the idea of "owning." Property rights are just a social construct, not "human nature."

[Vagos]

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Let's say I don't believe in property rights to land, and thus believe anyone should be able to be on whatever land they want.

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The "everyone has an equal share of everyone/everything else" argument. But what if two people want to live on the exact same spot? What if he wants to build something on his land right where you to plan to live. How is the dispute settled?

[NickMPK]

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Let's say I don't believe in property rights to land, and thus believe anyone should be able to be on whatever land they want.

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The "everyone has an equal share of everyone/everything else" argument. But what if two people want to live on the exact same spot? What if he wants to build something on his land right where you to plan to live. How is the dispute settled?

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The dispute is settled by the state, using the state's definition of property rights.

Obviously I'm not actually suggesting that we shouldn't have property rights.

All I am trying to point out is that ACists are wrong in suggesting that AC society is not coercive. It involuntarily coerces people who do not believe in the legitimacy of the AC definition of property rights, even if those people have no desire to interact with those who do believe in property rights. Just like the state involuntarily coerces people who do not believe in the legitimacy of the state.

[valenzuela]

An AC society is still coercive but much less coercive than a statist society.
In a statist society you have a group of ppl deciding what drugs u can do, how much money of ure money u have to give, what kind of gambling ure allowed to do .
AC only imposes property rights, which is something that a statist society also imposes.

[TomCollins]

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So what of societies that did not recognize property? How do you explain them? Native Americans did just fine for many years without the idea of "owning." Property rights are just a social construct, not "human nature."

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Do you really think that Native Americans did not recognize some form of ownership? According to Wikipedia-
"The concept of ownership has existed for thousands of years and in all cultures." Although they may not have had a concept of ownership of land (it was so vast, it was almost a nonscarce resource), but at an individual level it seems very unlikely that they did not have SOME form of ownership for certain things.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ownership

[John Kilduff]

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So what of societies that did not recognize property? How do you explain them? Native Americans did just fine for many years without the idea of "owning." Property rights are just a social construct, not "human nature."

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Why did various Indian tribes war with one another, then?

I think it is more like they didn't have a concept of ownership of the land - like air, like water, land was vast and plentiful then so they probably thought of it like air or water (sometime territorial disputes notwithstanding). I think they owned things like clothes and tools. What about wampum, which was the medium of exchange for some Indian tribes? Wampum was used to buy or trade for things.

By the way, I'm not trying to say that property rights are human nature. Rather, I'm suggesting that some respect for the rights and possessions of others is the nature of adult humans in society - along with some degree of violation of those rights as well (often depending upon perceived need). I think most societies, even before the state, probably held some respect for others and for others' property. This might have been violated for various reasons at various times, but it probably held overall for much of the time, too.

I'm also not convinced that property rights are any better respected post-state than pre-state, but I'm not making an assertion about that - just questioning it.

[pokerbobo]

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But it seems like whenever anyone asks something like: "Would poor children be provided with an education under AC?", all the ACists answer, "I have no idea, and why should I care?"

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No, the answer you are getting is more like- i don't know the exact amount that the market will value education but blanket assumptions that poor people get nothing under AC fail to understand how value is determined.
The longer answer is that education has value to both the person who gets the education and the employer of that person and so that there will likely be a large amount of investment in training by cooperations and companies. Setting up education for kids could possibly be parts of compensation packages offered, or coorporations funding entire schools for the opportunity to have first crack at the best and brightest that come out, or to gain good publicity in communities ect ect. There are tons of ways for groups to put money into education, but it all depends on how much people 9the market) actually values that education.

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If the govt was no longer providing education to the poor...I would look for a "Walmart" of education to start up. I would invest heavily in this company and watch my portfolio grow. Efficiency is the hallmark of successful business and efficiency is rarely if ever found in govt.

[kyleb]

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I would like to be coerced to give more because I believe that only coercion will generate a sufficient volume of contributions to actually accomplish something.

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I hope you realize that this is a ridiculous sentiment, not shared by the vast majority of the population of the United States.

[NickMPK]

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I would like to be coerced to give more because I believe that only coercion will generate a sufficient volume of contributions to actually accomplish something.

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I hope you realize that this is a ridiculous sentiment, not shared by the vast majority of the population of the United States.

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The sentiment is shared by most people with regard to many government programs. If it wasn't, there would never be sufficent political support to enact them.

It's basically just a rewording of the prisoner's dilemma. Society is better off if everyone cooperates, while each individual is better off if they defect. So individuals have an incentive to construct structures that will not allow either them or others to defect.

[pvn]

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I would like to be coerced to give more because I believe that only coercion will generate a sufficient volume of contributions to actually accomplish something.

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I hope you realize that this is a ridiculous sentiment, not shared by the vast majority of the population of the United States.

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The sentiment is shared by most people with regard to many government programs. If it wasn't, there would never be sufficent political support to enact them.

It's basically just a rewording of the prisoner's dilemma. Society is better off if everyone cooperates, while each individual is better off if they defect. So individuals have an incentive to construct structures that will not allow either them or others to defect.

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The prisoner's dilemma only works if you can define the "optimal" outcome. To apply this to "society" you have to either A) read people's minds (and have them all agree!) or B) arbitrarily make decisions for other people about what they prefer.

That's really what this is about - an excuse to make decisions for other people, based upon some "enlightened" despot's view of what's best for everyone.

And again, by trying to determine one single solution that is best for the aggregate, you totally ignore the fact that the chosen solution may be extremely harmful to some of the individuals.