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The best argument for altruism
(lemmy.world)
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this post was submitted on 01 Sep 2024
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So taxes?
Well, under a Libertarian model, t*xes are a dirty word.
It's "unfair" that you should have to help support public services that you might need someday, so it's better to push the full burden of cost on the specific people who need it at any given moment.
Insurance is fine though, which is basically privatized taxes. There'd probably be cop and bear insurance plans available in a perfect Libertarian world, so those with good foresight and the means to afford them wouldn't have to worry about having to pay to have their life saved.
As long as, you know, the situation also doesn't include the following criteria:
Only 1-3 bullets are covered by the plan, after which the policy holder is responsible for the full cost of any subsequent bullets used.
The policy covers the services of [1] officer at standard working rate. Additional cost due to surge pricing rates will be covered by the policy holder. One additional officer will be covered by the policy at a rate of 50%, with the remaining 50% covered by the policy holder. Any additional officer fees are the full responsibility of the policy holder to cover.
Bear disposal is covered in full by the policy, for bears up to 200kg. For bears greater than 200kg, the policy will pay 20% per additional pound up to 50lbs, after which the policy holder pays a flat rate of $50 per additional stone of bear.
The policy does not cover bear- or officer-related damages to your person.
I identify as some sort of a libertarian. My idea of the ideology is that taxes are gathered to fund essential services that cannot be resourced in better ways. Just about everybody who's not insane or an asshole agrees that police, military, judicial system, assistance for less fortunate, some infrastructure (edit: + emergency services like fire brigades and I'm sure I forgot something else too) are part of that, while schooling, healthcare and certain natural monopolies are sometimes debated depending on how strict of a libertarian you are. Personally, I side on thinking that schools and natural monopolies should be publically owned and funded, whereas for healthcare I would model the system based on Switzerland's, which is mostly privatized but works a lot better than USA's.
Debt can be used to fund profitable investments (usually infrastructure and other one-time up-front investments like school buildings), not for upkeeping existing financial structures.
Things beyond those sectors probably should not be funded by taxes. Funding for housing, culture, private sector tax breaks/direct support, and sports (outside of youth sports possibly) are examples of some of such things. In fact, if you do fund other things by taxes, you're essentially stealing resources from those essential services. Sometimes I wonder why so many people don't seem to realize this.
The criticism of taxes is based on the idea that you, an individual should not be expected to pay taxes by force. Corporations, trade goods, products should be taxed and enforced, but tell a person "you have no choice and no option and there are serious legal troubles (fines, garnishments, jail time, etc...) is not just because you're given no other option. The individual person is being forced to pay taxes because they were born in a certain region of the world?
Now let's be pragmatic; it would take a lot of work, time, and money to change a taxing standard. However it is not right to force each head in a country to pay taxes.
Edit: Also even as a libertarian, I think most insurance is bullshit lol
I'm actually not seeing what's weird about it. They are using and benefiting from the infrastructure that is paid for by those taxes, and pooling the resources this way allows the whole community you benefit in ways that can't be done otherwise. The extension of this is that if you are able to pitch in but don't then you're essentially "stealing" from the rest of the population.
I'm not well versed in the subtleties of a libertarian system; in a libertarian community, what's done with people who try to benefit from what others are doing without pitching in?
That's because no such system has ever worked for more than a few months. In the few attempts that have occurred, there's no way to prevent tragedy of the commons type situations and everything quickly goes to shit. They either end up reinventing taxes or getting overrun with bears.