teoretikern
10-01-2008, 01:08 PM
I love this book. I guess leftists and those called "liberals" in U.S do not. A prominent swedish socialist called this "The most lethal projectile ever aimed at the welfare state". And I understand him. I guess 'welfare' in american and swedish use differ, in U.S welfare means to have a job, to be able to save, to look forward to the ever increasing blob of products private capitalism is able to produce. In Sweden welfare means something else, it means that the government has a far reaching welfare net and produce services like day care center, hospitals, school or nursing for the elderly. Private enterprise does not exist at all in this picture. And you have to use this and be a part of it whether you like it or not. You can not say that "I don't like the quality of swedish public schools so instead I pay a well educated private teacher to teach me". That is blasphemy. you are not loyal to the collective An individual can not say that: "I can pay a certain amount of money to social security and it's unemployment insurance, but not to much, because I do not think that people really look for a job every day, and instead use their unemployment as vacation". If you suspect that unemployed spend some time in front of TV, you are hostile to humanity, but it is in perfectly good order to claim that rich people are the only ones that get greedy and desire money for nothing. If a family does not want to use day care center, they pay for other families day care center anyway, through a very complex tax system. And so on...
This book got famous because of Nozick's claim that the only acceptable moral, which is the base for politics and philosophy is that an action is "good" if two or more people participate voluntarily. If person A voluntarily agrees with person B to do something, this is moral correct. No one else can interfere in this "trade", and if it does happen by person C, that is not moral correct. This is what true liberals mean when they proclaim "freedom". Usually, leftists have got his all wrong and respond that "A poor person is not free to choose, he can not do as he like". But this is not the question. Guy A can persuade woman B to have ***, but he can not force her with gun threat. The leftists logic sounds a bit different, it says, in this case with my own words, that if guy A does not use a gun to get what he wants, the woman B forces him to be without ***.
This Nozickian philosophy was partially a response to the famous John Rawls, and his A Theory of Justice, a Bibel for social democrats, where he said that the only good political-philosophical moral is when all actions in a society take into account the effects on the "less equipped". But exactly when? When it comes to organ or blood donation? Grades in university? Does a teacher has the right to redistribute grades to the ones that did not make it, to the "less equipped"? A better equipped in is Rawls world a "collective resource". But what happens if the better equipped refuses to take action and instead watch TV, does he then waste collective resources, is he a thief?
Leftists I have met say that the capitalists control the means of production. Workers are forced to a relation with capitalists. The unions own billions of whatever currency in funds, and with these funds they can easily run worker controlled enterprises. They can run the enterprise totally PC. But unions in Western Europe have not been that eager to do so. Why? Are worker controlled enterprises not that effective?
A reader also meets in Nozick's book Karl Marx's theory of value. Nozick does not really present it in its full scale, but he gives some to the leftist destructive criticism. Friedrich Engels has a good description of the theory of value in a few chapters in Anti Dühring:
http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1877/anti-duhring/ch17.htm
Nozick assumes that in a country there exists one bigger private sector and one smaller public. The wages in the private sector is higher than those in the public. This is certainly not an absurd assumption, when Steve Hanke wrote in Privatization & Development (1987) this about government owned enterprises:
"These enterprises produce everything from pots and pans to cars and trucks. They even own hotel chains. As we would expect, these enterprises are quite different from their private counterparts. The most striking feature of nationalized enterprises is their politicization. Governments appoint the boards and top management and provide subsidies, since most nationalized lose money. Politicians must be consulted and approve major decisions. Government therefore determines pricing, purchasing, plant location and close-down, diversification, incentive systems, executive compensation, product development and financial policies. Labor relations are also regulated by politicians, and contrary to popular beliefs they are much more stormy in nationalized than in private companies. Not surprisingly, the behavior of successful managers of nationalized enterprises resembles that of politicians rather than of businessmen. The public ownership of nationalized enterprises and accompanying politicization lead to an interesting set of comparisons between nationalized concerns and similar private concerns. Sales per employee are lower for nationalized firms. Adjusted profits per employee are lower. Physical production per employee is lower. Taxes payed per employee are lower. Costs per dollar of sales (operating expenses plus wages) are higher. Sales per dollar of investment are lower. Profits per dollar of total assets are lower. Profits per dollar of sales are lower. Sales per employee grow at a slower rate. And, with the exception of nationalized oil companies, virtually all nationalized companies generate accounting losses."
Nozick then says that the left claim that the workers in the private sector are exploited, they produce a value that instead of floating to the workers float to the capitalists. He assumes that the public sector then slowly shrinks and disappears, and the ex public workers get employed in the private sector, and there get higher income. Then some very disturbing social relations must, according to leftists, appear: the workers suddenly get exploited.
Karl Marx never said that two persons must always produce the same value:
1. a person with real capital produces far more value than one without
2. education also raises the productivity
A japanese CEO has advanced computers to control the production, he also has a top level technical and economic education from a japanese university. And he has high income. What amount of value does this CEO actually produce per hour? Karl Marx had no hints how to value the CEO's work, or any other worker by the way. I have never heard of any other logic leftist way of how to measure. The social democrats and the biggest union in Sweden tried in many years establish a genuine, real labour theory of value, so a worker would get payed hes real, true wage. But that project ended totally empty handed in 1991 (big surprise!). The left does not know what value a CEO produces. Instead of trying to solve the puzzle how to measure someone's true income in some socialism, the left has been obsessed by redistribution of income, from the richer to the poorer, even when they do not know if this action is moral correct. The capitalists' income mostly consists of wage, not dividends. This means that the left actually might be thieves.
The distribution of income in Sweden is among leftists, like Naomi Klein, in many other nations highly praised, when it is said that without high taxes on higher incomes, Sweden would not enjoy it's "social reforms". This is not true. Take a look at the income distribution in Sweden:
http://i37.tinypic.com/smu7py.jpg
This picture shows the total income from wages in billions of SEK and how this income is being taxed, the year 1999. As I said earlier, the richests' incomes consist to the majority of wage, not dividends, to the degree that we can totally ignore them. As you can see, the collected taxes from the richest actually make a very minor sum. Redistribution from greedy, rich capitalists is only symbolic. Instead, it is the upper 30% of all income earners that redistribute to the poorer. the middle class earns nothing. If you look at a hole life span, only 20% of swedish citizens profit from redistribution. This raises the question if some welfare should be run by charity. Charity is a voluntary agreement. What is a government? It is an institution with a monopoly on violence in a certain geographical area. Social reforms, when a redistributing government under gun threat force people pay more taxes than others, is a not voluntary agreement.
The left claims that 'it is not fair' that some people have high income while others have low. But why stick to income? Why being so materialistic and only stare at money? Money is not all that matters. Why not investigate other forms of distribution? Income is only to look along one "dimension" but others exist. Getting close to Jesus is what counts for a true christian. Why not ***? Some people get more *** than others. That is not fair. I worked in a mental institution a couple of years, and met many men that because of their illness never met women. And they felt themselves "be on the outside". Why not redistribute leftist women to the lonesome men? A leftist can visit an institution and meet one or more lonesomes every second week, it is important to run this regularly so that the lonesomes feel themselves safe. They then have a social safety net. The leftist also shows her golden hart when she does social welfare job, and not only say that the society needs to direct resources to the poor and the rich will pay for it. Leftists acknowledge in discussions like this that "of course it is asburd to draw equality to far", but why that should be done when it comes to income and not when it comes to *** is an enigma. This book raises the question "do I have the right to use the government's monopoly of violence upon other people as I like, but other people have not the right to do so against me, because I have the right to voluntary agreements?" I can not say yes. What is the leftist's answer? Does she want to use the governments guns in her interest, but no one else has the right to force her, for example, to redistribute her body? If the answer is yes, then this political system is not logic, it is very arbitrary.
A person that tries by looking into coffe grounds predict wether a person is guilty or not to some specific crime and take action according to his findings would certainly be distrusted. His method has a complete lack of legitimacy. Is not leftists' economic-political methods like predicting the future in coffe grounds? In my view they have no legitimacy. This is where Nozick gets really lethal to leftists. My experience of leftists tells me that they are very self confident in their what they say superior moral. They have in their own view a complete monopoly on good behavior and sentiments; their politics is even purely scientific. This opinion Nozick smashes to bits, he shows that the left's theories are what they are - theories and values, not science.
Now buy this book!
This book got famous because of Nozick's claim that the only acceptable moral, which is the base for politics and philosophy is that an action is "good" if two or more people participate voluntarily. If person A voluntarily agrees with person B to do something, this is moral correct. No one else can interfere in this "trade", and if it does happen by person C, that is not moral correct. This is what true liberals mean when they proclaim "freedom". Usually, leftists have got his all wrong and respond that "A poor person is not free to choose, he can not do as he like". But this is not the question. Guy A can persuade woman B to have ***, but he can not force her with gun threat. The leftists logic sounds a bit different, it says, in this case with my own words, that if guy A does not use a gun to get what he wants, the woman B forces him to be without ***.
This Nozickian philosophy was partially a response to the famous John Rawls, and his A Theory of Justice, a Bibel for social democrats, where he said that the only good political-philosophical moral is when all actions in a society take into account the effects on the "less equipped". But exactly when? When it comes to organ or blood donation? Grades in university? Does a teacher has the right to redistribute grades to the ones that did not make it, to the "less equipped"? A better equipped in is Rawls world a "collective resource". But what happens if the better equipped refuses to take action and instead watch TV, does he then waste collective resources, is he a thief?
Leftists I have met say that the capitalists control the means of production. Workers are forced to a relation with capitalists. The unions own billions of whatever currency in funds, and with these funds they can easily run worker controlled enterprises. They can run the enterprise totally PC. But unions in Western Europe have not been that eager to do so. Why? Are worker controlled enterprises not that effective?
A reader also meets in Nozick's book Karl Marx's theory of value. Nozick does not really present it in its full scale, but he gives some to the leftist destructive criticism. Friedrich Engels has a good description of the theory of value in a few chapters in Anti Dühring:
http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1877/anti-duhring/ch17.htm
Nozick assumes that in a country there exists one bigger private sector and one smaller public. The wages in the private sector is higher than those in the public. This is certainly not an absurd assumption, when Steve Hanke wrote in Privatization & Development (1987) this about government owned enterprises:
"These enterprises produce everything from pots and pans to cars and trucks. They even own hotel chains. As we would expect, these enterprises are quite different from their private counterparts. The most striking feature of nationalized enterprises is their politicization. Governments appoint the boards and top management and provide subsidies, since most nationalized lose money. Politicians must be consulted and approve major decisions. Government therefore determines pricing, purchasing, plant location and close-down, diversification, incentive systems, executive compensation, product development and financial policies. Labor relations are also regulated by politicians, and contrary to popular beliefs they are much more stormy in nationalized than in private companies. Not surprisingly, the behavior of successful managers of nationalized enterprises resembles that of politicians rather than of businessmen. The public ownership of nationalized enterprises and accompanying politicization lead to an interesting set of comparisons between nationalized concerns and similar private concerns. Sales per employee are lower for nationalized firms. Adjusted profits per employee are lower. Physical production per employee is lower. Taxes payed per employee are lower. Costs per dollar of sales (operating expenses plus wages) are higher. Sales per dollar of investment are lower. Profits per dollar of total assets are lower. Profits per dollar of sales are lower. Sales per employee grow at a slower rate. And, with the exception of nationalized oil companies, virtually all nationalized companies generate accounting losses."
Nozick then says that the left claim that the workers in the private sector are exploited, they produce a value that instead of floating to the workers float to the capitalists. He assumes that the public sector then slowly shrinks and disappears, and the ex public workers get employed in the private sector, and there get higher income. Then some very disturbing social relations must, according to leftists, appear: the workers suddenly get exploited.
Karl Marx never said that two persons must always produce the same value:
1. a person with real capital produces far more value than one without
2. education also raises the productivity
A japanese CEO has advanced computers to control the production, he also has a top level technical and economic education from a japanese university. And he has high income. What amount of value does this CEO actually produce per hour? Karl Marx had no hints how to value the CEO's work, or any other worker by the way. I have never heard of any other logic leftist way of how to measure. The social democrats and the biggest union in Sweden tried in many years establish a genuine, real labour theory of value, so a worker would get payed hes real, true wage. But that project ended totally empty handed in 1991 (big surprise!). The left does not know what value a CEO produces. Instead of trying to solve the puzzle how to measure someone's true income in some socialism, the left has been obsessed by redistribution of income, from the richer to the poorer, even when they do not know if this action is moral correct. The capitalists' income mostly consists of wage, not dividends. This means that the left actually might be thieves.
The distribution of income in Sweden is among leftists, like Naomi Klein, in many other nations highly praised, when it is said that without high taxes on higher incomes, Sweden would not enjoy it's "social reforms". This is not true. Take a look at the income distribution in Sweden:
http://i37.tinypic.com/smu7py.jpg
This picture shows the total income from wages in billions of SEK and how this income is being taxed, the year 1999. As I said earlier, the richests' incomes consist to the majority of wage, not dividends, to the degree that we can totally ignore them. As you can see, the collected taxes from the richest actually make a very minor sum. Redistribution from greedy, rich capitalists is only symbolic. Instead, it is the upper 30% of all income earners that redistribute to the poorer. the middle class earns nothing. If you look at a hole life span, only 20% of swedish citizens profit from redistribution. This raises the question if some welfare should be run by charity. Charity is a voluntary agreement. What is a government? It is an institution with a monopoly on violence in a certain geographical area. Social reforms, when a redistributing government under gun threat force people pay more taxes than others, is a not voluntary agreement.
The left claims that 'it is not fair' that some people have high income while others have low. But why stick to income? Why being so materialistic and only stare at money? Money is not all that matters. Why not investigate other forms of distribution? Income is only to look along one "dimension" but others exist. Getting close to Jesus is what counts for a true christian. Why not ***? Some people get more *** than others. That is not fair. I worked in a mental institution a couple of years, and met many men that because of their illness never met women. And they felt themselves "be on the outside". Why not redistribute leftist women to the lonesome men? A leftist can visit an institution and meet one or more lonesomes every second week, it is important to run this regularly so that the lonesomes feel themselves safe. They then have a social safety net. The leftist also shows her golden hart when she does social welfare job, and not only say that the society needs to direct resources to the poor and the rich will pay for it. Leftists acknowledge in discussions like this that "of course it is asburd to draw equality to far", but why that should be done when it comes to income and not when it comes to *** is an enigma. This book raises the question "do I have the right to use the government's monopoly of violence upon other people as I like, but other people have not the right to do so against me, because I have the right to voluntary agreements?" I can not say yes. What is the leftist's answer? Does she want to use the governments guns in her interest, but no one else has the right to force her, for example, to redistribute her body? If the answer is yes, then this political system is not logic, it is very arbitrary.
A person that tries by looking into coffe grounds predict wether a person is guilty or not to some specific crime and take action according to his findings would certainly be distrusted. His method has a complete lack of legitimacy. Is not leftists' economic-political methods like predicting the future in coffe grounds? In my view they have no legitimacy. This is where Nozick gets really lethal to leftists. My experience of leftists tells me that they are very self confident in their what they say superior moral. They have in their own view a complete monopoly on good behavior and sentiments; their politics is even purely scientific. This opinion Nozick smashes to bits, he shows that the left's theories are what they are - theories and values, not science.
Now buy this book!