The case for Social Democracy.

No. Would you?

 

I have no right to take my neighbor's property in order to pay for medical care for another.

 

Correct. You don't. So don't. There are laws against theft and robbery.

 

So would you say that that ethical rule is universalizable? Does it only apply to me, or does it apply to all people?

 

No. That's back to the same old silliness.... and games.

 

He's asking if your morality is universal. If you think that's silliness, then you've got a major problem due to the inconsistency. Morality is either universal, or it's garbage.

 

So it's' wrong for me, Longshot, to take my neighbor's property, but it's ethically okay for others to do so?

By what logic do you conclude this?

 

Have a good time.

 

I understand that it's difficult to confront ideas that smash one's preconceptions. You seem like a nice kid. I urge you to seek to understand personal liberty and rights. Nobody has a right to take another's property. Once you understand that, it might effect your progressive agenda.

 

You've proven yourself unwilling to discuss the subject intelligently "kid". I have no interest in chasing after your silly fantasies that have nothing to do with anything. You're good at putting words in a person's mouth and that's another habit I don't like. I don't play such games.

 

So are ethical rules universalizable or not?

 

Even here you're wrong. We know, for example, that basic labour rights have been achieved through unionization. We also know that modern economics predicts inefficiently low wage through monopsonistic power. Both refer to how the employer receives economic rent by under-compensating their workers.

You certainly have dodged the economics. You are completely reliant on a false argument that Americans, relative to Europeans, are more feckless.

There is nothing credible in your response. First, My reference over socialism was simply a correction to your error. Socialism does not demand equal wages. That's a poorly constructed myth. Second, when you shifted comment from flow to stock (ie income to wealth), you made an additional error by adopting a flawed statistic. I illustrated it's flawed nature through direct reference to empirical evidence. The analysis into the impact of inheritance is not socialist analysis. It is, however, analysis into class divides that describes how wealth distributions become increasingly skewed. It is of course also alien to your original comments over merit. It is of course also an explanation for the lack of social mobility.

I did enjoy the irony of you referring to the UK when, adopting similar neoliberal strategies as the US, it is characterised in terms of high inequalities generating higher deaths and falls in regional life expectancy.

Perhaps set your sights a little higher?

A tad naive. Dependence is guaranteed. Being flippant, perhaps the film They Live should be part of the primary school curriculum. Might open a few eyes over the myth of individualism in the US.

You do have a habit of changing perceptions over time. I'll make it easy for you. A pay productivity gap cannot be justified. It is a direct attack on the notion of merit in labour markets.

This too isn't socialism specific comment. It's, after all, just reference to supply and demand.

Fair enough, but that does ensure that your stance on merit isn't credible.

I know how it's calculated. I also know the international evidence (typically using LIS data which ensures consistent income definitions across national datasets). I have also read the key research, such as the analysis by Smeeding, that confirms the higher poverty rates in the US.

Comparing poverty with skydiving? Wow, that's a new one on me.

I'm only correcting your error. You are really referring to public good provision, justifying a level of military expenditure and arms production. The MIC is a completely different kettle of fish. It refers to profiteering, by definition. It refers to our kiddywinks being killed unnecessary. There's no good from it.

This is when you could have referred to Britain. A political system which, until recently, was dominated by two party consensus politics. Not anymore, reflecting how folk- tired of a system geared for a financial elite- got off their backsides.

The US obviously does not have the same level of welfare as liberal and social democratic nations. As I've already said, the focus is on efficiency and not effectiveness (ie it does very little in protecting the lowest incomes from the consequences of poverty). Now I see genuine self employment as a good thing. Firm creation is a jolly outcome. Genuine economic choice, where you're not reliant on wage labour is super in the individualism stakes. We just know that those countries with higher welfare safety nets get a self employment boost.

Climate change will certainly generate food insecurity. Don't be comparing that with paragliding now!

It's an economic paradigm that celebrates individualism. Capitalism, in contrast, guarantees class limitation and restricts genuine choice.

No bother. Its been a pleasure correcting your errors

 

Why is the left pushing socialism? Did Socialism/Marxism not produce enough corpses in the last century?

 

I find a level of irony in your comment, given Marxist analysis into militarism helps explain events like WW1 and WW2

 

The communists predicted the great war, but that's no great shakes. There hadn't been a really big european war in 100 years. After the armistice was signed, the communists moved into power and then WW2 started up. The end of WW2 saw the communists and capitalists split the korean peninsula and Berlin split in half.

The side-by-side comparison of the korean peninsula gives a very real example of how the two systems compare to each other. One side is prosperous and free, while the other side is a hell hole.

and we all know which side our wonderful friends on the left would prefer to immigrate to. They just can't get enough of the good ol' Kim tribe up north.

If you don't want to move to NK, then the irony is even thicker.

 

Understanding world war which killed so many million is 'no great shakes'?

Or the US? That's also authoritarian after all.