Is wealth redistribution slavery?

Great Debates
1

There seems to be a sizable portion of the population who believes basic fundamental rights include the right to education, the right to health care, and similar “rights”.

I contend that such ideas are partial slavery.

Hypothetically, Person A (let’s call him Joe) can fully support his family as well as whatever hobbies he chooses by working X hours a week. Hypothetical Joe pays no taxes that are used in wealth redistributing social programs.

If the government then begins to tax 10% of his income in order to provide wealth redistributing social services, Joe either has the choice of working X+.10(X) time in order to maintain the same financial situation - therefore having .10(X) less time to spend with his family or on whatever other activity he may choose. Or he may continue working as he does, and have 10% less resources to support his family or whatever hobbies he chooses.

Work is essentially trading your time in exchange for money, and so this redistribution is taking a portion of Joe’s time and life and giving it to another person.

It strikes me that such forced theft of Joe’s time, in order to provide for the “rights” (entitlements) of others, amounts to nothing more than partial slavery. To do this, many tap into the innate resentment many people have for “higher classes”, convincing them that people who have more than them obviously “owe” them something. It’s also sugar coated and gift wrapped in the idea that the recipient of Joe’s time and effort is in more need of it than he is, or is more worthy of it than he is, but at it’s core, it’s partial slavery.

And so it strikes me as those who cry for the “rights” to various entitlements in the name of advocating human rights in general are advocating partial slavery, and as such, aren’t really human rights advocates at all.

One could argue that this argument could apply to all taxes, and it may be valid, but it doesn’t ring true with me. Taxes Joe pays to maintain a system of law and law enforcement, for instance, are clearly different, in my view, than taking Joe’s money and giving it directly to another person. But I’m approaching this with an open mind, so feel free to make me see differently.

2

There’s also the idea that Joe indirectly benefits from a society where folks receive entitlements as recipients are better off and society less decayed.

3

Why? The taxes being taken for law enforcement, for example, are still being taken from Joe and given to someone else; in this case, policemen (or construction firms to build police stations, gun manufacturers to arm the policement, etc). Redistribution of weath is what taxation is. It’s the idea that we, as a society (including Joe, feel that there are some things important enough to require spending money collectively.

4

Hmmm…

There are those that will argue that in the absence of the “right to-” housing, education, healthcare, employment, etc. , those unable to afford would just be allowed to die in the gutter unless Joe takes pity out of the goodness of his heart. But notice this need not be a matter of “fundamental rights”, but of practical statescraft: the State may create a wealth-redistribution scheme in order to prevent social inequalities from leading to out-and-out Revolution, which would be bad for the State AND bad for Joe, as it is hard to spend quality time with the kids when rampaging mobs of the uneducated and unemployed own the street.

Since part of the implied Social Contract is that you may go to sleep at night w/o fear of being dragged from your bed by neither governmental jackboots nor a street mob of looters, Joe agrees that he will give the State a share of his income, upon which after it leaves his pockets a policy decision will be made as to HOW the implied Social Contract will be satisfied. Whether it will be used to secure him through tough law enforcement or through improving living conditions at the marginal zone or more likely a combination thereof. Ideally, the decision will be made by representatives responsive to Joe’s interests. (Ideally, I said, OK?) Still, my conclusion is: NOT necessarily equivalent to slavery. Not any more than Joe’s son being drafted into the Army would be.

As to calling these policies “rights” … this is just a way of seeking to take policymaking leeway out of the government-du-jour, lest a future administration decide that maybe it isn’t THAT bad to just leave the least fortunate to die in the gutter. Not that it keeps exactly that from happening; plenty of examples all around. But think of the US Bill of Rights – at first glance very different, NOT a listing of “positive rights”: but it IS an enshrinement that the conditions that the founders understood necessary for a Free Society would not be reversible by subsequent ordinary political decisionmaking. Originally, it was not even included in the constitution – many of the time assumed that “rights” were so obvious that they did not need mentioning. BUT, who tells us what the “real” rights are? “God”? Which religion’s? “Reason”? Which school’s? Turns out it was not so obvious. Really, the problem seems to be that we humans do NOT have a universal instinctive sense of what is an “inalienable right endowed by our Creator” vs. what is “a good and necessary thing to have to live decently”, and whether it’s worth making a difference.

5

I don’t think we can neatly divide government services into “redistributive” and “not redistributive”. To the extent that law enforcement is about the protection of property, for instance, do taxes to support law enforcement redistribute resources from those who have no property to those who do? Taxes to support expenditure on roads are paid by those who have no car; taxes to support expenditure on railways are paid by those who do have a car, and may use the railways rarely or never.

On the other hand, taxes to pay for education are regarded by **senorbeef as, basically, redistributive. Not so, I think, or at any rate not if taxes for roads, police services etc are not redistributive. Vitrually all businesses benefit from having an educated, literate workforce available to them, and so all consumers of goods and services benefit likewise.

I think taxes to support direct transfer payments, such as social security, are the easiest to characterise as redistributive, but even here there is an advantage to all members of society in not having large numbers of desparate and destitute people around.

Finally, of course, “slavery” is not the losing the right to keep the product of your work, but rather losing the the right to decide whether to work at all and, if so, what work to do. No tax, however redistributive, therefore turns work into slavery.

6

If wealth redistribution is slavery, then so is drafting (and in a wost way, since your life, instead of only your time, can be taken from you), and so are the taxes used to pay for roads. I don’t own a car, so these taxes benefits me only indirectly (for instance, people can bring more cheaply my food to the place where I live, or the emergency services can come more quickly), but on the overall, I’m forced to give some of my money/time mostly for the benefit of car owners.And anyway, you too benefit indirectly from having a more healthy/educated population, since otherwise the economy of your country would go down the toilets, and your income will quickly do the same.
Anyway, it can’t be called slavery, since nobody can force you to work, or to do a given task rather than another, or to work more than you would want.
And finally, what you call “slavery”, I call “solidarity”, and I think it’s the very basis and of the existence of a society, be it a tribe or a large modern country. We live together in order to hunt more effficiently, to make sure there will be people around to help us against potential agressors, and to take care of us if we are wounded, ill or became too old to care for ourselves.
If you deny any value to solidarity, you’re basically breaking the social contract, in my opinion, and saying “I’ve no responsability to help the other members of the community”. In this case, still IMO, you should leave the community and live alone, since you’re willingly (as opposed to because you’re materially unable to) not giving anything to the community and there’s no reason to keep you as a member. And I don’t think you can pick and choose (I will pay for the roads but not for the hospitals) since being a member of the community, you have to abide by its rules, defined and approved by it. Or else, once again, you have to leave it and live by your own rules (or by the rules of your new community).
To sum up, paying taxes which are used for a redistributive purpose is as mandatory as sharing the meat you killed with the families of less lucky hunters, except on a larger and more anonymous scale. If you don’t want to share the meat, hunt alone, and live alone. You don’t have your place in the tribe.

7

Gee, I’d love to, but you already own all the land and then dictate how I’m supposed to live on it. The best I can hope for is to make just enough money to pay my property taxes on some island in a very democratic country, but not have enough income to pay any income tax.

It is awful sweet of you to suggest I leave, don’t think I haven’t thought of it, but that there isn’t anywhere to go.

8

These quotes seem to imply a general theme that because we may benefit indirectly from a service resulting from taxation that it is therefore justified. I disagree (and if that is not what you are implying, please correct me!). To put my view another way, the ends do not justify the means.

What if the state collected taxes to mow your lawn? Clearly you benefit, and so does the mowing service. Taxes justified? I don’t believe so. The issue isn’t the benefit, but rather the choice.

In a free society, we should maximize the number of choices individuals can freely make about their lives. We should be able to choose what we use and whether or not we pay for it. Taxation almost always pays for a service in an imbalanced manner, where levels of use and payment do not match on an individual basis. What’s fair about that? I don’t believe there are very many services provided by the state that cannot be provided on an as-needed, as-desired basis by a non-state entity.

This thread asks if wealth redistribution is slavery. If an individual is forced to provide for a service that is not wanted or needed, it is a form of slavery. Some will argue that our form of government provides this choice through voting. In truth it does not because only 50% of the voters + 1 are needed to impose a service on everyone else. That’s hardly a free choice.

9

Of course. It was a theorical statement. My point is that the other members of your society can legitimately demand that you share part of your wealth/time in behalf of the community, and that if you refuse to abide, you forfeit your right to stay a member of this society.

And anyway, I highly doubt that you would actually choose to leave human society, since (except if you happen to be a subsistance farmer), there essentially no way you could live without the support of the society, let alone having any income at all.

Apart from this theorical remark, my point was that not only solidarity can be mandated by society, but that it’s the very basis of the existence of human societies (and also that actually there’s no difference between being “deprived” of part of your income for the purpose of wealth redistribution or for the purpose of, say, funding the armed forces or the road networks)

10

I disagree.

Clairobscur, give me some of your wealth so I can benefit the community.

Sure, I can say that, but why should you lose any rights for refusing? What if the way I want to benefit the community is nothing you will use? Or even worse, you disagree with? Why should you pay for that?

I much prefer a community where we all voluntarily pay for what we want, because we all don’t want the same things. I don’t want you to subsidize me, and I don’t want to subsidize you. I don’t presume to know what’s best for you.

11

Well, why don’t you find one and live in it. The reason you will have trouble finding one is basically because such libertarian societies don’t seem to work…except maybe on a very small scale of likeminded people. (And, arguably, communistic societies seem to work on that sort of very small scale too.)

Also, one quickly gets into quandries…You wanting to drive around in your big hunkin’ SUV (on whose roads I do not know!!) will conflict with my desire to breathe clean air to name just one example.

12

Well…you’re reasonning from a totally individualistic point of view. You want to pay only for what you will use. In makes sense (though I find it unapealing, from a moral point of view), but in this case, the whole meaning of the community is lost. You become an individual dealing with other individuals, not a member of a society. you don’t have any more any obligations toward other people, and they don’t have any obligations towards you. You become a totally independant entity. There can’t be any government or any law in this case, because I’ve no reason to agree with you about any law or any governement form, and to be willling to pay for the enforcment of whatever law/constitutional rule/custom you happen to favor and I happen to dislike.
So, you’re advocating for a libertarian society. But to me, this would not be a society at all but rather a collection of individuals. Apart the fact that I don’t think there’s the slightest chance this could work (it would quickly turn into some form of tribal or dictatorial society after a short period of total chaos with the toughtest/ruthless individuals seizing power and imposing their will), it’s not at all the issue I believed we were discussing at the beginning. I thought we were arguing about the legitimacy of wealth redistribution in the frame of an organized society as we know them, not in an idealistic libertarian world.
And I think your OP is somewhat deceiving, because actually what you’re disagreeing with necesarily isn’t limited to wealth redistibution but include all kind of taxes and even all kind of governemnent/organized society.

13

I’m as capitalist as a Canadian can get and even I understand the need for taxation to support education, health care, law enforcement, military, roads and mass transit.

So quit your whining, already.

14

I wasn’t aware that any capitalists exist in the land of socialized, rationed medical care. My regards to your stamina. I don’t know how you stand it.

15

Ah…another example of one of our worldly posters who seems to know all about the deficiencies of other countries’ economic and political systems without having ever actually lived there! :wink:

16

**

It would seem, then, that the extreme edge of capitalism in Canada is pretty socialist.

I was attempting to discuss the philosophical merit of belief in entitlements as rights - I didn’t come in here crying about my taxes or something. So kiss my ass if you’re going to get condescending.

17

JRDelirious, I agree with your point, but I have one nitpick. The disctinction between positive and negative rights is a fiction. All rights require government action and expenditure to be realized. There is no right without a remedy, and remedies are expensive. How much money does the government spend on the judicial system that is designed to protect your so-called negative rights?

18

I’m not being condescending. I’m just telling you to grow up.

Actually, aside from health care, there’s nothing in the list I gave that wouldn’t be supported by the taxes of a typical urban American. Socialist, schmocialist.

19

Well, jshore, my post didn’t imply “knowing all” about anything, but even if you want to assume that, I didn’t realize that commentary on another place is less valid because one hasn’t lived in that place. That would really reduce the value of reading and thinking, wouldn’t it? If we all need to directly experience something to make a statement about it, most of us need to refrain from comment on most things.

20

You hardly have to be a libertarian to believe that the draft is slavery.