From: pmetzger@snark.shearson.com (Perry E. Metzger)
Subject: Re: The Anarchy Paradox
Organization: Lehman Brothers
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 1992 02:18:40 GMT

glenne@csd4.csd.uwm.edu (Neuromancer ) writes:
>pmetzger@shearson.com writes:
>>Anarchy doesn't mean chaos. Market forces can be used to check the
>>power of organizations under an anarchist system. All anarchy means is
>>no monopoly on the legitimized use of force.
> 
>Ahh yes... put power where it belongs, not in the hands of the
>elected officals, but in the hands of the rich... NOT!   Money
>controls too much power as it is.

Bill Gates didn't get to be a billionare by beating up 10 year olds
for their pocket change. Free exchanges of goods are NOT a zero sum
game. The rich, at least those who didn't make their money off of
government favors like Ross Perot, aren't rich at the expense of the
poor, but because they produced something people wanted. People freely
purchased what it is they had to sell, and they became rich. The
market allocates resources to those that give people what they want.
If you presume to make decisions for others since you know better than
everyone else, you aren't an anarchist -- you are a fascist.

>Legitimized use of force... legitimized yes... but never
>legitimate...  You can legitimize violence and coercion all you
>want... in your own mind...  to defend your riches... to protect
>your hide...   to keep yourself comfortable...

Tell it to my rifle.

Look, you seem to have this idea that people will produce without an
incentive. Go to the ruins of the giant tractor factories in Volgagrad
to see what that brings.

Legitimate and illegitimate are someone meaningless terms. The fact
remains that people will only cooperate with a system that brings them
benefits. The trick is to produce a system that brings as many people
benefits as possible. Some people will always choose to opt out of the
system and become thieves and rapists or what have you -- other people
who don't like what those people have done always have an incentive to
stop them.

I will use force to protect my riches, my comfort, and my family -- I
am also likely a much better shot than you. Now, you have two choices
about how to deal with me. You can try to sieze all that I have, in
which case you and a bunch of your friends will likely end up dead
before one of you manages to off me, or you can choose to come to me
and offer me deals based on voluntary exchange where I do something
for you, you do something for me, and we are all happy. People will
only voluntarily exchange goods when both see an advantage by doing
so. Leaving people free to possess property and engage in free
exchanges makes for a system that maximizes everyone's long term
happiness. Using econojargon, its Pareto Optimal. Now, you can choose
to live in a system where everyone who agrees not to use violence gets
left to his own affairs and freely and peacefully trade with others,
or you can live in a society where people are constantly trying to use
force to stop each other from living lifestyles the other people don't
like. You are free to choose violence and kill me, eliminating all you
may gain from my productive capacities and possibly your own life, or
to live peacefully with me. Choose.

>This raises some questions...  suppose a person is relatively
>more useful to society than most others...  does this person
>deserve to be rewarded with great riches?  I would say no.
>For me, the fact that the person is more useful is its own reward.

Then what incentive does that person have to do anything? Why not just
become a bum and let other people work hard? Why should I, a useful
and productive person, want to be punished for my value by being
forced to provide for all the rest of you who are useless? Why should
I bother? Why shouldn't I pretend to be useless, too? Once society
follows that path, you end up with the tractor factories where
everyone tries as hard as they can to do as little as possible lest
they be rewarded with more work.

--
Perry Metzger		pmetzger@shearson.com
--
		  Just say "NO!" to death and taxes.
			 Extropian and Proud.
Newsgroups: alt.society.anarchy