From: ald@clipper.ingr.com (Al Date)
Newsgroups: ba.politics,talk.politics.theory,sci.econ
Subject: Re: Ludwig von Mises laughs at Ronzone from the grave
Date: 4 Nov 92 19:56:03 GMT
Organization: Intergraph Advanced Processor Division - Palo Alto, CA

In article <1992Oct28.172210.2184@netcom.com> phil@netcom.com (Phil Ronzone) writes:
>In article <1992Oct27.234938.11676@clipper.ingr.com> ald@clipper.ingr.com (Al Date) writes:
>    >This attitude that all taxes are equivalent to theft shows a
>    >lack of discernment, in my opinion. If taxes were all used
>    >simply to redistribute wealth, then I would agree that taxes
>    >are equivalent to theft. But when a certain small level of
>    >taxes is used to provide secure borders and justice within
>    >that society, so that the market can operate and work its
>    >productive magic, this is not equivalent to theft. It is the
>    >cost of mutual protection and preservation, and it allows
>    >prosperity.
>
>Oh I see. So if I take your stereo and sell it and give the money to
>police department (which was broke), then it's O.K.? Right? It's O.K.
>to steal from you if it goes to a *worthy cause*, right?

Again, you show a lack of discernment.  Minimal taxes are different than theft
on two counts:   1. They are done with due process of law.  and 2. They
are intended to secure the benefits of liberty to all posterity, which 
is a worthy cause which you yourself have espoused.

>    >The great laissez faire economist Ludwig von Mises would
>    >laugh at the idea that the taxes collected to establish
>    >limited govt amount to "theft," but that probably wouldnt
>    >impress you.
>
>He most certainly wouldn't. In "Human Action" he even tripped himself
>up when he saw his conclusions going towards this very implication
>(taxation is theft) and mumbled something about it being a greay area
>that needed more work.


Oh, really?  How interesting.  Perhaps a few lines from Human Action
will yield a retraction, although I definitely will not hold my breath.

Human Action, Chapter XXVIII:
BEGIN QUOTE
To keep the social apparatus of coercion and compulsion running
requires expenditure of labor and commodities.  Under a [classical]
liberal system of govt, these expenditures are small compared with the
sum of the individuals' incomes.  The more the govt expands the sphere
of its activities, the more its budget increases. 

...Govts must resort to taxation, i.e., they must raise revenues by
forcing the subjects to surrender a part of their wealth or income.

A neutral mode of taxation is conceivable that would not divert the
operation of the market from the lines in which it would develop
in the absence of any taxation.  However, the vast literature on
problems of taxation as well as the policies of govts have hardly
ever given thought to the problem of the *neutral* tax.  They have been
more eager to find the *just* tax.

The neutral tax would affect the conditions of the citizens only to the
extent required by the fact that a part of the labor and
material goods available is absorbed by the govt apparatus.  In the 
imaginary construction of the evenly rotating economy the treasury
continually levies taxes and spends the whole amount raised, neither
more nor less, for defraying the costs incurred by the activities of
the govt's officers.  A part of each citizen's income is spent for
public expenditure.  

...

Taxation is a matter of the market economy.  It is one of the characteristic
features of the market economy that the govt does not interfere with
the market phenomena and that its technical apparatus is so small that
its maintenance absorbs only a modest fraction of the total sum of the
individual citizens' incomes.  Then taxes are an appropriate vehicle
for providing the funds needed by govt.  They are appropriate because they
are low and do not perceptibly disarrange production and consumption.
END QUOTE

>
>    >>Voting (democratic coercive secret voting) is the selection
>    >>of the master thiefs and who gets the loot for the next 2-4
>    >>years.
>    >>
>    >I dont see how voting for someone who favors minimal govt,
>    >and who is willing to work for it, is equivalent to voting
>    >for a master thief, unless you assume that everyone is a
>    >crook. Hm, I guess that wouldnt be too far out there for you,
>    >would it...
>
>Ah yes, vote for the lesser of two evils. And yes, anybody that
>wants to take my property is a thief.

Mises also disagrees that govt is a necessary "evil."  Why dont you
contradict that, so I can quote him further in this manner?

>Sorry Al -- 300 years ago your ilk would be
>futilely arguing, with the same lack of comprehension,
>for royalty. Surely no man could have cause against a just King now,
>right Al?

NOT.  "The sole object of govt ought to be the greatest happiness of
the greatest possible number of the community."   --Jeremy Bentham,
Anarchical Fallacies; being an examination of the Declaration of
Rights issued during the French Revolution.

Mises follows in this same tradition, of utilitarian economics.  

What amazes me is that you seem to think Mises is someone he is not.


--Al Date
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