[mindslight]

And yet continual rent for a place to sleep (whether paid to banks and cities, or abstracted to private landlords) is also literally taking money from people by force of law.

I'm personally against BI in that pouring more gasoline on the inflationary fire is not going to put it out, but deflationary economics have never been popular - trying to get people to stop partying while they're having a good time is impossible, but so is bringing up the topic when they're hungover!

So long as the overriding monetary environment remains a biased towards centralized extraction, there most certainly is a libertarian argument in that those who wish to distance themselves from that technology should be able to, rather than being forced to cope within it.

[jrs235]

> And yet continual rent for a place to sleep (whether paid to banks and cities, or abstracted to private landlords) is also literally taking money from people by force of law.

I concur. And we, IMO, ought to have a CIVIL way of determining land rights lest we go back to tribalism and might makes right determinations (individual violence).

>So long as the overriding monetary environment remains a biased towards centralized extraction

And how do we pay for the resources needed to civilly determine and enforce the outcomes of claims to land? Whatever government oversees the process, local, county, state, or federal will need a way to extract something of value from those governed which is why we have fiat currency and why taxes must be paid in the form of currency controlled and dictated by said governments.

>I'm personally against BI in that pouring more gasoline on the inflationary fire is not going to put it out, but deflationary economics have never been popular

I agree with you. Rather than collect taxes to force value extraction the government could just inflate the money supply by paying those that operate it with newly created dollars. No taxation needed. I think this is a worse solution as it's easy for loose money policies to snowball. People at least feel the pinch and pain of taxes to help restrain and reign in the cost(s) of government.

>there most certainly is a libertarian argument in that those who wish to distance themselves from that technology should be able to, rather than being forced to cope within it.

I believe people should be allowed to conduct business using whatever currency they wish except for paying taxes. They'll need to obtain or convert their currency into the fiat currency of choice.

I heard there's a Libertarian paradise East of Ethiopia and Kenya for those purists that can't accept compromise.

[mindslight]

I don't see how purporting to agree while then stating the direct opposite or talking past someone with a bunch of strawman would ever be productive.

[jrs235]

See POTUS.

[mindslight]

I meant for productive conversation.

Sure, a person can employ a combative communication style to get ahead in the monkeysphere. But still, the road to being a shithead president doesn't start off with being a shithead forum commenter.

[jrs235]

Fair enough.

I failed to understand your stance from your reply to cgore. I took your response to be "agreeing while pulling back a bit on cgore's position.

I am interested in your thoughts on how to address "taking money from people by force of law (gunpoint)" You pointed out the parallel between cgore's point the BI is no different than rent on land.

It appears you're against inflationary policies and pouring gas (BI) onto the situation adds to it (unless money is taken out of supply via taxes, however the symptom of inflation is still likely to appear: an overall increase in prices.). Inflation of prices is a symptom of inflation of the money supply. But an overall increase in prices does not necessarily mean there is inflation (of the money supply).

I am also interested in your thoughts on how should we pay for the civilized framework (government) that sorts out disputes?

[mindslight]

It's disagreement, but based on emphasis not axioms.

Singularly focusing on the tax aspect while ignoring the rest of the government-created conditions produces a biased conclusion. Basic Income seems to have gained appeal because of people's need to meet rent. But said rent is itself almost entirely due to government created conditions - the natural cost of building and keeping up dwellings is a small part of their budget.

Similarly while I do agree that taxes are inherently theft, applying this condemnation to any specific topic will just gain legs or not based on who stands to benefit. Condemning any new proposed program based on spending (rather than considering it in the context of rearrangement) is fallacious, and more befitting conservatism rather than libertarianism. I would be in favor of generally disbanding USG. But I'll be damned if such a push is going to result in cuts to eg NPS, NSF, NIH, EPA, NASA, and even USPS, while leaving eg NSA, FBI, ATF, DEA, and Raytheon intact.

FWIW, This is my specific critique of BI: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12782244

Regarding taxes and jurisdiction, there really is little point in going back and forth between wildly differing perspectives, and I've stopped asserting that I have the answer. I will say that I've come to view libertarianism heuristically (as opposed to axiomatically), and things like the federal government collecting lots of money just to dole it back out to the states with strings attached can still be pointed at as decidedly broken.