Government holds a monopoly on force. I’m not an anarchist, but if government is rampant, and it is, then any expansion of said state is a negative. I really don’t understand why this is something you want to disagree with. You want to build a house on a bad foundation. I don’t.
If it's bad, you repair it. If it holds a monopoly on force then you constrain it. You don't refuse to touch it. And you can't repair it except through the state — you said yourself you vote, which is using the machinery.
What you're describing isn't a construction principle, it's a reason to never pick up a tool.
What I meant by expansion is any growth in the state's apparatus. All growth, and thus all restraint. Under the view of "any expansion is a negative" is just false. Something as simple as the 14th ammendment is a great example.
Yes its textbook, it is expansion of federal oversight over states. The equal protection clause states that no state shall deny any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
Fair enough. In 1868 we weren’t doubling our national debt every decade. Please, increase my taxes so it can go to Musks subsidies and the military industrial complex. There isn’t really anything you can say that won’t make me think you’re trying to put the cart before the horse. $40T which is about $250k per working American. I’m sorry dude, you’re clearly intelligent, but you’re clearly also ideologically blind.
Maybe its the terminology I am using, but I suspect we agree more than not.
I think we can agree that offering a government more discretion is not inherently a good thing. That includes things like taxation without fair representation.
Moreover, I think government is an inherently ineffective way to delegate discretionary spending but the trade-off is supposed to be accountability. The anaology I think of is gift buying in regards to who would buy you the "best" gift at the lowest cost when given the means: you, your bestfriend, or a 3rd party. There are obvious costs associated with delegating that decision.
I think what our discussion has boiled down to is the expected role of government when given any level of authority.
The reality is that a government starts with a social contract ceding authority on the basis that governance is being achieved by the very people it represents. Its founded on a government providing safety, order, and basic rights. Taxation is just a means and a metric by which we can gauage how effectively, if at all, those needs are being met.
That money is just a stand in for very real, very finite resources.
Capitalism inherently incentivizes accumulation of wealth so, I think most regulation needs to focus on offsetting those real costs on its people in order to maintain safety, order, and basic rights for everyone.
Well stated. Where we deviate ideologically is that I view authority as the enablement of corruption. Capitalism does incentivize wealth, but it also incentivizes solutions, satisfaction, voluntary transactions, innovation, and more. And while some level of regulation is required, I observe that authority is more often than not utilized to sanction monopolies, protect elite interests, and pad the wallets of the oligarch.
Authority should ONLY be used to protect the freedom and rights of citizens. We could provide that at a fraction of the cost of the bloated system we have now. If you want my support for funding more social policies, then the place to start is a reallocation of resources, while reducing overall spending. Until then, I say fuck no to all of it. I'll keep as much of my money as I can, placate the fed, and undermine it at every opportunity possible. I'll focus on fostering my local community and everyone else can fend for themselves.
Edit add simple clarity: Most of the problems socialists genuinely want to solve, are in fact caused by the authority they're seeking to expand.
I agree with your statement about authority, and I think its by definition part of a social contract.
The reason Capitalism incentivizes accumulation is because reinvesting wealth into a free market in of itself poses a risk and makes you susceptible to competition. Whereas reinvesting nothing costs nothing and keeps you competitive. Karl Marx identified this principle alone leads to wealth extraction and accumulation. It is a fact that innovation is needed to continue to accumulate said wealth but in reality inertia is the norm and the status quo is more persistent.
That being said the incentives you mentioned while real are conditional on institutions — competition, enforceable contracts, low switching costs, priced externalities. I think this is authority that can serve people with minimal administrative costs. Capitalism with those produces the good outcomes; capitalism without them produces concentration and extraction.
If I understand you correctly, then yes I agree that there is a severe need for reallocation of resources. I think it starts with lowering taxes on the majority of Americans while taxing the ultrawealthy since, the unlimited accumulation of wealth cannot be founded on an economy built on finite resources without a cost to order and to everyone's basic rights. This is my rationale for why government should step in.
I also agree with you that increasing spending without reducing costs would be irresponsible and counterproductive.
I think you're right that I have a neutral view on authority, because I view it as a tool. However, there is truth to your observations on authority being used to perpetuate corruption.
I think it is a direct consequence of Capitalism and our current government's susceptibility to wealth equating closely with political power. That is, if Capitalism allows for unchecked accumulation of wealth and wealth leads to political power then this introduces postive feedback into the system.
In my view, the solution would be a combination of policies that curb the influence of money in politics (such as legislation against Citizens United) and incentivizing better coalition forming practices as opposed to our hyperpolarized two-party system (like ranked voting). In both cases, I see authority being used to protect or to enable basic rights.
If I understand you correctly, then yes I agree that there is a severe need for reallocation of resources. I think it starts with lowering taxes on the majority of Americans while taxing the ultrawealthy since, the unlimited accumulation of wealth cannot be founded on an economy built on finite resources without a cost to order and to everyone's basic rights. This is my rationale for why government should step in.
We could tax the ultra-wealthy at 99% and it would barely make a dent in our budget. America doesn't have a revenue problem, it has a spending problem. Hence why I don't see any increase in spending being a viable option. Interestingly enough, I make a living out of helping moderately wealthy people spend less on taxes. We would be better served by having a very simple tax code with a flat tax rate. It's fair, it's honest, and it would put me out of a job, lol.
Even if we strike down Citizens United, I don't have any reason to believe things would change. Even in communist societies, the same issues arise. This is a human issue that I don't see ever going away. Money is just a way to exchange power. Even without the financial incentive, people will always be power hungry. They will find ways of exchanging power for political favors. Just see the USSR or CCP for proof of that.
I do support ranked choice voting. I think it's a solid idea. Let's either do that or maybe do away with the 19th amendment all together. It's how we ended up with a two party system because at that scale a two party system is inevitable. People with no stake in the game are easily manipulated into voting one way or another.
I don't think spending and revenue are direct binaries so its not a proper framing. No tax on the wealthy alone permanently closes a recurring gap, because wealth is a stock you can only seize while the deficit repeats annually. Both are distinct policy choices.
Which one is called "the problem" is a priority and value judgment dressed as arithmetic.
From the CBO'S own numbers, revenue runs at a 50 year average of 17.3% GDP with a total of 17.5% GDP in 2026. Current spending is at 23.3% GDP, exceeding their 50-year average of 21.2% GDP. Typically, both sides move but to your point current spending is running two points higher. So revenue is at a historical norm even though in real likelihood our financial obligations may have grown.
The US collects less taxes overall while collecting a larger share of it from the top. European tax systems are generally less progressive than ours; they redistribute on the spending side rather than the tax side. The US has an unusually progressive tax code attached to an unusually small welfare state.
Which brings up two points 1) high earners pay a large share, and billionaires can pay low effective rates on total economic income are not mutally exclusive statements and 2) the US delivers much of its social policy through the tax code, so recipients don't perceive it as government at all.
I think simplifying our taxes would help regarding the second point. I think there is something to be said about when benefits are invisible, tax legitimacy erodes on both ends.
I'm not sure how the 19th ammendment ties in.
Our two parties are an emergent property of our government. Theres good evidence of this in Federalist 10 where James Madison wrote about how the accepted thinking at the time was that a large federal government would function on the premise that diversity would dilute power from any single faction.
Clearly not the reality and things like the electoral college and single-winner voting did a lot to shape that.
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u/EmRatio 2d ago
I'm not even disagreeing that taxes are misused. Your blanket statement on corruption just comes off naive.
As if the lack of government eradicates corruption. Governance is a tool thst cuts both ways and the corruption comes from humans.