- 17 Mar 2009 17:04
#1836939
Society is ultimately a collection of individuals. Therefore, benefiting society means benefiting many, or even all, individuals. Therefore, from a consequentialist perspective benefiting society is ultimately more important than benefiting any single individual. The argument could be made that rewarding the indolent and the unskilled at the expense of the rest of us creates perverse incentives, which ultimately results in a net harm to society (which I partially agree with).
Of course you have to remember that what he's redistributing isn't earned income. It's the unimproved value of land, which is the only portion of productive value that is not man-made, and thus not earned.
There's always a point in debate, because ultimately you're not debating for the benefit of your opponent. You're debating for the benefit of the audience, since your opponent is normally too busy trying to prove you wrong.
josephdphillips wrote:Your premise is that society is more important in every circumstance than the individual
Society is ultimately a collection of individuals. Therefore, benefiting society means benefiting many, or even all, individuals. Therefore, from a consequentialist perspective benefiting society is ultimately more important than benefiting any single individual. The argument could be made that rewarding the indolent and the unskilled at the expense of the rest of us creates perverse incentives, which ultimately results in a net harm to society (which I partially agree with).
Of course you have to remember that what he's redistributing isn't earned income. It's the unimproved value of land, which is the only portion of productive value that is not man-made, and thus not earned.
Paradigm wrote:Since you seem fundamentally incapable of understanding that landlord does not produce the land values which they reap, there is further point in discussing this matter with you.
There's always a point in debate, because ultimately you're not debating for the benefit of your opponent. You're debating for the benefit of the audience, since your opponent is normally too busy trying to prove you wrong.
"The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design." -F.A. Hayek