RE: A Simplified Taxless State: A Proposal (part one of three)

[vegeta]

Aren't anarchists against government as a whole? The idea of countries and borders are useless at that point.

Comments

[modprobe]

@vegeta, it depends on what exactly you mean by government. Your average anarcho-capitalist would define government as some variation of "The organization which initiates violence against peaceful people," so when they say they're against government as a whole, they mean no more and no less than that they're against initiating violence against peaceful people. Many people do not use the word government to apply solely to violence, and thus they are confused when anarchists oppose government, thinking anarchists oppose the good things governments do, which is not the case.

The above meme is using the word "governments" not in the anarchist sense, but in the sense the average person thinks of it in.

[akareyon]

Precisely. As "Self-Government" for example, the word doesn't sound that bad anymore.

[jacobcwitmer]

If by "average person" one means "person with a dictionary, who isn't a member of a cult" then yes, precisely. Government and "cybernetics" share the same Greek root word, meaning "steersmanship." This effectively means: "control exerted only where control is necessary, as indicated by feedback signals."

Where no-one is being attacked by aggressors, government is not necessary. Where aggressors and fraud perpetrators are present, government attempts to proportionally rise up against them. Those who never aggress against anyone should be able to exist without ever encountering government; much like those who are never attacked need never engage in the violence of self-defense.

The anarchist lack of understanding of the ramifications of the term "government" is also the reason that it's unintelligent to try to win support for "anarchism," per se. Political support (which results in fewer innocent people punished) can far more easily be won for a "radical libertarian," "night watchman," or "voluntaryist" state.

In a radical libertarian, night watchman, or voluntaryist state,

1. "Taxes" must be paid on a purely voluntary basis. (The common law already requires this. After all, every crime under a common-law/capitalist/libertarian/minarchist/night-watchman state must have a valid "corpus delicti" comprised of "injury+intent." If I keep money I earned, and don't pay it to a state I believe is illegitimate, then I have not intentionally injured anyone.
2. The only people a state actively "governs" are those who initiate violence. However, the state is always looking for violence initiators, so a state "passively governs" those it has access to, by fact of its geographical reach. (A CIA agent may protect the life of a U.S. citizen or innocent person overseas. For example: If the USA develops drexlerian nanotechnology, should it continue to allow Iran to execute hundreds of children per year, when the cost of preventing that murdering is lowered to zero? One would have to be a monster to suggest such a thing. The only reason non-sociopaths/empaths tolerate the mass murder of states is because they have lost control of those states to sociopaths and because of this loss of proper goal structure, their technology is grossly-sub-optimal compared to that which would be developed by free-market-states/phyles/tuatha.)
3. Because the state has multiple functions, and multiple priorities, everyone "governed" (passively or actively) by the state must have a say(a vote!) in how those priorities are implemented. Multiple "veto votes" must be built into the system in case it tries to "prioritize" an action that it should not even be allowed under any circumstances. Voters must include even people who did not pay into the state, since otherwise, the state has a perverse incentivization/targeting problem: it can respond to perverse market incentives and target non-payors, becoming a predatory institution (as it currently exists).

So, in short: Not everyone pays, but that's OK. There's no such thing as criminal tax evasion, and nonpayment of taxes shrinks the state while tax payment expands the state. Taxes are itemized to the greatest extent possible, and payments can be made to the military or courts that are not made to the local police. This then provides feedback to the local police about the job they are doing. Everyone also has a vote, and a vote on every "law."

The laws are "suggestions," and proper, random juries oversee the enforcement of laws that purely outlaw aggression and fraud. When a bogus law is broken, a random jury won't likely punish that lawbreaking. (Modern juries are not proper juries, but describing how and why that's the case requires more space than I have here.)

Everything legitimate that anarchists want is covered by a sufficiently-radical minarchist goal structure and viable strategy. Of course, that doesn't cover having a cool-sounding-but-ineffectual cult to belong to, for purposes of social signaling.

[mandibil]

What will happen to the extend of use of violence in the case that competing governments can exist ?

[luke490]

Well, I'm thinking people may not like living in the area of a violent government.