Historical. The question of whether a distribution is just depends upon how it came about, so one has to examine the history of the transfer and acquisition of any “holding”.

Rawls’ theory of justice is what Nozick called an “end-state” theory of justice. Such a theory proposes that redistribution must lead to a just state, in Rawls’ case, that distribution should be arraigned in a way that we achieve the Difference Principle.

Nozick contrasts this with his own “entitlement” theory which is a “historical” theory of justice. Distribution is only just if the transfer and acquisition of the goods were just. Further, all historical transfers of any certain “holdings” must be just, from its initial acquisition until its most recent.

In my mind, one advances just outcomes, the other just behavior. It’s no surprise that I’m with Nozick on this one. I fear end-state theories of justice because unjust behavior can (and has) been used in an attempt to reach a the desired state, which may or may not be achievable.

Anyways, Nozick’s chapter on Distributive Justice is a great companion to Rawls and makes for great debate.

Only if you see them as a means-to-an-end. But as an end-in-themselves they are priceless. How can one put a price on something that is original?

Here in the UK it’s the employer that pays their employees’ income tax and national insurance (and student loan repayments if required). We only ever see the post-tax amount.

The business is forced to deduct taxes from the gross wage and sends it to the government on the employee's behalf, leaving the employee with what is left over. The state sure has streamlined the process, haven't they?

Why would there be legal implications if the tax is voluntary?

Yes. The argument you gave was that your reward was agreed on by some other party, therefore you deserve it, if you provide no further factors, then whatever reward is agreed on is deserved. So the prisoner deserves to escape because that's what was agreed on.

If the transfer and acquisition of the exchange was voluntary and consensual, it would be a just exchange, sure.

Are you saying that taxation is a secret where you live?

No, taxation is not a secret. When you accept a job, do you agree to the gross or net wage?

I literally gave you the example in the fucking quote you're replying to, if would be hard to get more disingenuous. If you board a train you agree to pay the price of whatever journey you took. If you have a bar tab you agree to pay the cost of however many drinks you accumulate by the time the tab is due.

At no point in either arrangement did you shake anyone's hand or bow or sign anything. Remaining on a train definitely constitutes an agreement to pay for the excess journey.

You gave me a false analogy. You’re using an example of voluntary exchanges as analogies for compulsory taxation, services I agree to pay for and willingly seek out as analogies for services I do not. Utter trash.

You've not linked agreeing with deserving. If a prison guard agrees to help a prisoner escape, do they thereby deserve to escape?

I thought we were talking about why I am entitled to the gross wage, now it’s offers to escape from prison.

I didn't say it was his business. Your claim was that he consented. He did not. The amount was negotiated under an expectation. — Isaac

It could be possible you and your employer agree to net pay where you live, which might explain my confusion—but then your agreed-upon wage would be subject to shifts in taxation, going down should your taxes go up and vice versa, thereby violating the wage you both agreed upon. It just doesn't make sense to me.

Of course it does. That's exactly what you're violating. If I give you my bike on the condition you don't sell it, and you sell it, you're violating my consent.

One minute it's an "implicit understanding", the next its a "condition". I won't assume bad faith but I don't think I can keep arguing on such shifting sands.

When you board a train, or stay on a train past your station, you are agreeing to buy a ticket, you're using a service.

By remaining in the country, you're agreeing to the terms under which your use of that country is offered. You had 18 years to decide. If you don't agree to those terms, stop using the service. It's theft to use a service and not pay for it.

I have not agreed to any terms, figuratively or literally, implicitly or explicitly. I’ve never shook anyone's hand or bowed or signed anything. "Remaining" isn't a gesture of agreement in any language. But it’s no surprise you’d keep using the language of agreement and contract even if I have never agreed to any of the above. It’s intuitive, even if in your case it doesn’t reflect reality.

Yet you've given nothing in support of the assertion that you gross pay is either fair or equitable. The only argument you've offered so far is the entirely tautologous one that your gross pay is your gross pay.

It is fair and equitable because it was willingly given to me in trade for something of equal value. I deserve payment because that is what we agreed to, and the employer deserves my work for the same reason.

Hey, we actually agree on this. What is it about this self-imposition? Can you elaborate your thoughts on the fact that we don't just "do", but we have to continually buy into doing?

I wouldn't describe it as an imposition, myself, because no one is imposing this activity on me. I just think it is a burden and its fine to be pessimistic about it. It's tough. It's not easy. In such a life optimism leads to disappointment, pessimism to pleasant surprises.

I think you’re right. The technological growth of human history and “progress” could be the evolving effects of our attempts to mitigate this burden.

Apology accepted.

Oh dear, are we speaking in questions again?

... enforced on pain of state intervention which you rely upon at every turn.

Sounds like projection to me.

I claimed no such thing. You said your gross wage was agreed as yours by consent. That's a lie. You employer has full knowledge and expectation that you will give the taxable portion to the government. He never consented for you to keep that portion in return for your labour.

Well, that’s even more absurd. It’s no business of the other party whether I pay my taxes or not, and it matters not one bit what he implicitly expects me to do with my payment. If a client expects me to spend his payment on food or rent it makes little sense to say I am violating his consent if I flush it all down the toilet.

Because it is not all yours. Your ability to earn it comes partly from your education, partly from your health, partly from your clean air, water, refuse collection, coworkers, laws, trade deals, security, policing... The taxed portion is you paying for all that. If you take it all you are stealing those benefits which you did not pay for.

It is all mine because I earned it and did not agree to pay for any of things you mention. There is no voluntary and consensual agreement between both parties, I have zero say in what I am buying, and finally I am relieved of my money through coercion. That is why I say it is an unjust transaction.

If what is 'just' is just what is, then what does the word 'just' even mean? If the 'just' amount of wealth is simply 'all the possible wealth' then there's nothing the addition of the word 'just' is even doing.

I use "just" in the common sense to describe behavior that is fair and equitable between all parties involved in any one interaction.

You don't just make it so by saying it. If that's all you've got I suggest you get yourself a soapbox, you're in the wrong place.

But there is no other agent in the contract. You claimed it was a lie and then claimed the government is implicitly entitled to a portion even if there is no explicit mention of it. In other words, through a feat of imagination you assert your belief into an agreement and pretended it is binding. Soapbox.

These are two objections to the claim that your taxes are thus rendered just, but that's not the claim. The claim I'm asking you to justify is that your full, untaxed wage is just. Why is it just for you to keep that money? Why is the amount you negotiated with your employer a just amount for you to keep?

That was the payment for services rendered. That’s the money they wanted to give me and the amount I accepted. The amount isn’t just—it might be a poor wage—but the transaction is just because it was made between two consenting parties.

Why is it not just?

Thanks for that. I agree with him, of course.

I don't see how this response addresses anything I said above, which is the post you linked to.

Thanks for letting me know. I linked to the wrong post.

I’d like to think an old dog can learn new tricks. I’m proven wrong again and again.

We’re the same age.

And that's the end of it. Just means, just transactions, just acquisition. If you want to read about different theories of distributive justice be my guest. This isn't philosophy 101.

I did acquire it through the voluntary consent of all parties involved. Employer offers me a wage, I agree to it.

Yes, everyone is well aware that the government will skim from this transaction, and expect they will take it, so it needn't be implicit or explicit in any contract. The expectation that a thief will steal an unlocked bike is not enough to make the thief's appropriation of that bike a just transaction.

Yes, the employment occurs in the state where the government gets to dictate the rules, and they have dictated they have a right to my income and use it as they see fit. But states dictate all sorts of unjust rules all the time. So the fact that it dictates that it has the right to my income and that they get to use it as they see fit doesn't make the transaction just.

No, stealing is taking something which doesn't rightfully belong to you, you've yet to establish that the taxed part of your wage doesn't rightfully belong to the government. It's not sufficient to just say that you don't like it, this is a discussion forum, not a blog, we're not interested in your idle opinion.

To argue against government intervention on grounds of injustice you need to say why it is 'just' for you to retain your gross wage and unjust for the government to take it's taxes. The simple fact that it resides for any period of time in your bank account is not a measure of justice.

I worked for that money and acquired it through the voluntary consent of all parties involved. The government did not work for that money nor did it acquire that money through the voluntary consent of all parties involved.

Yes, and “the rest” will not have the monopoly on violence.

Ignoring or dismissing this comes across to others that you are being dishonest. And if you are dishonest in your dealings here, how can anyone believe your world where everyone is honest and good?

Your dishonesty is proven because you left out the one sentence in your quotation of mine that directly contradicts what you said here. Compare this surreptitious quote-mining to the actual one.

Quote-mining

It’s a faith of mine, but one founded on experience, that in the absence of state power a majority of free people will not resort tyranny, theft, murder, and they should have the means and ability to defend themselves against those who would.

Actual:

People are greedy and selfish and make many bad decisions, and that’s one of the many reasons why I do not want to give them power over others. It’s a faith of mine, but one founded on experience, that in the absence of state power a majority of free people will not resort tyranny, theft, murder, and they should have the means and ability to defend themselves against those who would.

Why would you do that?

Appeals to the population are not that convincing. Most people once thought the world was flat.

So your argument is either pointless whinging or lacks foundation.

The issue is what is just, not why people fear laissez faire. People fear laissez faire because they think it unjust. It's only sociopaths like you who think hoarding all the capital you can get your hands on is 'just'. The rest of us think justice is about what people deserve to get, not what people can get.

That’s right. Little prigs like yourself would authorize stealing so you can give it to people you want.

Who should stop them?

That is the fatal flaw in my arguments: it serves no utilitarian purpose. It won’t just work out. I do not believe laissez-faire or free markets results in some sort of market equilibrium. I do not believe it will work or function that well, especially in a culture crippled after centuries of state rule and intervention. It doesn’t aim for the greater amount of happiness for the greater amount of people.

The best laissez-faire could ever do is provide a space for humans to figure it out on their own, absent absolute power, the hard and soft despotisms and the game-rigging of a coercive and exploitative institution.

Most people probably are utilitarian and would side with letting the state take their money on the promise it would do charity wherever others refuse to. But an unjust transfer in wealth never results in a just distribution, let alone a just state of affairs. We cannot use injustice to reach justice. No matter the efficiency, no matter who gets what, it’s injustice all the way down.

So perhaps rather than asserting the red herrings which are the first two you could actually address @frank's claim which is the third. To back up his claim, see The Financial Crisis Inquiry Report:

All I know is that there are more causes, as I said. And it’s not clear to me that the absence of regulation can accurately be said to cause a certain activity. That’s why the conclusion of the dissenting statement in that report sounds more reasonable to me.

This is why a laissez-faire economy can't work. Contrary to your naive idealism, people are greedy and selfish and make many bad decisions. A democratically-elected government is the best tool we have to protect ourselves.

People are greedy and selfish and make many bad decisions, and that’s one of the many reasons why I do not want to give them power over others. It’s a faith of mine, but one founded on experience, that in the absence of state power a majority of free people will not resort tyranny, theft, murder, and they should have the means and ability to defend themselves against those who would. They will be free, at least.

Laissez faire: cover for corporatism.

You should probably double check what that word means.

Again, what?

It’s essentially the difference between expecting others to respect your ability to make your own way in life and demanding others to provide for your way of life. One involves voluntary association the other demands compulsory association.

The difference between negative and positive rights is pretty well established that anyone can spend a moment to learn the difference and come to his own conclusions.

Yes it is more fundamental and just than demanding others provide for you.

Are you arguing for human rights now? Freedom of association as a human right?

Is that more or less fundamental than the right to life, the right to a living wage, the right to humane working conditions - all of which have, historically speaking, require state intervention?

I'm talking about actual history, not your abstract fantasy.

Always have been. But no, you have no right to demand I provide for you.

That's why we have human rights. To protect everyone. Even stupid cowards. (Not saying you're a stupid coward xtrix :smile: )

Human rights are for the weakest, stupidest, most cowardly among us. Yes, and even the "moochers and looters." Everyone, no matter how unworthy.

That’s right. And freedom of association implies anyone can quit a relationship with the state should they choose.

It's food stamps NOS. Cheese. Milk. Hamburger.
Buns to put the hamburger in. It's not going to turn the world upside down.

It’s unjust, Frank. It’s an unjust system. It seeks to arise at a just state through unjust means. Not only that but it does so inefficiently, wastefully and poorly.

It's just nutrition assistance. Nothing drastic.

All of it at the cost of justice. It cannot differentiate between just and unjust distribution of wealth.

Exactly. It treats adults as unweened.

Only insofar as I think the state should defend human rights, which you just claimed yourself right before you implied it should offer people food and a living.

Moral hazard, NOS. That's the argument you're missing.

I’ll look into it.

Why should the state do any of that?

So they can continue to do nothing about it themselves. It achieves the greatest effect with the least possible exertion, no matter if it is an unjust relationship.

The reason The Wealthy purchase or influence power is because the people with power are selling it. If the state didn’t have that power The Wealthy wouldn’t be able to purchase it. The Wealthy do not have the power you claim they do until the people with power afford it to them, and even then it’s just the promise that the state will use its power to benefit The Wealthy.

The Poor, with no wealth, can only purchase or influence power through less-costly means such as voting or protest.

Both seek to influence power, actual power. Both desire the same ends: to use state power to benefit their preferred group of beneficiaries.

A police officer has the legal right to use force against you. The bureaucrat has the legal right take your children, your home, your wages. They can put you in prison. I don’t think any other class of people has that sort of power in the statist system.

Putin is the leader of a state. Yours is an example of an agent of the state getting away with such activity. But the phrase “the wealthy” also applies to people who are not agents of the state. Elon Musk, for example, doesn’t have the monopoly on violence, and any middle-class cop can toss him in jail should he break a rule.

If the richest man in America and the poorest cop in America were to draw guns and point them at each other, which one could shoot the other and be applauded for doing so?

It’s true, I do not equate the wealthy with the state because there are plenty non-wealthy, middle to low-class people who are agents of it. Similarly, not every wealthy person is an agent of the state.

You keep telling me things are a given but on closer examination we find they are not, and are in fact the opposite of the case. It makes all this condescending language about my thinking and naivety all the more precious.

Sometimes we use examples to give force to arguments. What’s the point of loaded questions?