I suppose I should clarify again--isn't web debate grand?--I am not denying the existence of public goods or collective action problems. (I dispute that all publicly provided goods are genuine collective action problems; there's a great deal of rent-seeking, log-rolling, and sheer stupidity in there.) When I say that your decision to pay, or not, into the treasury voluntarily, is not a collective action problem, I mean that your behavior is not in any way a solution to whatever collective action problems may exist. In the case of a Wal-Mart, it genuinely makes sense to shop there if everyone else does, even if you'd rather not have the Wal-Mart there. I don't think this holds for increasing tax revenue. There is no strategic benefit to doing so in a large polity; it is simply too big for you to have any observable effect on other peoples' committment to taxation.
So while I do understand, quite well, the theory behind which the provision of public goods is a collective action problem, I simply don't think that in practice, as an individual matter, you can decide how much to give to the government/charity on those grounds.
MM wrote: When I say that your decision to pay, or not, into the treasury voluntarily, is not a collective action problem, I mean that your behavior is not in any way a solution to whatever collective action problems may exist.
If that is your present position, with whom are you disagreeing? "Your behavior is not in any way a solution to whatever collective action problems may exist" is exactly what a good many people have been saying.
The real debate point, as best as I've understood it, rests over to what degree people want taxes on other people (rational, unfair in my favor), versus simply wanting everybody to pay in order to get something (rational, fair), versus paying into the public kitty with no expectation of anyone else chipping in (irrational, unfair against my favor).
Weird. Because actual scholars (John T. Scholz and Mark Lubel) do provide evidence that taxpaying is, in Henry Farrel's summary, "indeed a large scale collective action problem; although they don’t use this term, they clearly think of it as being in part an assurance game (that is one in which people’s willingness to contribute is conditioned on their belief that others will contribute too) a collective action problem." Your tactic is to just simply assert the opposite.
Megan, why not read the book Henry sent you.
anony,
The real debate point, as best as I've understood it, rests over to what degree people want taxes on other people (rational, unfair in my favor), versus simply wanting everybody to pay in order to get something (rational, fair), versus paying into the public kitty with no expectation of anyone else chipping in (irrational, unfair against my favor).
I think this shows that you haven't understood it at all. I haven't seen anyone who has been arguing that people who think their taxes are too low should pay extra into the public kitty say that they should do this "with no expectation of anyone else chipping in." As has been explained umpteen times, if these people are truly worried that no one else will be chipping in, they can band together and make a collective donation after they've found out how many people are willing to chip in and how much each of them is willing to give.
Really Megan?
That's interesting, and it's allot of clarifications.
Somewhere along the way you've dropped the claim that people who want their taxes higher are hypocrites or are failing to meet their moral obligation for not sending in more money above and beyond their taxes.
Since you acknowledged that people who want their taxes higher wish this because they want the government to have more money so it could better do its thing, and since you acknowledged in this post that,
"There is no strategic benefit to doing so in a large polity; it is simply too big for you to have any observable effect on other peoples' committment to taxation,"
then your claim about failing to meet any moral obligations would have seemed very out of place.
Somewhere along the way you've dropped the claim that people who want their taxes higher are hypocrites or are failing to meet their moral obligation for not sending in more money above and beyond their taxes.
Huh? She just said: "I have a different intuition, which is that if you want everyone to do something, you are morally bound to do it whether or not they follow suit." Presumably, "do something" would include "pay more money to the government."
But I do think this post is confusing, and it's not clear to me what she's saying in this post.
Mixner,
I don't see the quote you just showed me in this particular entry. Since I haven't seen it, I can't deny that she "just said" it.
But I was going off this entry.
BTW, I will say that her intuition is arbitrary and ridiculously Kantian.
Once again, if the reason people think paying taxes is good is that there is just some arbitrary, abstract, impenetrable principle they believe in, then I suppose they do have to contribute in order to remain consistent.
But since she has already allowed that the reason most people want higher taxes is so that government can have enough money to do its thing, then just up and giving one's money won't help, therefore, they are not inconsistent by failing to give their money over and above their taxes.
As for banning together, first, this wasn't her claim.
Second, the people who want higher taxes are only inconsistent if there is no other conceivable way to achieve their goals as effectively.
I don't see the quote you just showed me in this particular entry. Since I haven't seen it, I can't deny that she "just said" it.
It's in her newer post, titled "the logic of collective action."
But since she has already allowed that the reason most people want higher taxes is so that government can have enough money to do its thing, then just up and giving one's money won't help, therefore, they are not inconsistent by failing to give their money over and above their taxes.
Huh? Of course it will help. Every extra dollar the government gets in revenues is an extra dollar available for spending on its supposedly worthy programs. It doesn't matter whether that dollar comes from taxes or from a voluntary donation. A dollar is a dollar. That's why they're being inconsistent.
Mixner,
You're going to drive me to drink.
First, you implicitly acknowledged the problem with small, individual donations by repeatedly asserting that liberals could ban together to alleviate some of the problems of not making a large enough dent in the government's finances, so don't go back on that now.
If there is another way for liberals to spend their time as effectively, then they are not inconsistent.
Why is giving your pittance to government (above and beyond your taxes) a more effective way to spend your time rather than giving to an already established charity and trying to get leftist back in power so they can use the powerful enforcement mechanisms?
If the answer isn't obvious to you (I for one think the latter sounds more effective) then it's not necessarily the case that people are being inconsistent. In fact, there are other ways to spend their which are just as, if not more effective than just up and giving more money to the government, baned together or not.
BTW Mixner,
Megan has already acknowledged collective action problems. So if you don't see how they apply here now, then I have no idea what would cause you to.
You said a while back that you were done with me.
Yet turns out you weren't.
Well, I'm officially done with you.
I've concluded that you either being willfully (or perhaps unconsciously) obstinate, or you literally don't understand a damn thing about this discussion.
In either case, I'm done.
And here's a tip, don't be so myopic and pedantic. Realize that the content of your premises matter as much or more as the validity or your logic.
Jay,
First, you implicitly acknowledged the problem with small, individual donations by repeatedly asserting that liberals could ban together to alleviate some of the problems of not making a large enough dent in the government's finances, so don't go back on that now.
No, I don't acknowledge that it's a "problem" at all. As I keep pointing out to you, millions of Americans engage in millions of individual, voluntary acts in support of collective goals every year, from writing a check to a charity to installing CFL lightbulbs in their homes to voting for their preferred candidate in an election. They don't say to themselves, "Gee, I'd better band together with others before I send my check or cast my vote to make sure I'm not the only one doing this." They just go ahead and act as individuals. This isn't a real problem, it's an excuse. But if you seriously believe it is a problem, it can easily be eliminated by the kind of cooperative voluntary action I have described. I don't know why you keep obsessing over this point.
Why is giving your pittance to government (above and beyond your taxes) a more effective way to spend your time rather than giving to an already established charity and trying to get leftist back in power so they can use the powerful enforcement mechanisms?
Er, if you think a charity would make better use than the government of the extra money you think you should be paying to the government, why do you think you should be paying more to the government in the first place, rather than just increasing your donations to charity?
Since Megan was the one who stated that the only way to be consistent, if you wanted higher taxes, was just to up and give more money to the government, then it is her burden, (and the burden of those who agree with her) to demonstrate that claim.
The reason that it would be more rational to give money to charity rather than government (provided one thought taxes should be higher) is because there is an ALREADY ESTABLISHED organization ready to go to work. Rather than trying to spend precious time and resources organizing groups large enough to make a difference to the government's finances (provided one accepts collective action problems, as Megan has, and Mixner hasn't), one can just give to organizations that already have organized and already have a mission one approves of.
So why not just give to charity all the time, rather than trying to raise taxes? Because the choice is not between charitable giving on the one hand and insufficiently high taxes (in a leftist's eyes) on the other. In times when the GOP is in power (or a centrist Dem) then one can give to a charity, and give to left-wing candidates who pledge to put taxes at desired levels.
One can be more confident that more money will be raised if there is an enforcement mechanism for higher taxes. Of course, unless those who run our government are anarchists, there is always an enforcement mechanism, but with leftists, there is an enforcement mechanism for even higher taxes.
So spending time trying to organize groups large enough to overcome collective action problems will be less efficient than giving to charities and trying to get leftists back in power to raise those taxes through enforcement mechanisms.
At the very least, it's not obvious that just up and giving money as an individual, or trying to spend time and resources organizing groups together to donate, will be more effective than trying to get leftists elected (who will the enforcement mechanism to collect more tax money) and giving to already established charities.
We have,
A) The option to give money to candidates who pledge to put taxes at desired levels, knowing that these politicians will have enforcement mechanisms to alleviate concerns over collective action, AND giving to charities in the mean time.
and
B) Donating one's own money (above and beyond one's taxes) to the government, and/or spending time organizing people to give money to the government as a group.
"A" seems like the next best (next most effective) option (to someone who wants higher taxes) to actually having a left-wing candidate in who will be in office, raise taxes, and use enforcement mechanisms to collect the taxes.
At the very least, it's not obvious that "B" is a more effective means, but in order for Megan's point about consistency and moral obligation to be correct, it has to be obvious and indisputable that "B" is the best way, and it's not, therefore, her assertions about moral obligation and consistency are unwarranted.
Mixner, if you still can't see this then you are either,
1) Willfully and dishonestly trying to be obstinate and get people to waste their time arguing with you,
2) Blinded by your own ideology,
3) Dimwitted.
I thought all along that it was 2, but I'm starting to think it is 1 or 3.
Closing thought, the argument is not that it's *possible* for people to raise allot of money without an enforcement mechanism, the argument is this:
If a person thinks taxes should be higher, how should they best spend their time? Should they just give money to government and hope that allot money will be raised, knowing no enforcement mechanism is in place? Should they try to spend precious time and money organizing with large groups? Or should they do the next best thing and donate to an already established charity with a proven track record of performance, and try to get their favorite candidates in office to use enforcement mechanisms to raise taxes?
After all, it's not as if charities are favored in the abstract, but rather in particular circumstances. And getting a politician to get elected and raise taxes through enforcement mechanisms may very well raise more money in the long run than by sending off your extra money to a tax-me-more fund.
If you can't see this now, then you're going to need some sort of epiphany to see it in the future.
I'm not going to wait around for it myself.
Jay,
So why not just give to charity all the time, rather than trying to raise taxes? Because the choice is not between charitable giving on the one hand and insufficiently high taxes (in a leftist's eyes) on the other.
The choice isn't between giving to the government and trying to raise taxes, either. Obviously, while you're trying to raise taxes, you can donate to the government whatever extra money you think you ought to be paying in taxes. Or you could donate it to a charity instead, if you think the charity would make better use of the money. Either way, you should be donating the money towards the goal you're trying to achieve by raising taxes. If you don't, you're a hypocrite, period.
Your posts are rambling and confused, poorly written, unfocused, full of irrelevant digressions and unsupported factual assertions. There are occasional moments of clarity, but in general it's hard to extract any clear and relevant argument from all the verbiage. I'm not sure what's driving your endless, tortured attempts to excuse tax-raisers for refusing to put their money where their mouth is, but it is at least entertaining to watch.
You should be giving to some goal which will alleviate the social ills you perceive, no argument there. But its not obvious that trying to get your favorite candidate elected (so they can use enforcement mechanisms) is less effective than the alternatives. Mega made the claim, so you would do well to pay attention to who has the burden of proof.
But no one is inconsistent by failing to give to government above and beyond what they're taxed.
The reason people would think that a charity would make better use of their money (in times when taxes are thought to be too low) is that a charity is an already established organization with a track record of raising large amounts of money and attacking social ills in a targeted way. But this doesn't necessarily make them preferable to government all the time, since that the all important enforcement mechanism (which you're ignoring) can raise tons of money, particularly when someone who likes high taxes is in charge of the government.
I'll admit to one thing, my posts could be written much better than they are. But as to the rest, I'm afraid you must not know what is or isn't relevant, and you must not know what a factual assertion is.
As to the verbiage, that wouldn't be such a barrier if you weren't such an idiot.
Jay,
So spending time trying to organize groups large enough to overcome collective action problems will be less efficient than giving to charities and trying to get leftists back in power to raise those taxes through enforcement mechanisms.
How do you know it will be less efficient? Where are your efficiency studies? You keep making grandiose empirical claims like this, but you provide absolutely nothing to back them up. Here's another simple plan for "overcoming" the alleged "collective action problem."
1. Set up a fund, the "My Taxes Are Too Low!" fund, to which people who think their taxes are too low can make deposits by check, cash, credit card, electronic transfer or whatever other means.
2. Publicize the fund on liberal blogs and publications, through word-of-mouth, letters to the media, social events, flyers, email, text messages and in whatever other ways you can think of. Mass communication has never been easier. Emphasize how much more the government could do for education, health care, the environment, medical research, the poor, etc. if it had more money.
3. Sit back and watch the donations roll in. Every six months or so, the trustees of the fund would write a check to the IRS equal to the contents of the account. The donated money would be combined with tax revenues and be available for spending on your favorite government programs.
Voila. Simple. You could get the thing going with a couple of days' work, and it would snowball from there. If a significant number of Americans share your belief that their taxes are too low, you could raise millions or billions of dollars. What are you waiting for?
But no one is inconsistent by failing to give to government above and beyond what they're taxed.
If they think their taxes should be higher, yes they are being inconsistent. They're hypocrites.
The real question is, where are Megan's efficiency studies?
She's the one who made the claim.
I have been more epistemologically modest, by allowing that at the very least, it's not obvious that giving money to the government (above and beyond your taxes) will be more efficient than giving a bit to charity during lean tax years and working to get your favorite candidate into office so they can use enforcement mechanisms to raise a bunch of money.
My version seems at least as likely, even more likely to work to me, but that's just me.
But I allow that this isn't an established fact, and I allowed that in my posts, I guess that verbiage prevented you from comprehending.
You obviously don't understand that since Megan made the claim, it's not on me to cite stats. It's only on me to point out the wholes, and to point out that it isn't at all necessarily true that giving to the government above and beyond your taxes will be a more efficient way to cure the social ills that concern you, compared to giving to charities and preferred tax and spend candidates.
Once again, my argument works just fine with epistemological modesty, but yours doesn't. So I don't need to rely on any grandiose empirical claims, you do.
Steps 1, 2, and 3 NEED to be a more efficient way to raise money than giving to charities during the lean tax years and giving to tax and spend candidates who will gladly use enforcement mechanisms to raise funds.
If it's not obvious that steps 1, 2, and 3, are more effective, then on what grounds is it warranted to call people hypocrites for failing to behave the way you say they should?
Mixner,
So you don't get lost in all the words, I'll make it a tad shorter:
In your post on February 26, 2008 at 1:16 AM, you showed me three steps (1,2,3) to raising money.
One question about these steps, and one question about concerns over empirical evidence:
*What is your evidence that steps 1, 2, and 3 would be a more effective way to raise money, compared to giving to a preferred charity in the lean tax years and to tax and spend candidates who would gladly use enforcement mechanisms to raise money?
*Don't you realize that all I have to do is point out that it's not obvious why one is manifestly more effective than another, while you have to demonstrate why your suggested path is obviously more effective, in order to establish warrant for calling people hypocrites?
I look forward to your specific answers to these questions.
Jay:
You're not going to get specific answers, just the same accusation of hypocrisy. And empirical evidence? Megan was given that over at Crooked Timber, and she's been well nigh babbling ever since.
Dolf Fenster-
Your kind of reasoning and standards of evidence, while prudent, do not go very far in these parts.
Jay,
I have been more epistemologically modest, by allowing that at the very least, it's not obvious that giving money to the government (above and beyond your taxes) will be more efficient than giving a bit to charity during lean tax years and working to get your favorite candidate into office so they can use enforcement mechanisms to raise a bunch of money.
Sorry, but this is yet another of your false dichotomies. As I have already explained to you repeatedly, you can donate to the government the extra money you think you should be paying in taxes while you're working to increase taxes. If you're not doing this, you're a hypocrite. As Megan put it succinctly, you have a moral obligation to do what you're trying to force everyone else to do.
And the various reasons you keep asserting for donating to charity instead of donating to the government (that charities are "already established," that charitable donations are "targeted" to specific goals, etc.), to the extent they have any merit at all, are also reasons not to raise taxes. You conveniently ignore all the alleged disadvantages of using the government to solve problems rather than private charities and non-profits when the funds are to be raised by taxes rather than voluntary donations.
Mixner,
Why don't you reply to my 2:06 AM post?
It's short enough for you to stay on track.
I would be interested in you specific responses.
What is your evidence that steps 1, 2, and 3 would be a more effective way to raise money, compared to giving to a preferred charity in the lean tax years and to tax and spend candidates who would gladly use enforcement mechanisms to raise money?
I don't need any evidence. You do. The premise of the tax-raisers is that their taxes are too low and that they should be paying more to the government, remember? They can obviously pay that extra money to the government voluntarily. It's your burden to show that some mutually exclusive alternative action would be a "more effective" way of achieving whatever goal it is they seek to accomplish. Unless you can do that, you have no basis for claiming that a more effective alternative exists. The bottom line is that unless they're willing to put their money where their mouths are, there's no reason to take them seriously.
Oh well Mixner,
I guess this is ultimately futile, as Dolf Fenster predicted.
Mixner have you been to Matt's blog?
You know that crazy left-wing blogger who goes by the moniker "Soullite?"
http://matthewyglesias.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/02/tax_and_deregulate.php#comment-1411467
Well you seem like the right-of-center version of that person. Even if I've pegged you wrong, you still behave like Soullite. You know, myopic, dim, oblivious to reason?
If you go back and carefully read the posts from start to finish, you will find that you are the one who exuded the vinegar even when I was trying to be civil.
But of course I abandoned that course once I realized you were determined to act like an asshole.
BTW, though Megan is sometimes similarly vinegary, she seems about 100X as smart as you, so although I can't predict the future, don't be shocked if she abandons the untenable position you've been fighting for over the last couple of days.
Have a nice life.
Mixner,
I don't have to claim a more effective alternative exists. All I have to show is that it's not obvious that your suggestion is more effective.
YOU'RE the one charging hypocrisy. If it isn't obvious that up and paying more money to the government (as individuals or groups) is more effective then giving to a preferred charity in the lean tax times and trying to get leftists back in so they can raise taxes with the almighty enforcement mechanism, then you're claim to hypocrisy is unwarranted.
It's sad that your don't understand who holds the burden of proof, you stupid son of a bitch.
Jay,
I don't have to claim a more effective alternative exists. All I have to show is that it's not obvious that your suggestion is more effective.
No, you have to show that there is a more effective alternative than donating the money to the government, since the premise of the people whose hypocrisy you are futilely laboring to excuse is that they owe the government more money.
YOU'RE the one charging hypocrisy.
Saying that you think you owe the government more money but failing to pay the government that money is a textbook example of hypocrisy.
... you stupid son of a bitch.
You've been flailing around for a while now, as your increasingly rambling and incoherent posts demonstrate, but you're really losing it now.
It's simple, Mixner.
A generalized contribution to government will not necessarily be used to address any particular problem.
A contribution to a charity will be used to directly address a particular problem.
A tax payment, because it was levied pursuant to a budget request that authorized a particular program, will be used to directly address that particular problem. (Don't get into Christina's buckets and tracing the flow of a particular dollar I contribute, that just confuses the issue).
Can you see that?
Let me add something else, because I wasn't necessarily thinking of "the collective action problem" when I stated my original objection to this accusation of hypocrisy. It's something I said before that apparently has gotten lost in this argument.
I'm not asking for my taxes to be lowered while other people's taxes are raised.
I'm asking for taxes which were previously collected to once again be collected.
I don't see any hypocrisy in that.
A generalized contribution to government will not necessarily be used to address any particular problem. A contribution to a charity will be used to directly address a particular problem.
That's a good argument against raising taxes in general. You might want them to go to health care, but they might be spent on the military instead. If it's not a good enough reason to oppose higher taxes, why is it a good enough reason to oppose voluntary donations to the government? The concern could be largely eliminated anyway by allowing donors to make voluntary contributions to specific programs or budget areas. So, for example, if you think you should be paying an extra $1,000 a year in taxes for Medicaid, you could send the government a check for $1,000 that would be added to the Medicaid budget specifically.
A tax payment, because it was levied pursuant to a budget request that authorized a particular program, will be used to directly address that particular problem.
Nonsense. General tax revenues may be spent in whatever way congress and the president choose, and those spending decisions change every year. They are likely to change significantly when control of congress or the executive switches from Democrat to Republican or vice versa.
There's some sort of cognitive dissonance at work here, because what I'm saying isn't registering. Let me say it again:
A tax payment, because it was levied pursuant to a budget request that authorized a particular program, will be used to directly address that particular problem.
I don't see what's so hard to understand about that. There's no such thing as "general tax revenues" which may be spent "in whatever way congress and the president choose." They can only authorize those funds to be spent on specific programs. There's a whole cumbersome budget authorization process they have to go through to spend every single penny, that's one of the things that anti-government types rail against as government inefficiency! They have to pass a budget authorization to buy fracking paper clips! How useless! And you're trying to tell me in the same breath that they have this power to just levy a tax to collect "general revenue" that they can spend any way they want? Which one is it? It can't be both!
Even if government tried to just declare by fiat that X amount of tax money would be collected, which is not the case, they can't spend it without passing an authorization. That's my understanding on how government works in this country.
There's some sort of cognitive dissonance at work here,
Yes, there is. Let me say it again: General tax revenues may be spent in whatever way congress and the president choose, and those spending decisions change every year. They are likely to change significantly when control of congress or the executive switches from Democrat to Republican or vice versa.
What part of this don't you understand?
There's no such thing as "general tax revenues" which may be spent "in whatever way congress and the president choose." They can only authorize those funds to be spent on specific programs.
Nonsense. They can create new programs, eliminate old ones, and change existing ones. They can spend tax revenues in whatever ways they want. How do you think they managed to dramatically increase the military budget, and cut spending on scientific and medical research?
But they have to pass new authorizations to change spending! Those require public debates and votes! In what way is that the same as what you are implying, which is that they simply "decide" to change spending from year to year?
You seem to think government is some sort of unaccountable group of "others" who are totally divorced from any oversight by the citizens who elect them. That's not how the system of government works in this country.