[QUOTE="frannkzappa"]
[QUOTE="Laihendi"] This roughly translates to "I am intellectually incapable of understanding what you are saying because I do not read books, specifically those authored by Ayn Rand." Frank Zappa, what you are promoting is slavery to a board of bureaucrats. This is just another way of saying "from each according to his ability, to each according to his need." Who determines whose ability? Who determines whose needs? The system you advocate is completely open to political favours and corruption.Laihendi
"The system you advocate is completely open to political favours and corruption"
Not if the government is technocratic. Not if the members of governments are followers of the platonic human ideals. It would be in the governments own best interest to be as non corrupt as possible.
"Who determines whose ability"
People who have trained and dedicated their lives to the job.
"Who determines whose needs"
It is quite easy to find out what a good standard of living is. The system is made to balance keeping people as happy and comfortable with being productive and useful.
if you are lacking something, but are not contributing you will not receive what you need and may have your citizenship revoked.
"what you are promoting is slavery to a board of bureaucrats"
It's not slavery if it's in your own best interest.
Please define slavery. The difference between freedom and slavery is the difference between voluntary action and physical coercion/compulsion. It has nothing to do with the intentions of the man holding the whip.Standards of living change by time and location, and what is appropriate to an individual man within a bureaucratic collectivist society is an entirely subjective (and arbitrary) judgement. Also, you do not even seem to consider the possibility of corruption and so your system is left completely vulnerable to it. What compels an empowered bureaucrat to act with integrity and honesty in such a system? What prevents him from acting without integrity and honesty? And what motivates men of exceptional ability to work as hard as they can in such a system, when they are not rewarded for it at all but are punished instead.
Those found to have more ability would be expected to always work more and give more, as the more ability they demonstrated the more hours of labour would be demanded of them. And yet the income they received for their job would not be proportional to the effort that they put into it. In such a system it becomes a competition to see who can most successfully demonstrate his own incompetence in order to work as little as possible, and this results in the dissipation of the money available for distribution (unless the government just prints more, which of course leads to inflation).
In the system that you propose, the people who would make it possible would be punished for making it possible. Have you read Atlas Shrugged? This system you are proposing is thoroughly debunked in the story of the Twentieth Century Motor Company.
First of All the "citizenship package" as i will hereby call it is standardized and created by and regulated by the government and can be changed quite easily to suite the times.
in a large technocratic government the individual bureaucrat is relatively weak and operates as part of a board. no one man has very much yes/no power. So if one man is somehow coerced he not be able to do much in the face of his logical peers. not to mention he has little to be gained from any bargain.
Also money is non-existent in this system. One receives requested consumer goods, not money. Man is also not asked to work above what his station asks, he only needs to do extra if he wants more. So a genius or platocrat who works for the act of gaining knowledge will be serving the government by doing what is essentially recreation. this system is built for the platonic man not the slacker (though he would still live a happy, comfortable life if he at least does the minimum).
If one works hard and is rewarded, he does not need to keep up the pace if he does not want to, as long as he contributes, he is a citezen.
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