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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Mary Cluney who wrote (65233)	8/29/2004 11:50:21 AM
From: LindyBill	Respond to of 793964

I doubt that as we become more and more civilized, we will ever tolerate people starving in the streets because they were too lazy, stupid, or unlucky in life. I don't think so either. But right now SS is a "Ponzi" scheme. Privatising it will allow funds to be built up, rather than counting on your grandchildren to pay it for you. Although the "tough love" approach has it's merits. "Work or starve" is the way a lot of us get our kids out of the house when they grow up.

To: Mary Cluney who wrote (65233)	8/29/2004 1:48:41 PM
From: Ilaine	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 793964

Ayn Rand grew up in the Soviet Union, where productive people were killed or else forced to conform to the directives of the Supreme Soviet and only produce what was ordered, when ordered, as ordered. Information theory and choice theory prove that no central bureaucracy is capable of obtaining and reacting to sufficient information to make the kind of choices that entrepreneurs and individual consumers make every day -- Adam Smith called it "the invisible hand" but it's really just enlightened self-interest. Rand knew that entrepreneurs produce because they are selfish. Consumers consume because they are selfish. There's nothing wrong with looking out for yourself, that's what makes the economy work. It's human nature to envy those who are better off than yourself, but killing entrepreneurs is like killing the goose that laid the golden egg. No more goodies. In contrast, America has always had a majority of people willing to let the goose keep producing the golden eggs, and that is why America is a land of plenty. I do pro bono bankruptcies for Legal Aid, not quite the poorest of the poor, but getting there. Most of my clients have telephones, TVs, VCRs, microwaves, CD players, CDs, radios, jewelry, automobiles, and other consumer goods that even well-off people don't have in many Third World countries. The trustee and the creditors and the judges don't even think about it because there is so much stuff in this country that these people's stuff won't go for much at a trustee's sale. The poorest of the poor are the homeless. Yet, what is our mental image of homeless? For me, they're pushing around their worldly goods in shopping baskets! They don't have much stuff, but they still have stuff. Much of it made in China, which is an excellent example of what happens when socialism takes its feet off the throats of the entrepreneurs and let them do their thing.

To: Mary Cluney who wrote (65233)	8/29/2004 2:08:07 PM
From: Lane3	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 793964

BTW wasn't Alan Greenspan a student of Ayn Rand? Yes, he comes from that school. I doubt that as we become more and more civilized, we will ever tolerate people starving in the streets because they were too lazy, stupid, or unlucky in life. Me neither. Now, what does that have to do with Social Security? You and I have had this discussion before. I think that history has pretty much proved that self-interest and the marketplace provide better for society than the nanny state but you don't see it that way. I know I've studied this long enough and hard enough that I won't change my mind. From our earlier discussions I assume that you're attached to your POV as well. You'd rather have a small pot with shares divided equally than a big pot with disparity in shares. That's a pretty basic difference in values. Probably can't be overcome.