That is a seriously stupid statement.

What artificial monopoly? You think the government is stopping companies from creating the next boner pill?

This is wrong. Again, how would I know about these contract disputes? What if the 'best practice' is to not tell your consumers that your product causes cancer if used correctly. Companies have no morals, their only incentive is to maximize profits. Any theory of living the supposes they will act benevolently if left to their own devices is flawed.

"close to the poverty level" means not having guitars or computers. It means wondering where the next meal comes from. Nothing in Lirv's posts implies he is close to that poor.

Nothing in his posts implies he has a job and is making enough money to be above the poverty line either. I know LirvA had to compromise his values and take out student loans and receive pell grants. Which most likely means he is shouldering a bit of debt that he will need to pay off six months after he graduates or leaves college. Being in debt isn't exactly a sign of riches and fortunes.

JJ was nitting him up with an argument about third world vs first world poverty. Sure, he isn't starving. But LirvA wasn't exactly out of line in his statement either.

Being able to eat regularly. Being able to have clothes on your back. Having a place to live. Having access to a computer and internet and enough leisure time to spend hours a day on both of those. Being able to smoke drugs regularly.

All of these are signs that you're no where ****ing close to living in poverty.

How is that nitting it up? ACLand is only going to happen in the rich countries? I was talking about people that are born into poverty. You know, actual poverty.

Lirva is better off than what a billion people, a couple of billion people?

In fact the point that Lirva thinks he's "close to poverty" is part of the reason that he seems to have no ****ing clue how badly most people would be off in ACLand.

Edit: Paul, your post about "nitting it up about third world vs first world poverty" is probably the closest I've gotten to being actually irritated by a stupid internet post. I mean, do you actually believe its "Nitting it up" to think about third world poverty levels? Are those magically going to disappear in ACLand?

Edit2: And also, why the **** is it some sort of good thing that Lirva had to "compromise his values". It's just one more sign of hypocrisy from him. Sure he'll stand up for his values when it just involves making an ass of himself by ripping up bibles and ballots but when it means an actual sacrifice he runs away and grabs up a bunch of that Government money that he believes was stolen from people.

http://www.familiesusa.org/resources...uidelines.html

LirvA is an American. Where is he in err to say he is close to the poverty line if he is in fact close to those figures?

Just because he has money to smoke weed doesn't equate him to not being poor by American standards. In fact a lot of drug addicts who probably have a higher expenditure for their vices probably do not make above those figures.

That's a pretty big goal post move. We were talking about people being poor and at no point were we talking about just the US.

Why don't you give me those figures for the whole world.

The closest we got to specifically talking about American poverty lines was my comment acknowledging that at best he was "first world white boy poor".

Edit: Paul D - Here's the exact quote that started it:

Notice the use of the word "world".

No, LirvA was talking about being poor. He is doing so from an American perspective. Last time I checked he wasn't a Chinese peasant farmer.

Don't try to use the magical "goal post" shift clause because you made a ****ty argument out of LirvA's living conditions.

The fact that he's poor from the American perspective while living off of money that was "stolen" from other people and given to him without him doing any work at all has nothing to do with the comment that I made about being poor in the world.

And besides that my post even acknowledged that he could be poor from the American perspective and then went on to reiterate that I was talking about actual poverty that we see outside of the American perspective.

Its not my fault you can't ****ing read or just jumped the gun and are probably a little embarassed that you posted a totally ridiculous post.

You know what, even if you concede Lirva is "American perspective poor" his comment is still irrelevant to the argument that was made.

He's poor but getting money from the Government teat. So for him to turn around and say he's fine with ACLand and he's poor so he can speak for poor people is ridiculous because right now he's no where near as poor as he would be in ACLand.

Who are you to say LirvA would be poor in ACland?

There is actually an argument to make more opportunities would arise for everyone since barrier entries to the market place would be much lower for individuals. Of course technical prowess in your field would still probably make or break you. Unless of course you are like LirvA, who would most likely use his mind to bioengineer some superfunky weed.

Paul D. You're missing the point. I couldn't care less if Lirva is poor or not. In reality or in ACLand.

The discussion started with the Social Contract and how Lirva didn't sign anything and its unfair to be governed by something just because you happened to be born in the territory claimed by that something.

We pointed out that the same criticism can be made of ACLand.

In particular, I pointed out that people that are born into extreme poverty and with next to no chance of ever being able to afford to own property probably won't agree that absolute property rights are a good axiom for life - since they never had any say about this axiom and absolute property rights kind of ****s them in the AC system.

Lirva then tried to claim that he was poor and he was fine with ACLand.

Now you're caught up.

I don't know about LirvA specifically, but I do know for sure that (a) there will still be tons of poor folks in ACland and (b) that their lives are going to be pretty miserable. How do I know this.

The real world examples of countries with failing/failed governments and/or governments that do not regulate the worst excesses of the marketplace (Somalia, Bangladesh, basically any country ever during the early stages of industralization, etc.)

Yeah, it's not like I advocate ACism. I believe it to be out of touch with capitalism altogether. Because capitalism has to have framework to actually work (some centralized power). I also believe that anarchy can be only accomplished in a cooperative manner (read collective anarchy).

However, what ACists are really seeking, in economic terms, is a perfectly competitive marketplace where many buyers and sellers would interact and not be stunted by government regulations.

lol

ACland will have super low wages because why wouldn't it? With no protection for Labor at all Management will be free to do whatever it wants, think Wal Mart times 100. Lirv has almost no marketable skills, he'll be hoping for a job cleaning out septic tanks or that he has a blood type that is worth something.

Milton Friedman sez hi.



The labour market would set wage prices according to what buyers and sellers of labour determine what is worth their time or money. If someone feels screwed, they'd take their labour somewhere else.

But, wait. You're forgetting that his life will be awesome because (a) the government won't be stealing the money he gets from cleaning toilets or selling blood or whatever he ends up doing for money, (b) he'll be able to smoke weed without any consequences b/c private entities like landlords, banks, employers, colleges and the people that own the roads totally won't try to use contracts in order to tell him that he can't smoke a plant, and (c) the internet (something that was largely developed through governmental R&D and infrastructure investments) would totally still exist in a free and unrestricted form so he'd have unfettered access to the youtubes and illegally downloaded music and movies.

Until the big die off it's going to be a buyers market: Wal Mart times 1000.

There are almost zero barriers to setting up a business as it is now. There are diverse sources of funding, few trade barriers, and the cost of entry into the online marketplace is trivial compared to the costs of setting up a few years ago.

Don't forget that LirvA already tried selling his home made guitar pedals on EBay, it didn't finish we'll as I recall.

Any idiot can start a business, making it profitable is harder, making a living harder still.

Cut to LirvA posting stories about jack booted thugs from the government shutting down a kids' lemonade stand...

This is why ACism is popular amongst certain groups.

They get to pirate all the stuff they want with no laws against it, mythically that stuff will still get made because...well, moving on, everything will be cheaper because no company will own the monopoly on something they develop but they will still spend money developing it because...and they can smoke all the weed they want which will be stronger and cheaper and no longer illegal and they will never be forced to not smoke weed contractually by their employer or landlord or healthcare provider because...demand means someone else will offer it exactly the same but allowing weed smoking...because...and finally you dont believe in marriage because of what that website said and that is why you cant get a girl but its cool prostitution will be totally legal and cheap so its even better than having a girlfriend, you will even be able to order women online using bitcoin and because there is so much competition in this new legal industry they will all be super hot with no diseases and be really into it and not have dead eyes like that hooker you hired last year when you were feeling really low and had $50 left over from your Xmas money from your parents!

The best thing about ACism is it has never existed before and never will exist so you get to believe everything will be just like your fantasies and no one can truly tell you otherwise provided you believe strong enough! And as a bonus if anyone tells you they were ACist and they learned a lot more about life and economics and facts then stopped being ACist you can say they were never truly ACist and just didnt get it!

Yurp. When people are selling companies that have zero profit for a billion bucks and inventions are being crowdsourced from prototype to multi million dollar orders thanks to a good youtube video and a snappy pitch you really have no excuse for not being an entrepreneurial success that wouldnt also exist in ACism land.

I lived for three years below the American poverty level while I was severely underemployed. It ****ing sucked. But the fact that what I did can technically be called "living in poverty," that is utterly demeaning to the billion+ out there who experience true crippling poverty, and you can't just pretend that they wouldn't exist or don't matter in AC-Land.

Mayo nitting it up about poverty ITT.

Edit: I should add that I'm sure I lived under the poverty level while I was in school as well. Many students do. At no point did I consider myself actually impoverished.