Why? The Purpose of the Universe by Philip Goff

Laura

Administrator
Administrator
Moderator
FOTCM Member
I've been writing a series of posts for Ark's blog starting with a discussion of Philip Goff's "Why? The Purpose of the Universe". The link to the first post is here:

Subsequent posts are linked on the right of the blog in a scrolling menu. I've finished part 7 at this point.

In the hardcopy of the book, he has an essay "Is Taxation Theft" that is not included in the pdf version I have. But, I found it online. I think it is more revealing than anything he has written about "The Purpose of the Universe." I will paste it in below. There is something so wrong about this and yet I have difficulty articulating exactly what. I'm hoping some of you will be able to take it apart logically and expose the errors.

Is taxation theft?​

The assumption that you own the contents of your pay-packet, although almost universal, is demonstrably confused​

Philip Goff

Some radical libertarians hold that all taxation is immoral, on the grounds that it amounts to the state stealing the money of private citizens. This is an extreme position, but the sense that tax involves the government taking ‘our money’ is ubiquitous, and hugely influential in real-world politics. The former British prime minister David Cameron, for example, repeatedly made a ‘moral case’ for low taxes, based on the need to give back to you, the citizen, more of ‘your money’. And even those who believe in relatively high taxes tend to start from the assumption that one has some kind of moral claim to one’s gross income, a claim that is overridden only by the greater good of equality or the need to fund public services. Outside of academia, almost everyone assumes that the money I get in my pay-packet before the deduction of taxes is, in some morally significant sense, ‘mine’.


This assumption, although almost universal, is demonstrably confused. There is no serious political theory according to which my pre-tax income is ‘mine’ in any morally significant sense. Moreover, this matters: this confused assumption is a major stumbling block to economic reform, causes low and middle earners to vote against their economic interests, and renders it practically impossible to correct the economic injustices that pervade the modern world.


In addressing the question of whether taxation is theft, it is important to distinguish two senses of ‘theft’: legal and moral. In 18th-century North America, it was possible to ‘own’ a slave, in the legal sense of ownership. If someone deprived me of my slave in order to give that slave liberty, then this constituted ‘theft’ in the legal sense. But of course the laws underpinning slavery were morally abhorrent, and hence few these days would class liberating a slave as ‘theft’ in any moral sense. Conversely, we can have cases of moral theft that are not legal theft. The laws of Nazi Germany enabled the authorities to seize the property of Jews who had been deported; although strictly speaking legal, such actions constituted ‘theft’ in a moral sense.


And so, when we ask ourselves whether taxation is theft, we have to specify whether we are thinking of the moral or legal sense (or both). If we wanted to say that tax is legal theft, then we would have to argue that people have a legal claim to their pre-tax income, and hence that the government commits legal theft when it takes the pre-tax income of its citizens. This idea can be quickly dismissed. Clearly if Ms Jones is legally obliged to pay a certain amount of tax on her gross income, then she is not legally entitled to keep all her pre-tax income. It follows logically that the state does not commit legal theft when it enforces the payment of this tax.


The more interesting question is whether taxation is moral theft, and this depends on whether citizens have some kind of moral claim on their gross income. It is to this question I now turn.

Your gross, or pre-tax income, is the money the market delivers to you. In what sense might it be thought that you have a moral claim on this money? One answer might be that you deserve it: you have worked hard and have done a good job, and consequently you deserve all your gross income as recompense for your labour. According to this line of reasoning, when the government taxes, it takes the money that you deserve for the work you do.


This is not a plausible view. For it implies that the market distributes to people exactly what they deserve for the work that they do. But nobody thinks a hedge-fund manager deserves many times more wealth than a scientist working on a cure for cancer, and few would think that current pay ratios in companies reflect what philosophers call desert claims. Probably you work very hard in your job, and you make an important contribution. But then so do most people, and the market distribution of wealth patently does not reward in proportion to how hard-working people are, or how much of a contribution they make to society. If we were just focusing on desert, then there is a good case for taxation to correct the amoral distribution of the market.


If we have a moral claim on our gross income, it is not because we deserve it, but because we are entitled to it. What’s the difference? What you deserve is what you ought to have as a result of hard work or social contribution; what you are entitled to is the result of your property rights. Libertarians believe that each individual has natural property rights, which it would be immoral for the government to infringe. According to Right-wing libertarians such as Robert Nozick and Murray Rothbard, taxation is morally wrong not because the taxman takes what people deserve, but because he takes what people have a right to.


Therefore, if taxation is theft, it’s because it essentially involves the violation of people’s natural rights to property. But do we really have natural rights to property? And even if we do, does taxation really infringe them? To begin to address these questions, we need to think more carefully about the nature of property.


A person has a moral claim on all her gross income only if property rights are natural, not human constructions


The French anarchist Pierre-Joseph Proudhon declared in 1840 that all property is theft. But even among those who accept the legitimacy of property, there are very different views as to what exactly the right to property amounts to. Libertarians believe that property rights are natural, reflecting basic moral facts about the world. Others hold that property rights are merely legal, social constructions, which are created by us and can be shaped to suit our purposes. We can call the latter view ‘social constructivism’ about property. (Please note, our focus here is specifically on social constructivism about property; we are not considering a more general position according to which morality as a whole is a social construction.)


To bring out the difference, ask yourself: ‘Which comes first: facts about property or facts about property law?’ For the social constructivist, the right to property is not some natural, sacred thing that exists independently of human conventions and legal practices. Rather, we create property rights, by setting up legal institutions to ensure that people have certain legal rights over the material world. For the libertarian, in contrast, facts about property exist independently of human laws and conventions, and indeed human laws and conventions ought to be moulded to respect the natural right to property.


This distinction is crucial for our question. Suppose we accept the social-constructivist view that property rights are merely legal. Now we ask the question: ‘Do I have a moral claim on the entirety of my pre-tax income?’ We cannot argue that I am entitled to my pre-tax income on the basis of my natural property rights, as there are no such things as ‘natural’ property rights (according to the social-constructivist position we are now considering). So, if I have a moral claim on my entire pre-tax income, this must be because it is exactly the amount of money I deserve for my hard work and social contribution, presumably because in general the market delivers to each person exactly what they deserve. But we have already concluded that this is not a plausible claim. Without the belief in natural property rights, existing independent of human laws and conventions, there is no way to make sense of the idea that the deliverances of the market are inherently just, and hence no way to make sense of the idea that each person’s gross income (which is just the income the market delivers to them) is hers by right.


Here’s where we’re up to: to make sense of the idea that taxation is (moral) theft, we have to make sense of the idea that each person has a moral claim on the entirety of her gross income, and this can be made sense of only if property rights are natural rather than mere human constructions. We need, therefore, to defend a theory of natural property rights. Our next task is to explore philosophical theories of property rights.


We can group philosophical theories of property rights into three categories: Right-wing libertarian; Left-wing libertarian; and social constructivist. Let’s take each in turn.


All libertarians hold that an individual has full natural rights of ownership over herself, and the fruits of her labour. However, libertarians of the Right and the Left disagree over the ownership rights that individuals can have over the natural world, ie over land and natural resources.


Right-wing libertarians believe that the material world – all land and everything that stands on it – was once owned by nobody. The first individuals who discover, or claim, or ‘mix their labour’ (a phrase introduced in this context by the 18th-century philosopher John Locke) with things in the natural world come to possess an inalienable natural property right over those things. If I’m the first to find some land and I farm it, I come to have natural property rights over that land, such that it is morally wrong for someone to take the land or its produce away from me without my consent.


We can now start to see how someone might try to make sense of the view that taxation is moral theft. If we think of the market as a free and consensual exchange among individuals of things over which they have natural property rights, then any state interference with the market will constitute infringement of individuals’ natural rights. Taxation will take from citizens what is theirs by right.


Less familiar in popular discourse is the view known as ‘Left-wing libertarianism’, defended, among others, by Peter Vallentyne, Hillel Steiner and Michael Otsuka. Left-wing libertarians agree with Right-wing libertarians that each individual has full rights of ownership over herself and the fruits of her labour. However, they hold that the natural world belongs to everyone: it is not possible for one individual to acquire exclusive rights over land or natural resources in a way that excludes the equal moral claims of other citizens.


The claims of future generations must also be taken into account, leading naturally to an inheritance tax


There are various forms of this view. In a more extreme version, the natural world is jointly owned by everyone, such that no one is permitted to own anything without the express consent of every other living individual (compare: if we jointly own a house, you can’t just let out half of it without my consent). In a more modest form, no one is allowed to acquire property unless they leave enough for each person to have an equally valuable share of natural resources. The uniting principle of Left-wing libertarians is that each of us has an equal moral claim over the resources of the world.


Left libertarianism will certainly rule out some forms of taxation as immoral. If I have acquired land or natural resources in a way that is consistent with the equal moral claim of others, and by my own labour increase the value of those resources, it is wrong for the state to tax that wealth away from me. But Left-libertarian theories leave considerable latitude for the state to alter the distribution of wealth, perhaps through taxation, if some take more than their fair share of natural resources. Crucially, the claims of future generations must also be taken into account, leading naturally to an inheritance tax (or at least restrictions on the right to bequeath) to ensure that each future individual has a fair share of natural resources.


As already discussed, social constructivists do not deny the existence of property rights, rather they take them to be social or legal constructions, which humans are free to shape to reflect what they deem valuable. Jesus declared that ‘The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath.’ Analogously, for the social constructivist, property rights are made to serve human interests and not vice versa.


It is plausible that human flourishing requires certain legally protected rights to property, and hence most social constructivists will advocate a system of property rights. At the same time, there are other things of value – perhaps equality, perhaps reward for hard work and/or social contribution (which as we have seen is not well-protected by the market) – and in order to promote these other values, most social constructivists propose making property rights conditional on the payment of taxes. In the absence of pre-existing natural property rights, there is no moral reason to respect the market distribution of wealth (there will of course be pragmatic, economic reason, but that is another matter).


Almost all politicians and voters start from the assumption that each citizen has some kind of moral claim on her gross income. In fact, we have seen that making sense of this requires some hefty and highly contentious philosophical theses. It requires accepting the general libertarian commitment to property being natural and not dependent on human laws or conventions. And it also requires denying the Left-wing libertarian claim that each of us has an equal moral claim on the resources of the natural world.


The second requirement – the denial of equal rights over the natural world – is particularly implausible, and something I’ve never seen any justification of from Right-wing libertarians. On the Right-wing libertarian view, it is perfectly morally acceptable for one person to claim a vastly unequal proportion of land and resources for himself, resulting in his propertyless neighbours being forced to work for him to avoid starvation. By what right can the natural world be appropriated in this way? It is one thing to say that one has exclusive natural rights over oneself, but how can we justify exclusive natural rights over the natural world? And if it can’t justify this, Right-wing libertarianism falls at the first hurdle.


Moreover, as I will now try to show, even if Right-wing libertarianism is true, even if there are natural property rights, even if such rights allow private individuals to carve off for themselves a vastly unequal share of natural resources, even then we cannot make sense of the idea that actual people living today have a moral claim on their pre-tax income.


Professor Schmidt’s salary comes from the state: she has no right to complain that she keeps only some of this stolen money


The reason is that the world that Right-wing libertarianism theorises about is a very different one to the world we live in today. (It is no accident that Nozick’s 1974 book is called Anarchy, State and Utopia.) According to Right-wing libertarianism, the market distribution of wealth is morally significant because it is the distribution that respects the voluntary choices people have made with the property to which they have a natural right. But this is the case only if the market is perfectly free, ie if the state has no influence on the distribution of wealth. Yet there are very few countries in the world in which this is the case. In almost every country, there is a certain amount of taxation, at least to pay for roads and infrastructure, if not for education and healthcare. But even the smallest such state intervention entails that the market distribution of wealth no longer reflects the free choices of citizens, and hence by the lights of Right-wing libertarianism the citizens of these countries have no moral claim on their pre-tax income.


The point can be made clearer with some examples. Consider a Professor Schmidt, a Right-wing libertarian academic working in a German university, who is very annoyed about the state taking 42 per cent of ‘her’ income. Where did her salary come from? Well, German universities are publicly funded, and so Schmidt’s salary comes from general taxation, from the money the German state forcibly extracted from its citizens. But according to Right-wing libertarianism, this is an immoral state action that infringes the natural rights of its citizens; in effect, it steals from people to pay Professor Schmidt. It follows that Professor Schmidt has no right to her salary, and hence no right to complain that the state lets her have only 58 per cent of this stolen money.


Perhaps some radical libertarians will gleefully agree with me that professors who leech off the state have no right to resent taxation. But the point applies quite generally, although in a more subtle way. Now consider a Ms Jones, a libertarian British businesswoman who resents paying tax on dividends from her lucrative company. Although she is not directly paid by the state, the profits generated by Jones’s business are dependent on many things that are funded by the state: perhaps she receives state subsidies, but even if not, certainly the success of her company will depend on infrastructure, roads, rule of law, and an educated and healthy workforce. It doesn’t matter whether in principle these things could have been provided privately; in reality, they are provided by the state and funded through taxation. According to Right-wing libertarianism, these things were paid for by theft, and hence Jones has no right to the profits thus generated.


In theory, Right-wing libertarianism does entail that people have a moral claim on their pre-tax income, and hence that taxation is theft, but only in hypothetical societies where there is zero or minimal state interference in the economy. In states in which the government intervenes in the economy through taxation – ie, in almost every developed state – market transactions are tainted and so are morally void. The Right-wing libertarian is perfectly entitled to campaign for the day when her minimal-government Utopia is brought about, but until that day she cannot consistently argue that she has a right to her pre-tax income, and hence cannot consistently complain that the government is taking what is hers by right.


It’s hard to shake the feeling that the gross income figure on your payslip represents your money, and that the difference from your take-home pay represents how much the state has taken from you. In fact, there is no coherent way of justifying this conviction. Even if the most radical forms of Right-wing libertarianism are true, it remains the case that you have no special moral claim on your gross income.


Still, the vast majority happily vote for low taxes, rejoicing that they get to keep their morsel while in reality all they’ve done is protect the spoils of a tiny minority at the top. The result is our failure to create what we really need: a tax system that – as part of the wider economy – creates a just society.

 
From my point of view as a middle-class worker, that article is nonsense.

A worker's salary does not correspond to his worth or his effort, but rather to what the "spirit" of society has decided.

The greater the service to the status quo, the better the salary.

Jobs of service to others that are hard and sacrifice are poorly paid.

Likewise, no worker thinks anything about the money that the state "takes" from the monthly salary.

That money is science fiction for the worker, it does not exist and it is useless to think about it.

At least "they" steal it openly (there is no ability to resist that) and that money destined for incapable, selfish and useless people (the machinery of the countries) is not given voluntarily by anyone. They cannot take that risk, since unconsciously people know where their taxes are going.
 
I remember when I and my family visited a palace that had been the residence of Spanish kings.

One of the security people who started a conversation with us told us: "Isn't it great that this palace belongs to all of us citizens now and we can see it."

We smile politely at the crudeness of the lie.

In no way is it the property of anyone other than those it always was.

We paid an entrance fee to see it, traveling only through the authorized areas and of course without being able to manage any of the priceless Antiquities that were there (the security cameras and the current law somewhat prevented this:-)).

So any academic discussion about property and your right or not to it, fantasy that does not support the reality of what has been established for people during the last millennia.
 
My time and labor are worth something. The amount is whatever I and the other party agree on. It doesn't matter if it is the "minimum wage" or those high amounts the hedge fund managers get. Two people agree, and the money is the property to be exchanged. The amount becomes my property once I perform the task in exchange for the money. Taxing this money is theft because it takes my property from me, without my consent.

Just because taxation is "legal" does not mean it lawful.
 
Likewise, no worker thinks anything about the money that the state "takes" from the monthly salary.
Wrong. I think about it almost every day. I see my tax money used to purchase bombs and ammunition that is used against people in foreign countries who have done nothing against the USA.

That's one moral argument against taxation.

The author writes:

Clearly if Ms Jones is legally obliged to pay a certain amount of tax on her gross income, then she is not legally entitled to keep all her pre-tax income. It follows logically that the state does not commit legal theft when it enforces the payment of this tax.
The only reason the legal argument for taxation in the USA holds is because of the 16th amendment to the Constitution. There are a great many Americans who wish it to be repealed, although some libertarians believe that will accomplish nothing because the Constitution empowers the federal government to tax whatever it wants. In fact arguments have been made that the amendment does not legally grant the federal government to tax wages, since wages are not income because labor is exchanged for it. There's also the argument that taxation at the federal level was originally supposed to be based on population of the states, not a "direct tax."

I would also add that the "what about the roads" argument with regards to taxation is totally idiotic. Plenty of other areas are managed by private entities quite competently. Houses, cars, boats, furniture, airports, fire trucks, these are all built by private companies. The US postal service is a joke. The conditions of roads in the US is a constant source of frustration. Yet people think that if they weren't funded by our tax dollars, it wouldn't be possible to manage. Eric July's hilarious rant is how I feel about that.

The rest of the author's rant is basically an Authoritarian take against libertarianism. It does not require a "utopia" to create the conditions that libertarians argue for in regards to taxation. Does having a social support system funded by taxpayers help? Yes it does. Does that mean there is no other way? I would argue no. I think most Americans do not like that their tax money is used to support foreigners who simply enter the country and then burden the system. Can I go to Russia and then survive on the taxed income of their residents without doing anything? No I cannot because smart governments understand that that is not to the benefit of their populace or themselves.

The idea that I have no special claim to my gross income is absurd. I have exchanged my labor for wages and no one else should be involved in that fair exchange.
 
Last edited:
Wrong. I think about it almost every day. I see my tax money used to purchase bombs and ammunition that is used against people in foreign countries who have done nothing against the USA.

That's one moral argument against taxation.

The author writes:


The only reason the legal argument for taxation in the USA holds is because of the 16th amendment to the Constitution. There are a great many Americans who wish it to be repealed, although some libertarians believe that will accomplish nothing because the Constitution empowers the federal government to tax whatever it wants. In fact arguments have been made that the amendment does not legally grant the federal government to tax wages, since wages are not income because labor is exchanged for it. There's also the argument that taxation at the federal level was originally supposed to be based on population of the states, not a "direct tax."

I would also add that the "what about the roads" argument with regards to taxation is totally idiotic. Plenty of other areas are managed by private entities quite competently. Houses, cars, boats, furniture, airports, fire trucks, these are all built by private companies. The US postal service is a joke. The conditions of roads in the US is a constant source of frustration. Yet people think that if they weren't funded by our tax dollars, it wouldn't be possible to manage. Eric July's hilarious rant is how I feel about that.

The rest of the author's rant is basically an Authoritarian take on libertarianism. It does not require a "utopia" to create the conditions that libertarians argue for in regards to taxation. Does having a social support system funded by taxpayers help? Yes it does. Does that mean there is no other way? I would argue no. I think most Americans do not like that their tax money is used to support foreigners who simply enter the country and then burden the system. Can I go to Russia and then survive on the taxed income of their residents without doing anything? No I cannot because smart governments understand that that is not to the benefit of their populace or themselves. The idea that I have no special claim to my gross income is absurd. I have exchanged my labor for wages and no one else should be involved in that fair exchange.
I agree. My taxes funding foreign wars and color revolutions that benefit those at the top of the pyramid is the main reason I dislike being taxed. I often wonder if the billions of dollars sent to places like the Ukraine somehow find their way - in a smaller dollar sense - back to secret bank accounts of the politicians who voted for it.

Another reason I dislike being taxed - especially here in the state of Commiefornia where taxes keep going up - is the obvious corruption and kick-backs to the friends and families of US congresspersons and senators. The late Senator Diane Feinstein is a great example of federal and state tax wealth being funneled to her late husband's numerous construction companies. The still unfinished "train to nowhere" which was supposed to be used between San Francisco and LA is just one frustrating example. And don't get me going about free medical care for illegal immigrants. Even many of my liberal friends are ticked off about that.

I'm for taxes - obviously not high ones - if I can see some positive outcome or a modicum of equitable exchange. Here in CA, as well as many parts of the USA, roads, infrastructure and education are terrible. Our taxes are spent on insane programs/projects while working people suffer.
 
Taxes are accepted by the majority for the benefit of the majority, it is the tacit commitment and duty of the state and its politicians to make it work. Now, a theft, in the context, is both legal and moral and there is no difference, they are equal.
If the political contexts change in society it is because communities expand and also change but everything falls within the consensus of society and every change supposes a free and voluntary acceptance ( The fall, in my opinion I see as part of the cycle, democracies may not work in the end)
When the author refers to moral theft, he does not make emphasis to the reality that occurs there that is called corruption (legal and moral) and it is as if he did not want to mention or see who compose that caste he mentions, that is what to me generates confusion in the text, because it doesn't matter the system he pretends to approach, be it the left or right libertarians, the moral right we deserve or the well-known equality that seems like neo-language, all this seems to be a subterfuge to escape or mask the reality that when there is political psychopathy no system with justice will work.
 
All the pro's and con's of approaches has some level of validity. If no tax, no roads and no money to even earn etc. The assumption that one solution or ism will work all times and all over the place is problematic to start with. People themselves constantly change and comes with wide range of temperaments, desires and methods. The crux of the issue is "misuse" rather than "proper use". There are many people constantly adapt to misuse it. So enforcers ( aka authorities who are working at the behest of public- best case scenario) has to constantly adapt. It is the lack of balance that is the issue in the dynamics of the misuse vs proper use. Particularly lack of awareness of these dynamics to react to it.
 
Goff says, "But nobody thinks a hedge-fund manager deserves many times more wealth than a scientist working on a cure for cancer..." It does not matter what any of us thinks about who "deserves" more. It is what the parties have agreed to accept and no matter the amount, it is their property! It is no more OK for me to steal from a "rich" person that it is from a "poor" person. Theft is theft, no matter how I might justify stealing from someone "rich". And if it is not OK for ME to steal, why would it be OK for government to steal with guns pointed at us?
 
Wrong. I think about it almost every day. I see my tax money used to purchase bombs and ammunition that is used against people in foreign countries who have done nothing against the USA.
How difficult it is to communicate and understand what is being transmitted.

And I thought I would explain it well later.

At least "they" steal it openly (there is no ability to resist that) and that money destined for incapable, selfish and useless people (the machinery of the countries) is not given voluntarily by anyone. They cannot take that risk, since unconsciously people know where their taxes are going
 
Wrong. I think about it almost every day. I see my tax money used to purchase bombs and ammunition that is used against people in foreign countries who have done nothing against the USA.
And just in case, when I say that the worker in general does not think about that, I mean that it is something that is assumed by the worker and against which he cannot do anything.

I hope this is understood now.
 
What a complete and utter butt load of cheap sophistry and fake Swiss cheese “logic” riddled with holes than the Albert Hall.

All you have to do is apply his same bogus argumentation to the taxing state government to invalidate his entire thesis.

This question revolves around the social contract which is ultimately based on a bunch of assumptions about a series of illusions. The social contract (as well as many employment contracts) is in reality unilateral, or, a contract of adhesion. IOW: a take-it-or-leave-it deal offered by a superior party with terms favorable to the offering party.

This is to say nothing of the corruption, malfeasance and dishonesty of the offering party and their usage of the employee’s confiscated wages. (Govt handouts, bailouts, incentives, pork barrel spending, policies and programs that undermine the middle working class… the list is endless)

The government taketh and the government giveth away. The notion we have any real say in this process is an illusion promoted by the government to insure social cohesion with minimal intervention: economy of force required. This mainly applies to Western governments. In thug dictatorships, the illusions are laid bare.

To conclude, just who is paying this guy’s salary? Aeon is a 2012 startup. It is so hard to dredge up any real dirt on who is behind this particular entity but the thrust here is to legitimize corporate/federal neo-feudalism. Whoopee. Bust out the pitchforks and torches.
 
The only reason the legal argument for taxation in the USA holds is because of the 16th amendment to the Constitution. There are a great many Americans who wish it to be repealed, although some libertarians believe that will accomplish nothing because the Constitution empowers the federal government to tax whatever it wants. In fact arguments have been made that the amendment does not legally grant the federal government to tax wages, since wages are not income because labor is exchanged for it. There's also the argument that taxation at the federal level was originally supposed to be based on population of the states, not a "direct tax."

I would also add that the "what about the roads" argument with regards to taxation is totally idiotic. Plenty of other areas are managed by private entities quite competently. Houses, cars, boats, furniture, airports, fire trucks, these are all built by private companies. The US postal service is a joke. The conditions of roads in the US is a constant source of frustration. Yet people think that if they weren't funded by our tax dollars, it wouldn't be possible to manage.
By the way, if I had thought that the question about the text was in the context of the people of your country, I would not have responded, because I do not live there.
 
Back
Top Bottom