> When you work for an hour, you increase society’s wealth (and your own) by an hour’s worth of wages.
true.
> When you save a dollar rather than spending it, you increase society’s (and your own) wealth by a dollar
um no. spending only transfers the dollars, and normally you trade the dollar for something worth more to you than the dollar & vice versa, and society's wealth increases due to trade.
Yeah, this is total bs. The economy needs the money to circulate, then everybody gets richer. Money has no value but as a share of the economies' production. When money flows, production goes up. The problem is when some people who are so rich that they can barely spend a few per cents of their income. Instead of getting spent, the money gets invested. But that's not really circulation, it's the opposite: Stuck money used to stick more money.
Edit: This is not to say that there isn't any merit in Georges' other ideas.
> You’ve got to think of “land” as a metaphor for all unproductive forms of capitalism... Goldman...
Banking existed in George's day too and when he said land I think he meant land. Land issues are still relevant today - in SF/silicon valley much of the value created by the tech industry has ended up with landlords who did nothing to produce it. You could make an argument for taxing that and spending it on social stuff. Also places like Monaco and Hong Kong have been successful in having low / zero taxes on wages etc by the government keeping ownership of much of the land and getting income from that.
I have a lot of respect for Georgists and geolibertarians, unlike the much more common Randroids and propertarians (which one geolibertarian author quite rightly calls "royal libertarians" both because of where their wealth came from and the role they aspire to). The central Georgist/geolib idea of a land value tax has been tried quite a few times, generally with quite positive economic effects even before factoring in the moral effect of taxing rents instead of productive enterprise. The author's right that these ideas deserve more exposure than the melange of crappy fiction and crappier ideology that is Ayn Rand.
The author of the piece says Rand "rationalizes greed," which is false, as there are many forms of greed, not just financial. My understanding is that she says that society is most moral when people are able to trade without coercion, and therefore the wealth generated from free trade cannot be classified as "greed".
"Chances are that will be Ayn Rand and her extreme form of capitalism, which she called objectivism."
Rand's views on capitalism are only a small part of her philosophy and not at all the most interesting or compelling by far. By reducing objectivism to a form of capitalism, the author and most contemporary Rand proponents show they know little to nothing about objectivism and understand little to nothing of Rand's philosophy. It's sad that this aspect of her writings is so emphasized over everything else when it's the least interesting and least compelling of her writings about the human condition and the self. Most people using Rand's philosophy as a justification for their exploits of others would be considered looters by Rand, the exact opposite of what she espouses.
The author of the piece, Michael Kinsley, is a flat out genius. That is and has been apparent going back to his both incisive and funny comments on Crossfire.
I started reading the article and was blown away within the first paragraph by the quality of the writing and I scrolled up to see the author and.... Michael Kinsley.
"According to James Stewart (the prominent business journalist, not the even more prominent actor), writing in The New York Times, President Trump says Ayn Rand is his favorite writer and that The Fountainhead, her pulmonary embolism of a book, is his favorite novel. Travis Kalanick, the onetime Übermensch of Uber, is on board, as is (liberal foodies, please note) John Mackey, co-founder and C.E.O. of Whole Foods."
Or the actual reason why the author thinks Ayn Rand should be "dumped", in case you are wondering.
President Trump is a fan of Ayn Rand. Travis Kalanick likes her books. John Mackey likes her books aswell. This proofs that Ayn Rand is evil and therefore her ideas are evil. Guilty by association.
Someone who somehow survived the atrocities of communism and dedicated the rest of her life to make sure nobody would face the same atrocities like she did again. And this person is considered to be evil.
Well, you know what, author over at Vanity Fair? Maybe Ayn Rand had some points which are debatable but YOU have unmasked yourself as a far left "liberal" ideologue. So fuck off, and take your ideological bullshit with you.
> YOU have unmasked yourself as a far left "liberal" ideologue. So fuck off, and take your ideological bullshit with you.
Please don't post ideological rants to HN. Regardless of how lousy an article or a comment may be, all this does is poison the commons and degrade the discourse further. We're trying to avoid those things here.
on the other hand, nobody built a world-changing global repository of information based on Henry George's principles, so as much I dislike her, empirically speaking Ayn Rand has that going for her.
Ayn Rand's principles invented the internet? Someone should write the history of how all those government-funded research institutes weren't really involved.
[+] [-] homarp|8 years ago|reply
Previous HN Discussions: "Land-value tax: Why Henry George had a point" - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10442929
How I Used Eve Online to Predict the Great Recession - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9158868
[+] [-] kashkhan|8 years ago|reply
true.
> When you save a dollar rather than spending it, you increase society’s (and your own) wealth by a dollar
um no. spending only transfers the dollars, and normally you trade the dollar for something worth more to you than the dollar & vice versa, and society's wealth increases due to trade.
[+] [-] _0ffh|8 years ago|reply
Edit: This is not to say that there isn't any merit in Georges' other ideas.
[+] [-] 9j9j9j9ju|8 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] tim333|8 years ago|reply
Banking existed in George's day too and when he said land I think he meant land. Land issues are still relevant today - in SF/silicon valley much of the value created by the tech industry has ended up with landlords who did nothing to produce it. You could make an argument for taxing that and spending it on social stuff. Also places like Monaco and Hong Kong have been successful in having low / zero taxes on wages etc by the government keeping ownership of much of the land and getting income from that.
[+] [-] notacoward|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sparkzilla|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mnm1|8 years ago|reply
Rand's views on capitalism are only a small part of her philosophy and not at all the most interesting or compelling by far. By reducing objectivism to a form of capitalism, the author and most contemporary Rand proponents show they know little to nothing about objectivism and understand little to nothing of Rand's philosophy. It's sad that this aspect of her writings is so emphasized over everything else when it's the least interesting and least compelling of her writings about the human condition and the self. Most people using Rand's philosophy as a justification for their exploits of others would be considered looters by Rand, the exact opposite of what she espouses.
[+] [-] polotics|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] 9j9j9j9ju|8 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] british_india|8 years ago|reply
I started reading the article and was blown away within the first paragraph by the quality of the writing and I scrolled up to see the author and.... Michael Kinsley.
[+] [-] mindcrash|8 years ago|reply
Or the actual reason why the author thinks Ayn Rand should be "dumped", in case you are wondering.
President Trump is a fan of Ayn Rand. Travis Kalanick likes her books. John Mackey likes her books aswell. This proofs that Ayn Rand is evil and therefore her ideas are evil. Guilty by association.
Someone who somehow survived the atrocities of communism and dedicated the rest of her life to make sure nobody would face the same atrocities like she did again. And this person is considered to be evil.
Well, you know what, author over at Vanity Fair? Maybe Ayn Rand had some points which are debatable but YOU have unmasked yourself as a far left "liberal" ideologue. So fuck off, and take your ideological bullshit with you.
[+] [-] dang|8 years ago|reply
Please don't post ideological rants to HN. Regardless of how lousy an article or a comment may be, all this does is poison the commons and degrade the discourse further. We're trying to avoid those things here.
Please see https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html.
[+] [-] dnautics|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] notahacker|8 years ago|reply