Individual liberties, regulation and the obesity epidemic (and possibly other stuff)

The Black Oil

///MOD NOTE////
This thread as was created as a offshoot of a discussion that began in the lefty nutty cookies thread.


Original post below:
Socially? The soda thing is government overreach, state knows best, ignoring personal responsibility and shortsighted - usually things people decry about the left, no?

Brian Shanahan

The Black Oil wrote: »

Socially? The soda thing is government overreach, state knows best, ignoring personal responsibility and shortsighted - usually things people decry about the left, no?

Nah that's just the likes of the Heil or Faux News just manufacturing controversy.

Zillah

The Black Oil wrote: »

Socially? The soda thing is government overreach, state knows best, ignoring personal responsibility and shortsighted - usually things people decry about the left, no?

People are drinking themselves to diabetic, obese death because they're too stupid to stop downing 2k calories worth of liquid sugar every day on top of the food they eat.

Banning massive sodas is a great idea. Sometimes people are too stupid and the government needs to intervene. Sorry if that makes me the new the Comrade Stalin but honestly people act like children too much to not need this sort of intervention. The principle of "let them drink anything they want" is nice and all but the real and stupendous cost to the healthcare system outweighs that easily in my opinion. People incur hundreds of thousands of dollars of medical expenses needlessly because they can't stop drinking liquid sugar. The mind boggles.

The Black Oil

Zillah wrote: »

Banning massive sodas is a great idea. Sometimes people are too stupid and the government needs to intervene. Sorry if that makes me the new the Comrade Stalin but honestly people act like children too much to not need this sort of intervention. The principle of "let them drink anything they want" is nice and all but the real and stupendous cost to the healthcare system outweighs that easily in my opinion. People incur hundreds of thousands of dollars of medical expenses needlessly because they can't stop drinking liquid sugar. The mind boggles.

No, it isn't. How will it make a jot of difference? I'm not for a moment going to deny that there are significant issues with physical inactivity and with the quality of what people eat, but there's already enough weight bias, stigma, negativity and fearmongering around without knocking their intelligence. This is a complex issue with a range of causes. Persuasive cases must be made on facts, not emotive argument. Since it's a public health matter (link 1, link 2) as the stats and economic costs infer, I can see the case for intervention, but there are no quick answers. It can't be the libertarian style of letting everyone get on with it and simply talking up personal responsibility. Nor can be can it be the flip side, banning or taxing (sugar tax) way out of the problem.

I've never been overweight or obese. I learned to cook at home and in school. Both of these areas need to be tackled. If you look at Jamie Oliver's TED talk (I know it's emotive, despite what I've said above) there's a clip where he's in a school and the kids don't know what the veggies are. Staged TV or not, that's certainly a bit mental. Also, food manufacturers are not totally blameless here, imo.

Gbear

Zillah wrote: »

Banning massive sodas is a great idea. Sometimes people are too stupid and the government needs to intervene. Sorry if that makes me the new the Comrade Stalin but honestly people act like children too much to not need this sort of intervention. The principle of "let them drink anything they want" is nice and all but the real and stupendous cost to the healthcare system outweighs that easily in my opinion. People incur hundreds of thousands of dollars of medical expenses needlessly because they can't stop drinking liquid sugar. The mind boggles.

This line of thinking is what this thread was tailor made for.

I'm going to assume you're not generally an authoritarian who thinks that mob rule should determine what laws ought to be passed.

The problem with governments being given a pass on making these kinds of petty authoritarian laws isn't about the specific laws.

By giving a "sane" government that you generally agree with the power to stick it's oar in, you're empowering every version of the government to do the same, including the insane ones or the ones who've a radically different political outlook to you.

For an example on the practical end of the scale, consider how state legislatures have blocked Tesla from selling directly to consumers, nominally to protect the consumer or some bull**** but really, to protect car dealerships. Just because the government says it's doing the right thing doesn't mean that it is.

More seriously, think back to racial segregation laws or even consider laws that are still in effect today throughout the Western world, such as the government deciding who can and can't get married.
We have invested power in the government to make laws at the behest of one part of society in contravention of the rights of others without any good reason.

Rather than question the underlying principle that keeps ****ing people over, most people seem content to play whack-a-mole with laws as they become unpopular and create new forms of authoritarianism as they become popular.



Consider the root logic behind why it's immoral to prevent 2 men or 2 women from getting married.
It's not because you like gay people or the two specific men in question are your friends. It's not because you're trying to destroy humanity by stopping people having babies.

It's because it's none of anyone else's ****ing business other than the two people in question.

Would it start being other people's business if legalising homosexuality/homosexual marriage increased the prevalence of AIDS or other STIs (increasing healthcare costs)?
Would it start being other people's business if allowing gay marriage somehow turned others gay and reduced the effective birth rate?

In general, are practical concerns about the "wellbeing" of society or the financial cost a reason to deny people to right to marry each other?
In such a situation would the ends justify the means?

You would of course to be correct in saying "fizzy drinks aren't as important as gay rights" but the magnitude isn't what's in question - it's the core principles that are.

Should one group of people, even if they're a majority, be allowed to interfere in matters that aren't their concern?
Are you happy to abandon your principles for financial or practical shortcuts? If so, why for certain issues and not for others?

I think this broad issue of personal freedom is a problem for a lot of people on both sides of the political spectrum.

I think most people can be intellectually lazy in their approach to it and rather than creating a strong set of beliefs that are based on the core of why racial segregation or banning Christianity are abhorrent to them, they only engage with the issue on a superficial level.
As a result, when it comes to an issue they don't feel as strongly about or one that they disapprove of, they employ the same fallacious logic that's responsible for laws that disgust them.

Turtwig

There are merits and demerits to lumping everything together like above. Yes there are similarities but there are also differences. Consider vaccination for a moment, as this is one that confuses me no end. Personal liberties are often interrelated. That idiot that didn't vaccinate is the reason this particular virus is still such a dangerous threat. Yet, can we forcibly invade his body autonomy? I don't think so, even if his actions restrict the freedom of others. Take smoking, a person can smoke I believe they should be allowed to take that risk but there's also a clash of liberties. Passive smoking, drain on limited health resources, to name but a few. Whenever the question of individual liberty is considered one must never forget that it's not always just the liberty of the sole individual that's in consideration.

I don't think anything in this world can be black and white. Any core principles can be broken if the benefits outweigh the risk. Establishing where that balance lies is bloody hard but it's far better than the alternatives of absolutes. Which is what leads to the rubbish of bigotry, liberal fascism, right wings fruitcakes etc.

All that said there are very real pragmatic reasons for such absolutes. Like I said, none of this is easy. The people who try to make it so are possibly doing humanity a disservice.

Zillah

The Black Oil wrote: »

No, it isn't. How will it make a jot of difference? I'm not for a moment going to deny that there are significant issues with physical inactivity and with the quality of what people eat, but there's already enough weight bias, stigma, negativity and fearmongering around without knocking their intelligence. This is a complex issue with a range of causes. Persuasive cases must be made on facts, not emotive argument. Since it's a public health matter (link 1, link 2) as the stats and economic costs infer, I can see the case for intervention, but there are no quick answers. It can't be the libertarian style of letting everyone get on with it and simply talking up personal responsibility. Nor can be can it be the flip side, banning or taxing (sugar tax) way out of the problem.

I've never been overweight or obese. I learned to cook at home and in school. Both of these areas need to be tackled. If you look at Jamie Oliver's TED talk (I know it's emotive, despite what I've said above) there's a clip where he's in a school and the kids don't know what the veggies are. Staged TV or not, that's certainly a bit mental. Also, food manufacturers are not totally blameless here, imo.

Just because curtailing soda serving size won't single handedly solve the issue doesn't mean it won't help. I didn't say anything about quick and easy answers. My point being, that if we accept for the sake of argument that it will help, I think it is a good thing for a government to do, and be damned to the people whining about how the founding father's were crucified for their right to consume their daily calories in liquid sugar form.

The Black Oil

Well, then where do you draw the line - limiting certain carton sizes of cigarettes, quantities of alcohol you can purchase from an off licence or supermarket? People into the oversized sodas might simply buy two medium ones if the massive ones are a no go. I'm not into sentimentality around rights, btw.

Turtwig

Or they might start making or selling their own. The thing about trying to enforce anything by legislation is that you cannot ignore the human factor. For example, if cigarettes were blanket banned in Ireland tomorrow there'd be a black market by the evening. Banning soda's only works if the individual has no access to any alternative and given how easy it is to make a soda drink and that no other country is enforcing a ban it's not beyond the realms of possibility that people would still get the same amount of soda as before anyway. Companies will undoubtedly look for whatever ways they can to negate the effect of a law that impacts their sales. People will always look for a means to fill their perception of needs.

Zillah

It is not about banning soda, it is simply a disincentive towards casual and unthinking excess. We tax cigarettes and alcohol to hell, there are limitations on what advertising can be done for either, age limitations and legal sale hours (not all of which I think is effective).

The slippery slope has already, if you'll endure the mixed metaphor, sailed. Government has power over you, we're just going to have to hope that the cut and thrust of public discourse will keep them from verging too far into regulation.

Brian Shanahan

Zillah wrote: »

People are drinking themselves to diabetic, obese death because they're too stupid to stop downing 2k calories worth of liquid sugar every day on top of the food they eat.

There is also another side to this equation, people don't actually know how much sugar and salt they take in every day because the food manufacturers find it in their own best interests to obfuscate how unhealthy and loaded with dangerous additives their foods are (especially the more processed foods at the "affordable" ends of the market, which is what the poor often resort to due to a lack of ability to afford anything better).

This combination of ignorance amongst consumers and rapacious greed amongst producers is the reason why regulation of foodstuffs needs to be a hell of a lot stronger.

Zillah

I don't think conflating government regulation of public health issues and marriage equality is anyway meaningful or useful (unless one simply has an anti-government agenda, in which case I'm not sure there is much conversation to be had).

This isn't about me knowing better than someone, it is what the science tells us, what the medical fact tells us. Smoking of anything more than a trivial amount and large amounts of alcohol or sugar are very bad for one's health, and very bad for the public finances when healthcare comes into it. Someone still has the freedom to choose to smoke or eat sugar or drink alcohol to the point where it is effective suicide if they like, I just want it to be made difficult to do this unknowingly.

My opinion is that the government has the right and the duty to legislate so as to disincentivise these things. That's my position and think it is very clear - so far I don't think you have stated a position beyond expressing ambiguous disquiet around the role of government. Are you a libertarian? Should we abolish all government regulation?

Karl Stein

keane2097 wrote: »

This is really another way of saying you know what is best for people and let their freedom to choose be damned.

No it's not. Medical experts are drawing attention to the harm that's being caused by over-consumption of particular foodstuffs, refined sugar being one of the most harmful.

The same medical expertise combined with public health campaigns, banning advertising from the public airwaves, and increased taxes, has successfully reduced cigarette smoking across the developed world.

'Free to choose' has to be balanced with 'free from'. Would any one of us advocate that tobacco companies should be free to advertise on children's TV?

No, because we all agree that children should be free from such predatory practice.

TheChizler

My gf was part of the research team for the large Irish study recently that showed a significant correlation between sugar sweetened beverages and childhood obesity, I got to see some of the questionnaires that parents returned that were frankly shocking.

The number of parents that said they gave their kids soft drinks over healthier alternatives for cost reasons was shocking. Or even who wouldn't give them water instead because they didn't like it, and it was just easier to give them SSBs.

I used to be against the idea of a sugar tax for personal liberties reasons but then I realized that it wouldn't significantly affect people who consume sensible quantities of the stuff, whereas those who consume a lot would be more likely to feel the impact and rethink their buying habits for economic reasons, if they're not prepared to consider the health reasons. I'd be prepared to take a small hit if it meant a healthier society overall.

You have to consider the economic and public health impacts as well; obesity related diseases cost the health service roughly €1 billion every year, I think it makes sense to recoup some of this cost directly from source.

Karl Stein

TheChizler wrote: »

I used to be against the idea of a sugar tax for personal liberties reasons but then I realized that it wouldn't significantly affect people who consume sensible quantities of the stuff

The EU (and US) could make a good start by ending subsidies to sugar producers.

Sugar companies were the biggest beneficiaries of the European Union’s €55bn ($71.24bn) in agriculture subsidies last year, a new study has found.

Topping the list was France’s Tereos, with €178m, according to data compiled by Farmsubsidy.org, a transparency group. It was followed by St Louis Sucre, with €144m, and Poland’s Krajowa Spolka Cukrowa, with €135m.

www.ft.com

Dick Dastardly

Why not tax the hell out of them and use the proceeds to subsidise sugar free options?

The Black Oil

I'm not a libertarian. I do not particularly welcome the increasing popularity of this world view, nor do I hold an inherently dim take on government regulation.

A lot of this is in the execution and there is a balance to be struck. The Michael Bloomberg approach appears to be quick headlines. Disincentives have to be more than limitations on the end product and yes, as noted above - there probably needs to be more diversity in agriculture. If regulation of food content is part of the answer then what does that regulation look like? On the tax situation, will any income from a sugar tax be then used and put directly back into health system? Given the often lack of forward thinking here it's hard to feel optimistic that it wouldn't be hoovered up into the general coffers.

Karl Stein

Dick Dastardly wrote: »

Why not tax the hell out of them and use the proceeds to subsidise sugar free options?

That'd be a bit like substituting natural opium for synthetic methadone. I've read that sweeteners are worse than sugar because they set the person up for a sugar-rush that doesn't come causing the 'addict' to seek substitutes i.e. more calories.

KomradeBishop

Gbear wrote: »

...

The 'slippery slope' argument about government being involved in some areas/regulations, is pretty irrelevant until you start touching on critical civil liberties issue like free speech and stuff; curtailing the freedom to have 500ml cans of coke instead of 325ml, comes pretty low down on the list of threats to society.

There's nothing wrong with interfering in other peoples business, when it is better for society overall - a workable society the size of ours can't exist in the first place, if you don't, as that's pretty much what every single law does. Finding the dividing line where that can give government too much power, or can create a real slippery slope to tyranny, is often a very complicated matter - that you can't succinctly lay out with just a handful of principles (that's what we have a complex legal/political system for).

KomradeBishop

The Black Oil wrote: »

Well, then where do you draw the line - limiting certain carton sizes of cigarettes, quantities of alcohol you can purchase from an off licence or supermarket? People into the oversized sodas might simply buy two medium ones if the massive ones are a no go. I'm not into sentimentality around rights, btw.

Evidence-based policymaking: If any of those things, are proven to significantly help in resolving a societal health issue, why not?

If it's about sugar and calories only, then why are fruit juices excluded? Pure orange juice has a profile not at all dissimilar from Coca Cola.

If we're being scientific about it, then set a calorie limit, or a sugar limit, or a combination of the two (or make it as complicated and correct as you'd like). This is just bad policy pretending to be evidence based policy making.

KomradeBishop

Deleted User wrote: »

If it's about sugar and calories only, then why are fruit juices excluded? Pure orange juice has a profile not at all dissimilar from Coca Cola.

If we're being scientific about it, then set a calorie limit, or a sugar limit, or a combination of the two (or make it as complicated and correct as you'd like). This is just bad policy pretending to be evidence based policy making.

You're attacking the policy from a theoretical/consistency based view - not an evidence based view.

I don't know what kind of support the can-size regulation has, in evidence.

Banning/ over-taxing things is the lazy way out and ultimately isn't going to solve anything imo. Education on the facts is what people need. Cooking classes in school on tasty basics that aren't instant noodles and a chipper. You can stay away from sugar drinks & juices and still eat your way into unhealthiness and obesity quite easily.
Sure the info is out there for us internet experts, but as I said elsewhere, if all you know is people drinking or eating badly and nobody has ever told you otherwise or even showed you the actual benefits or cons of it, how do you know what's wrong. Parents give their kids sugar drinks from childhood. Or packets of crisps. Potato, what's that? People come on H&F going "I know about the calories but like drinking 10 cans of coke a day isn't bad otherwise is it?"
And when I say education I don't mean govt sponsored agri-pushing "eat more wheat! we need to prop up our industries", but something based on actual research. Which changes too based on best knowledge and this needs to be kept up to date.
In addition to this remember the low fat high sugar thing that was being peddled big time - why should people think sugar is bad if it's "low fat".

Zillah

bluewolf wrote: »

Banning/ over-taxing things is the lazy way out and ultimately isn't going to solve anything imo. Education on the facts is what people need. Cooking classes in school on tasty basics that aren't instant noodles and a chipper. You can stay away from sugar drinks & juices and still eat your way into unhealthiness and obesity quite easily.
Sure the info is out there for us internet experts, but as I said elsewhere, if all you know is people drinking or eating badly and nobody has ever told you otherwise or even showed you the actual benefits or cons of it, how do you know what's wrong. Parents give their kids sugar drinks from childhood. Or packets of crisps. Potato, what's that? People come on H&F going "I know about the calories but like drinking 10 cans of coke a day isn't bad otherwise is it?"
And when I say education I don't mean govt sponsored agri-pushing "eat more wheat! we need to prop up our industries", but something based on actual research. Which changes too based on best knowledge and this needs to be kept up to date.
In addition to this remember the low fat high sugar thing that was being peddled big time - why should people think sugar is bad if it's "low fat".

All of these things are helpful and can absolutely work in tandem with regulation of high sugar food and drink.

(Sure, include fruit juice if you like, but A: there certainly isn't a relevant percentage of obese people driving up to McD's and getting a gallon jug of fresh orange juice - so the point is moot - and B: juice at least has some other nutritional content and is low in sodium, unlike coke)

Permabear

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Zillah

lol yeah, one day these liberals are all "stop using the law to promote religion" and the next day they're all "hey law, stop this guy from stabbing me" lol liberals make up your mind about the government :pac::D:D:P

swampgas

Permabear wrote: »

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I guess it depends on how an individual's actions impact on other people. Laws to discourage drink-driving are easily justified - your desire to drive intoxicated can result in other people getting injured or killed. Laws for seat-belts though, or motorcycle helmets, don't really protect anyone else from harm, at least not directly. Unless we factor in the cost to society of people stupidly killing and maiming themselves.

If people could sign a waiver, saying if they get a head injury while riding a motorcycle without a helmet, that the state won't have to pay for any medical treatment, would that make it okay for them to do so? Or should they be required to take out extra insurance?

There is a weak precedent - hospitals refusing transplants or other treatments to people who won't stop smoking, or who won't stop drinking. If people insist on drinking gallons of sugary drinks, should they be refused treatment for diabetes?

Permabear

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Turtwig

Permabear wrote:

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You believe in freedom of speech? You also believe in a person's right to defend their character? Clearly you cannot have freedom of speech or the person's right to defend their good name as absolutes. The same too goes for liberties. Liberties are interrelated. You can harp on all day in absolute terms about crap about liberals, or whatever, but it does not change the fact that liberties are never going to be absolute, they can't by their very nature be.

If the so-called liberals (and it amuses me greatly to hear the advocates of a nanny state call themselves "liberals") get their way, we ultimately end up with the state controlling absolutely everything

That is such a big strawman it needs a fibre stronger than straw to keep it held together.

If you cannot admit there is a broad spectra to what people want to regulate, liberate and restrict then there's absolutely no pointing in posting here, or on any discussion anywhere for that matter. Because you'll never actually be addressing the position of others.

Gbear

This is going to be a long post. I think I'll throw in some TL;DRs for anyone wanting to skim.

Zillah wrote: »

I don't think conflating government regulation of public health issues and marriage equality is anyway meaningful or useful (unless one simply has an anti-government agenda, in which case I'm not sure there is much conversation to be had).

People really do get hung up on analogies, even when it's explicitly stated that what's being compared is not their seriousness but rather a logical construct that underpins the two examples.

I'm not trying to score points using some easy emotional target - I'm picking an obvious example that virtually everyone on this forum agrees with so I don't have to spend time finding one you would accept. You can compare commonalities in anything.

You can't dismiss arguments by mislabling that comparison as conflation to suit your own arguments. If the elements I'm comparing are not analogous than by all means tell me why and I'll stop making the comparison.

Zillah wrote: »

This isn't about me knowing better than someone, it is what the science tells us, what the medical fact tells us. Smoking of anything more than a trivial amount and large amounts of alcohol or sugar are very bad for one's health, and very bad for the public finances when healthcare comes into it. Someone still has the freedom to choose to smoke or eat sugar or drink alcohol to the point where it is effective suicide if they like, I just want it to be made difficult to do this unknowingly.

There are several elements to this:

1) I think you're incorrectly entangling scientific consensus with governmental policy. (TL;DR the door left open to allow science to influence public policy cannot be closed when bull**** turns up.)

That there is a consensus in how to avoid the negative health effects of consuming certain products does not mean that the government will correctly apply the recommended policies.

We already have a system in place that is perfectly capable of taking the opinions of experts on board and using them to drive policy, yet that clearly doesn't always happen.
You have governments (local for the most part) prohibiting the use of flouride in drinking water, you have huge swathes of governments, especially in the US, ignoring climate science, you have the anti-women abortion policies based on faulty information, you have the nonsensical approach to drug classification all over the place (to the point where the appointed experts are even fired for not bending to the politicisation of drug policy).

You might say "just because it doesn't work doesn't mean that it couldn't", and you'd be correct. Lacking an option that promotes liberty, I would hope for a more fact-based approach to governmental policy.

The problem is that I do not think that you can distinguish between the apparatus used by science-driven policy and bull****-driven policy.
So the same power that, for example, penalises the use of fossil-fuel driven cars based on wanting to combat climate change, can be used to impede the sale of electric cars.

Scientific consensus isn't an executive tool - there's no overlord who decides what is and isn't a fact. All the scientific consensus does, from a political perspective, is give you some ammunition to win support. It's by no means the only form or even most powerful form of ammunition.


2) People have different, equally valid priorities.
Saying there's a benefit from a medical perspective is pretty much a completely empirical statement.

Saying there's a general benefit to society or to the individual is a value judgement and the only person who's opinion is important is the individual in question. They decide whether stuffing their faces is worth the health risk....

3).... except there's the whole socialised medicine issue. (TL;DR, practicality isn't a license to abandon logical consistency - certainly not on a debate forum).

That certainly could complicate the matter, however, the issue I raised a yesterday, vis a vis gays, is important here.

If there was a public health or wellbeing issue raised in opposition to, for example, legalising homosexuality, is that a reasonable objection?
On this issue, pretty much the whole forum would agree that even if legalising homosexuality created a problem for the health service (like if it increased AIDS or something), that still wouldn't be a reason to keep a sexual preference illegal.

The problem with trying to dismiss this line of thought as being irrelevant because civil rights are more important is that we've already had laws like this that use moralistic or health-based arguments. They weren't overturned because there was a fundamental shift that abandoned their underpinnings in law - they were overturned because there was a shift in popularity.
That they were incorrect from moral or logical standpoint isn't actually relevant unless the scientific consensus is forcibly and rigorously imposed to steer public policy.
The politician who's pushing for a ban on phone masts because they give you brain cancer doesn't give a **** what the scientific consensus is and the success or failure of such a law being enacted will only very loosely be determined by it.

Why are those arguments unreasonable for a serious issue like civil rights but perfectly ok for more minor civil liberties?

If there is no fundamental issue with the logic (ie - the government should interfere to influence public health as it sees fit) then do you have a non-arbitrary distinction between what issues are serious enough?

I would think that here of all places would place a value on being logically consistent, not because being logically consistent is nice or wins you points but because being anything else is totally intellectually dishonest.

4) "I just want it to be made difficult to do this unknowingly."

The specifics of the law are irrelevant - whether it's banning cups over a certain size, using a certain % of sugar in drinks or whatever - you're intruding on what a businesses can and can't sell.

That's really nothing to do with improving the knowledge of the consumer. Totally unrelated.

Undermining the decision to live unhealthily by addressing it in school curricula would be an example of how to address that issue. Even stuff like putting pictures of cancerous lungs on cigarette packets, which does make certain authoritarian strides against businesses (purely in terms of deciding how they can package their product), still primarily increases the choice of the consumer by giving them extra information.

If education improves the healthcare considerations by people eating more healthily as a result of it, it makes legal interference at the point of sale redundant.

KomradeBishop

Yea this is following the typical pattern, where Libertarians sit at the position of advocating 'Minarchism' (a limited government aimed at protecting property rights), yet use generic black-and-white "Government involvement in everything is bad" type arguments - even though that is incompatible with Minarchism - in order to try and shift the debate rightwards.

It's not even consistent with their own views - just a rhetorical tactic.

KomradeBishop

Gbear wrote: »

1) I think you're incorrectly entangling scientific consensus with governmental policy. (TL;DR the door left open to allow science to influence public policy cannot be closed when bull**** turns up.)

Science isn't the same as Bad Science; the existence of bad/fraudulent science doesn't prevent the use of real science.

Gbear wrote: »

2) People have different, equally valid priorities.
Saying there's a benefit from a medical perspective is pretty much a completely empirical statement.

Saying there's a general benefit to society or to the individual is a value judgement and the only person who's opinion is important is the individual in question. They decide whether stuffing their faces is worth the health risk....

None of the policies stop them doing that if they want; win-win.

Gbear wrote: »

3).... except there's the whole socialised medicine issue. (TL;DR, practicality isn't a license to abandon logical consistency - certainly not on a debate forum).
...

If you want logical consistency, then the end-result of what you all are arguing is Anarcho-Capitalism - which is practically impossible.

Libertarians made the choice to abandon logical consistency where it comes to individual freedoms, in favour of practicality, by adopting Minarchism.

Finding the right balance between individual freedoms and government infringement upon them, is what the legal/political system is for - it is far too complex a set of problems, to be succinctly described in a few logically-consistent principles.

Gbear wrote: »

4) "I just want it to be made difficult to do this unknowingly."

The specifics of the law are irrelevant - whether it's banning cups over a certain size, using a certain % of sugar in drinks or whatever - you're intruding on what a businesses can and can't sell.
...

Virtually nobody outside of extreme free-market supporters think this is a bad thing; that's why we have regulations to stop manufacturers doing stupid things like making e.g. radioactive products, such as radioactive chocolate bars.

Zillah

Libertarians seem perfectly happy to hold forth on how much they don't like the way things are and yet never really seem willing to proffer the alternative.

swampgas

Permabear wrote: »

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One can always find some rationale for deregulating this or permitting that, often involving emotive hand-waving and repeated references to "individual freedom".

For example, one could argue that if Denmark had passed blasphemy legislation, the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy could have been avoided, together with the violent riots that led to around 200 deaths. Therefore, blasphemy legislation can be justified in the interests of protecting society.

And one could argue that blasphemy is a legitimate complaint for individuals to complain about, and that their individual religious freedoms are being violated unless they can vote to make blasphemy a legal crime. Therefore, blasphemy laws are justified to protect individual religious freedom.

If the so-called liberals (and it amuses me greatly to hear the advocates of a nanny state call themselves "liberals") get their way, we ultimately end up with the state controlling absolutely everything -- all in the interests of "society," of course. But any historically informed individual might suspect, with good reason, that ceding so much power to the state might not ultimately be such a good idea.

Power has to lie somewhere. And quite often I get the impression that some of those most opposed to state power are those that would wield disproportionate power as individuals - large business owners, press barons, the very wealthy. Unfortunately some of the poorest in society buy into the same idea, blaming their lot in life on an oppressive state. If only naked capitalism could set them free ... yeah right.

Ultimately, without state power as a counterbalance, there is only the power of wealth, and I suspect most people in society are smart enough to recognise that.

Zillah

For example, one could argue that if Denmark had passed blasphemy legislation, the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy could have been avoided, together with the violent riots that led to around 200 deaths. Therefore, blasphemy legislation can be justified in the interests of protecting society.

Haha, I didn't even see this on my first scan through. It's the moral equivalent of saying that short skirts cause rape.

recedite

There's a difference between banning something and taxing something.
A sugar tax would "discourage" people away from fizzy drinks to some extent.
Same with taxing tobacco, alcohol and high carbon fuels. That's social engineering, not authoritarianism.

KomradeBishop

There is also an interesting alternative approach to taxation, from some economic schools of thought, which looks at how taxes encourage or discourage certain behaviours among different people/businesses/industries in the economy - classifying things as 'socially good' and 'socially bad'; e.g. a person working = good, a corporation employing people = good, polluting = bad, excessive 'economic rents' (profits with barely any effort put in, or benefit to society) = bad, damaging to public health = bad.

This alternative approach, focuses on taxing 'bad's instead of 'good' things - and this leads to the very unusual stance, of progressive/lefty economists, who are heavily against income tax and corporation tax (taxing work = bad, it discourages work; taxing corporations = bad, it discourages entrepreneurial activity and employment).

This would not be possible while stuck in the Euro though, but is for countries that aren't.

From this perspective, all taxes are a form of social/economic regulation - encouraging/discouraging certain activities; and since taxes are necessary for any kind of government to exist, might as well target the 'bad's (including things which harm public health).

Brian Shanahan

KomradeBishop wrote: »

This alternative approach, focuses on taxing 'bad's instead of 'good' things - and this leads to the very unusual stance, of progressive/lefty economists, who are heavily against income tax and corporation tax (taxing work = bad, it discourages work; taxing corporations = bad, it discourages entrepreneurial activity and employment).

The only way I'd see this working was in a situation where the government was kept very small. At the current level of government involvement in society, takes are essentially payments for services rendered. And when you look at it that way it becomes obvious that the rich and the larger corporations should pay proportionally more tax than the rest of us, simply because they receive more benefits from the government (they are not alone benefitting personally, but are also in a position to receive the gains from what the government spends on other people. For example, most of the benefit from what the government spends in education doesn't go to the individual but to their employer who receives the lion's share of their the proceeds of the employee's work a large part of which is possible due to state funded education).

Karl Stein

Brian Shanahan wrote: »

it becomes obvious that the rich and the larger corporations should pay proportionally more tax than the rest of us, simply because they receive more benefits from the government

Try telling people that and a lot are unable to understand, some want to ignore, and others would like to shut you up.

I arrived with $250 in my pocket, and got where I am based entirely on my hard work.” This is true, but it’s not the whole truth.

A more accurate telling of my story would consider that every day I benefit from schools, hospitals, roads, bridges, parks and civic amenities that were built and paid for by previous generations. They were much less well off than we are today. Yet they had the collective will to invest in their future and the future of their children.

Arul Menezes, Microsoft Millionaire.

It's something that the oft cited 'Father of Capitalism' Adam Smith astutely wrote of:

The subjects of every state ought to contribute towards the support of the government [...] in proportion to the revenue which they respectively enjoy under the protection of the state.

It is not very unreasonable that the rich should contribute to the public expense, not only in proportion to their revenue, but something more than in that proportion.

Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations.

KomradeBishop

Brian Shanahan wrote: »

The only way I'd see this working was in a situation where the government was kept very small. At the current level of government involvement in society, takes are essentially payments for services rendered. And when you look at it that way it becomes obvious that the rich and the larger corporations should pay proportionally more tax than the rest of us, simply because they receive more benefits from the government (they are not alone benefitting personally, but are also in a position to receive the gains from what the government spends on other people. For example, most of the benefit from what the government spends in education doesn't go to the individual but to their employer who receives the lion's share of their the proceeds of the employee's work a large part of which is possible due to state funded education).

The only way it would work, is to unlink government spending from taxation altogether - then you would have a different role for taxes: taxing by above mentioned 'socially bad' activities (including e.g. for public health issues, like the thread is about), taxing areas of the economy that are causing inflation (to prevent excessive inflation and speculative bubbles - no hard-set/general rule here mind, depends on circumstances), and more - I can't remember the other conditions, offhand. Can't be done by countries stuck in the Euro though.

As long as left/progressive economics, depends on an economic system and narrative where government spending is dependent on taxes, then left/progressive political/social gains will take a massive beating every time there is an economic crisis.
Economic crisis will always remove the funding that 'the left' needs for its public programs, and will automatically shift politics/economics rightwards by doing this - this is simply unsustainable for 'the left'; voluntarily walking into a trap each time there's an economic crisis really.

In my view, 'the left' will remain divided and crippled while sticking to that way of framing economic issues; in an economic crisis 'tax the rich' type arguments, in order to help better fund government, are actually counterproductive (increased income tax - even if on the rich - reduces aggregate demand, and increased corporate tax also has a lagging effect on industry) - and this can be, surprisingly, a lefty/progressive viewpoint (even though it, extremely low income/corporate tax, is something you'd normally only attribute to heavy free market supporters)

There are, of course, good reasons unrelated to funding government, for policies aimed at controlling income inequality though.

jank

Zillah wrote: »

Just because curtailing soda serving size won't single handedly solve the issue doesn't mean it won't help. I didn't say anything about quick and easy answers. My point being, that if we accept for the sake of argument that it will help, I think it is a good thing for a government to do, and be damned to the people whining about how the founding father's were crucified for their right to consume their daily calories in liquid sugar form.

Note the 'I' and 'government' in that sentence. You are of course right to have an opinion but as per usual when someone wants make others do as they are told, well they go hand and hand to the government to enforce said opinion. So now the state is just a facilitator of authoritarianism. The only thing that has changed is the colour of the coat.

jank

KomradeBishop wrote: »

The 'slippery slope' argument about government being involved in some areas/regulations, is pretty irrelevant until you start touching on critical civil liberties issue like free speech and stuff; curtailing the freedom to have 500ml cans of coke instead of 325ml, comes pretty low down on the list of threats to society.

There's nothing wrong with interfering in other peoples business, when it is better for society overall - a workable society the size of ours can't exist in the first place, if you don't, as that's pretty much what every single law does. Finding the dividing line where that can give government too much power, or can create a real slippery slope to tyranny, is often a very complicated matter - that you can't succinctly lay out with just a handful of principles (that's what we have a complex legal/political system for).

Ah, the 'greater good' argument. How many times have we heard that. Miscegenation laws were passed in the US for the 'greater good' of society. These laws also had a scientific consensus that was popular at the time. Basically if you were 1/16 native american or 1/8 African American it was illegal to marry a white person, all for the 'greater good'.

TheChizler

jank wrote: »

Ah, the 'greater good' argument. How many times have we heard that. Miscegenation laws were passed in the US for the 'greater good' of society. These laws also had a scientific consensus that was popular at the time. Basically if you were 1/16 native american or 1/8 African American it was illegal to marry a white person, all for the 'greater good'.

If it's for the greater good and this good is backed up wholly by evidence then I'd be all for it.

With miscegenation was the scientific proof that the genetics or traits mix and then taking a jump away from evidence to say that was a bad thing? If it was that's only using evidence when it's convenient.

Edit: All for it is a tad strong, but it definitely would be a large part of the consideration.

swampgas

jank wrote: »

Ah, the 'greater good' argument. How many times have we heard that.

There will always be a tension between individual rights and freedoms, and the greater good. The "Tragedy of the Commons" scenario, or the results of unregulated over-fishing of limited fish stocks, show that ignoring the greater good can be bad for individuals in the long run too.

There are no simple answers either, and the balance between the two can be cultural as much as anything else.

The greater good must be considered in public policy, as must individual rights. I can't see a way to avoid a case-by-case approach, TBH.

keane2097

It's reasonable to tax alcohol, cigarettes, sugar etc because excessive consumption of same lead to higher costs to the health system. It's not reasonable to ban them because your opinion says that people would be better off without them.

recedite

Karl Stein wrote: »

"the rich should contribute to the public expense, not only in proportion to their revenue, but something more than in that proportion".
Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations.

KomradeBishop wrote: »

This alternative approach, focuses on taxing 'bad's instead of 'good' things - taxing work = bad, it discourages work; taxing corporations = bad, it discourages entrepreneurial activity and employment.

Both are valid points, so why not apply both factors simultaneously?
In the case of someone who works hard and earns a lot, tax them proportionately, but not "more than" in proportion. They would still provide a higher than average tax take.

In the case of someone who earns a lot, but doesn't work much, lets say a multi-property landlord for example. They would be be taxed "more than" in proportion to their revenue.
AFAIK, Adam Smith was thinking along those lines; he considered that property should be considered an expense or a liability, not an asset. The kind of capital he was in favour of was productive capital; mills and factories to create wealth and jobs.
In that respect he would be in favour of the Property Tax as a progressive tax. Ironically a true Marxist would also be in favour of a property tax.
Yet here in Ireland, the lefties seem to be the people most against it.

KomradeBishop

jank wrote: »

Ah, the 'greater good' argument. How many times have we heard that. Miscegenation laws were passed in the US for the 'greater good' of society. These laws also had a scientific consensus that was popular at the time. Basically if you were 1/16 native american or 1/8 African American it was illegal to marry a white person, all for the 'greater good'.

Moot/inconsistent criticism really, as all but a minority of Libertarians support having a public legal system, police force and government, for the 'greater good' of not having an anarchic society that implodes upon itself.

Zillah

Zillah wrote: »

Libertarians seem perfectly happy to hold forth on how much they don't like the way things are and yet never really seem willing to proffer the alternative.

yes I did

Zillah wrote: »

Haha, I didn't even see this on my first scan through. It's the moral equivalent of saying that short skirts cause rape.

So you're both mocking the same argument now - progress

KomradeBishop

swampgas wrote: »

There will always be a tension between individual rights and freedoms, and the greater good. The "Tragedy of the Commons" scenario, or the results of unregulated over-fishing of limited fish stocks, show that ignoring the greater good can be bad for individuals in the long run too.

There are no simple answers either, and the balance between the two can be cultural as much as anything else.

The greater good must be considered in public policy, as must individual rights. I can't see a way to avoid a case-by-case approach, TBH.

Indeed, and more generally: When you focus on political/economic issues from a position of hyper-individualism, then you start to not notice or to ignore, Fallacies of Composition (which Tragedy of the Commons is a well known one).

It's one of the most useful/important concepts for anyone interested in economics, to understand - it focuses generally, on how what may be true for one person or for part of an economy, is often not true/applicable for all people or the whole economy. It's the principal behind a lot of macroeconomics.

Tiddlypeeps

jank wrote: »

Ah, the 'greater good' argument. How many times have we heard that. Miscegenation laws were passed in the US for the 'greater good' of society. These laws also had a scientific consensus that was popular at the time. Basically if you were 1/16 native american or 1/8 African American it was illegal to marry a white person, all for the 'greater good'.

How do you propose laws be decided upon if how they effect society isn't a valid metric to base the decision on? Obviously other factors should be weighted up, but the benefit it will bring society is pretty much the biggest factor in passing any law.

Stating that it's sometimes used badly isn't a good reason for not using that reasoning, not without suggesting a viable alternative anyway.

KomradeBishop

recedite wrote: »

Both are valid points, so why not apply both factors simultaneously?
In the case of someone who works hard and earns a lot, tax them proportionately, but not "more than" in proportion. They would still provide a higher than average tax take.

In the case of someone who earns a lot, but doesn't work much, lets say a multi-property landlord for example. They would be be taxed "more than" in proportion to their revenue.
AFAIK, Adam Smith was thinking along those lines; he considered that property should be considered an expense or a liability, not an asset. The kind of capital he was in favour of was productive capital; mills and factories to create wealth and jobs.
In that respect he would be in favour of the Property Tax as a progressive tax. Ironically a true Marxist would also be in favour of a property tax.
Yet here in Ireland, the lefties seem to be the people most against it.

You can do both simultaneously alright, but if you unlink government spending from taxation (not possible while stuck in the Euro), there is no need to tax peoples income or to tax corporations (they are both 'good', you don't want to discourage workers or businesses), you focus on 'bad's (as described in my earlier post) and on taxing areas of the economy causing inflation (where appropriate, on a case-by-case basis).

Nearly all people think in terms of 'tax' = 'government spending', so when you unlink the two, it changes how things work in a significant way, that people find hard to understand, because of what they are used to.