Neo-Anarchism and friends: Questions about the Sixth World

[Username17]

except that the pareto efficiency rant in the NA guide isn't espousing pareto effiecient policies at the moment, it's about pareto optimality being the natural result of non coercive deals, so stripping the megacorps of the ability to coerce people, (Which they explicitly advocate) is, just as you would hope, a major loss to the megacorps.

If you scrubbed the little rant at the end about how if you just give out informative fliers to everyone the megacorps will go away, the entire rant could be presented as a glowing endorsement of megacorporate policy. There is some bitching here and there about monopolistic competition being coercive, but it very explicitly isn't. Monopolies don't have to force anyone to do anything, they are simply able to make exploitative profits and still undersell competition anyway. Dealing with the monopolies is Pareto-efficient. You get more out of your dealings with the monopoly than you lose, and they get even more. You accept the deal because it's a net positive for you, and that's the deal you get because their bargaining position is better than yours.

also, WTH did aztech have a natural monopoly on? I thought they started as a mining company.

NAGNA uses a very loose definition of natural monopoly. Rather than being things like public water sources that are demonstrably superior when provided by a single supplier, they are defining it as this:

Effectively, natural monopolies use technologies that have a continuously declining marginal cost. The more produced, the lower the cost per unit.

So they are using the expansive definition, in which a natural monopoly is absolutely anything that benefits from mass production techniques. You know, almost everything. Because anything that benefits from mass production will naturally favor larger firms over smaller firms and ultimately make competition extremely one-sided.

This is actually quite defensible, since the official definition of a natural monopoly is a condition under which an industry is most efficient when operated by a single firm. Interestingly: since "efficiency" is defined as "lowest long-run average cost (to the industry)" that is almost all industries. So... almost all industries are natural monopolies, which is why firms become larger over time without government intervention.

-Username17

[fectin]

Right. So the description of the underlying principles here is borked, and that's skewing the whole discussion. I blame Blade, because he has no idea what he's talking about.

Any mutually beneficial (or neutral) trade is a Pareto improvement. Opposing Pareto improvements really is mouth-breathingly retarded. You don't even have to benefit equally: I could have no preference between apples and oranges and you could love apples, and trading my apple for your orange is completely neutral to me, but super-amazing to you. That's a good trade, and if we make it then the overall value of everything has increased. If I value apples even slightly more than oranges (i.e. I would not make that trade on my own), it is not a Pareto improvement to force that trade, because I am harmed by it, regardless of whether your net increase outweighs my net decrease (the theory that Blade describes with increasing net value by outweighing harms instead of by avoiding them is called "welfare theory." No really, I'm not being cute, that's actually what it is called).

I'll say it stronger: if you oppose Pareto improvements, you are an actually evil person (comment reserved on people who believe Pareto improvements are insufficient, because that's a separate issue). This is a weird way of approaching it, but is basically the core principle of the social side of libertarianism. It's also the thing that everyone here spends the most time angry at republicans for failing to grasp (by a narrow margin).

Any state where there are no more Pareto improvements is "Pareto efficient." Going from a state which is not Pareto efficient to a state which is Pareto efficient is always an improvement (it's tautologically true: if at least one person is positively impacted, and no-one is negatively impacted, the overall effect is positive). That doesn't inherently mean a Pareto efficient state is the best of all possible worlds, or even that any particular Pareto efficient state is somehow better than any other state. It just means that "Pareto optimization" (the process of making only Pareto improvements) does inherently lead to a better system, and no-one is worse off than they started.

Again, I'll reserve comment on sufficiency, but Pareto optimization is unqualifiedly good.

So as an example, Bob Millionaire and Joe Pizza, and Steve the Crap Covered Farmer, Bob has money, and Joe has Pizza, and Steve has nothing, and that's our entire economy. Bob trades some money for some pizzas until he doesn't feel another pizza is worth the number of monies that Joe is asking. Afterwards, Bob has money and pizza, and is happier than before, and Joe has money and pizza, and is happier than before, and Steve still has nothing. Astute readers will notice that the system as a whole has improved, and that no-one is worse off, and also that Steve is still screwed. So, there should be no question that allowing these trades is good, but (at least superficially) it seems worth asking whether it's really fair enough to leave Steve to the mercies of this system.

Pareto, having established this taxonomy, went on to say that it was not okay to coerce trades that are not Pareto improvements. He asserts that we cannot know how people value assets, so we cannot know the magnitude of harms or of benefits that come from taking from one person and giving to another, and so it is literally impossible to determine whether any particular gain outweighs any particular harm. So we can tell that someone who has 100 barbie dolls values the 100th barbie less than 99th, which he values less than the 98th, etc. That's diminishing marginal value, and it's assumed, but basically uncontroversial. What we cannot say is that he values the 100th barbie less than someone with no barbies would value it. Maybe he just really likes barbies, and the barbieless man is barbie-ambivalent (the simple fact that he has accumulated so many barbies suggests that this is the case).

I'm not real interested in arguing here whether Pareto is correct in this assertion, but I will note that "first, do no harm" has some pretty strong antecedents, and also that any other system creates a couple perverse incentives and a strong moral hazard. That said, "other systems aren't perfect" isn't exactly a ringing endorsement of this one.

---

Shadowrun is a fictional situation. If it were subject to normal market forces, it would devolve to something more like Gibson's worlds very, very quickly. Asking how it stays the way it does is an exercise in circular thinking because you started out by saying, "assume the world were this way."

If you have billionaire Damien Knight and a million people with nothing, the currency changes. Maybe people still deal with Damien for whatever reason, but some new medium of exchange also crops up, and having a big pile of it means you are also rich (see 'cigarettes in prison' for a caricature version and the economicon for a more in-depth discussion).

[Neurosis]

Ja. I think Frank once said that there were as many elves in Seattle as in Tir na nOg, but what can I say - the early writers fapped to the elves. <shrug>

Early writers? I feel like there's been an excessive level of elf fappery in literally every era of Shadowrun.

Ancient History, unless it violates the non-disclosure agreement, can you tell me what original plans you had for the CAS write-up?

I don't have an NDA, so I can do much better than that. Link

/me reads.

Damnit, the NASA mainframes got left behind in the CAS? That's one thing I got wrong in my campaign. I had them significantly further northwest. (I like your CAS chapter, Bobby. I'll have to compare it to the one that actually made it into 6WA some time.

Um... Shadowrun's 2052 has Aztechnology in it, Natural Monopolies totally happened.

I must be misunderstanding your terms then, because I thought that AZT was as far from a NATURAL monopoly as you could get.

[Blade]

@fectin: care to point where I'm wrong? I admit to having limited knowledge of microeconomy but I don't see what mistake I've made. (Except maybe dumbing down the beer example so much that it had no trade element).

A natural monopoly is a monopoly where it's more efficient to have only one supplier. And the definition Frank quoted isn't wrong per se: a technology that leads to cost going lower as production goes higher (with no bound) would indeed lead to a natural monopoly.
I don't see anything showing that Aztechnology can be doing this.

[fectin]

Sure. This part is fine:

Neo-Anarchism is closer to Anarcho-capitalism (but still a little bit different). It's centered on the concept of the Pareto Efficiency. You reach this efficiency by making improvements that make someone better off without making someone else worse. Once no such improvement can be made, you've reached efficiency.

But then this part is completely untrue:

In order to reach this efficiency, your economy must meet the conditions of perfect competition. These are:
- All products are equal. Which means no patents, shared R&D, no advertising, no branding and so on.
- No barriers to entry. Any company can start in any business without any problem. This means no patents, no fees, no need to be a member of some association and so on.
- Many different suppliers and buyers so that if one buyer/supplier leaves, the market stays the same. This means no megacorporation domating a market, no oligopoly and so on.
- Perfect price information: buyers always know which suppliers offer the lowest price (and since products are all equal, this is the only thing that matters), and will buy from these suppliers.
- Mobility of money and workers.

As you can see, the megacorporation dominated economy is completely opposed to this. Which is why neo-anarchism makes sense: it fights against the corporations to get a world where people are more free but also better off.

None of the things you list have any impact on whether you can make Pareto improvements or reach a Pareto efficient state. Fungible, interchangeable products are easier to model, but aren't necessary or even helpful. If anything, they undermine and trivialize Pareto's taxonomy and conclusions. Same for 'no barriers to entry;' it certainly makes for a better end result, but doesn't have any impact on anything Pareto said. Same for each of the next two.
Mobility of money and workers is sort of weird: either you mean something trivially correct (without participants and valuables, there is no market), or you are wrong.


But the beer example was flat out wrong. IMHO Frank wasn't quite right either, because economies aren't zero-sum, but he's dead on for what Pareto says.

Pareto optimization by definition means that you don't take anything away from the people who are already "haves". So if your position is that Megacorps shouldn't exist, you can't espouse Pareto optimization without being a mouth breathing sub-human.

I think you don't understand correctly the concept of a Pareto improvement: let's say I have a hundred bottles of beer and you have none. Taking some of my bottles to give them to you won't make me worse off, because I have more than I can drink anyway. But it will make you better off. That's why you can take something from the "have" to give the "have not". (In a Pareto-efficient economy, companies don't make any profit: the money they make just covers the costs.)

A market dominated by Megacorps is an oligopoly (or monopolies, depending on the scale you look at). By definition, an oligopoly is NOT pareto efficient. So getting rid of the megacorporations would help getting to pareto efficiency.

As soon as you say "Taking some of my bottles" you are describing a non-Pareto improving transaction. I don't know how detailed the description you got for this theory was, but that phrase should immediately throw a red flag in your mind. An exchange where you lose something and gain nothing inherently moves you to a lower indifference curve (remember the rectangular graph with the series of asymptotic functions progressively farther from the lower left corner, and another series progressively farther from the lower right?), which is exactly the thing Pareto said was intolerable.

What you are describing is welfare theory, which instead assumes that the valuations people assign to things are at least qualifiably comparable across different people, at least in aggregate. (So welfare theory says that we can at least know that the guy with 100 barbies values the hundredth barbie less than the guy with 0 barbies would value it)

This is the exact polar opposite of what Pareto asserted, and leads to wildly different moral conclusions.

edit: looking again, your definition of perfect competition is also wrong. That's not perfect competition, it's just homogeneity. Competition is largely about differentiation, including both price and quality competition.

[Blade]

@fectin:
Weird, if you take a look at the wikipedia article for perfect competition, it pretty much says the same things I did.
And it does also say "In the absence of externalities and public goods, perfectly competitive equilibria are Pareto-efficient."

And all this is pretty close to what I remember about my microeconomy classes (which is where I got what I said earlier). May I ask where your knowledge comes from?

For the transaction example, I just wanted to explain the fact that if someone doesn't make use of a resource, then he loses nothing if the resource is allocated to someone else.
If I have 10 tickets for a unique show that, for some reason, I can't sell/trade (and I don't have any friend to bring there), I lose nothing by giving 9 of them to someone else. (This actually might be a better example, since in that case I'm clearly not worse off and the people getting the tickets are better off).

[fectin]

In the absence of externalities and public goods, perfectly competitive equilibria are Pareto-efficient

is not in any way the same as "In order to reach this efficiency, your economy must meet the conditions of perfect competition." 'Path A leads to Location X' is a long way from 'Path A is necessary to reach Location X'.

@fectin:
Weird, if you take a look at the wikipedia article for perfect competition, it pretty much says the same things I did.
And it does also say "In the absence of externalities and public goods, perfectly competitive equilibria are Pareto-efficient."

You're right, Wikipedia does agree with you on perfect competition. I don't know what to tell you, because those conditions are not compatible and are inherently unstable, unless you have functionally infinite demand. The only ways to get functionally infinite demand at a set price (condition 4), are to be playing in either a monopoly market (because you have a patent, violating condition 2) or an oligopoly market (violating condition 3), or a monopsony market.
Looking around that topic area, Wikipedia is both inaccurate and internally inconsistent Compare:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareto_efficiency
and
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welfare_economics
and you'll see two wildly different descriptions of Pareto efficiency. To figure out which one is right, start from first principles: Pareto improvements are good for at least one person, and are not bad for anyone. Pareto efficiency is any state where there are no more such improvements. Lets examine e.g. the four criteria which the welfare economics page lists:
- "The marginal rates of substitution in consumption are identical for all consumers" Can you make Pareto improvements if this is not the case? Obviously yes. (The tenth barbie is worth $1 to me and $100 to you. Each of us can still make trades that are Pareto improving.)
- "The marginal rate of transformation in production is identical for all products." Completely false, based on the first one. Unless our preferences are the same, production substitution rates could be anything at all. I think this was trying to refer to being at the production possibility frontier, but that's not what it actually says.
- "The marginal resource cost is equal to the marginal revenue product for all production processes." WTF? This is obviously false. You can make Pareto-improving trades with 1920's Banting (only guy who knew how to make insulin), and he could have established any margins he wanted. In fact, he could have set his price so high that only one person could afford it, and after that purchase, the system would be Pareto efficient (no-one else willing to exchange at that price).
- "The marginal rates of substitution in consumption are equal to the marginal rates of transformation in production". Again, take a look at it. Even there, there are some Pareto improving trades, and those will eventually be exhausted.

And all this is pretty close to what I remember about my microeconomy classes (which is where I got what I said earlier). May I ask where your knowledge comes from?

Economics minor from a top-100 college, with classes & seminars from full research professors, followed by extensive reading.

For the transaction example, I just wanted to explain the fact that if someone doesn't make use of a resource, then he loses nothing if the resource is allocated to someone else.
If I have 10 tickets for a unique show that, for some reason, I can't sell/trade (and I don't have any friend to bring there), I lose nothing by giving 9 of them to someone else. (This actually might be a better example, since in that case I'm clearly not worse off and the people getting the tickets are better off).

Sure, but that is qualitatively different. Only you are able to assess to what extent you are worse off after giving away those tickets.

Besides that, a good which you "can't sell/trade (use)" but somehow can give away is a really weird situation; to the point of being intellectually dishonest. I may as well discuss executives who are making nine figures and spending ever penny of it on medical treatment for an elderly relative, such that taking even a single cent causes that relative to die. clearly, marginal utility of dollars is far higher in their case than for anyone else. Based on that, I can categorically reject redistributive programs as inefficient, per your own standards.

[Libertad]

14. What was going on with the Berlin Anarchist situation in Germany?

15. If the Constitution still exists in the UCAS and CAS in some form, this means that freedom of speech and freedom of the press is still legal. Outside of illegal activities, does this make it harder for the megacorps to hide their dirty laundry if a UCAS news station or media outlet gets its hands on some confidential company files?

[Blade]

In the absence of externalities and public goods, perfectly competitive equilibria are Pareto-efficient

is not in any way the same as "In order to reach this efficiency, your economy must meet the conditions of perfect competition."

Yep, I got it the other way around. My point stands that supporters of a pareto-efficient market will often support a perfectly competitive market. At least, that's what I was told in class, and what I can read in all books (and online courses) talking about micro-economics.

You're right, Wikipedia does agree with you on perfect competition. I don't know what to tell you, because those conditions are not compatible and are inherently unstable, unless you have functionally infinite demand.

Infinite demand is one of the conditions of perfect competition (first bullet point "infinite buyers"). But micro-economy is about adjusting limited resources to fit unlimited needs, so this is consistent.

The content of the wikipedia articles seems to fit what I've been told in my classes and what I've read in economy books (except maybe in some details), so I doubt they're as wrong as you say, but I'll refrain from arguing about it since my knowledge is admittedly limited.

[Username17]

Lots of things are Pareto-efficient that are morally reprehensible. Slave labor is Pareto-efficient, because the slaves gain basic room and board and the slave masters gain all the proceeds of the labor and no one is worse off than if no transaction took place (and the putative slaves died of starvation and the putative slave masters didn't get any cotton). The fact that something is Pareto-efficient doesn't mean it's good.

Pareto-efficient economic policies are simply any policies which increase GDP without taking a single dime away from rich people. If you aren't personally rich, supporting Pareto-efficiency means that you are dumb. Hell, even if you are personally rich, you should still probably support a maximizing or welfare economic policy, and that's almost certainly not going to be Pareto-efficient. Pareto-efficiency does not allow progressive taxation or punitive legal measures, both of which are quite conducive to a productive society.

14. What was going on with the Berlin Anarchist situation in Germany?

That... depends. The Germany Sourcebook for old SR was... extremely dumb. There is a German-only Berlin book that many German people say overhauled the setting into something vaguely sensible. But mein Deutsch ist schlect and I haven't read it.

15. If the Constitution still exists in the UCAS and CAS in some form, this means that freedom of speech and freedom of the press is still legal. Outside of illegal activities, does this make it harder for the megacorps to hide their dirty laundry if a UCAS news station or media outlet gets its hands on some confidential company files?

In the CAS and UCAS you have a right to say whatever you want. But you don't have a right to bandwidth to say it on. That is leased out to the highest bidder, which means that if you don't have serious bank you are a criminal if you broadcast anything.

So all the UCAS media outlets are corp-owned. They will probably run a story that makes a rival corp look bad, but they won't run a story that makes corps in general look bad.

-Username17

[Ancient History]

Ja. I think Frank once said that there were as many elves in Seattle as in Tir na nOg, but what can I say - the early writers fapped to the elves. <shrug>

Early writers? I feel like there's been an excessive level of elf fappery in literally every era of Shadowrun.

We were less fappy than most. [/edit] I was writing an adventure where you could shoot an IE in the face and live to brag about it as the climax of the adventure.

/me reads.

Damnit, the NASA mainframes got left behind in the CAS? That's one thing I got wrong in my campaign. I had them significantly further northwest. (I like your CAS chapter, Bobby. I'll have to compare it to the one that actually made it into 6WA some time.

NASA is headquarted in Washington, but all the facilities are in Huntsville, Cape Canaveral, Houston, and Langley.

Megacorporate Shuffle might have helped out with some of your financial questions. <sigh> That was one I was really pissed didn't make it, especially with what Jason cludged together to replace it.

[Stahlseele]

I have the limited Berlin Source Book.
It is really well written and to me as somebody who does not understand much of economics and anarchy and the such it makes a surprising ammount of sense . .

[Blade]

Lots of things are Pareto-efficient that are morally reprehensible.

Yes. Pareto-efficiency is just supposed to make sure that all resources are used in a way that maximizes their output.

Pareto-efficient economic policies are simply any policies which increase GDP without taking a single dime away from rich people. If you aren't personally rich, supporting Pareto-efficiency means that you are dumb.

For a single set of resources, there are many different pareto-efficient solutions. There is always one where someone possesses everything, but there are many others.
That's why both Ares and neo-Anarchists could use Pareto-efficiency to support their viewpoint. The only difference is that they'll push a different Pareto-efficient allocation (different welfare function).

[Username17]

Lots of things are Pareto-efficient that are morally reprehensible.

Yes. Pareto-efficiency is just supposed to make sure that all resources are used in a way that maximizes their output.

No. That's maximization. That is entirely different from Pareto-efficiency. Pareto-efficiency is about increasing output as much as possible without taking anything away from anyone who already has something.

Let's consider the starting point where GDP is 100 represented in one person who has 100 and another who has zero. Now let's consider some possible reforms:

Reform	Person A	Person B	GDP
None	100	0	100
1	105	0	105
2	100	10	110
3	90	40	130
4	70	50	120

Pareto-optimality allows for Reform 1 or Reform 2, but explicitly forbids Reform 3 or Reform 4. Maximization says that all Reforms are good but ranks them with Reform 3 as the best, followed by Reforms 4, 2, and 1. Welfare Economics says that Reform 1 is meaningless and ranks the remaining options with Reform 4 as the best, followed by Reform 3 and then 2.

Anyone who says that Pareto-Efficiency ensures that resources are used to maximize output is flat-out wrong. Pareto-efficiency values increases to output, but explicitly condemns redistribution more. To an infinite degree. Pareto-efficiency will not allow for any amount of output increase if it requires even the tiniest bit of wealth redistribution.

Pareto-efficient economic policies are simply any policies which increase GDP without taking a single dime away from rich people. If you aren't personally rich, supporting Pareto-efficiency means that you are dumb.

For a single set of resources, there are many different pareto-efficient solutions. There is always one where someone possesses everything, but there are many others.
That's why both Ares and neo-Anarchists could use Pareto-efficiency to support their viewpoint. The only difference is that they'll push a different Pareto-efficient allocation (different welfare function).

Again, No. Pareto-efficiency assumes the current distribution of wealth as its start point. If rich people have all the money right now, all Pareto-efficient solutions involve those same rich people having at least as much money at the end. That is how it is different from other ways of evaluating the economy. It has as its first and immutable assumption "Assume that the megacorps are allowed to keep absolutely all their wealth and power..."

And because of that, it makes absolutely zero sense as part of any nominally anti-corporatist creed. Anyone who wants to take any wealth and power away from anyone has to abandon Pareto-efficiency. Because that is literally the one thing that Pareto-efficiency will not allow you to do. If you think that megacorps need to relinquish wealth or power or prestige, you do not support Pareto-efficiency.

-Username17

[Blade]

We've had many democracy supporting groups who took power in a completely non-democratic way in order to have a "better democracy".

Why can't we have a pareto-efficiency supporting group wanting to change resource allocations in a non-pareto efficient way in order to have a "better pareto efficiency"?

[Username17]

We've had many democracy supporting groups who took power in a completely non-democratic way in order to have a "better democracy".

Why can't we have a pareto-efficiency supporting group wanting to change resource allocations in a non-pareto efficient way in order to have a "better pareto efficiency"?

Because democracy is about power sharing. People having "unjust" power warrants taking arms against them in social contract theory. Pareto-efficiency is about preserving the wealth and power of whoever happens to have any of it. Social contract theory is not anti-revolution. Pareto-optimality is anti-redistribution.

Or to put it another way: changing resource allocations can't result in a "better Pareto efficiency". Pareto efficiency is defined as "maximizing outputs without changing any resource allocations".

You can have better maximization and you can have better welfare by redistributing wealth from haves to have-nots and then fiddling with the economic rules. Pareto-efficiency requires that everyone who is rich right now stays rich. That is what Pareto-efficiency is.

If you are in favor of Pareto-efficiency and you're poor, you are a moron. It is as simple as that.

-Username17

[Blade]

Because democracy is about power sharing. People having "unjust" power warrants taking arms against them in social contract theory.

Taking arms against unjust power isn't power sharing. Social contract theory isn't democracy.

Making a non pareto improving change isn't pareto-efficient. The second (and in some ways the first, though it's less related to the example) welfare theorem isn't Pareto-efficiency.

[Username17]

Because democracy is about power sharing. People having "unjust" power warrants taking arms against them in social contract theory.

Taking arms against unjust power isn't power sharing. Social contract theory isn't democracy.

So? Pareto-efficiency isn't electronic currency. People support democracy because of social contract theory. Or because of one of the other ideas that results in democratic ideals like idea market theory or whatever. As far as I know, there is no theory that supports democracy that rules out revolution against non-democratic governance.

But Pareto-efficiency is still explicitly anti-redistribution. You cannot, cannot get away from that. Pareto-efficiency holds that it is immoral and unthinkable to dispossess the corporations of absolutely anything without giving them compensation of equal or greater value. That is the beginning and end of the moral and economic theory. Taking things, any things, away from rich people or organizations is wrong.

Making a non pareto improving change isn't pareto-efficient. The second (and in some ways the first, though it's less related to the example) welfare theorem isn't Pareto-efficiency.

I actually don't know what you are talking about here. Welfare theory holds that Pareto-efficiency is actually fundamentally bad, and maximization theory holds that Pareto-efficiency is a worthless consideration.

Pareto-efficiency is literally and specifically only something you care about if you are 100% against ever considering taking a single dime away from a single rich person. It's completely insane and no country anywhere in the world actually abides by it.

-Username17

[Blade]

But Pareto-efficiency is still explicitly anti-redistribution. [...]
Pareto-efficiency holds that it is immoral [...]
Welfare theory holds that Pareto-efficiency is actually fundamentally bad

Ok... I guess I better leave the discussion here.

[Gnosticism Is A Hoot]

But Pareto-efficiency is still explicitly anti-redistribution. [...]
Pareto-efficiency holds that it is immoral [...]
Welfare theory holds that Pareto-efficiency is actually fundamentally bad

Ok... I guess I better leave the discussion here.

Put it this way - there's nothing inherently good about Pareto efficiency at all, and holding Pareto efficiency as your economic goal leads you nowhere, because it closes off any course of action that involves making anyone worse off. In the world we live in, any remotely just or equitable policy or fuck, any remotely workable policy would involve making some people worse off. Pareto efficiency is an interesting and useful economic concept, but it isn't any kind of guiding principle - just like perfect competition is a useful teaching tool and baseline for theoretical models, but it isn't in any way the ultimate aim of the market system.

And since the question of economic qualifications has been raised, I did my undergraduate degree in philosophy, politics and economics at (arguably) one of the top 5 universities in the world. My Micro tutor was a no-shit Austrian School Hayek-worshipper, and even he recognised the argument that Frank is making.

[fectin]

As far as I know, there is no theory that supports democracy that rules out revolution against non-democratic governance.

Hobbes does. But Hobbes also believes that any government which is not actively killing you is better than no government. He makes a coherent argument, but his premises seem flawed.

But Pareto-efficiency is still explicitly anti-redistribution. You cannot, cannot get away from that. Pareto-efficiency holds that it is immoral and unthinkable to dispossess the corporations of absolutely anything without giving them compensation of equal or greater value. That is the beginning and end of the moral and economic theory.

It's actually strongly pro-redistribution, but doesn't have a strong leveling effect. I know that's what you meant, but it's still not the same as the rich having all the money in the world, sticking it in their ears, and going "neener-neener." There is also at least a weak leveling effect if you accept that there is a decreasing marginal value to currency (which you must accept in order to advocate welfare).

Taking things, any things, away from rich people or organizations is wrong.

This is like complaining that Amnesty International opposes the torture of rich people. It's accurate, but only because Pareto held that taking things away from anyone is wrong. It's an equally strong condemnation of slavery, (which is taking labor from slaves).

I actually don't know what you are talking about here. Welfare theory holds that Pareto-efficiency is actually fundamentally bad,

I don't think this is true. It may be insufficient, and it may not reliably solve some classes of problem, but there's not a lot of room to be angry about people making mutually beneficial trades.

and maximization theory holds that Pareto-efficiency is a worthless consideration.

I must be misunderstanding you here. You're correct, but it looks like you're advocating profit maximization theory as better than Pareto, which seems out of character.

Pareto-efficiency is literally and specifically only something you care about if you are 100% against ever considering taking a single dime away from a single rich person. It's completely insane and no country anywhere in the world actually abides by it.

No country actually abides by free speech rights either, but turning this into a real-world policy discussion is going to take us into Spooner-style craziness, and I am not prepared for that.

[Neurosis]

We were less fappy than most. [/edit] I was writing an adventure where you could shoot an IE in the face and live to brag about it as the climax of the adventure.

I know, we chatted about it briefly in The Shadowrun Situation thread here a couple years back and I've read the drafts. : )

[Username17]

I don't think this is true. It may be insufficient, and it may not reliably solve some classes of problem, but there's not a lot of room to be angry about people making mutually beneficial trades.

Mutually beneficial trades that are strongly tilted in favor of the powerful at the expense of the weak are exploitative whether they are strictly better than nothing for the weak or not. If you're working for Ebeneezer Scrooge and barely making enough money for food for your family, that is strictly better than remaining unemployed and dying of starvation in poverty. But it's still exploitative, and there are few people who would look at that situation and not be angry about it.

Slaves (wage slaves and other) get to trade their labor for mean survival. Obviously they value food and shelter more than the sweat of their brow, so the trade is "mutually beneficial". But it's still fucked up. The situation is Pareto-efficient, but both Karl Marx and Adam Smith say it is undesirable.

-Username17

[Libertad]

I have the limited Berlin Source Book.
It is really well written and to me as somebody who does not understand much of economics and anarchy and the such it makes a surprising ammount of sense . .

If it's not too much trouble, I'd like to hear what the Anarchists were fighting for. I know that they're anti-megacorp at the very least, but what kind of society do they want to build when (and if) they win?

A brief explanation on Anarchism: Anarchism is the belief that a stateless society based upon non-hierarchal voluntary associations is the ideal. The state is inherently harmful to human dignity and well-being.

Anarchists can range the gamut from extreme collectivism to unfettered individualism. Individualist anarchism emphasizes the individual over any kind of external groups, ideologies, societies, or traditions. Collectivist anarchists oppose all private ownership of the means of production, instead advocating that ownership be collectivized. There are smaller, more specific forms of anarchism that branch off of these two schools of thought, such as anarcho-communism and egoist anarchism.

Are the Berlin anarchists closer to the Collectivist or Individualist side?

[Stahlseele]

Well, actually, it seems to be a mix between the two.
Live in peace with your neighbour, contribute to the survival of your society so your society will contribute to your survival. Fuck with one, fuck with all.
No real rules other than these, outsiders are generally met with distrust and guilty until proven innocent in most cases.