On Sun, 26 Feb 2012 11:00:15 -0500 "Bill St. Clair" <billstcl...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Sun, Feb 26, 2012 at 10:08 AM, Benjamin Kreuter > <brk...@virginia.edu> wrote: > > On Sun, 26 Feb 2012 08:48:05 -0500 > > d...@geer.org wrote: > > > Money and government go hand in hand. Governments need money in > > order to manage taxes, fees, fines, and so forth; yet money becomes > > valuable because of the legal structure that surrounds it, which is > > as true for gold as it is for fiat currency. Even if you could > > become completely self sufficient, to the point of not have to > > trade with anyone, you would still need to pay taxes and fees > > (property taxes, hunting license fees, etc.), and you will need to > > make those payments in a manner that is accepted by the government > > (i.e. the money issued by the government). Barter systems, de > > facto currencies and so forth only work on small scales. > > You've just made a very good argument for eliminating money, at least > government issued money. Yes, governments just love to assess taxes, > fees, and fines. No, I have no need of any of that. I do not follow your argument -- how does eliminating government issued money stop governments from collecting taxes and fees? Governments whose currencies fail sometimes switch to the currencies issued by other governments; there are quite a few nations that use US Dollars instead of issuing their own money. You may not like the idea of fines or fees, but how would you propose courts manage disputes between people? Suppose I fail to maintain my house, and a piece of it falls off and damages your house -- should you have to pay for my negligence? If I raise cattle and you write software, what should I give you -- a cow perhaps? Perhaps I should pay for a repairman to come and fix things -- but what if you do not like the person I choose? We have judges and courts to help us resolve these sorts of disputes, and money is a great way to ease these sorts of disputes. You may disagree with the taxes you pay, the fines that are issued, and so forth -- but would you really want to have a tax collector come and rate the quality of your work, and then take the products of that work as a form of tax payment? Do you want to see people imprisoned, enslaved, tortured, etc. instead of paying fines? I also disagree with the laws in this country, but the solution is not "do away with money" or "switch to Bitcoin." -- Ben -- Benjamin R Kreuter UVA Computer Science brk...@virginia.edu KK4FJZ -- "If large numbers of people are interested in freedom of speech, there will be freedom of speech, even if the law forbids it; if public opinion is sluggish, inconvenient minorities will be persecuted, even if laws exist to protect them." - George Orwell
signature.asc
Description: PGP signature
_______________________________________________ cryptography mailing list cryptography@randombit.net http://lists.randombit.net/mailman/listinfo/cryptography
