13-05-2003 05:36									#31
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quote: Sure, no problem - AS LONG AS people who choose no insurance/healthcare or private insurance/healthcare aren't also forced to fund government programs.

I think thats where you and me differ. You see taxes and government expenditure as illegitimate. I see taxes as a fee you pay (and its voluntary because you can leave if you dont want to pay it) and the government also has a choice to provide services to the people.

What they do with those taxes is then the governments choice. (just like private companies can choose where they want to spend their money) Therefore, if you pay taxes, but you choose to pass on the free insurance for example, then thats your choice, and more power to you.

	13-05-2003 05:36									#32
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quote: And living in America is your choice also.

Please don't tell me you actually think you're making a valid argument.

Look, it's very simple. Freedom is not something that should be taken away. Actually, freedom cannot be taken away. Through superior force, freedom can be infringed upon, or simply not protected. But the point of government is to prevent freedom from being infringed upon. Therefore, I fail to see why I should have to move out of my home in order to enjoy freedom without fear of coercion.

quote: Such as?

Gun ownership I'm sure is one.

	13-05-2003 05:38									#33
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quote: I think thats where you and me differ. You see taxes and government expenditure as illegitimate. I see taxes as a fee you pay (and its voluntary because you can leave if you dont want to pay it) and the government also has a choice to provide services to the people.

I fail to see the equity or justice in being forced to pay into a service I have no intention of using, just so some poor person can use it. Why should I? If I wanted to do that, I'd donate to charity - and actually, the reason I don't donate to charity now is that I ALREADY DO, involuntarily, through taxes going to social programs.

quote: Therefore, if you pay taxes, but you choose to pass on the free insurance for example, then thats your choice, and more power to you.

So, for example, I should have to lose $100 out of each paycheck to go into Social Security, which I neither want nor would even see if I did want it, due to the fact that it's gonna be gone by then? How is that fair?

	13-05-2003 05:40									#34
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Freedom is not defined as not paying for the services rendered by thte state.

	13-05-2003 05:47									#35
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quote: I fail to see the equity or justice in being forced to pay into a service I have no intention of using, just so some poor person can use it. Why should I? If I wanted to do that, I'd donate to charity - and actually, the reason I don't donate to charity now is that I ALREADY DO, involuntarily, through taxes going to social programs.

Who says its fair? Is it fair that some people are smarter then others just because they were born that way? Is it fair that some people are born cripple while others arnt? The answer of course is no.

quote: So, for example, I should have to lose $100 out of each paycheck to go into Social Security, which I neither want nor would even see if I did want it, due to the fact that it's gonna be gone by then? How is that fair?

When you pay for a meal, you dont get to decide where and how that money is used. I guess thats also not fair, but thats the choice of the private organization.

	13-05-2003 06:02									#36
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The government is also a monopoly. Its got a monopoly on the law, and on power. Image if corporations were allowed to become monopolies

The government is elected. Whatever some may say about voting with one's wallet, corporations are not.

	13-05-2003 06:03									#37
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quote: Freedom is not defined as not paying for the services rendered by thte state.

Obviously. Who's making that claim?

quote: Who says its fair? Is it fair that some people are smarter then others just because they were born that way? Is it fair that some people are born cripple while others arnt? The answer of course is no.

Actually, the answer is that those things are natural. Taxes, though, cannot be considered natural, and thus are totally different.

quote: When you pay for a meal, you dont get to decide where and how that money is used.

Obviously, but I do get to decide whether or not to fund the restaurant. I can't opt out of social programs, and when I suggested that, you disagreed.

And no, for the last time, a restaurant is not the same as a government or a country.

	13-05-2003 06:17									#38
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quote: Obviously. Who's making that claim?

Obviously I thought it was you when in response to one of my posts about taxes, you said that the governments job is the protect freedom.

quote: Actually, the answer is that those things are natural. Taxes, though, cannot be considered natural, and thus are totally different.

Paying for a service is natural ( I think we can agree on this) and thus that makes taxes (the payment of a service) natural.

quote: Obviously, but I do get to decide whether or not to fund the restaurant. I can't opt out of social programs, and when I suggested that, you disagreed. Obviously, but I do get to decide whether or not to fund the restaurant. I can't opt out of social programs, and when I suggested that, you disagreed.

Thats right, you can decide whether you want to fund the restaurant or not . . same as the government. If you dont want to fund the government, go to a country where they do not require you to fund it.

quote: And no, for the last time, a restaurant is not the same as a government or a country.

And why isnt it?

	13-05-2003 10:38									#39
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quote: Oh, and yes, part of my tuition is paid by scholarships. I don't lose sleep over that because I'm taxed out the ying-yang in my 40 hour per week full time job as it is, and will continue to be for the forseeable future, except that it'll get worse.

Love the irony! PAY BACK YOUR SCHOLARSHIPS YOU GOVERNMENT MOOCH! Just because they take your money in taxes, you will just willinging take the money government is giving you and then ***** that they are giving you money?

Don't think so. Be a REAL libertarian and reject governmental aid, if you really think it is wrong. Don't say one thing out of one side of your mouth and another out of the other side.

LoA is right. Taxes are a user fee for living in the US. If you don't like the user fee, then don't use the services, ie, get out (but first don't accept scholarship money that you are morally opposed to! ).

	13-05-2003 11:01									#40
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quote: Obviously I thought it was you when in response to one of my posts about taxes, you said that the governments job is the protect freedom.

Quite so. The government should not be in the business of medicine or insurance or anything of the sort.

quote: Paying for a service is natural ( I think we can agree on this) and thus that makes taxes (the payment of a service) natural.

Fine, fine, but I don't want the service! Why should I pay for something I don't want and don't use?

quote: Thats right, you can decide whether you want to fund the restaurant or not . . same as the government. If you dont want to fund the government, go to a country where they do not require you to fund it.

"Fund the government", hmmm, interesting phrase. If the government was functioning as it should, rather than as mommy and daddy and the mafia all combined, then it wouldn't need funding.

quote: And why isnt it?

Why isn't your restaurant analogy any good?

OK...

1)A restaurant is a place you voluntarily enter and exit at will. While at the restaurant, you can order as much or as little as you would like - you only pay for what you consume/use. If the food isn't good, you can send it back and get more, and if the employees are *******s to you then you speak with the manager and get your meal comped.

A government is a structure under which one is born, with no say in the matter. One may NOT enter or exit at will, at least not all that easily. In terms of social services, one does not get to pick how much or how little, if any, they want, and as such one does not get to decide how much to pay. If the services you DO receive aren't up to your satisfaction, you're pretty much out of luck, and if the IRS act like a bunch of dicks, then they get judicial protection without a lot you can do about it.

2)The purpose of a restaurant is to provide a good and service - that is, food, drinks, and someone to prepare and bring these things to you. This is the sole purpose of a restaurant. The restaurant doesn't ask you how much money you make, it doesn't tell you what pictures you can and can't look at, what you can and can't drink/eat/consume, and who you can and can't have sex with.

Your vision of a proper government is one of a government with many functions, most of them intrusive into your private life. The government, you say, has a right to know who lives in your house, how much money you make, what hole you stick it in, what you put into your own body, what political views you hold, and a plethora of other things. Not only this, but the government is supposed to provide all kinds of services to everyone, and demand payment for these services, whether they are or are not wanted or used.

3)Of course, in my vision, a government also only has one general purpose, and that is to protect individual liberty by preventing coercion. In either of our views, though, it becomes quite clear that the purpose of a restaurant and the purpose of a government are entirely different.

4)A restaurant does not have any power to come after you if you start giving business to another restaurant. If you eat the filet mignon at Restaurant A, and then tell Restaurant B how to make their filet mignon better, Restaurant A can't do **** about it.

A government, on the other hand, apparently has a vested interest in making sure you don't help other governments out with certain things. You can't go tell certain governments how to make a better power plant or a bigger explosion, for example.

Oh, but you might argue, why should we be able to help dictators build nukes? They will just use our individual knowledge to harm lots of people. And indeed they might, but if you admit that a power of government is to prevent this from happening, then you must either a)acknowledge that restaurants have the power to prevent you from helping other restaurants make better food, or b)admit that restaurants and governments are not the same, and that your analogy is silly in the extreme.

Imran,

quote: Love the irony! PAY BACK YOUR SCHOLARSHIPS YOU GOVERNMENT MOOCH! Just because they take your money in taxes, you will just willinging take the money government is giving you and then ***** that they are giving you money? blah blah blah

I quite assure you, if I wasn't forced to pay taxes to, for example, feed starving people in New York or educate kids in Alabama, and all of this was left up to me, to donate to private charity, then I guarantee you that I would not accept government funds. I'd simply dump all that tax money into my own education - and I guarantee you that the amount of taxes I pay each year would MORE than fund my education.

You don't believe me? I don't really care. You are making the argument that, basically, private charity wouldn't work because people don't donate enough to it. Of course they don't! They are already taxed - why should they give double donations?

	13-05-2003 11:14									#41
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quote: I quite assure you, if I wasn't forced to pay taxes to, for example, feed starving people in New York or educate kids in Alabama, and all of this was left up to me, to donate to private charity, then I guarantee you that I would not accept government funds.

Such a freaking cop out. You'd do something you were morally opposed to because of something else you were morally opposed to? Two wrongs make a right to you?

quote: You are making the argument that, basically, private charity wouldn't work because people don't donate enough to it. Of course they don't! They are already taxed - why should they give double donations?

I wasn't then, but I will now. Libertarianism (and some Conservatism) asserts that people are self-interested. So if taxes were gone, why would more people give to charity? Why wouldn't they just buy bigger and better things or invest it? If you are self-interested, you would.

	13-05-2003 11:20									#42
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Oh, and btw, you go to a state university, where the tuition is kept low by state taxes. Without that, you'd have to go to private school, where tuition is closer to $20,000 (and above). You are student, you work part time (and full in the summers) I assume. There is NO WAY the government is taking that much money from you.

You go to state school, you take scholarships, I mean what other principles of yours are you going to compromise?

	13-05-2003 11:23									#43
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quote: Such a freaking cop out. You'd do something you were morally opposed to because of something else you were morally opposed to? Two wrongs make a right to you?

You're gonna have to explain how it is morally wrong for me to try to get back my own property.

quote: Libertarianism (and some Conservatism) asserts that people are self-interested. So if taxes were gone, why would more people give to charity? Why wouldn't they just buy bigger and better things or invest it?

I don't really make this assertion at all - I can't prove it any more than you can prove the other way. What I'm saying is that I don't really care if ANYONE donates. If no one wants to donate, why should anyone have to?

quote: Oh, and btw, you go to a state university, where the tuition is kept low by state taxes. Without that, you'd have to go to private school, where tuition is closer to $20,000 (and above).

Why do you assume that in a free market, with education totally in the private sector, that it would cost around $20,000? I just don't see why this would be the case - natural competition would drive down costs.

But in any case, you are probably right that tuition would be higher. The solution is simply to keep working full time, try to get voluntary help from others (such as family), and arrange for student loans.

	13-05-2003 12:19									#44
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quote: Originally posted by David Floyd Yeah, and then we come and save you when the Germans come a-knockin'

What after waiting 2 years, bleeding us dry and actually waiting for the Germans to declare war on you. Then taking all of our technology without giving any back and then portraying the history as a one man US show

	13-05-2003 13:50									#45
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Getting away from the ridiculous "don't pay tax" argument...

The problem with this policy is it doesn't address the problem, which is that our once great research institutions are losing manpower and research to higher paying, better equipped universities abroad and that we also have technical skills shortages. I might not be totally behind the current government's policy but at least it is attempting to tackle those two problems, and they are beginning to address the problem of students from poorer backgrounds not wanting to get into debt at uni.

Once again I'm left feeling that this is another "we should say what they want to hear" Conservative policy with no actual substance behind it. In effect the policy is to end student debt by not letting people become students in the first place... then they can't get into debt!

	13-05-2003 15:25									#46
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I agree completely with MikeH. Universities need more money, else they just won't offer a decent degree. While I'd like the government to pay, and I think they should, I am perfectly happy to pay, and would ratehr that then the universities didn't have enough money. What I wanted to see, was the government making us pay the extra £2000 per year (on top of the £1000 we already pay) and the government matching that, so that universities get an extra £4000 per years per student. That would go some way towards providing a decent university education, when actually just using the extra won't give enough, and many universities will still be in difficulties. I wouldn't mind paying extra, if I knew the government were doing the same.

I think the Tories are just sayignt his to be popular. I doubt they ever will do. And if they do, I think they won't add extra government funding, and thus we would have an even more drastically underfunded university system. After reading an Oxbridge magazine article about it, it reallyb hgihlighted the difference between the US and UK funding differences. Harvard getting over $25,000 per student per year average (IIRC) and with an endorment worth over $20 Billion, and Oxford getting under £8,000 (~$13,000) per student per year average, with an endowment worth £1 Billion (~$1.6 Billion).

How are we meant to compete with that much less funding? Raise fees, means tested if we must, but raise government funding too.

	13-05-2003 15:30									#47
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Why is the answer throw money at it. I work in the oublic sector, it is a shambolic mess with people running round trying to meet targets that are meaningless, managers deviding new inclusiveness policies and workers moaning about their pay not relaising they get a great deal because of the job security and pensions.

You could make 30% of the public sector redundant overnight and the job could still get done if it was run properly. I have yet to see anything that makes me think Universities are an exception to this. So you could infact have your increased funding if the money was spent correctly in the 1st place.

	13-05-2003 16:23									#48
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Regarding efficiency and management I think that most universities have got pretty good at this recently because their budgets have already been squeezed so tightly. Over the last years they've had to become more efficient to deal with more and more students on budgets that don't increase as fast. I think that further efficiency savings are probably going to be false economies. You could trim staff/building budgets further but you'd end up with run down facilities and even more top staff moving abroad for the higher paying jobs.

Another problem is the link between research and teaching. What we really want is good researchers and good teachers but you very rarely get both in the same person. Not sure what the solution to that is. We want students to learn cutting edge concepts in the subjects although the people we want to teach them are often ill equipped to deliver that quality of teaching.

	13-05-2003 16:24									#49
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More campaign promises Don't believe anything politicians say. Especially when they aren't in power.

	13-05-2003 16:49									#50
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I went to a UK university back in 1979 and dropped out two years later. At that point student protests over government plans to increase means testing of grants were just starting. Over the following decade government funding for higher education was severely restricted whilst the same government pressured universities to increase student numbers. So government policy forced universities to cope on a lower income per student.

Now the current opposition party advocates increasing grants and limiting student numbers, even if that means scrapping some courses.

The connection? Both are policies of the Conservative party.

Even if I thought they were on the right track (and I don't) I would not vote for the same party who started the mess in the first place.

	13-05-2003 16:58									#51
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The Tories are just starting to show signs of a revival. They won't win this time but after the next elction who knows. If they keep saying that they believe in public services enough people will start to think they do. Then they might srat to think that there are alternatives to throwing money at them.

In a way this is how Labour returned, they kept saying they wouldn't ruin the economy and wouldn't let the hard left dominate policy, eventually people thought they might be telling the truth and voted them in.(of course it helped that Tony Blair is a charasmatic leader and the Tories were a joke)

	13-05-2003 17:01									#52
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At least the Tories are finally starting to be in opposition. Labour did very well, when they were in opposition in the early 90s, of bringing vaguely credible alternative policies to the fore as a means of attacking the government.They did not implement most of them, but it showed up weaknesses in the then Tory govt policies.

It was an early Thatcherite tactic in the education funding debate to criticise some university degrees as "irrelevant" and to try and force a vocational direction on all studies. I cannot believe that Charles Clarke is now adopting the same tactic with his attack on teaching of medieval history.

	13-05-2003 17:03									#53
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In the end Labour did a much better job running the economy than the Conservatives had been doing and they haven't even let the center left dominate policy.

I still don't trust the Conservatives. They keep coming up with policies that just don't sound convincing to me and they keep doing it in a way that makes it look like shameless attempts to grab votes rather than well thought out policy. I've heard this old line about funding something by cutting other services time and time again. All it does is damage one service to make mild improvements to another.

I agree with what you are saying about Blair though, I don't really agree with everything he does but I think he's a strong leader.

	13-05-2003 17:12									#54
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The next general election is probably going to be about europe and joining the euro, not education.

The Tories are still in a mess and papering over the cracks about europe. Labour are about to fudge the issue of joining the euro and not make a decision. That leaves the Lib Dems as the only really pro europe party.

Education may sway some votes, as will healthcare but the economy and particularly whether we go more into europe or not will be the key issue.

	13-05-2003 17:17									#55
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It will take something radical to really reform the public services(probably from the left) Most Labour people seem to be more concerned though with preserving the traditions of their party than doing anything new though. On Health they seem to think that as they introduced the NHS in 1948 they have to keep it as it was then or they are bertraying it.

tinkering with resources here and there won't help in the long term.

	13-05-2003 18:33									#56
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quote: Originally posted by Provost Harrison Free education for all! Anyway, some good my prestigious education did me, degree and experience later and I am still flat on my face...

Likewise. It cost me $20,000 CAN to acquire skills I haven't been able to profit from. I'm right back to where I was before I went to school. And I can't even declare bankruptcy and have that debt nullified. The Canadian government in it's wisdom won't allow that until 10 years after I've finished school, so I can still look forward to 7 years of that hanging over my head.

At least I have some personal use for my knowledge. Rather a costly hobby though.

	13-05-2003 18:41									#57
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quote: Originally posted by David Floyd Yeah, and then we come and save you when the Germans come a-knockin'

When are you guys going to stop harping on about that? Does it look to you like Germany has any intention whatsoever of invading anyone these days? That's ancient history, take a look at the world the way it is now for a change. That whole argument is starting to sound like some old fogey carrying on and on about his "glory days".

PS And it wasn't even that much of a glory. If your country would have joined in right from the start, Hitler would have been defeated long before he did, and countless lives might have been saved. Instead you twiddled your thumbs until you were given no choice in the matter.

	13-05-2003 18:55									#58
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quote: Originally posted by CerberusIV Even if I thought they were on the right track (and I don't) I would not vote for the same party who started the mess in the first place.

But that's a common Tory policy don't you know. The same thing happened here in Ontario, Canada, especially with health care. They slashed budgets all around so their corporate buddies could get their tax breaks, and now we're getting inundated with media messages about all the things they're doing to solve the problems they created in the first place.

As if we're supposed to be grateful or something.

	13-05-2003 19:02									#59
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quote: Originally posted by Willem When are you guys going to stop harping on about that? Does it look to you like Germany has any intention whatsoever of invading anyone these days?

Thats what they said in the 1930's, we must remain vigilant of the Hun and his nefarious empire building!

	13-05-2003 19:05									#60
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quote: Originally posted by reds4ever Thats what they said in the 1930's, we must remain vigilant of the Hun and his nefarious empire building!

OK, whatever Gramps.

PS Good thing China is the up and coming superpower. At least they have their focus set on the future, and not dwelling on some so called glorious past.